₦airaland Forum

1) Conditional love leads to unconditional love

The path of conditional love leads to unconditional love, same way childhood leads to adulthood. But this is not an excuse to stay stuck there at conditional love. The same way we suffer when we try to physically restrict the growth of a child to adulthood (if ever possible), is the same way we suffer when we try to hinder our non-physical growth. Growth occurs physically and also non-physically too, and you might have heard of the non-physical growth — you likely call it 'Maturity' or use it in sentences like 'he acts and speaks maturely even for his age'

Stagnation in growth leads to suffering, and stagnating doesn't mean not progressing from point A to B, it also mean dwelling at point A and egoistically thinking that it's the growth ceiling.

By proper definition, if conditional love is one with conditions, then what truly is unconditional love and how best do we practice this form of love necessary for our growth?

Unconditional love simply means loving without attachments, and it can genuinely be expressed when we learn to give exactly what we can afford to lose.
For example, if you have #2000 and the amount you can afford to give is #20, do so shamelessly and lovingly without judging yourself on the amount you're giving.

'Shamelessly' in the sense that the amount you're giving might seem little to others, but it's what you can afford to give and sleep well at night. The price for authenticity is attachment because if you really want to live your truth and convictions, you must be willing to lose relationships or attachments which doesn't support the new you. That's the price to pay for being a new you

Conditional love occurs in a scenario where you have #2000 and you feel subtly ego compelled to give #500, an amount far greater than what you can can to lose.
That #480 difference (compared to the first example of #20) is the price you paid for your suffering of attachments to the outcome of your giving

That's where expectations such as
“She didn't even thank me enough for helping her with my money”
or
“I hope he's spending my hard-earned money well and not wasting my sweat!”
or
“I hope I finally get the respect of my colleague by spending this much in the bar for their drinks”
or
“I hope he'll love me forever after giving him my virginity”
Expectations/ attachments such as these creeps up in our minds when we give more than we genuinely can afford to lose.

You have a right to perform your prescribed duties, but you are not entitled to the fruits of your actions. Never consider yourself to be the cause of the results of your activities, nor be attached to inaction." —
Bhagavad Gita

Don't give what you can't afford to lose, because I've learnt from my experience and from that of the people around me, that by so doing, it creates attachments to the expectation that you hope to get from your giving, which then leads to tension and hurt, especially when your expectation(s) doesn't come to fruition. And when such category of givers get hurt because their giving wasn't appreciated, even with a simple “thank you”, they lash out and build a wall of defense around themselves, telling themselves that no one will ever see them so vulnerable again. You likely term this "see finish"
This leads to the birth of Pride in them, a situation where people who are capable of giving and receiving love, prevent themselves from giving and receiving love all because they're scared of getting hurt or being underappreciated
This is the real definition of Pride.
https://www.nairaland.com/8703930/ego-phases-ego-simplified

Expressing unconditional love to yourself or to others isn't limited to physical cash alone. You could also learn to invest the time that you can afford to lose on someone(relationship) or a project and not feel regret.
Same goes for trust, tolerance and other non physical goods
Now this brings us to a twist

If unconditional love means expressing love to others or to yourself, without expecting anything in return, then the best set of people to practice your unconditional love of giving are towards stingy people or people who find it difficult to say a "thank you" for the help you've rendered to them. It's not primarily for you to wake the up from their slumber of ungratefulness but for you to feel happy to have been of genuine help to those who need it.
The joy on the face of a person you've helped or the thought of you being a factor to reduce someone's suffering should be enough reward for you, as a genuine giver. The act itself should be your reward.

The best set of people to express your unconditional love of non-sexual attention to, especially as a man, are physically non-attractive ladies, or beautiful girls who are in very serious relationships with other men.

If you, as a man, can still love a physically attractive girl who is in a very serious relationship with another man, with no expectation of a thank-you-sex from her as a payment for the "unconditional love" you just expressed towards her, therein lies your growth.

Love that security that cannot offer you an appointment letter to aso rock.

Love that your cleaner that cannot even help you with job connects.

Little wonder why Jesus said, "love your enemies"
This is because our enemies are the people who can't reciprocate our love. Instead, they'd even repay us with hate. Lol. A form of repayment which shouldn't bother a true giver. Learn to discern what that means

By giving what we can genuinely afford to lose, we remain at peace with ourselves regardless of the outcome of our giving.

To summarize,
a) Give what you can afford to lose
b) Increase your capacity for giving, because that's how you grow and not stagnate (Probably you could achieve this with the understanding that all that can be taken away will be taken away from you in time, so they're not your identity. Your identity is what remains when all that can be taken away from you is taken away from you (surname, religion, family, skin color, tribe, gadgets etc)

One love

Another step to walk to know what loving without attachments is: https://www.nairaland.com/8577305/dont-try-change-people-accept

Reverseng:
1) Conditional love leads to unconditional love

The path of conditional love leads to unconditional love, same way childhood leads to adulthood. But this is not an excuse to stay stuck there at conditional love. The same way we suffer when we try to physically restrict the growth of a child to adulthood (if ever possible), is the same way we suffer when we try to hinder our non-physical growth. Growth occurs physically and also non-physically too, and you might have heard of the non-physical growth — you likely call it 'Maturity' or use it in sentences like 'he acts and speaks maturely even for his age'

Stagnation in growth leads to suffering, and stagnating doesn't mean not progressing from point A to B, it also mean dwelling at point A and egoistically thinking that it's the growth ceiling.

