Satya's Philosophy: The Greatest Pain

[Satya]

The greatest pain in this world is to be unloved.

To be cheated on by your lover.
To be betrayed by your friends.
To be abandoned by your family.
To be ostracized, segregated, or tormented by your fellow human beings.
To be forsaken by your God.

What people tend to forget is that love serves only one purpose. That purpose is unity. Love exists to bond people to each other. While the reasons love brings people together may vary...

For procreation or sexual gratification
For fun, fondness, and utility
For stability and security
For a certain way of life
For faith and hope

...what always remains the same is how love seems to draw people toward oneness.

However, choosing love means choosing pain. Love empowers. It delegates a special power to others known as trust. Those who cannot bestow trust in others are incapable of love. But trust is easily violated. People are often unwise in how they use this power delegated to them by others because they often love themselves first and foremost. And thus, pain is an inevitable part of love because human nature is imperfect and inherently selfish. That is why lying is a detestable sin. It violates trust, it destroy bonds, it make peoples feel unloved, and its brings them great pain.

Love is also the source of all conflict, simply because love is divided.

Those who first and foremost choose to love themselves.
Those who first and foremost choose to love their friends and family.
Those who first and foremost choose to lover their lover.
Those who first and foremost choose to love their people or country.
Those who first and foremost choose to love their God.

By choosing to love one being over another, humans create all the conflict in this world. Human greed, pride, possessiveness, bigotry, and righteousness are born from these choices. Those who choose to love one more than another look down on all those who do not share their kind of love. They see their love as superior to all other forms of love. A Randist may say that for a person to love themselves is the greatest love and all other forms of love are irrational, whereas a Christian may say that for a person to love God is the greatest form of love, and all other forms of love are blasphemous. Choosing one form of love over another defeats the purpose of love, since it divides people.

True unconditional love may be to embrace the greatest pain as part of life, and to use it to help us remember why we must always love others. As long as we can remember what it feels like to be unloved, we can find the strength to trust in and love others.

 

[Shai Gar]

cuddle

 

[Satya]

cuddle

I am feeling awfully snuggley today. But don't tell the other INFJs.

 

[Shai Gar]

Heee, INFJs are always snugly

 

[Satya]

Heee, INFJs are always snugly

Shuddup.

 

[frozen_water]

Very nice. Seriously, the only thing I can find to nitpick about that (besides the "Christians would find other kinds of love as blasphemous," which is just wrong--but not important to your overall point) is that I don't think it's loving one person more than another that causes conflict. It's close... but I think it's only because to love one object/person more that another means that you're not loving whatever the "other" person/object is as much as you could. Love isn't something that's limited--it's not like you could choose to love one person totally or two people at half strength. Instead I think it multiplies to encompass the other person/object. I don't think it's loving one person more than another that causes conflict, then (because that would presuppose jealousy, which is a type of conflict... otherwise no one would be upset by someone loving something else), but the fact that you're not loving as much as you could.

So if jealousy exists, divided/uneven love will enhance the conflict. If all conflicts are caused by divided love, though, I think you have to say that it's the lack of total love itself that causes the conflict to stay consistent.

 

[Satya]

Seriously, the only thing I can find to nitpick about that (besides the "Christians would find other kinds of love as blasphemous," which is just wrong--but not important to your overall point)

My apologies. I was debating with some Christians the other day, and they argued the Aquina's perspective that since God is the most rational being, he is the most deserving of love. And they further eluded that love for God must come over love for neighbors, friends, lovers, and even family. They cited the story of Abraham and Issac to demonstrate this point, since God demanded greater love from Abraham than he had for his own son. This is what I find to be intuitively wrong with the Christian religion. Love that is out of balance. A God that demands so much and belittles the human love that he has so graciously gifted us. But this also permits a sort of religious bigotry, by which anyone who is chooses to love another human being seemingly more than God is judged harshly.

So if jealousy exists, divided/uneven love will enhance the conflict. If all conflicts are caused by divided love, though, I think you have to say that it's the lack of total love itself that causes the conflict to stay consistent.

Perhaps. Perhaps that is the underlying force. Jealousy is born from not having the total love that you desire.

Is it possible that we choose to love certain things more than others to condemn those who possess love that we wish we had? Do we attempt to estrange others from love by judging them?

 

[frozen_water]

ooh'k... see I'd agree with everything they said, er... maybe besides "rational beings" are most deserving of love, but that doesn't amount to "all other kinds of love are blasphemous."

