Facts about Love

Agap? love is charitable, selfless, altruistic, and unconditional.

Agap? love is charitable, selfless, altruistic, and unconditional.

Where self-love is construed as self-centeredness, placing concern for self first, as in narcissism, it can be viewed entirely in the negative.

Depending on context, love can have a wide variety of intended meanings, including sexual attraction.

To love even when it is difficult: This requires the capability of the mind to assert itself over the demands of the body.

The Bible teaches, "If God so loved us, we also ought to love one another" (1 John 4:12).

Love is also needed in the larger spheres of life beyond family and friends.

Not only in the human world, but the beauty of nature can be regarded as an expression of God's love.

Conjugal love, including its sexual expression, is perhaps the most formidable of loves.

Family love takes different forms, including conjugal love between spouses, parental love for children, children's love for their parents, and sibling relationships.

Others divide the experience of love into three partly-overlapping stages: Lust, attraction, and attachment.

The ancient Greeks described love with a number of different words: Eros was impassioned, romantic attraction; philia was friendship; xenia was kindness to the guest or stranger.

Tensions may develop, unless the parents are mature enough to give unconditional love to their children.

Rather, Parvati's primary function is as the wife of Shiva, and she is seen as the civilizing, domesticating force who complements his unfettered asceticism.

Biological models of sexual love support the above psychological theories.

People who are inspired by the love of God feel joy to sacrifice themselves for the sake of their beloved; which in the absence of God's love they would not do.

Religions lift up those qualities that make for "true love"—love that helps those experiencing it live fuller lives.

Intimacy is usually shown in friendships and romantic love affairs.

Eric Clapton's band, Derek and the Dominos devoted a whole album to the topic, Layla & Other Assorted Love Songs.

Other thinkers, notably the Russian philosopher Vladimir Solovyov, have recognized that the essential quality of love is that it focuses on the other, not on the self.

Confucianism also calls for love for all beings, but sees such social love as an extension of the elements of love learned in the family.

Some notion of transcendental love is a salient feature of all the world's faiths.

Buddhism clearly teaches the rejection of K?ma, sensuous, sexual love.

God in Sufism is referred to in three main terms which are the Lover, Loved, and Beloved, with the last of these terms being often seen in Sufi poetry.

Their love lacks the integrity to weather the storms that are inevitable in any relationship.

Islam has couples consecrating their lovemaking by offering a prayer.

Compared to the tradition of unrequited love, there is little here that speaks to love as a life-long bond, persevering and enduring despite disappointments and hardships.

Ironically, the very eponym of this love, Plato, as well as Socrates and others, belonged to the community of men who engaged in erotic pedagogic friendships with boys.

The sex instinct is the biological counterpart to the spiritual heart impulse to love.

The key elements of love are "care, responsibility, respect," and "knowledge."

Self-love, depending on how it is construed, can be either the bane of genuine love or a necessary foundation for loving in all contexts.

Self-love creates a positive attitude towards life that helps people deal with the everyday problems, rather than dwelling on negatives.

Genuine love involves concern for the other and the desire to satisfy their needs rather than one's own.

I), as can be seen from the Hebrew word for love ahava, as the root of the word is hav, to give.

Love is one of the most featured themes in all of culture, more than knowledge, money, power, or even life itself.

Psychologists and religious teachings, however, define love more precisely, as living for the sake of another, motivated by heart-felt feelings of caring, affection, and responsibility for the other's well-being.

A more threatening unrequited lover, Roderigo, is shown in Othello.

John the Apostle wrote, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16 KJV).

The Bhagavad Gita states, "To love is to know Me/My innermost nature/The truth that I am" (18.55).

Among the most important tasks in developing the ability to love others is to curb self-centeredness.

Love as an act of giving, living for the other, requires a set of competencies that one learns through a lifetime.

Unrequited love has been a topic used repeatedly by musicians for decades.

Their judgments about love is mainly self-centered—how their partner makes them feel loved—rather than judging themselves over how they might give more to their partner.

A simple expedient to separate such self-centered infatuation from genuine love is for the couple to abstain from sexual relations.

Platonic love in its modern popular sense is an affectionate relationship into which the sexual element does not enter, especially in cases where one might easily assume otherwise.

From The Eagles all the way to Led Zeppelin, almost every classic rock band has at least one song on the topic of love.

Peck even argues that romantic love is a destructive myth, leading to unhealthy dependency.

A common viewpoint of Sufism is that through love, humankind can get back to its inherent purity and grace.

Perhaps the best context in which to develop such love is the family, where the love that is given and received is of various kinds.

Islam also lifts up the ideal that one should love even one's enemies.

