The Three Loves and the Meaning of Life

Onhell

Onhell

Infinite Dreamer
So I'm over my crappy weekend... I'm still amazed by how easy it is to deal with negative emotions now-a-days. Two years ago I would be in a bad mood for weeks before letting it go. Now it only took 24 hours... sweet.

At any rate I got my oil changed last friday and said hello to some of the few salesmen that are still there from when I worked the key office. What was nice is that they all remembered me as the guy who was always reading something and one still remembered I was a Religious Studies major and we had a nice chat about that. I say it's nice, because at least I'm not remembered as the Burrito Bandit LOL (long story). Then today I tutored a guy in Spanish who works at COPE, one of a few behavioral health/substance abuse/etc facilities here in tucson and we shared stories pertaining to working in social services. On top of that I finally met the vocational director for the Jesuits last week Tuesday in Phoenix and on my drive up there a lot of things fell into place. Here is the core of what I discussed with said folks:

The Three Loves

The first Love is the love of self. Now, we've all heard this before, love and respect yourself so you don't have to take crap from anybody. But how does this "love" come about? One doesn't just wake up one morning hugging oneself thinking "God I love me!" To love and respect oneself one must first FORGIVE and ACCEPT oneself. Part of the reason women in abusive relationships stay in them is because they believe the bullshit being told to them. We have to understand that who we were is not who we are or who we are going to be. We all have a past we have to come to terms with and as soon as we accept our mistakes and forgive ourselves for them no one can hold it over our heads. Once one is comfortable with the reflection in the mirror the second love is easy to see.

The second love is the love of others. Once we forgive and accept ourselves for who we are we can forgive and accept others for who they are. Usually we dislike someone because we see in them our own faults and we don't want to be reminded of them, but if we are at peace with ourselves we will be able to look past other's own faults. Also we will see people for people and not labels like "dork," "slut," "junkie..." etc. As soon as we build friendships on respect the third Love is a natural step.

The third Love is the love of another, for you see, if you love yourself you are happy and like all good things you want to share it (the love of others), and then you will find a specific person you want to share much more with and this is the love of another. Once you have built relationships based on respect you can build relationships from the same foundation, because you will love that person for who they are and not for who you want them to be.

All this starts witht the little things of course. The first thing we must realize is that we are not perfect, we all got issues. What makes us "healthy" is not being issue free, but how we handle and deal with the ones we got. Take sports for example. What makes the great players great? It's not perfection; on top of the drive to succeed it is consistency. They do the little things right more often than others, because they are more focused than others. To use yet one more sports cliche: They take care of their own end...

What does this have to do with life, love and happiness? Well... everything. We don't have to be perfect to be happy, just consistent. We shouldn't worry about what we cannot control, we just need to focus on taking care of our own end first, which takes us back to the first love.

Now all this love and respect is all fine and dandy, but worthless unless we have a purpose. Why do elite athletes do the little things and are consistent? Well, baseball players want to win the world series, football players the Super Bowl, hockey the Stanley Cup, etc. There is a goal, a purpose, it's not doing things just for the sake of doing them, there is a reward at the end. We often sit and wonder what is the meaning of life and more often than not we are left without an answer and that is because of two things. First of, the meaning of life is it doesn't have one. Second, we are asking the wrong question. We shouldn't be asking, "What is the meaning of life?" But rather, "What is the meaning of MY life."

Viktor Frankle said that Freud and Adler were wrong when they said what drives us is pleasure and power respectively, because both those things are superfluous without meaning. That's why there is no answer to, "what is the meaning of life?" And only we can answer, "what is the meaning of MY life?" No one is going to answer that for us.

I have rambled long enough and it is time I tie it all up. The road to happiness begins with forgiveness and acceptance of oneself and taking care of all the little things in one's life and doing those little things consistently. While this opens us up for the other two "loves" it also makes it easier to reflect on what we truly want out of life. What gives you a reason to get out of bed in the morning? Your job? Family? Religion? Or the simple fact that you are facing a new day with a host of new possibilities and experiances? Regardless of the reason the more important thing is to have one...
 
Onhell said:
Also we will see people for people and not labels like "dork," "slut," "junkie..." etc.
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Make all the excuses you want - you're still a sociopath. :P

Onhell said:
What gives you a reason to get out of bed in the morning?
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Music.

Or more specifically, playing music. Not a CD or MP3 - I mean real instruments. Rocking on my bass. Whaling on my drums. Performing with my band.
(Though listening to music ain't bad either.)