Is it possible that we choose to love certain things more than others to condemn those who possess love that we wish we had? Do we attempt to estrange others from love by judging them?

That... seems very possible to me. It seems impossible to answer about anyone but yourself, though, since you don't know others' motives. It would certainly account for a self-perpetuating cause of problems for people, at least. One person is not loved as much as they need to be, so they choose to not love (some) others as much as they could, creating more holes in others' hearts and causing their problems.

The one question I think it does leave unanswered though (that is, if it's accurate and right) is how the chain started. If there was just born a person who wished for more love than they had that started the chain, then that person was just excessively greedy for love... meaning they had a problem that was not caused by a lack of love originally. If there was some person who decided not to love someone else as fully as they could and that started the chain, then there was a person who did something hurtful that was not started by a lack of love. Really, the only way I can see a chain like that starting is if someone had a legitimate reason to love one person more than another (say if they were mother and son, or close friends whose relationship developed over a long period of time), and someone else didn't understand the reason for it and just thought they were unloved, or less loved than they should be. In other words, it would have to start with both some natural hierarchy of who should be loved more than others (like within a family as opposed to like a stranger), as well as someone who didn't understand or accept that natural hierarchy.

um... wow, ok, I promise I didn't set this up to sound like this, and just typed my natural thoughts as they came up... but as soon as I hit that last sentence, I realized just how close that comes to flat-out agreeing with the people who you were debating. If the lack of love is actually what causes and sustains all problems, though, that's the first cause that jumped out at me.

 

[Satya]

ooh'k... see I'd agree with everything they said, er... maybe besides "rational beings" are most deserving of love, but that doesn't amount to "all other kinds of love are blasphemous."

That's simply what I don't like about Christianity. Why should anyone be forced to love a God above everyone else who is invisible and silent? Especially since in order to do so we have to believe a contradicting book which has sexist, homophobic, racist, and sadistic themes. I would sooner go to hell than spend eternity with a God who is so dumb and twisted that he punishes people for not loving him when he has provided that kind of sketchy evidence of his existence. But that is another debate.

um... wow, ok, I promise I didn't set this up to sound like this, and just typed my natural thoughts as they came up... but as soon as I hit that last sentence, I realized just how close that comes to flat-out agreeing with the people who you were debating. If the lack of love is actually what causes and sustains all problems, though, that's the first cause that jumped out at me.

I guess it is simply going to have to be my choice. I'm fine with others choosing to love their God above everyone else, or loving their child over their own life, or even loving themselves more than their friends, and so forth, because people have their reasons. But since I know what it feels like to be unloved, that is going to be my reason to love everyone as much as I can.

And that corresponds with my spiritual beliefs since I believe God is love. Therefore, the best way to bring God into people's lives is to bring love into their lives. If I'm wrong and I was supposed to follow some hierarchy of love established by a bunch of people living in the Middle East and Greece a couple thousand years ago then so be it.

 

[frozen_water]

shame... I tried as much as I could a split in my posts to keep what I thought about your theory separate from my religion... the paragraphs separate so I wouldn't blend the two. I think that got lost in translation a little bit... but I don't really have a stance on what I think about your thoughts yet at all, so I'd hardly be able to suggest what you're "supposed to" follow in light of it. I'm trying to follow the ideas you're laying out to find the natural order to things... you did ask if I thought people estranged others by their love, and I think that's possible... but if you're going to say that's the sustaining power in ruining relationships, you do have to square with "what caused the lack of/badly distributed love in the first place?"

That's the first answer that popped into my head... if you can think of others, go for it. If there aren't any other causes for the lack of love and you still don't like mine (that there's a natural hierarchy of what should be loved), then it's hard to accept the possibility that the problems of the world are caused by unequal love distribution.

I kinda threw in that bit about christianity because it really did remind me of it... but I kind of regret it. To the best of my ability, I'm keeping it from mixing into the logic while I try to help give you thoughts on yours.

 

[Satya]

shame... I tried as much as I could a split in my posts to keep what I thought about your theory separate from my religion... the paragraphs separate so I wouldn't blend the two. I think that got lost in translation a little bit... but I don't really have a stance on what I think about your thoughts yet at all, so I'd hardly be able to suggest what you're "supposed to" follow in light of it. I'm trying to follow the ideas you're laying out to find the natural order to things... you did ask if I thought people estranged others by their love, and I think that's possible... but if you're going to say that's the sustaining power in ruining relationships, you do have to square with "what caused the lack of/badly distributed love in the first place?"

