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What is the Meaning, Concepts and Theories of Love

by Abbey
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At school we learn that love is an abstract feeling that we can not touch but can only be feel and experience. Our goal in this article is to go a little further and understand the meaning of the word love, the concepts behind this real abstract feeling, and to understand how a little 4 letters word can inhabits our collective imagination as human being, transforms us, elevates us and often makes us lose our selfish reasons for someone else

Meaning of the word love:

The word love has its origin in Latin, love, as we know it, can be a sign of compassion for someone, a simple affection, a type of physical attraction that can converge in Passion or a good want, also means mercy, sexual desire, can be applied also in the family sense, father’s love, mother’s love, between brothers.  Love in Latin has two more variations with the same meaning, “Dilectio and Charitas”. A word so tiny but so rich and with so many developments, that’s what it means, a greater amplitude than we can measure.

“How to explain love: is to like someone without looking at who, to want well without having a why, just to want.” to dream of living with someone else all our lives. Love only for loving without knowing why. If you can explain it better, let us know “

Note: The Greeks also had words to define love and types of love, they are:

Eros: love expressed in a physical form, deeply passionate.

Pragma: the one who seeks the practical side of relationship/feelings, symbolized by that person who only enters a relationship if he is sure that he will achieve some practical goal, the one who wants to benefit himself, who wants something in return.

Philia: whose meaning is generosity, altruism, the opposite of pragma, the one who thinks before the other, the one who does not care to give up what he has to live a great passion and satisfy his partner even if he has to sacrifice himself.

Characteristics and Concepts about Love

The characteristics of love are many as explained above but to fully understand this complex feeling we must bring to light the concepts about love, those that are characterized by the formation of emotional bonds with other people, whether family, friends or even a loving relationship in its most complex styles and possibilities.

“To love is to prove what is beyond time, is to live a lifetime in just a moment, is to experience eternity without becoming nostalgic, is to know everything that has been said and have nothing to say, is to defy physics and occupy two places at at the same time, in space, is to feel like God without being so, is to be happy to have someone to share life without dividing, only adding, only loving! “

To understand more deeply the concept of love, it is necessary to understand that this feeling is like a living organism that constantly feeds on reciprocal feelings, a series of stimuli that can be demonstrated through gestures, words, thoughts, these stimuli can be sensorial or psychological and are of great value to sustain this feeling, so that it may grow, so that it may bear fruit. We can say that for love to grow, it is necessary to stimulate the motivation of both parties so that they can create the necessary connection so that this conviviality can be called love.

The various forms of manifestation of love:

Mother’s Love: Perhaps the greatest manifestation of love felt by a human being, the love of mother is beyond all that can be said, that can be understood, which comes closest to the love of God, since in the same way that God created all things, created life, the Mother also, give life to the child and give her life if necessary.

Physical love, passion, falling in love: This is the most common manifestation of love, when two people fall in love, when two beings recognize themselves as soulmate and unite with the bond of endless possibilities and passion. It inebriates and can lead human being to commit either heroic acts or barbarous crimes.

Platonic love: A kind of love that is very poorly interpreted by people, in a popular, empirical view, says that a person has a platonic love when he loves someone and that person does not know, that person who dies of love for someone and can not declare his feeling and idealizes in his mind a beautiful story with only one real protagonist and another imaginary. In fact, Platonic Love is based on the concept of Plato’s philosophy of something existing only in the plane of ideas, where there can exist an ideal and perfect love that exists only in the mind of those who project it, a utopia that may or may not become a reality, it only depends on its idealizer.

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Passion: It is very common to hear the phrase “I am in love”, there is no harm when love becomes passion, the problem starts when loves becomes passion and passion becomes pathological. A pathological passionate love, is a disease whose symptoms are characterized by the loss of reason, when a person leaves aside his rational side and indulges in primitive instincts contained in all of us and becomes dangerously possessive to their beloved ones. In its romantic manifestation, passion is a good thing to be felt and experienced by lovers, in its pathological manifestation it can imprisons, maltreats and even kill.

Theory of Love Styles:

In the year 1970 Professor Alan John Lee introduced to the world the theory of love styles, where he used a number of distinct models to come to his conclusions, studying romance books, philosophical and psychological studies in addition to films and a series of documentaries produced so far, his conclusion gave rise to the theory of the various forms of love that love is a feeling learned throughout a relationship or throughout a lifetime. Its varied styles reflect the various forms of love according to the environment, political and social situation in which they were inserted.

Later researchers and professors of psychology at Texas Tech University Susan Hendrick and Clyde Hendrick further deepened Lee’s theory and created the Love Attitudes Scale, from the six types of love classified by Alan John Lee the researchers observed interpersonal relationships correlated.

Agape: altruism in the form of love, this is truly spiritual, without the need to be reciprocated, which exists only to help others. Father Marcelo Rossi wrote a book about Agape, where he tries to explain this feeling, this manifestation split from love through religious life and surrender to others.

Psyche: A superior feeling, almost spiritual, grounded in the mind and philosophical sentiments.

Ludus: Practiced by people who like to play, make the feeling of loving a game where there can only be one winner or who plays with the feelings of the loved one.

Eros: The closest to what we know by passion, based on physical beauty, in appearances.

Storge: It is that love that arises over time, often begins with a friendship that will mature where two people meet as equals, with similar feelings and tastes.

Pragma: a more selfish, pragmatic love that usually comes with a goal, with a need that usually benefits only one person.

Mania: Where emotion speaks stronger, very unstable and approaches the feeling of passion that can evolve into a sickening jealousy and feeling of possession.

Reference and sources of research and bibliographical references for you to delve into the subject.

Romantic Love , book by Susan Hendrick and Clyde Hendrick
https://books.google.com/books/about/Romantic_love.html 

Expression and perception of the feelings of love and lack of love in the experience of the loving dyad, by Marina Vilela
https://bibliotecadigital.fgv.br/dspace/handle/10438/9696

Love
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love

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