Love and Loving

I’ll be brief here. I have this specific take based on how I process being told "I love you" versus being told "I adore you." To me, saying "I love you" feels heavy—it carries this built-in expectation, an obligation to reciprocate if possible. It’s a demand. But when someone says they adore you? That feels lighter, more elective. It’s still affection, sure, but it feels chosen. You can choose to adore God, flowers, or even a cactus... but loving someone isn't a choice. We often end up loving all the wrong people without any say in the matter.

swiftcobra15 said:

But let's be real—you're making them happy just so YOU can feel good about doing it. In the end, you're just satisfying your own internal need. It's all self-serving if you look closely enough.
Give me a break.



😁 😉

@sukuba, but then we’re talking about a much more selfish kind of "love," aren't we?
And honestly, it shows up way more often than people care to admit.
I think we've all felt it at some point. But there’s also that other version that adriatic keeps bringing up...

Maybe I'm off base here, but I have this nagging feeling that true love really does exist, even if it feels like a total unicorn. I know, I know—this is one of those big, messy, interdisciplinary questions that crosses into a dozen different fields, but I’m not approaching this as a philosopher or an academic; I’m just speaking as a regular person first and foremost. So, I suppose my expertise on the matter is about as deep as anyone else's 😁 ...

I don't know, honestly... I think that’s just how everyone operates deep down. It isn't really what people call "selfish love"—you know, that shallow version where you love someone just because you expect them to love you back? That kind of transactional stuff, where you're basically just hunting for validation, is definitely selfish enough.😳Expecting someone else to satisfy our needs or fulfill some internal void—well, that’s just looking for a bargain under the guise of affection.

But if you ask me, there’s no such thing as pure altruism. We shouldn't go around acting like we're saints just because we do something kind. Let's be real: we do things because we need that little hit of dopamine, that feeling of being a "good person." It’s about us, not them. I look at love the same way. If love were actually something powerful enough to break the laws of psychology, I might believe otherwise. But hey, what do I know?..
🙄

Charles Anderson7 said:I’ll be brief here. I have this specific take based on how I process being told "I love you" versus being told "I adore you." To me, saying "I love you" feels heavy—it carries this built-in expectation, an obligation to reciprocate if possible. It’s a demand. But when someone says they adore you? That feels lighter, more elective. It’s still affection, sure, but it feels chosen. You can choose to adore God, flowers, or even a cactus... but loving someone isn't a choice. We often end up loving all the wrong people without any say in the matter.

Yeah... I guess it all comes down to how you define love... but there's also that massive, huge gap between actual love and just being infatuated. Which is a big deal. In my head, it goes something like this...

True love—it's unconditional, just pure devotion!
Infatuation—that's conditional... it's more like a "wanting" than a "being." I used to try explaining it by splitting the word "love" into two different meanings, but honestly, distinguishing between adoration and deep love makes way more sense...

Joker said:Everywhere I look on your posts, I just see total nonsense.😕
Like, take this first sentence right here.

And then there's this...
Like someone already pointed out, when you try to make someone else happy, you're really just doing it to satisfy yourself.
When you feel the need to control or possess things, it's always about you...
But you won't actually find happiness, because that "self" you're chasing is just an illusion anyway. It isn't even really you.

Love—whether it's affection, passion, whatever—exists where there is no control, no words, no explanations, no expectations, and no logic.😵

Love >I've seriously never heard a decent definition of love. Is it a state of being, a feeling, an emotion, or just some abstract noun?