I flipped open to this section of Harville Hendrix's book Keeping the Love You Find, in a bookstore and I resonated so much to it I immediately copied it into my journal (my "commonplace book"). Although the book is focused on a specific two-way commited relationship, i.e. marriage, this section is particularly universal to all relationships:
"... [The Greek word] agape, an unconditional concern for the other that elevates the partner's emotional and spiritual welfare to a condition of absolute priority--thus guaranteeing your partner's safety, and paradoxically, your own. (Safety, it seems, is the necessary precondition for optimal life throughout nature.) In a relationship, safety means the end of criticism and all other forms of abuse.
. . .
NO STRINGS ATTACHED
"Unconditional love of the other turns out to be the highest form of self-interest and the key to one's personal welfare. But the catch is that if you do it for the outcome, paradise will elude you. You do it because it should be done.
Agape refers to the self-transformational act of caring absolutely and unconditionally for another in the exact way they need to be cared for. [Agape was conceived of in "the period of Greek tribal wars preceeding the golden age of Pericles."]
Pondering this eternal dilemma of how to end war, they came to the conclusion that war was a function of the perception of the "other"--i.e. the "enemy"--as a "nonperson," or someone who is not human. . . . Furthermore, they argued that the "other" who was the enemy should be redefined as "kin." That makes him "one of us."
. . . To this new code of international behavior they gave the word agape--meaning unconditional acceptance of the other who is now "one of us," a "no strings attached" commitment to their welfare. This seems to be the origen of the idea of "unconditionality" in the granting of a privilege or the giving of a gift. Agape is not an economic barter or a "trade agreement" in which one or both racks up deficits in the exchange of goods. It is a reciprocal exchange without anyone keeping score.
. . .the unconscious is singularly unimpressed with them [bargains]. It needs and will be satisfied only with unconditional love." - Harville Hendrix, Keeping the Love You Find
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