I like your “giving / craving / euphoria” classification.
I wonder whether the debates about love are often so confused precisely because in human mind the feelings are not clearly separated. We are prone to the halo effect; for example, if someone is sexually attractive, we might instinctively assume that they are probably also good, smart, etc. (Then some people get burned, and sometimes they overcompensate by making the opposite assumptions.)
But sometimes there are genuine effects of different kind happening all at the same time. For example, I may feel good when I have some kind of (non-sexual) interaction with someone… and at the same time, I may find them sexually attractive (but perhaps I have never communicated this aspect to them, and I have no idea whether they feel the same way about me)… and at the same time, I may feel altruistic towards them. These things happening together have a different flavor than if they happened separately.
So maybe “love” points towards the complex outcome when you strongly desire someone, and simultaneously wish them well, and simultaneously feel happy with them. Some people succeed to get the whole package. Some people only get a part of it, and find the experience confusing, asking themselves whether this is or isn’t “love”… and maybe try to fix the wrong part, for example by trying harder to be altruistic, when the actually missing part is that the other person’s presence doesn’t make them happy.
Well, that would be the whole package for romantic love. The whole package for loving your children includes wishing them well and feeling happy with them and feeling optimistic about their future. Etc.
People are kinda right when they refuse to be more specific, because “love” refers to the entire package, not any of its individual parts. But being more specific can be useful for figuring out why someone fails at love (what part exactly is missing from the package).
I like your “giving / craving / euphoria” classification.
I wonder whether the debates about love are often so confused precisely because in human mind the feelings are not clearly separated. We are prone to the halo effect; for example, if someone is sexually attractive, we might instinctively assume that they are probably also good, smart, etc. (Then some people get burned, and sometimes they overcompensate by making the opposite assumptions.)
But sometimes there are genuine effects of different kind happening all at the same time. For example, I may feel good when I have some kind of (non-sexual) interaction with someone… and at the same time, I may find them sexually attractive (but perhaps I have never communicated this aspect to them, and I have no idea whether they feel the same way about me)… and at the same time, I may feel altruistic towards them. These things happening together have a different flavor than if they happened separately.
So maybe “love” points towards the complex outcome when you strongly desire someone, and simultaneously wish them well, and simultaneously feel happy with them. Some people succeed to get the whole package. Some people only get a part of it, and find the experience confusing, asking themselves whether this is or isn’t “love”… and maybe try to fix the wrong part, for example by trying harder to be altruistic, when the actually missing part is that the other person’s presence doesn’t make them happy.
Well, that would be the whole package for romantic love. The whole package for loving your children includes wishing them well and feeling happy with them and feeling optimistic about their future. Etc.
People are kinda right when they refuse to be more specific, because “love” refers to the entire package, not any of its individual parts. But being more specific can be useful for figuring out why someone fails at love (what part exactly is missing from the package).