Summary

The author reflects on the dichotomy of love and fear as driving forces in human behavior, particularly in relationships and personal motivations, using Valentine's Day as a backdrop to explore these themes.

Abstract

The article, set against the backdrop of Valentine's Day, delves into the author's personal experiences and observations about the profound impact of love and fear on human actions. The author admits to a personal fear of love, stemming from a past traumatic experience, which has led to a lack of emotional investment in romantic relationships. Drawing on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, the author suggests that most human motivations, including the drive to work, are rooted in either love or fear, with fear often being the more potent force at the lower levels of the pyramid. The article posits that understanding these motivations can foster empathy and improve interpersonal relationships, encouraging readers to consider their own actions in light of these two primal emotions.

Opinions

The author believes that the fear of emotional vulnerability has prevented them from engaging in romantic relationships.
Despite the societal emphasis on romantic displays, especially on Valentine's Day, the author feels detached from these expressions of love.
The author perceives their neighbor's grand romantic gestures as likely stemming from genuine love rather than insecurity.
The article suggests that fear, particularly the fear of loss or rejection, underlies many social interactions and can lead to avoidance behaviors.
The author proposes that self-actualization is more closely associated with love-driven motivations, while basic survival needs are more closely tied to fear.
It is implied that most people default to fear-based actions, and that love, while a less common motivator, is a silent yet powerful force in human behavior.
The author encourages readers to evaluate their own and others' actions through the lens of love and fear to cultivate a more empathetic understanding of human nature.

Everything We Do Boils Down To Either Love Or Fear

An empathetic approach to navigating life.

I am writing this article on a valentine’s Monday morning. Thoughts passing through my head are about an article I just finished reading from an amazing writer who goes by the initials K.L.

My thoughts while reading that article are about how I never feel anything when it comes to days like these. As I walked by the streets early this morning, it was red everywhere.

Flowers, dresses, lips dressed in lipstick, everything. People I have never seen wearing 6-inch heels are showing up a lot taller either feeling bougie or awkward. It’s a public show of affection.

Then there are the romantics who’ve bought out billboards. 50X20ft, 14x48ft, those massive ones. All for a portrait of an individual!!!! I know it’s romantic. I just don’t feel it.

But then again, this is how I feel about the whole day.

I have tried to walk that path in the past(Of trying to feel something I mean). But I have never been in a relationship on valentine’s day— Today is no different.

People talk of valentine’s FOMO, but I also don’t know what it feels like, or at least I have been very successful at blocking out that feeling.

K’s article talks about the hopeless romantics which I know are a lot of people. But at least they feel something.

I am on the extremes and polarised to the other end is my neighbor who bought out a billboard ad for her boyfriend. A relationship they’ve had for just under 3 months now.

Considering how affectionate she is, I want to believe that her actions are based on love. This is assuming that she is not insecure, in which case her actions could be based on fear. But I am team love on this one.

In my case, part of the reason I don’t feel anything about this day is that there is a part of me I never access. I know this because I keep snapping myself out of it when I feel myself getting closer.

It is not a stretch if I say that I am scared of love. I have come close to suicide once and it was because I had let someone in, trusted them and it ended horribly.

Don’t get me wrong, I feel things. Love/crushes and all… I just don’t reach the part where I feel like I need to have them or feel sad when I don’t.

When I was younger, I had a stab wound through my palm(crucifixion style) although it never came out through the other end. It was the most painful experience I had ever had. — Or so I thought.

But that pain and misery of that stab wound pale in comparison to what I went through with a broken heart. Looking back at that experience scares the life out of me when I get close to being in relationships.

It is the fear that keeps me polarised to one end of the affection scale. — The non-romantic pole.

My observations about the world around me also seem to suggest that love and fear do not only show up in romance.

The motivations people have to do or not do things are a result of these two factors.

Why do we work for instance?

Look at work in terms of Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

At the lower levels of the pyramid, the needs there are motivated by fear. They are “deficiency” needs while higher levels are “being” needs.

These “deficiency” needs have a stronger motivation coming from fear. This is because they threaten the very existence of the person.

Physiological needs are almost purely based on fear. You know that you must have shelter, food, sleep… or else you will die miserably. — You also know that work is how you get those needs.

This underlying knowledge keeps us motivated to push so that we never have to worry about those.

Contrast that with self-actualization. Love is a stronger contributor to that. The motivations of a self-actualized individual are more based on love than they are in fear.

When we work, it could be a combination of the two factors depending on where we are in relation to Maslow’s hierarchy, but more often than not, it is the fear of what life would be like if we do not work.

This fear also never goes away. Like love, fear is deeply coded in our motivations to act.

You would think that after a certain amount of money, for example, these motivations would stop coming but they keep coming back.

In Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the lower the level, fear motivation is more probably, and somewhere on the level of belonging and love, fear has less power and love becomes much more dominant.

But at any level, both of those motivations exist.

When we look at life this way, it is important to understand that everyone we will ever meet, including ourselves, is going to act in line with these motivations.

People aren’t bad, or good. They are just manifesting a result of one or both of these motivations. I suppose that makes them good or bad and it sounds contradictory to what I just wrote but the difference is that their actions whether good or bad do not speak to the nature of their being.

Every day, we have to choose whether to act from a place of love or fear. Acting from a place of fear tends to be what most people do. Fear makes a lot of noise but love doesn’t.

My fear of getting my heart broken again has kept me away from having romantic relationships but I am by no means the only one who has had their heartbroken.

I am stuck in this cycle of non-romantic relationships because I let my motivations for human interactions be based on fear.

I am scared of losing people I care about. I am scared that constantly reaching out to them increases the chances that I may say something wrong and spoil everything. So I choose to shut up or make little or no effort to reach out.

Something about that tells me that staying on talking terms even though rarely is better than being blocked and not being able to talk at all. — That something is the motivation of fear.

Other people, talk a lot too. Scared that if they don’t, they’ll become irrelevant or forgotten. It too is the motivation of fear.

Just about anything we do can be traced down to some form of fear or love. Motivations of love are much rare as most of them can be found at higher levels of our lives.

For example, when you are searching for meaning in your life. You are doing so because love is driving you to do so. You constantly search for your passions. Fear may exist here but it’s not the one driving your motivation to find meaning in your life.

You can use this idea to examine your world and see if it makes sense. If it does, examine how other people in it behave. Examine the way people treat you and how you treat them.

Understand that it is either fear or love that is behind their actions. You may then develop a more empathetic perspective for them thereby improving the nature and quality of your relationship with them and your life in general.