I find myself wondering about love (between partners) again. Lately I’m haunted by desires that I thought I had ‘overcome’ or was in the process of overcoming but now they seem to be back in full force. Apparently I haven’t learned my lesson yet? Confusion arises when thinking about love between two persons and how that relates to unconditional love.
It’s funny how I ‘run into’ relevant material about that topic now that these questions linger in my mind. In the Seth book I’m listening to a chapter about the functions of the brain and how chemicals influence our experience. Additionally, I came across this article on CNN about the very same subject. So when thinking further about it I realized there are some major differences between interpersonal love and unconditional love:
(note: I’m not implying to speak the Truth below, it is only how I view things at this time.)
Interpersonal love can be the basis for a relationship but unconditional love cannot because unconditional love is impersonal, does not judge and applies to all of experience indiscriminately. It will not lead to a choice to commit to a specific relationship. Furthermore, interpersonal love is not unconditional because the relationship will only survive as long as it works for both persons. (Note that ‘works’ can mean different things; a person who keeps an abusive partner to unconsciously punish onseself due to childhood imprinting may seem to be in a bad relationship when viewed from the outside, but the person in question still ‘thinks’ the relationship works.So a ‘working’ relationship does not necessarily look good from the outside.) As soon as one of the partners starts to show behaviour that is unacceptable to the other, the relationship will end.
What the Seth material and the CNN article also made me realize is that interpersonal love includes the desire to mate (sexually), which clearly is not the case with unconditional love.
So if a desire to be in a relationship with someone includes the desire to mate, I’m assuming that I’m a slave to brain chemistry and although it feels hard to ignore or dismiss, is ultimately of no importance when looking at the bigger picture.
Also this tells me that I should not compare unconditional love to interpersonal love, nor should I judge myself for not feeling unconditional love for my partner. That’s unrealistic and not how it works. I think best case one can have a good loving relationship with a person and – at the same time – feel unconditional love for All That Is, which of course includes the partner.
It also means that the relationship can be ended if it doesn’t work anymore, while still feeling unconditional love because feeling unconditional love does not infer one should stay in a relationship that is harmful.