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Post by geode on Feb 20, 2019 17:16:57 GMT
Many years ago I was in a long distance relationship with a Scottish girl. She flew to Thailand for a visit and after a very hard week at work where I discovered on Friday that my boss was advertising a job description to replace me, we headed off to a beach resort for the weekend. After dinner there was a stage show by the pool and I became aware that she did not look happy. I asked if anything was wrong and she made a face and pointed at me. I asked what she meant and she said she was homesick. That seemed odd as she had only left home two days earlier, and I said so. She then said that she wanted to return to where people gave her unconditional love. I was tired but had been OK company I thought. She said to look at the couple around us. Yeah, some were hugging and nuzzling a bit and she indicated I was being remiss in not attempting the same. Well, I had been in Thailand for years. and it was considered very bad form to show affection like this in public. This did not make her any friendlier towards me and the evening ended very coldly. The next day we had a conversation about her comments. I said that there was no such thing as "unconditional love" except perhaps from a pet dog, but then I qualified that with the thought that if you stop feeding your dog, it might stop showing affection. I then said that perhaps only God offers unconditional love. But is it true that God offers unconditional love? If we do not believe in God and obey Him are we damned? If so any love from Him would be pretty conditional. This girlfriend and myself were Mormons. Mormon theology is non-Trinitarian and was just thinking today how that may have been part of my thinking in the discussion I had back then. God the Father had an idea that his spirit children would come to Earth, and be born in mortality. But they would sin and because of an eternal law not even in His control, they could not return to Him as was desired. Lucifer had a plan to force everybody to obey which was rejected. But Jehovah (who would become Jesus) said he would lead them back to the Father but acting as a redeemer between the Father and man, with man retaining free choice. I am now thinking this frees Jesus from the harshness of forcing anybody to believe or be damned. It allows Him to extend unconditional love.
Anyway, it was a rather moot point when it came to the girlfriend. A couple of years later she declared that the only way we could be together was for me to quite my job and move to Scotland. She said that I had no friends and that she was not going to give up her job, her house, or her friends. She backed off a bit on my friends and said that although I had some they really didn't matter. I had explained that my chances of getting a job in the UK as a foreign national were not very good at that point in time, and if I worked another five years I could take early retirement with full health benefits. I brought up how her occupation as a teacher was far more portable than mine as a geologist. I said that I would be in far better shape at that point to locate where I wished, and I could choose Scotland for at least part of the year, if not all. She didn't budge from her position. So much for unconditional love. Her love had some rather heavy conditions placed upon it.
Does anybody here think that unconditional love exists? Does a mother have unconditional love for a child? My mother showed anger when I disobeyed her, and told me what I had to do to get back into her good graces. Somehow this did not seem to be unconditional to me. I had a friend at the time that said a woman never really fully loves a guy, but guys give her children and she comes to sort of love them through these children.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 20, 2019 17:28:53 GMT
Yes... I call them dogs.
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Post by rizdek on Feb 20, 2019 17:33:31 GMT
Really? I think that would have been a misinterpretation on her part. A mothers love need not waver when she has to discipline her child. The child should not have to "win back" a parent's love. Perhaps the parent might put it in terms of winning back privileges or something like that, and maybe even winning trust...ie when the child shows they can use discipline in some area, the parent can give them more freedom, can trust them with more freedom. But NOT more love OR faith.
And as far as the love God gives us? God gives us exactly the kind of love we think God gives us...no more and no less.
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Post by rizdek on Feb 20, 2019 17:35:34 GMT
Aint that the truth? Gotta love dogs. I get emotional almost 20 years after having had to put ours to sleep when she got old. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 20, 2019 17:40:15 GMT
Aint that the truth? Gotta love dogs. I get emotional almost 20 years after having had to put ours to sleep when she got old. 20 years without a dog? That's a sin, so it is ☹️ Go to your local shelter this weekend, adopt a dog... You rescue them, they rescue you... It's a good deal all round 🐕 |
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Post by rizdek on Feb 20, 2019 17:41:51 GMT
Aint that the truth? Gotta love dogs. I get emotional almost 20 years after having had to put ours to sleep when she got old. 20 years without a dog? That's a sin, so it is ☹️ Go to your local shelter this weekend, adopt a dog... You rescue them, they rescue you... It's a good deal all round 🐕 We already rescued two cats. |
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Post by thefleetsin on Feb 20, 2019 17:42:21 GMT
first they came for the semi-colons
amidst the ever expanding language archipelago
the wholesale castration
of
first phrases
and then
individual words.
i
realized;
freedom of expression
is
the only thing,
worth
living for.
dying for real estate
is
just so
over rated and
last
millennium.
sjw 02/20/19 inspired at this very moment in time by the language police are coming mommy!
from the 'bewitched series' of poems
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Post by Deleted on Feb 20, 2019 17:48:25 GMT
20 years without a dog? That's a sin, so it is ☹️ Go to your local shelter this weekend, adopt a dog... You rescue them, they rescue you... It's a good deal all round 🐕 We already rescued two cats. All rescue animals are cool 👍 Here's our Dennis, chilling with me on the porch 🐈  |
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Post by geode on Feb 20, 2019 17:57:35 GMT
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Post by politicidal on Feb 20, 2019 18:18:11 GMT
Among humans, no.
