What is love?

[AG31]

Again we trip over the meaning of ‘love’.

The passage is from a letter written by Saint Paul to a Christian community in Corinth, Greece. It was written in Greek and the specific word used is ‘agape’. Without trying to go crazy in terms of translation, ‘agape’ is a special subset of love. The King James Bible uses the word ‘charity’, which also looks a bit weird to us today because we think of that as being generous, as in giving money to charity.

What ‘agape’ refers to is a giving love, a love that gives without any expectation of return or reward, a love that can be given to any or all, even to one’s enemy. It is a love that continues to give even if it is rejected. It is toleration and acceptance and inclusivity, a general love, including a willingness to forgive.

More recent translations, including that given by CK54, use the word ‘love’ - and again we get confused. Think of what Paul meant when he wrote it, using the word ‘agape’, and it makes sense. It’s nothing to do with feeling affection for another person, it is an overarching attitude to all.

I'm just pointing out that my post is focused on being "in love." I'm very familiar with Corinthians 13. It's not talking about "being in love."

 

[VerbalAbuse]

like many other words, "love" is used to refer to a broad field of related concepts.
finding a definition that explains all these concepts at once is a fool's errand.
isolate the one concept you want to define, and you'll find out it's simple to say what it is.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Point taken.

 

[AG31]

like many other words, "love" is used to refer to a broad field of related concepts.
finding a definition that explains all these concepts at once is a fool's errand.
isolate the one concept you want to define, and you'll find out it's simple to say what it is.

I tried to isolate it by changing my OP to "in love." This after seeing people tackle agape and philia, etc., etc., etc. I further tried to refine it by asking people to distinguish it from "Friendly affection, Sexual attraction, and Infatuation." I'm eagerly awaiting your simple answer.

 

[Rustyoznail]

Sometimes I think it's more helpful to think of "love" more as something one practices than as something one feels.

When I'm angry at somebody close to me, but I make the effort to work past that anger and talk things out - not trying to win, not trying to get them back for making me feel bad, trying to understand their perspective even though it'd be more comfortable just to wallow in my cranky feelings - that's a form of love. Getting up at two in the morning to clean up cat vomit so your partner doesn't have to, that's love even if nobody wrote a sonnet about it.

I’ll go with this. Even if at times, it’s not appreciated until later.

Edit - I have to admit, I had the image from “A night at the Roxbury" rattling through me head, so thanks for that...

 

[AG31]

Sometimes I think it's more helpful to think of "love" more as something one practices than as something one feels.

When I'm angry at somebody close to me, but I make the effort to work past that anger and talk things out - not trying to win, not trying to get them back for making me feel bad, trying to understand their perspective even though it'd be more comfortable just to wallow in my cranky feelings - that's a form of love. Getting up at two in the morning to clean up cat vomit so your partner doesn't have to, that's love even if nobody wrote a sonnet about it.

Are you applying this to "being in love," or just to "love?"

 

[DinglyDangly]

Love is the drug.

Love is all you need.

Love is like oxygen. You get too much you get too high. Not enough and you're going to die.

Love is a battlefield.

Love is higher than a mountain, love is thicker than water.

Love stinks.

Love, I get so lost sometimes.

Love comes to everyone.

Love is all around.

Love the one you're with.

I'm not trying to avoid the question. I think it's the best answer I can give.

Many great lyrics there

 

[Ssbbw4u1974]

I honestly believe that there's multi levels to love.
I've had many different "loves" in my life so far.
There's the first guy I crushed on. But in my mind, I loved him. He excited me and he was my sister's friend, a bad boy everyone told me to dislike.
Then.. There was my BFF when I was 15. She was magical in my eyes. I loved her.
Jump ahead to the love triangle thing I was in at age 22... Married one. Obsessed with the other until a few years ago. Love... Love.. Just different personalities, different people.
Idk...I have issues and I love feeling intensity for certain people.
Love makes you feel alive.

 

[VerbalAbuse]

I tried to isolate it by changing my OP to "in love." This after seeing people tackle agape and philia, etc., etc., etc. I further tried to refine it by asking people to distinguish it from "Friendly affection, Sexual attraction, and Infatuation." I'm eagerly awaiting your simple answer.

do you want to know what love is for a poet, or for a psychologist?

mind you, a psychologist is like a car mechanic, just for the human mind.
you will not find much inspiration in the answers of a psychologist, no more than in those of a car mechanic.