The shape of the triangle functions to represent the kind of love, which typically varies over the course of the relationship: passion-stage (right-shifted triangle), intimacy-stage (apex-triangle), commitment-stage (left-shifted triangle), typically.

Love of the things of the wider world begins with one's home environment and the things one uses: The house and yard, the car, and the spaces in which people live.

Love is to be found in a variety of contexts.

Let his thoughts of boundless love pervade the whole world: above, below, and across without any obstruction, without any hatred, without any enmity.

Sexual desire can lead to deceit and exploitation, to taking advantage of a friend who deserves better with blandishments of "I love you" for the sake of nothing more than the body's gratification.

The environment responds to this love; there are numerous anecdotes, for example, about how an owner who loves his automobile can coax even a broken vehicle to run.

Like mentoring relationships in school, sibling love often respects the asymmetry in age between the children, establishing complementary roles between elder and younger siblings.

Agape love, which the Greeks defined as unconditional giving, became the keystone of Christianity, where it is exemplified in Christ's sacrificial love on the cross.

Each role provides opportunities to develop a particular type of love, and carries with it specific norms and duties.

The Christian saints beginning with Paul endured many tribulations in their efforts to love God and do his will by preaching Christ to the unbelieving people.

The Christian Bible states, "God is love" (1 John 4:8).

The ability to love and care for nature is an essentially human quality.

Love is universally desired, but love can be fraught with infidelity, deceit, possessiveness, unrealistic expectations, jealousy, and hate.

The covenant relationship to God requires humans to respond to God's love by loving God in return.

Popularly, Love is any of a number of emotions and experiences related to a sense of strong affection or profound oneness.

The Biblical book Song of Songs is a considered a romantically-phrased metaphor of love between God and his people, but in its plain reading reads like a love song.

Work performed with love thus elevates the worker in innumerable ways.

All who hold the faith have God's love, but to what degree or effort he has pleased God depends on the individual itself.

Sufis believe that love is a projection of the essence of God to the universe.

God's love is often seen as universal love.

Children's love includes feelings of respect and admiration for their parents, and is expressed by obedience and the desire to please their parents.

Sufism is often referred to as the religion of Love.

Abandoned babies, children raised in institutions or shuttled from foster home to foster home, find it difficult in later years to love deeply and make lasting bonds with other people.

Hurricane Fifi caused severe damage while skimming the northern coast of Honduras on September 18 and 19, 1974.

The power of the gods was thus vested in the pharaoh.

Intimacy is a form of love by which two people can share secrets and various details of their personal lives.

The serotonin effects of being in love have a similar chemical appearance to obsessive-compulsive disorder; which could explain why a person in love cannot think of anyone else.

Conjugal love, parental love, friendship, compassion, love of self, love of country, love of God—"love" or its opposites can be found in all the diverse contexts for human relationships.

Psychologist Rollo May differentiated between the impulse for love and the drive for sex, saying, "For human beings, the more powerful need is not sex per se but for relationships, intimacy, acceptance, and affirmation."

Love is the absolute, eternal desire of all human beings, and as such it is the most popular topic in all the arts.

Psychologists and character educators hold that much of the heartbreak of failed love could be avoided by education about the nature of love, and by cultivating the self to be able to love well.

The author of the letters of John wrote, "We love, because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19).

To resolve this confusion, French scholars found it helpful to distinguish between amour platonique (the concept of non-sexual love) and amour platonicien (love according to Plato).

The love between spouses is a world in itself.

Closest to agape love is the sacrifice and investment that parents willingly give on behalf of their children.

Theodore Roosevelt once said, “With self-discipline most anything is possible.” Self-discipline is fundamental to character growth, which in turn is fundamental to the capacity to give genuine love.

Young people can benefit from a clear-eyed discussion about the nature of love that helps them distinguish between true conjugal love and its myriad of counterfeits.

Passion, born of sexual attraction, is shown in infatuation as well as romantic love.

Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.

Understanding love as involving an act of will brings in the element of choice.

All religious exhortations to love one’s neighbor and even one’s adversary are based on the idea of love as a decision.

The challenges of work can be an opportunity to express love, by appreciating one's given task from a transcendent perspective as one's small part in creating the great Universe.

God's love is widely seen as his benevolence, mercy, and care upon human beings.

Roman poet Catullus wrote about his unrequited love for Lesbia (Clodia) in several of his Carmina.

Self-love creates a positive attitude towards life that helps people deal with the everyday problems, rather than dwelling on negatives.

Nevertheless, people still long for "true love," love that never fails.

The most basic distinction is between genuine love and infatuation—the common feeling of love based mainly on sexual attraction and passion.

Opportunities to love grandchildren provide elders with "a higher sense of self.