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Post by rachelcarson1953 on Feb 20, 2019 18:49:04 GMT
We already rescued two cats. All rescue animals are cool 👍 Here's our Dennis, chilling with me on the porch 🐈 All my critters have been rescues, and they know that you saved them. I think animals, no matter where they came from, are the only source of unconditional love and acceptance. When my late husband was terminally ill, I got him a puppy. She could comfort him when even I could not. They were such good companions, and she grieved after he died. My parents already had a puppy waiting for me to be born. He shared his dog food with me (yes, there is a photo of me in diapers, on the floor on all fours, eating food from his dish while he watched - my Dad couldn't resist taking the shot.) He protected my baby carriage, and me as I grew. He lived to age thirteen, and when the vet told us that his kidneys were failing, I offered one of mine. Transplants were just becoming more survivable, and I had no idea that cross-species transplantation wouldn't work. I just wanted my friend to get better. Companion animals enrich our lives so much, and when I see, on the news, that an animal has been mistreated, it makes me sick. It tells me that the human involved is a bad person. I am typing this one-handed, because there is a sweet, loving kitty curled up in the elbow of my other arm. I'm sick today, in bed, and he is on the case.     |
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Post by CoolJGS☺ on Feb 20, 2019 18:55:40 GMT
Yes but it’s a principle not an instinct when not dealing with family
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Post by thefleetsin on Feb 20, 2019 19:16:46 GMT
goes something like this
if i
were to make a map of her heart,
as
tiny as it
is.
this would surely include
those
precious parts,
held out
to
each and everyone
she
ran into.
for
her skills
at
driving points home
were
like landing parachutes
inside
astrodomes.
sjw 02/20/19 inspired at this very moment in time by luzmia.
from the 'baby series' of poems
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Post by maya55555 on Feb 20, 2019 19:27:37 GMT
Yes, I have experienced that type of love when caring for my medically compromised mother and father. Unconditional love was for my pets and current boyfriend.
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Post by thefleetsin on Feb 20, 2019 19:47:41 GMT
was daddy a closet racist
when
plowing throw the annals of
american history
always
keep in mind
the perpetuated misery
self inflicted by
a certain percentage of
ignorant
mouth breathers
who
truly believe
the united states exists
to promote
a caucasian jesus
who lived for mutual funds
and promoted
world peace through
hail mary end runs
into
the backyards of any nation
so naive
and so inoculated
as to believe:
we have their best interests at heart.
sjw 02/20/19 inspired at this very moment in time by everyone quickly look over there.
from the 'blitzkrieg series' of poems
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Post by clusium on Feb 20, 2019 19:56:37 GMT
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Post by Aj_June on Feb 20, 2019 21:08:10 GMT
Does anybody here think that unconditional love exists? Does a mother have unconditional love for a child? My mother showed anger when I disobeyed her, and told me what I had to do to get back into her good graces. Somehow this did not seem to be unconditional to me. I had a friend at the time that said a woman never really fully loves a guy, but guys give her children and she comes to sort of love them through these children.
This is a topic that might get different answers and is pretty subjective question. So without criticising any one else's opinion I will present my belief. I do not believe in existence of unconditional love of any kind. Yes, someone can have have a very deep love for another person/living being and may be wiling to love the other person even if the other person doesn't give back anything in return. But I still don't consider such cases to be instances of unconditional love because there is unique set of conditions implicit in the moment the love develops in any person for another person. A mother's love comes closest to unconditional love in my opinion and even that love has deep underlying reasons for continuing (and why it was formed for the first time). It's partly evolutionary and partly a result of natural bonding a mother develops with her kids. Irrespective of whether the kid returns anything back or not, a mother automatically derives certain value from existence of her child. Still, there can still be mothers who love their kids a lot vs those who don't. In fact in every kind of human relationships there are benefits attached to both parties (even if it may not appear). That said, words like unconditional love shouldn't be used to demean natural human love that we all experience is various forms. |
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Post by clusium on Feb 20, 2019 23:08:45 GMT
Does anybody here think that unconditional love exists? Does a mother have unconditional love for a child? My mother showed anger when I disobeyed her, and told me what I had to do to get back into her good graces. Somehow this did not seem to be unconditional to me. I had a friend at the time that said a woman never really fully loves a guy, but guys give her children and she comes to sort of love them through these children.
What about when a mother still loves her child, even if or when said child becomes a serial killer, & among the victims is one of her other children (sibling of the perpetrator)? Does that count as unconditional love from mother for child?  |
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Post by OpiateOfTheMasses on Feb 20, 2019 23:49:12 GMT
I love my wife and children unconditionally.
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Post by rizdek on Feb 21, 2019 9:42:53 GMT
We already rescued two cats. All rescue animals are cool 👍 Here's our Dennis, chilling with me on the porch 🐈 Nice looking cat. Ours are solid white...kind of rare as I understand it. |
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