And the fact that I hate sleeping. I'd rather be doing something. Anything. Even watching TV, which is *this close* to doing nothing. The phrase "I'll sleep when I'm dead" is something I live by. I think it's genetic, my whole family is like that.
 
Forostar said:
Do explain Mr Cannon. :)
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I think what LC is saying is that what thing can you do that does not involve the three mentioned by Onhell?
 
That depends on how we would like to define the word love. And how we connect everyting to "love ourselves."

To go to a lonely place without people and enjoy the surroundings?
To collect stamps?

To be interested in things that may have nothing to do with loving yourself... Is that possible?

Or do we constantly love ourselves when we eat an apple or read a book about black panthers?
 
OK, but to love another does not necessarily constitute loving another person. Does it? I mean, to love another could be simply to love my dogs. ;)
 
Forostar said:
That depends on how we would like to define the world love. And how we connect everyting to "love ourselves."
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I did define it, "Love" is forgiving and accepting whether ourselves or others, but obviously one has to start with him/herself.

And Both you and LC are right IMO. Loving doing things comes from knowing the meaning and purpose in your life so you are doing what you love, thus the "fourth love" is the one of doing things, but it is a natural extension of the other three.
 
I love it when a plan comes together.

I love the smell of napalm in the morning.

I love rock and roll, so put another dime in the jukebox baby.



Sorry. I'll be going now... :innocent:
 
Albie said:
OK, but to love another does not necessarily constitute loving another person.
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That's exactly my idea.

And we can also love things which do not contain emotions or even life. And we can love to do things.


source: wiki ->
Impersonal love

A person can be said to love a country, principle, or goal if they value it greatly and are deeply committed to it. Similarly, compassionate outreach and volunteer workers' "love" of their cause may sometimes be borne not of interpersonal love, but impersonal love coupled with altruism and strong political convictions. People can also "love" material objects, animals, or activities if they invest themselves in bonding or otherwise identifying with those things.
 
What?

Foro, you can't be serious.

Citing a source in a discussion about love? Are you trying to get wrapped up in semantics here?

You either know what love is, or you don't. This is not about proving your case.

You either love, or you don't. Talking about love is like dancing about architecture.
 
I see your point Foro. But the way I see it is that if you love doing something, you must first be content in yourself to be able to express such an emotion.
 
Albie said:
I see your point Foro. But the way I see it is that if you love doing something, you must first be content in yourself to be able to express such an emotion.
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If you don't love yourself (self respect, self esteem, whatever the case), you don't have the ability to love someone (or something) else. 

ONe of my fav quotes was a definition of love for someone: " when someone else's happiness is the key to your own"
 
Wasted155 said:
If you don't love yourself (self respect, self esteem, whatever the case), you don't have the ability to love someone (or something) else.
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That sounds a bit too reproachful in my ears. I don't even think it's true in all cases.
 
Ok, in my opinion, if one can't love ones self, one can't receive or give love. Granted, I don't know everyone alive, but in the people that I do know, if they didn't 'love' themselves, they weren't able to be in a healthy relationship-- they didn't have the ability to give and receive love.  I'm sure there are exceptions, but how can one have the ability to love outside of themselves if they can't love inside themselves.
 
Wasted155 said:
Ok, in my opinion, if one can't love ones self, one can't receive or give love. Granted, I don't know everyone alive, but in the people that I do know, if they didn't 'love' themselves, they weren't able to be in a healthy relationship-- they didn't have the ability to give and receive love.  I'm sure there are exceptions, but how can one have the ability to love outside of themselves if they can't love inside themselves.
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It's good that you write the word like this: 'love'
A lot things can be called love.

Have you never seen someone with a lack of selfconfidence loving other people more than him/herself?

I might be wrong but are you referring to religious views such as Love your neighbor as yourself, but then making an own translating like this: If you don't love yourself, you can't love your neighbour?

Those are too different things imo.
 
I have not seen one with low/no self esteem loving another.  What I see is one that has no self esteem wanting to be loved, urging the other to love them, but not being able to love in return.  It is a difficult and grey area. 

I'm not using any religion to back my thoughts.  MOre my experience with my ex-wife, and other friends that I have known.  It's almost like 'self love' is a stopper in a drain, with out it, love just keeps going down the drain, and can't complete one.  ONce self love is in place, it can be held and returned.  Again, just my opinion.
 
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