Some things you love because they are good, others because they are yours
FAMILY IS yours
There are things you love because they are good: a beautiful sunset, a graceful ballerina or a no-hitter, a magnificent painting, an exquisite sculpture, a symphonic performance, an act of selfless sacrifice, a stary night sky, or even a mathematical formula. These are examples of things that are inherently loveable and deserve to be cherished in-and-of-themselves. They embody one of the transcendentals: The True, The Good or The Beautiful.
On the other hand, there are things you love because they are yours: your children, your baseball team, your city, your mother and father, your dog, your home, your brothers and sisters, your country – all forms of this kind of love are an extension of a healthy love-of-self. This love is not contingent on the goodness or beauty or truth or usefulness of what is loved. It cannot be earned or lost. It is inalienable as-long-as that which is loved is yours.
The confusion of these two types of love, or reasons for loving, leads to much suffering in family life. Likewise, there is much confusion over what it means “to love” and what it does and does not require of us. These and other matters are (or soon will be) discussed on the “Thoughts” page of this website.
