Prompts from the Heart

Beyond Gift

We like, because… but love, in spite of…

“If you love me, then post my picture on your status with a caption of how you feel about me.” “Damn truth or dare,” I muttered.

You love love… — she would often tease. I’ll scuff and then, think about it. Indeed, I do love love. I love to love, just as I love to be loved. To me, love should be all or nothing. If I think so, and if 𝘋𝘪𝘢𝘯𝘢 𝘊.’s prompt was a test, then I just failed. If love, be unconditional, then even a good condition still makes it imperfect.

I’m guessing she too also desired such love as I when she dared me to post her photo for the whole world to see. Maybe she dared me to look within to see if I am indeed all in.

As I edge closer to my end, I seek a different kind of love — the old traditional kind of love — untainted by modernity, its third parties and its intricacies of modern — ed and loosed morality and political correctness. Though I seek a perfect love, though I seek to be the best lover I can ever be; to create the best love experience my lover can possibly dream of, yet the question remains; is that love pure? Is it unconditional?

James is my friend, and we have often debated this. In the end, our conclusion is; man is not capable of loving unconditionally. For so long, we are conditioned creatures, conditioned from childhood by both nature and nurture, therefore are we cursed to act conditionally. We school ourselves because we seek to be competent in our society. We hold our tongue in public, only because we do not want to be perceived wrongly. We participate, just because we dread seen as different.

When I think of love, (i should say, the ideal love), in its agape sense, it is even truer than romantic love. But, even it (Agape love), is not free of conditions. We extend this love, maybe because we think we are virtuous. Are we? Or we do so because we like to continue to think we are? Or our conscience pricks us for trying to turn a blind eye?

Romantic love is where we express our selfishness. If we are pressured by society or religion to act out of love and compassion towards others regardless of, then we resent society unconsciously for not allowing us the chance to choose to love that which we feel is befitting of our ideal. We express this selfishness when we choose our romantic partner. We do not love romantically unconditionally. At our best moment, we are tempted to think we do. But we do not. Our romantic partners or potential partners are our tailored conditions from our subconscious. And for many, even consciously.

Freud and Jung assert that we are simply products of our upbringing. Our conditioning has been put in place as early as 1–7 years old. When we seek love, we either seek something we didn't have but desired, or we seek something we had and would like to have again, usually inspired by parents.

If we are capable of unconditional love, then we would love that hairy, dirty, mouth smelling, jobless drunk from the bar last night. Or that fat, mother of five, who can’t seem to keep her legs closed. But we won't. Because we are programmed not to.

Whether we are capable to love unconditionally, remains to be answered. But I dare to think, maybe that is not the right question. Maybe loving conditionally is how we survive.

Or maybe we creatures have no clue of what love truly is.

When I look at my partner, something I often do, I zoom out of that moment and take a very good picture of her — of who she is. At that moment, I stare in awe of her and think, ‘I couldn't have made a better choice.’ Then I take a look at when she isn't her best character. The moments I feel maybe I had made a mistake. Do I love her for her goods, and dislike her for her wrongs?

I am beginning to understand that, how I feel when am happy, and how I feel when am upset are only two pieces of a larger mosaic. How I feel is not love. How I feel are determined, they say, by chemicals in my brain. Then what is love? Maybe understanding love better would best position us to know if it can be conditional or unconditional.

4. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. — 1 Corinthians 13:4–8 New International Version

Indeed love is not a feeling. For everything love is, as the old prophets define it, it’s more of what we do, rather than what we feel. It is our behaviours, our acts, choices and decisions. When we love, it is a commitment, a decision made. Whether good or bad, bitter or sweet, we choose to stay, to continue to love.

Maybe I can say, therefore, that I love her unconditionally, though my feelings, be conditional, my commitment is unconditional. Through hell or high water, I ain't going nowhere.

These are the thoughts that flood my mind, as I zoom out, and take a good look at her. Maybe love isn't what I feel for her, but my decision to love her no matter what. Not to quit because of her flaws. The unconditionality of love is not, and cannot be embedded in our emotions, but in our resolve, our will — our character.

Beyond gift is beyond her, beyond my feelings for her, beyond me as well. Beyond gift, is that which proceeds beyond everything that currently is or felt. A decision and a commitment to look beyond flaws and beyond insufficiencies.

In all, I am not saying we love unconditionally, I'm saying, maybe we can. We are not loving, if we go by the true definition of love, we are only trying to love. Just like life, sometimes we are not living. But every day we try to live. Sometimes we get it wrong, sometimes we get it right. No one faults us, but us. And maybe that is all we can do. Try!

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