do you think marital love can be unconditional?
Discussion
Not in a healthy way.
Thereās conditions: communication, no abuse, mutual respect, empathyā¦ etc.
From those conditions you can build something beautiful, spiritual and more unique than most people understand.
But itās not a parent child relationship. Or at least it shouldnāt be.
At its best- itās a healthy adult to healthy adult relationship.
thanks for all the answers~! :3
i think i follow
to me, as imperfect people, we won't always meet those conditions. should love be withdrawn once those conditions become unmet?
how do apologies and forgiveness tie into conditional or unconditional love?
hmmm, i think i'm starting to get off topic >_>
We canāt always be perfect. Love doesnāt need to be withdrawn at every little error- but gentle reminders and communication help the other person know where they are.
Forgiveness within reason is of course necessary. There needs to be flexibility.
Itās an underlying somewhat silent set of conditions (if things are going reasonably well). Infinitely complex.
"infinitely complex"
<3
since you shared so much, let me share where i'm coming from with this.
like i mentioned earlier, we aren't perfect. sometimes my Wife will do or say something that gets me to *feel* disrespected.
in the past, this would cause me to withdraw (drawing boundaries), which would escalate the tension.
now, despite feeling hurt and disrespected, i continue to stay close, i continue to pour love into Her, i choose to stay loving. because i know that She loves me. i still feel loved by Her.
the end result is that She ends up acknowledging what happened, making amends, and respecting me more for staying consistent and connected.
i'm not sure if this is a result of the dynamic we share or emotional maturity, or something else. but it makes made me wonder about the relationship between feeling respected and feeling loved.
nostr:npub19vw7zdr07yyhdw8ns3d26c26n70mh2090d4cr6m24c8ee8wjpq0qg0m7ps just because you shared with me too
thanks, gentlemen~! <3
Beautiful said. Disconnecting because one feels disrespected without making space for understanding and without communication to understand what just happened is coming from a place of love but rather of indifference. Love cannot thrive in a restrictive space like this. We all are flawed and experience life differently. And probably even the definition of respect may differ from person to person.
thank you ^^
and spot-on analysis. not only do the definitions vary, but they will most likely change over time.
i appreciate your addition to the conversation, Cristalina. :3
Thank you. I believe in unconditional love between all beens. It's beautiful to watch how love can expand people and make them growth more vulnerable and more authentic. I understand that some dynamic can be harder than others. Depends on previous situations, how we react, how we get triggered to heal. nostr:nprofile1qqs8nxvpg9shg0ez0yqx4vgvlkpm6vadlu3ushjan5y5nlwkp783jqgpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumn0wd68ytnzv9hxgqgcwaehxw309ac8yetdd96k6tnswf5k6ctv9ehx2aqpzfmhxue69uhhqatjwpkx2urpvuhx2ucx0aqs4, I appreciate your insight and agree with most, except one thing. All the things that were said are very import between people, I don't think they are conditions but elements necessary to build a strong foundation. With these elements present, good communication, respect, loyalty and trust, a beautiful uncontional healthy relationsgip can be build.
We are always ever hanging. Sometimes, we part ways because we don't resonate or because there are inherent incompatibilities, but when we love one another, where there is will, there is always a way.
nostr:nprofile1qqs8nxvpg9shg0ez0yqx4vgvlkpm6vadlu3ushjan5y5nlwkp783jqgpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumn0wd68ytnzv9hxgqgcwaehxw309ac8yetdd96k6tnswf5k6ctv9ehx2aqpzfmhxue69uhhqatjwpkx2urpvuhx2ucx0aqs4, Why do you think there can only exist unconditional love between a child and a parent and not between all, in a marital and platonic connection?
I ask this since for me, conditional love is : " I only will do this for you, if and only you do that in exchange for me. If not, I will retract it from you." This is conditional.
And why unconditional giving and receiving, between to sovereign beings, whole in their authenticity, would be unhealthy?
I will also add, that I will only act, present myself in a certain matter towards you, if and only you tick a box in my mind as how you should operate and behave. This is in my humble opinion conditional and very unhealthy.
nostr:nprofile1qqsddtl6r9dmwx22wpvr9af4lfjm4vwcmndd56e9grlnfvmsjygtzacpz4mhxue69uhkummnw3ex2mrfw3jhxtn0wfnsz9thwden5te0dp5hxapwdehhxarj9ekxzmnyqyf8wumn8ghj7am0wsh82arcduhx7mn9gqnun3 said it beautifully how in his connection love is being fed and nourished by holding space for the other when things get messy ( putting abuse aside, that's a fat no). We are all inperfect and with flaws, if we just disconnect and retreat every time something goes not accordingly with our expectations, there is no room for growth and expansion inside a connection. If we retrieve love if someone does not act how we wish, want or expect, that in itself is IMHO, abuse.
nostr:npub1qnykqjt67cv2ux84z3anuhpsnmea3f39za52rsyzpcpvjdmgesasvkcxvz this is such a great insight~! i think many of us have a transactional view of relationships because we never really had good examples. and when two people inside a loving relationship are giving to each other, we mistake it for transaction. but one doesn't give *because* the other has givenāone gives because he/she *loves*. the intention is felt.
in the past, when i would withdraw, my inner narrative was something like: "i'm not yelling, i'm not abusing. i hurt. i need space."
but what my Wife *experienced* was abuse and a type of betrayal. that disconnection, whether intentional or not, was weaponized and compounded with poor communication skills.
it wasn't until i finally understood how to love that i could consistently fulfill my role in the relationshipāto stay aligned with Her. this necessitates maintaining a loving connection, even though hurt, misunderstandings, failures, etc.
Hey thanks for engaging thoughtfullyšš¼. I never got a chance to respond to nostr:nprofile1qqsddtl6r9dmwx22wpvr9af4lfjm4vwcmndd56e9grlnfvmsjygtzacpz4mhxue69uhks6tnwshxummnw3ezumrpdejqz9thwden5te0wahhgtnwdaehgu3wwpshyarertrqe8's last message. Iām quite a busy guy and I can only engage so far in these online discussions before Iām needing to move back into IRL/work/etc (which happens to include being present with my amazing wife š).
I think in order for us to find common ground we should avoid extremes. To me, the version of conditional that you put forth there is an extreme. I agree: the way you put it sounds abusive. So letās think of it as a spectrum from rigidly conditional (unhealthy) to self-destructively unconditional (also unhealthy).
Somewhere between the extreme conditional and unconditional is āhealthy adult boundariesā. You said it yourself: abuse is a hard no. Ok great, thatās a healthy boundary.
IMO thereās lots of room within a set of reasonable healthy adult boundaries to have a deep, spiritual, kind, and forgiving relationship where you lean into one another instead of withdraw when things arenāt perfect. Thatās not rigidly conditional, and itās also not completely unconditional because there are lines both partners know they canāt cross no matter the emotional state.
To bring it full circle, in my opinion, itās deep respect that keeps those boundaries in place as we navigate the beautiful emotional messiness of bonding with a life partner.
this is a wonderful explanation here. i think there is some overlap in each perspective.
nostr:npub10xvczstpwsljy7gqd2cselvrh5e6mlerep09m8gff87avru0ryqsg2g437, do you think the conditions structure the relationship?
for me (and perhaps nostr:npub1qnykqjt67cv2ux84z3anuhpsnmea3f39za52rsyzpcpvjdmgesasvkcxvz as well? though i don't want to speak for her), i think the connection structures the relationship more so.
idk
i really appreciate the time taken for this discussion. ^^