The answer to that question seems obvious to me. A desire for power and control. I honestly think that desire is the sole thing that distorts love. People will find ways to exploit people's trust, and thus their love, whether it is through politics, religion, the media, etc. for the purpose of dividing them so that they can profit off those divisions. It makes perfect sense to me. When you consider how profitable war is, how the best selling books of all times are religious scriptures, how people spend countless hours watching the crap on television, and on and on, it seems clear that people will seek to divide your love for their own gain.

Love only exists to unify us, and if a person is truly capable of fully embracing it, then nobody has any power over them. Power and control become illusions when a person lives only to love.

 

[frozen_water]

but I mean... if power and control become illusions when one lives only to love, then nobody would have ever stopped loving simply because they wanted power, right?

It's like a "which came first, the chicken or the egg?" question. If love ends conflicts and removes the thirst for power and control, why would anybody not love because they want power and to control? Unless you're saying that the natural state of a person is to not love, and that it's something that took work even at a time before conflicts began. That could work, I think.

Then again... although we could never answer philosophically whether the chicken or the egg came first, clearly both exist... so on a second thought, just because you can't answer how it all began doesn't mean that the theory itself can't be right. That was a pretty bad lapse in judgment to think it did. mm....

 

[Satya]

but I mean... if power and control become illusions when one lives only to love, then nobody would have ever stopped loving simply because they wanted power, right?

You are assuming that people are born loving, or that human beings began as a loving people. We began as animals, and to this day we are born as animals. Every individual must learn to love, but those who fail to do so will only understand power and control. The difference between a beast and a human being is love.

 

[frozen_water]

Unless you're saying that the natural state of a person is to not love, and that it's something that took work even at a time before conflicts began. That could work, I think.

mmhmm, I realized I assumed it eventually... just took a while :mrgreen: . Like I said, I think that would work then.

 

[Satya]

Unless you're saying that the natural state of a person is to not love, and that it's something that took work even at a time before conflicts began. That could work, I think.

mmhmm, I realized I assumed it eventually... just took a while :mrgreen: . Like I said, I think that would work then.

oops.

I guess I must be pretty tired to have misread that to such an extent.

 

[G.Kai]

The greatest pain in this world is to be unloved.

To be cheated on by your lover.
To be betrayed by your friends.
To be abandoned by your family.
To be ostracized, segregated, or tormented by your fellow human beings.
To be forsaken by your God.

What people tend to forget is that love serves only one purpose. That purpose is unity. Love exists to bond people to each other. While the reasons love brings people together may vary...

For procreation or sexual gratification
For fun, fondness, and utility
For stability and security
For a certain way of life
For faith and hope

...what always remains the same is how love seems to draw people toward oneness.

However, choosing love means choosing pain. Love empowers. It delegates a special power to others known as trust. Those who cannot bestow trust in others are incapable of love. But trust is easily violated. People are often unwise in how they use this power delegated to them by others because they often love themselves first and foremost. And thus, pain is an inevitable part of love because human nature is imperfect and inherently selfish. That is why lying is a detestable sin. It violates trust, it destroy bonds, it make peoples feel unloved, and its brings them great pain.

Love is also the source of all conflict, simply because love is divided.

Those who first and foremost choose to love themselves.
Those who first and foremost choose to love their friends and family.
Those who first and foremost choose to lover their lover.
Those who first and foremost choose to love their people or country.
Those who first and foremost choose to love their God.

By choosing to love one being over another, humans create all the conflict in this world. Human greed, pride, possessiveness, bigotry, and righteousness are born from these choices. Those who choose to love one more than another look down on all those who do not share their kind of love. They see their love as superior to all other forms of love. A Randist may say that for a person to love themselves is the greatest love and all other forms of love are irrational, whereas a Christian may say that for a person to love God is the greatest form of love, and all other forms of love are blasphemous. Choosing one form of love over another defeats the purpose of love, since it divides people.

True unconditional love may be to embrace the greatest pain as part of life, and to use it to help us remember why we must always love others. As long as we can remember what it feels like to be unloved, we can find the strength to trust in and love others.

I agree with all of this. If I may, I'd only like to add that we could truly free ourselves to be more loving if we gave up the notion of owning other people, as a form of emotional enslavement. We truly love when we can love to see people being exactly who they are.