I was speaking with a friend about love. I don’t remember the exact context, or how the conversation began, but it had roots in love being the peak experience of life, of it being what helps to turn the world most harmoniously on its axis. We noted that the love must be unconditional, and then we stopped, because what does this even mean?
We use the phrase all the time within relationships, but which of us has stopped to really define our own individual understanding? When we talk about love, the type that arrives with conditions and the type that does not, are we clear on what we’re saying? For most, unconditional love is to give or receive it freely, without strings. But when we call for someone to love us unconditionally – our flaws, our strengths, the things we hide and the things that matter to us; I wonder whether what we’re really asking for is acceptance. I wonder whether the reason so many relationships fail, why we battle with parts of our own self, is because our root language is so incorrect that it cannot bear the fruit needed to sustain us.
What would happen if we admitted that it is possible to both love someone without condition and yet not accept them for who they are? It sounds like a paradox, I know, but bear with me. I’m talking about love that persists despite, that thrives regardless, love that will not die but remains hopeful and restless for change.
What alchemy would occur if we stopped believing love can be subdivided or categorised into conditional and unconditional, and instead twinned it with the entirely separate state of acceptance? Love is love, or it is not. And acceptance is unconcerned with the heartstrings, it defers us to the intellect, will mark crossed boundaries and remain vigilant for behaviour that challenges our map of the world, or love for self. It will show us in certain terms, that to love or be loved is a thing on its own, and that to be accepted is the gift that may accompany it, or not. The two can (and often do) exist independently.
When coupled in their most extreme expressions, love and acceptance will always challenge each other. For example, where there is abuse in relationships, one must have strength enough to disentangle the act of walking away from the assumption of love no longer being present. I love you but I will not accept the way you treat me, is a sentence to tongue-tie many. The notion of unconditional, has been so manipulated that it has cut the strings tying us to our own care and self-respect.
The flipside of this is fully accepting a person for who they are but rebuffing their pleas to be loved because well, it’s not them, it’s you, and you simply don’t feel that way about them. It is possible to accept people and to reject them from your life – a concept unfortunately lost to the last generation to grace this planet.
Perhaps the problem with acceptance, more so than love, is that it’s one of the hardest gifts to give and receive. It’s not necessarily sexy, it doesn’t always arrive with butterflies in your stomach, doesn’t make your heart skip a beat. Usually, if one suffers from the typical human ailment of ‘I’m not good enough’ acceptance will flat-out confuse us. That someone does not find our quirks off-putting, or our belief systems irregular, will usher us into thinking their love is given freely and purely. Here, in this moment, is where we mistake acceptance for love. And yes, for a time, it can be as intoxicating.
Maybe in the throes of personal relationships, whether at the start, middle or end, what we need to ask is both “are we loved” and “are we accepted”. The distinction between these two questions and their potential answers is a different, higher springboard to finding the truth of a situation. When we free ourselves from trite or overused language such as unconditional love, we move closer to connecting with what we really need to know or express, about ourselves and others. To love and to wholly accept is a rare talent, and I dare say that even the best of us will falter in performing it. But let’s remember, the world has copious amounts of love that is surely helping it to spin, what’s missing is the honesty around whether that love comes alone, or with the acceptance needed to make it harmonious.