By proper definition, if conditional love is one with conditions, then what truly is unconditional love and how best do we practice this form of love necessary for our growth?

Unconditional love simply means loving without attachments, and it can genuinely be expressed when we learn to give exactly what we can afford to lose.
For example, if you have #2000 and the amount you can afford to give is #20, do so shamelessly and lovingly without judging yourself on the amount you're giving.

'Shamelessly' in the sense that the amount you're giving might seem little to others, but it's what you can afford to give and sleep well at night. The price for authenticity is attachment because if you really want to live your truth and convictions, you must be willing to lose relationships or attachments which doesn't support the new you. That's the price to pay for being a new you

Conditional love occurs in a scenario where you have #2000 and you feel subtly ego compelled to give #500, an amount far greater than what you can can to lose.
That #480 difference (compared to the first example of #20) is the price you paid for your suffering of attachments to the outcome of your giving

That's where expectations such as
“She didn't even thank me enough for helping her with my money”
or
“I hope he's spending my hard-earned money well and not wasting my sweat!”
or
“I hope I finally get the respect of my colleague by spending this much in the bar for their drinks”
or
“I hope he'll love me forever after giving him my virginity”
Expectations/ attachments such as these creeps up in our minds when we give more than we genuinely can afford to lose.

You have a right to perform your prescribed duties, but you are not entitled to the fruits of your actions. Never consider yourself to be the cause of the results of your activities, nor be attached to inaction." —
Bhagavad Gita

Don't give what you can't afford to lose, because I've learnt from my experience and from that of the people around me, that by so doing, it creates attachments to the expectation that you hope to get from your giving, which then leads to tension and hurt, especially when your expectation(s) doesn't come to fruition. And when such category of givers get hurt because their giving wasn't appreciated, even with a simple “thank you”, they lash out and build a wall of defense around themselves, telling themselves that no one will ever see them so vulnerable again. You likely term this "see finish"
This leads to the birth of Pride in them, a situation where people who are capable of giving and receiving love, prevent themselves from giving and receiving love all because they're scared of getting hurt or being underappreciated
This is the real definition of Pride.
https://www.nairaland.com/8703930/ego-phases-ego-simplified

Expressing unconditional love to yourself or to others isn't limited to physical cash alone. You could also learn to invest the time that you can afford to lose on someone(relationship) or a project and not feel regret.
Same goes for trust, tolerance and other non physical goods
Now this brings us to a twist

If unconditional love means expressing love to others or to yourself, without expecting anything in return, then the best set of people to practice your unconditional love of giving are towards stingy people or people who find it difficult to say a "thank you" for the help you've rendered to them. It's not primarily for you to wake the up from their slumber of ungratefulness but for you to feel happy to have been of genuine help to those who need it.
The joy on the face of a person you've helped or the thought of you being a factor to reduce someone's suffering should be enough reward for you, as a genuine giver. The act itself should be your reward.

The best set of people to express your unconditional love of non-sexual attention to, especially as a man, are physically non-attractive ladies, or beautiful girls who are in very serious relationships with other men.

If you, as a man, can still love a physically attractive girl who is in a very serious relationship with another man, with no expectation of a thank-you-sex from her as a payment for the "unconditional love" you just expressed towards her, therein lies your growth.

Love that security that cannot offer you an appointment letter to aso rock.

Love that your cleaner that cannot even help you with job connects.

Little wonder why Jesus said, "love your enemies"
This is because our enemies are the people who can't reciprocate our love. Instead, they'd even repay us with hate. Lol. A form of repayment which shouldn't bother a true giver. Learn to discern what that means

By giving what we can genuinely afford to lose, we remain at peace with ourselves regardless of the outcome of our giving.

To summarize,
a) Give what you can afford to lose
b) Increase your capacity for giving, because that's how you grow and not stagnate (Probably you could achieve this with the understanding that all that can be taken away will be taken away from you in time, so they're not your identity. Your identity is what remains when all that can be taken away from you is taken away from you (surname, religion, family, skin color, tribe, gadgets etc)

One love

Your points are understandable, but I think it somehow defeats the concept of gratitude (that’s if you believe in it).

Going by your notion, then what’s the purpose of gratitude?
What’s the purpose of being grateful or appreciative to the universe for having the blessings you have?

If the universe loves you “unconditionally,” then the universe shouldn’t care about your being grateful or not.

What makes you think the universe does?
Don't you think the universe has given what she can too?

Your ability to be grateful is a judgement on you, and not of the universe expecting you to be. If you're grateful, fine
If you're not grateful, it's still fine.

Look at the sun. You know how important the sun is to life here on earth. Do you worship it? In all your life, have you for once thanked the sun directly for just shining??

Imagine how pained the sun would feel that after almost effort, it's not getting the recognition it deserves. Probably the sun should pack up and go shine on another planet since most humans don't even acknowledge it.

I advise you have a re-read using the likely insight from this reply

It's unconditional love
Not conditional love

Liballo:
Your points are understandable, but I think it somehow defeats the concept of gratitude (that’s if you believe in it).

Going by your notion, then what’s the purpose of gratitude?
What’s the purpose of being grateful or appreciative to the universe for having the blessings you have?

If the universe loves you “unconditionally,” then the universe shouldn’t care about your being grateful or not.

Cc: Olaolar
In response to your recent post where you said you're conflicted on the man you're becoming