The Buddhist saint Nagarjuna wrote: "Compassion is a mind that savors only mercy and love for all sentient beings" (Precious Garland 437).

Not only in the human world, but the beauty of nature can be regarded as an expression of God's love.

Parents' love for their children naturally calls forth investment and sacrifice.

Jesus taught, "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44, Luke 6:27), in keeping with the character of agap? as unconditional love, given without any expectation of return.

Religions like Buddhism and Roman Catholicism regard family love as incompatible with the higher life.

To rectify this problem, one must back up to consider the individual and the training he or she requires to be capable of true love.

When the term "Platonic love" is used today, it generally does not describe this aspect of Plato's views of love.

Judaism employs a wide definition of love, both between people and between humans and the Deity.

Rootedness in a loving family is an important foundation for love in community.

Bertrand Russell described love as a condition of absolute value, as opposed to relative value.

Psychologists warn against a common misconception about love: To construe love as a feeling.

The Bible commands, "you should love the Lord your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might" (Deuteronomy 6:4).

Plato never considered that one would love a person for his or her unique qualities, because the ideas are abstractions that do not vary.

Studies in neuroscience have indicated that a consistent number of chemicals are present in the brain when people testify to feeling love.

Sprachinseltдnze (literally "language island dances") are those dances which are actually by German-speaking minorities (see German as a Minority Language) living outside Austria, but which originate in Austria, e.g.

argued that all motion in the universe was caused by the interplay of two forces: Love (philia) and strife (neikos).

M. Scott Peck, in The Road Less Traveled, likewise taught that love is an activity or investment rather than a feeling.

Christianity lifts up the Greek term Agap? to describe such love.

God's love is seen as an incentive for sinners to aspire to be as worthy of God's love as they may.

All of these types of love have their distinctive features.

Conjugal love itself involves many elements, including romantic love, sex, deep friendship, and mature commitment to a life-long relationship.

The solution to environmental problems begins by learning how to love the earth, all its wondrous features—mountains, rivers, oceans, trees, and so on—and all its living creatures.

Love for nature is encouraged by a sense of dependence and indebtedness to the earth, and gratitude for its provision, which sustains life and health.

The type of love often featured is unrequited love.

The family is the primary locus where most people cultivate their character and learn how to love.

The effort to live for the sake of the other that is genuine love requires giving up territories of self-centeredness at every turn.

One moves the other; there is a mysterious link of reinforcement between the communion of lovers’ hearts and union of their genitals.

The family of origin is the context for a child's lessons about love and virtue, as he or she relates to parents and siblings.

A theme in much popular music is that of new love, "falling in love:"

The biological perspective views love as an instinctual and physical drive, just like hunger or thirst.

Such ways of love in community increase one's sense of self-worth and widen one's circle of adult friends.

Intimacy is usually shown in friendships and romantic love affairs.

People who are inspired by the love of God feel joy to sacrifice themselves for the sake of their beloved; which in the absence of God's love they would not do.

A loving doe, a graceful deer—may her breasts satisfy you always, may you ever be captivated by her love” (Proverbs 5.18-19).

The twentieth century rabbi Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler is frequently quoted as defining love from the Jewish point of view as "giving without expecting to take" (Michtav me-Eliyahu, vol.

The Christian saints beginning with Paul endured many tribulations in their efforts to love God and do his will by preaching Christ to the unbelieving people.

Thomas Jay Oord defined love as acting intentionally, in sympathetic response to others (including God), to promote overall well-being.

In Asia this type of love is called filial piety; yet it is fairly universal.

From these experience, they learn to find self-worth in conquering the challenges of life's journey and striving in the realms of love.

Love, in fact, is at the root of much pain and conflict in the world.

A person of character in a committed relationship will make effort to love whether or not he or she feels loving at the time.

The concept of platonic love thus arose within the context of the debate pitting mundane sexually expressed pederasty against the philosophic—or chaste—pederasty elaborated in Plato's writings.

People need to love themselves enough to care for their health and strive to better themselves.

A more complete theory of conjugal love has been put forth by psychologist Robert Sternberg, who posits three different components: Intimacy, Passion, and Commitment.

The family is where most people are introduced to the experience of love.

Conjugal love is the natural union between spouses and is the sign of a healthy marriage.

Most philosophers have recognized though that the essential quality of love is that it focuses on the other, not on the self.

The Chinese philosopher Mo-tzu developed a second concept of love, ai (?), which is universal love towards all beings, not just towards friends or family, and without regard to reciprocation.

Perhaps the most famous example in Western culture of unrequited love is Dante Alighieri for Beatrice.

When the term "Platonic love" is used today, it generally does not describe this aspect of Plato's views of love.