 

[AG31]

do you want to know what love is for a poet, or for a psychologist?

mind you, a psychologist is like a car mechanic, just for the human mind.
you will not find much inspiration in the answers of a psychologist, no more than in those of a car mechanic.

You pick. You said it was simple. Pick the easiest point of view. How about your own?

 

[VerbalAbuse]

I did not say it's simple to answer your question. I've said it's a fool's errand. And I'm not going to attempt it.
it may simple when you know what you're asking.
ask a poet what a car is, and see what you make of that answer.
ask a mechanic, and you'll be frustrated and disappointed.
do you want to hear that a car is excitement and liberty? a bucket of rust and bolts? a chassis with an engine on top?

 

[Yarglenurp]

I did not say it's simple to answer your question. I've said it's a fool's errand. And I'm not going to attempt it.
it may simple when you know what you're asking.
ask a poet what a car is, and see what you make of that answer.
ask a mechanic, and you'll be frustrated and disappointed.
do you want to hear that a car is excitement and liberty? a bucket of rust and bolts? a chassis with an engine on top?

To be fair, conversations about abstract subjects are fool's errands in general. I assume we're all doing this for fun.

When someone tells me they're in love with a person:

In IRL, I just assume it means they're tilted towards that person.

In erotica, I assume it means they're going to fuck.

In a true crime podcast, I assume it means that someone is depressed about losing that person or actually killed that person themselves.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

I tried to isolate it by changing my OP to "in love." ... I'm eagerly awaiting your simple answer.

Being in love is completely different. It is simply an addiction to someone's physical presence. It's lust. "I just need to hear the sound of your voice," is the same as "I just need another cigarette."

 

[AG31]

I did not say it's simple to answer your question. I've said it's a fool's errand. And I'm not going to attempt it.
it may simple when you know what you're asking.
ask a poet what a car is, and see what you make of that answer.
ask a mechanic, and you'll be frustrated and disappointed.
do you want to hear that a car is excitement and liberty? a bucket of rust and bolts? a chassis with an engine on top?

And I replied this way. I'm asking "you."

I tried to isolate it by changing my OP to "in love." This after seeing people tackle agape and philia, etc., etc., etc. I further tried to refine it by asking people to distinguish it from "Friendly affection, Sexual attraction, and Infatuation." I'm eagerly awaiting your simple answer.

 

[AG31]

I usually go first when I post questions, but not this time. I don't have answers to these questions.

Well, I actually do have a sort of answer. It's really what prompted me to start this thread. I read a book in which a man and woman, who had been good friends since childhood, decided to get married because they were rounding the bend toward late middle age and wanted to stop the merry-go-round and have a family. They wondered allowed how sex would go. After the sex went, either the female MC or the author, I forget which, said/wrote "Ping!" It worked so perfectly for me. That told me they were in love.

 

[THBGato]

Some random thoughts on being "in love"...

It's believing you'd do anything for that person (of course you wouldn't, but it's the belief you would).

It's having somebody you want to share your triumphs and disasters with.

It's having a vital variable to consider in all your decisions: "how will my decision affect X?"

It's having a reference point for all memories you make together.

It's having somebody you miss and ache for when they aren't there. "Bed's too big without you."

It's having somebody that you want to be a better version of yourself for.

That might all be just me though.

 

[AG31]

Some random thoughts on being "in love"...

It's believing you'd do anything for that person (of course you wouldn't, but it's the belief you would).

It's having somebody you want to share your triumphs and disasters with.

It's having a vital variable to consider in all your decisions: "how will my decision affect X?"

It's having a reference point for all memories you make together.

It's having somebody you miss and ache for when they aren't there. "Bed's too big without you."

It's having somebody that you want to be a better version of yourself for.

That might all be just me though.

No erotic tingle?

 

[THBGato]

No erotic tingle?

Well, yeah, but as that can come without love, I didn't include it. (Though, as I said, they were "random thoughts").

 

[Blind_Justice]

Baby don't hurt me no more