Unconditional Love

April 2008

Unconditional Love - A Vital Aspect of
all Successful Relationships

Although we may not always realise that we are doing it, we normally place
conditions on our happiness. We decide that we will be happy when certain
conditions are met in our lives - for instance, we might decide that we
must live in a particular type of house in a particular location for us to
be truly satisfied and happy. Or it might be about a situation that we
feel must come about - for example, we decide that we must get a particular
job promotion so that we can be content in our work. There is one other big
condition that we often set before we think we can find happiness - we must
find Mr or Mrs Right. We believe another person in the shape of a partner
will make us happy.

Think about all the conditions you have set yourself for happiness - make
a list of them. Notice how we can spend our whole life waiting for these
things to be fulfilled. Even if we fufill one, we then create a new one!

All of these conditions have one thing in common, and ironically it is a
flaw that prevents us ever finding lasting happiness. Each of these
conditions is about bringing something from the outside, to make us happy.
Each of these conditions is designed to meet a need - to fill an emptiness
we have inside. These conditions fail because ultimately we cannot ask
anybody else or any situation to heal our insecurities and sense of lack -
we must do that ourselves.

In the relationship work I do, I often hear people complaining that their
partner does not do things right - fails to meet their expectations of a
devoted, loving partner. They normally say that they no longer love their
partner in the way they did when they first met - they think their partner
has changed. This is conditional love - it says that "when you behave in
the way I want you to, then I will love you." This places a huge demand on
the other person and they feel they are being judged. They might find that
they are frozen out and starved of love, unless they behave in the expected
way. It is not surprising that this control will damage or destroy a
relationship.

The way forward is therefore Unconditional Love, which as it's name
suggest, sets absolutely no conditions on the love that we feel for another
person. It really does mean that we will love them no matter how they
behave or treat us. Of course this can be a real 'stretch' because we will
often feel that the other person does not deserve our love. To
break-through this resistance we need to look within and see that the every
thing we are asking as a condition of our love is something we are not
doing ourselves. For instance - we might say that the condition of our love
is that our partner must listen to us and understand us as a person. But
how well have we listened to and understood them? As all bad behaviour
originates from low self-esteem, if they are not behaving in the way we
want them to, then we have failed to fully understand why this is. If we
could see their inner pain we would know why they are not meeting our
conditions and immediately know how to respond with empathy and compassion.

Tip

To be able to love somebody unconditionally we need to be able to see
through the surface behaviour to the beautiful. innocent, perfect person
underneath. If you find this hard to do today - think back to the time you
fell in love with them. Those amazing feelings came about because you were
loving them unconditionally - faults and all! It was only later those
faults became more obvious as you settled down to a longer-term
relationship. So think back to those heady times and visualise yourselves
back in that situation of falling in love. Re-live those feelings and then
take a long, compassionate look at your partner - see their beauty and
grace and imagine yourself melting into them. Forgive them for failing your
conditions and forgive yourself for doing the same. If you can, tell them
how much you appreciate and love them and remind them of those original
wonderful times together - those feelnigs are still available as soon as
you stop judging them and placing conditions on your love.

Conditional love is a viscous circle because if we withdraw our love as a
form of punishment, our partner does exactly the same to us. Unconditional
love has the opposite effect - it reinforces itself because the forgiveness
and acceptance is felt as pure love by our partners and they then naturally
return it. Practice unconditional love at every opportunity with your
partners, family, friends and colleagues - it is the key to sustained
happiness.

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