Walker wrote: ↑Sun Sep 17, 2023 3:53 pm
To answer your question, I mean the attitude of asking nothing from a loved one will eventually, over time, cause one to be taken for granted by that loved one, and that affects the behavior of the loved one towards you, because you asked for nothing.
If someone I love takes me for granted just because I ask nothing from them, then that is not love. Personally, to love someone,to me, means not taking people I love for granted, and not to ask anything from them in return for my love to them, like for instance, I can love someone, but then wouldn't dream of asking them for their love in return. That's not love according to my version of what love means.
To love is not to ask anything in return, not even to feel that you are giving something.
I never give someone I love the sense that they should love me back just because I love them. If someone I love does not love me back, but I love them, then I am fine with that, it wouldn't change the situation, I would still love them regardless, because loving someone to me is just something that either happens or it doesn't. I can't help who I fall in love with, and I love my children but in no way do I expect them to love me back.
To love someone is not to expect them to love you back by assuming that by loving someone automatically obliges them to love you just because you are giving them something to make them feel as if they have received something from you, and should feel obligated to return that something given by also giving it back. That's what the quote means, well to me anyway, that's how I interpret it as saying.
Of course we ask our loved ones something, like can you pass me the salt at the dinner table. That's just basic communication between two people, and has nothing to do with loving them, or them loving us just because they've answered the question, can you pass the salt, by actually passing the salt. But we cannot ask someone to love us just because we have given our love to them, as a something. That's what the quote means, to me anyway, might not be for you, but for me, that's what it means.
Walker wrote: ↑Sun Sep 17, 2023 3:53 pmOn the other hand, those who are remembered when all others are gone are those who loved us unselfishly. Parents and grandparents, perhaps others, who loved us into being.
One might love one into being, but no one who is loved into being is under any obligation to love back that person who loved them into being. And that person who was loved into being has every right to ask the one who has loved them into being, that they do not want to love them back, just because they chose to love them into being. That's not love.
Loving other people and expecting them to love you back is unhealthy attachment, and that attachment can hurt and deeply wound you, if the loved one dies, or doesn't love you back the way you love them. That's an expectant love, a needy love, that you impose upon yourself, you become dependant on their love, to love you, just because you loved them into being. That is not love, in my humble opinion, so as usual, I do not agree with you Walker.
But thanks for responding to my post with your reply.