Entry 75 - Lesson on Conditional Love vs Unconditional Love

9/2/19

It's easy to love someone when they're behaving how you would expect them to behave or when they're loving you how you wish to be loved, but is it still easy to love someone when they aren't doing that? I had to think about it for a hot sec, but I realized so many times in the past my love for others has been conditional based on if they're acting and behaving and loving me how I wish to be loved.

For example, maybe you're sick, and you expected someone to take care of you or at least check up and see how you're doing. Or maybe you need help with something and someone knows you need help, but they don't help you. Or maybe you got someone a bday present, but they never got you one. What all these scenarios have in common is the people you love fail to show you that they love you through their actions of how you expected to receive love. It sometimes hurts especially more than others because you know deep down that you would've done it for them and the fact that they didn't do it for you hurts at the core.

The reality is, every single human being is going to let you down at one point in your life or another. No one is 100% perfect and chances are, they have a life too. Sometimes we commit mistakes purposely, sometimes we do them unconsciously, and sometimes people genuinely don't have enough time to cater to our needs or to love us how we like to be loved. Therefore, we should expect that people will not always meet our expectations that we set for them and to learn to be okay with that.

So what I realized was much of the love I gave to others was conditional on if they met my expectations of how I desired to be loved. Two important things for me are quality time and words of affirmation. If I'm not communicating with someone or spending time with them, I notice it's easy for my love to be conditional.

That's what prompted this question for me. How can I not let my love be conditional? Then I realized if my love is sourced in myself, my forms, my attachments, my wants, my desires, then it's rooted in temporary things and will not last for that person and therefore will be conditional. However, if the love I love others with is sourced in God who is eternal, unending, omnipresent, omnipotent, and through all, in all, and over all, then the love I have for someone will be unconditional because this love isn't based on me and my needs, but based in God who covers all my needs and theirs together.

So the source of unconditional love is found, but then how do we properly put it into practice each day? First, it requires us to be conscious that our love that is based on us, our wants, desires, attachments etc. are temporary and cannot meet the demands of unconditional love for someone. Secondly, one must consciously decide to tap into this divine, unconditional love each day.

There are many ways to enter into that unconditional love. Some people like worship music, some like spending time in nature meditating, others like praying, and so on. When you're searching for the Author of perfect love, you will find Him. And as you search, and as you aspire to daily tap into that unconditional love, that unconditional love will become a part of how you think, how you act, and how you react more and more as each day goes by. 

Before you know it, you're allowing the God of the universe to flow His unconditional, unending, unexplainably rich love through you to others. Then because you are released from wanting or needing things from others because everything you need is found in God, you're able to love freely with no condition required to keep loving that person, and you're free.

So hopefully this encouraged you that there is freedom from conditional love. Being aware, choosing to consciously make decisions throughout the day to tap into that unconditional love and then following through when situations arise, will create more scenarios where people can experience this unconditional love through us, and thus transform lives. And if you're reading this, I want you to know in the most corniest way ever with corn in my teeth, that I love you.