Usually, when I hear the word 'love' being used in discussions of doctrines, I automatically translate it instead to 'cathexis'. In many contexts (especially religious ones)it makes parsing what is being said more logical. I've found it predictive of what is going to transpire in most discourse on the subject, because cathexis is often a relationship of lessers to greaters, sometimes transposed in ways that are not immediately intuitive.

-Kerry O.

I absolutely agree.

And we often mistakenly associate love with monogamy which is truly absurd. Monogamy clearly has nothing to do with love. We can love more than one child for example. We can love more than one sibling. We usually only have one set of parents to love, but the fact that we love two of them rather than just one of them also flies in the face that love has anything to do with monogamy.

Honesty and integrity certainly are an important aspect of love though. And so having made a monogamous commitment to an intimate partner, keeping that commitment would certainly be associated with demonstrating a love for the person to whom it was made.

However, the major point is that many people do indeed confuse cathexis (attachment or affinity) with love. I think it’s quite possible to love many people simultaneously and to not be clingy about it.

This is certainly true of mothers who have many children.

They can even adopt children and love them just as much, so the notion of love is quite broad.

Most people are too involved with the quest for unconditional love to have had the Moment of Zen that allows them to see and understand that their Adored One may not give them the return on investment they demand. That's why I've always thought that Buddhism was a little more clued in, with it's lesser dependence on doctrine and dogma and it's teaching that most human pain from attachment.

Sure, the doctrine of Unconditional Love is very seductive, but it's often more like that maddening thought game called The Dollar Auction.

-Kerry O.

I say fall in love with yourself before you even attempt to find what your looking for outside yourself....

Hey Kerry O you should put up the doctrine of detachment from attachment.


I for one would love to see it.

It's quite succinct, actually (and thus hardly worthy of its own thread):

"What is the sound of one hand clapping."


-Kerry O.

P.S. Lovely sermon RevRab.....Too bad more preachers don't do that...

I’m in complete agreement with you Kerry. Except for one thing. What you are describing here is not love, but rather it’s a misconception of love which is what you are alluding to.

Many people look at love, not from the viewpoint of what they have to give, but from the viewpoint of their own definitions of how they expect someone to ‘love them’. That’s not love. That’s a gross perversion of love, and unfortunately this is precisely what the word means in many western cultures.

People often talk about ‘searching’ for true love. To even make such a statement is to proclaim a total ignorance of what love is. One does not ‘search’ for true love. One either has true love in their heart or they don’t. True love is something you give, not something you demand from another.

You can only give true love. To demand it, or even expect it in return, is the nemesis of the western world.

Love is about giving, it’s not about expectations.

So when you look at a doctrine of love, you need to look at it from the correct viewpoint, and not imagine it to be a proclamation of the perverted view.

The doctrine of love is concerned with what you give, not with what you expect to get back.

Love truly is the sound of one hand clapping. And when two hands come together in a true love applause that is a blessing that should be savored, but never expected nor demanded. To many people are seeking the applause and have never learned the value of one hand clapping.

A new day shines on the doctrine of


Love

All are welcome

Kerry O.,

I second Abra's suggestion, even after hearing your response; succinct OPs make for great tangents!

Abra,

That was a remarkably brief-yet-complete comment on polyamory - can I have permission to quote this?

The doors swing wide and the choir inside sings

Com'on people know,
smile on your brother
everybody get together
Gonna Love one another Right now