These days I’m thinking a lot about the conditions we put on love.
When my boys hug each other, I smile and offer a loving gaze. When they are less kind {hitting} my smile and loving gaze quickly disappear — I withdraw the visual expression of my love.
My boys quickly adapt to receive more love – I’m okay with that for the whole hitting and hugging thing – but I am hyper-aware of the dangers of too much adaptation and too many conditions put on love.
If we place too many conditions on love we risk causing the subject of our love to abandon their true self and replace it with a false version.
Conditional love and the adaptations we make in order to get love is how we lose ourselves. It happens to our children, and it happens to us as adults.
When the true self is repressed and the false self is expressed we struggle and suffer. I don’t want that for my boys and I don’t want that for you.
Where in your life are you putting too many conditions on your love?
Where in your life are you losing yourself in order to be loved?