Dear Nexians,

I've recently been hearing the word "love" being thrown around a lot, I'm curious how different people would define it.

One thing that I have heard that I can't help but feel bothered by is the idea that it's good to love everyone, and love oneself, unconditionally. Naturally, this would mean that everyone is equally good, and deserving of this love? What about "unvirtuous", people that don't strive to be good, or better? Or, if I love myself unconditionally, what drive do I then have to "fix" faults in my character or bad habits etc.? Should I love murderers? Accept them?

To give an example, this is the view I disagree with:


I think most people do have the equal potential to be the best person they can be, but few have the "virtue" to actually do it, or be driven to try. If I do happen to find one such rare person, it would be an honor to love them, to be loved by them, and have them as part of my life. I then want to devote as much my time/energy/life to that person, because I feel they "deserve" it, but also because I hope to build something more.

What about you?

Looking forward to your replies as always

Here are two threads that work to answer your question:

https://www.dmt-nexus.me...aspx?g=posts&t=65968

https://www.dmt-nexus.me...aspx?g=posts&t=55649

And of course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEXWRTEbj1I

As for your question, there are different kinds of love in my opinion. Paternal, maternal, friendship, platonic, and romantic love, as well as many others. The love I have for all my fellow people is different from the love I share with my partner, but it all has this same kernel of emotional appreciation and respect.

I would suggest that all these forms of love are subsets of one type of love..what is that?

Also, do you believe everyone to be unconditionally worthy of respect and appreciation?

Yes.

tseuq

There are different things defined as Love, but the big L is simply an acceptance and openness with whatever thing/place/concept/person/entity. The more you Love something the more you accept it and are open to it - to the point of it becoming part of the definition of 'you'.

This was one of my first lessons in hyperspace. To open and accept, to Love - all that you find, whatever its motives or however it looks.

As humans Love tends to come with baggage, desire - ownership - hormones - need. But the underlying Love just is, you don't create it with chemicals or effort. It is what is there when you let go of all that stuff.

For me, love is connection. If I can deeply connect/synchronize/harmonize with someone (or a group of people, or all humanity/planet/existence), then I call that love.

I think that it's good to aim to find that connection to people. Does that mean that I need to accept every negative action and damage caused by others ? Not IMO... Sometimes to love might mean these people need a 'slap', like the DMT love giving us a hyperspacial slap

This seems to be the crux often missed, differentiating between "to be" and "to behave like". The detachment of a certain behaviour and the identification with a state of being. F.e. we all can behave like reckless egosits but we are not.

tseuq

Everyone in my opinion is worthy of these things, but maybe to a different extent. While I do love everyone, some people must be detained and/or simply avoided. We may appreciate the life and consciousness of a mass murderer, but this person must arguably be kept separate from society in order to not harm anyone else. Love and letting people do whatever they wish are different things!

Like endlessness wrote, sometimes people need a "slap" for their best interests and to be pushed in the right direction, which may end up being a healthier path for them.

Glad I saw this or was about to create and add another in my history of strange threads.

Struggling with this one big time right now. I was doing great, on my merry way into yet another foray to another part of the country, setting up, getting my sh** together and feeling steady and more confident than I have felt in a long time. Then earth day goes and throws a spanner in the cogs and I'm all F'd up now and I don't know what to do and don't feel there is much choice regardless but it doesn't feel right at the same time.. It's been a little while, and just like the time before, I am feeling completely slain.

I can articulate, divulge and magnify and expand and record the many fingerprints and shapes and sizes and vocabularies of love at length, in my own way but thoroughly and convincingly just the same. And then there are all of you and others with these amazing revelations and your own explorations into the question and the heart and the idea of things. But its all too easy to reflect, with seeming crystal clarity, on something while it doesn't have me by the scruff of my neck. And when it does, I am scared shitless and just as lost as anybody.

It is clearly an illness, otherwise it would not F me up so consistently and so completely. I am of the opinion that love cannot be trusted, that it is pathological.. it needs to be overcome, somehow. Don't give in, however incapacitating the ache and however wrong it feels in your body entire to ignore it.

I am not talking about the philosophical concept of it, which is reducible to the sentiment common with the word 'connection', coupled with that of 'positive energy'. I am talking about the inescapable, meat grinding mind shredding blood sinew bone, the nuts and bolts of the human genome. The duality.

How does one conquer the duality? It makes me ill.

I'd be very interesting in knowing more about the nature of your struggle... I've have been caught amidst an ever more complex love triangle of the worst kind for the better part of 8 months... I know what incredible pain love can lead to..

What's this duality you refer to?

Maybe its the other way around? Perhaps if you don't truly love yourself, you won't have a genuine drive to improve yourself.



Do you love your family? Are they all driven to be the best people they can be? Do you have children? Would you not love them even if they were not "deserving" of it? Would your love for them vary depending on their current drive towards self improvement?

Another question, do you believe you have the ability to determine if someone is or is trying to be the best person they can be? How do you make this determination?


To me it seems to me that true love becomes apparent at times when it is specifically not "deserved".

1. Loving one's family vs. falling in love with someone.. I would be less tempted to fall in love with someone who makes a habit of lying and hurting people, though I would be more tempted to fall in love with someone who does these things but also has a clear (and honest) drive to change.

2. Yes, I can certainly have a valid opinion.

3. Caring for someone does, but I would suggest that the need to stay in love with someone that doesn't deserve it is actually a really negative side of being in love. Loving someone who is abusive for example.

Love is like a hangnail. Nip it in the bud before it snags on something and leaves a little hole in the topside of your finger.

I am just fine, but thanks for your consideration, PH0. Will skip the details and save myself the embarrassment.

I love my life. That is the only love there is that is real. All other "kinds" as I thought of them before, are but byproducts.

I think it's important to differentiate between romantic love, platonic love, and compassion.



Love is the answer, but again, I feel there must be some confusion when things like this are said...

Romantic love has its functions, and isn't in itself negative, but it's not what I'm talking about when I say I promote love at all costs.


I think it's great to contemplate love, but we must also be mindful to define what it is that is meant by the word "love"

---

This was an example of how by using simple love, the 60s counter-culture had the establishment baffled, they did not know how to react, and it wasn't until the counterculture degraded to the level of the establishment that the establishment was finally able to defeat it...

Nothing can be changed except ourselves...

... and by living by example, and by practicing love and compassion in every aspect of our daily lives, we know that we are at least doing all that we can. You can not force anybody to understand you or except your values, and often there's no point in even trying, you don't have the right to tell another what values to hold, but, by living by example we can put as much love and positivity in the world as possible, without violating the rights of others around you.

-eg