Just because you love someone, doesn’t mean you know how….
Love can be experienced as a profound emotional desire to care for another person. However, this feeling doesn’t come with instructions on how to care for someone in a truly constructive manner. It is not enough to love someone, you also need to learn and practice the behavior that actually helps that individual thrive.
Imagine a small child who captures a frog and loves the frog so much that she wants to take it home as a pet. She puts the frog in a box with some grass and the poor frog is dead within three days. The child loved the frog, so she is heartbroken. Obviously, love was not enough to sustain this relationship. It takes knowledge and even skill-building to take appropriate care of something that you love.
People are trained, certified, and licensed to participate in many different areas of life, but the most important thing in life, which is LOVE, is given very little if any formal attention. Even a basic definition of the word is lacking as most of us struggle to even simply define love. So, I would like to make a few suggestions;
M. Scott Peck has a definition of love in his book, “The Road Less Traveled, ” which I think is most helpful. He states that love is a commitment to promoting the growth and well-being of someone. Of course, he continues with many other clear and concise definitions and methods to help the reader become better at loving. I highly recommend this book, for starters. Another good book is “The Five Love Languages” by Gary Chapman. However, my simple point to you is to make a real effort to learn how to love. If you are newly married, consider reading the book “Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus” by John Gray. It is obvious that we all have much to learn about the opposite gender and how to love them differently.
Perhaps, most importantly, we should all learn something about how to love children. This can be most complex for many reasons, one being that they change so drastically from year to year. Parents also commonly either over-emphasize their responsibility to correct (and the child feels they are never good enough), or overdo praise, neglecting discipline. Discipline must be understood as a responsibility to teach, not to punish. Consequences for unwanted, unhealthy behavior are only a small part of instruction. Disciplining a child is challenging and the most useful tool is actually encouragement. One valuable body of knowledge in this area of how to love is “Systematic Training for Effective Parenting” by Don Dinkmeyer and Gary McKay.
If you educate yourself and subsequently find it hard to carry out methods that make sense to you, then perhaps you may have some emotional obstacles left over from your own childhood. In that case, consider an emotional cleansing with an Enlight application to clear the path to a more loving you. Visit enlighttreatment.com today for more information.