The dictionary is accurate with the descriptive word profound, but passionate affection is not enough to describe all of love. There is a feature of love that is unconditional. What I mean by that is that once our heart feels that emotion, our thinking follows our heart and our thinking will remove any negativity associated with the object of our affection. This is the process of “unconditional”. For example, when we fall in love with our infant offspring, the love is not conditioned on how our infant behaves. If our child is fussy or has unpredictable bowel movements it is of no matter to our love and affection for the child. We will pace, patiently cradling our child to calm whatever makes them cry. Our love for our children is the easiest of all to describe because it is resoundingly true for almost all parents and thus is a point in common for discussion. It is unfortunate that adult to adult relationships are less primal and thus filled with all of the baggage that brings evaluation and judgment into new relationships. Would that we could pronounce our love and be done with it, unconditionally accepting the object of our affection and all of their faults with one declaration.
“Positive” is the rose-colored glasses that we view our loved ones from. We color our loved ones with our wishes and dreams and this is always an appealing way to see someone. It does not necessarily mean illusion either. It can also mean that we have acceptance for all of who the other person is. It can reflect a mature love, either because the participants are mature, or because the love has matured. What comes to mind, is my relationship with my first-born daughter; our history is intense. As we fumbled through her teen years, neither of us mature, our acceptance of each other was guarded. I am not saying that our love for each other was less than it could be, but our regard for each other was seldom positive. We tumbled into her early twenties barely coherent with each other. Because our love is unconditional, we were able to keep our relationship intact. As inadequate as I felt as a mother and as frustrated as she felt as a daughter, we were somehow able to work through that tumultuous time. Now, we experience a mature love that is grounded in a complete acceptance of all of who the other woman is. Whatever imaginary dreams I harbored for her lifetime are all gone. And vice-versa, whatever imaginary mother she had conceived in her mind, is all gone. What remains for both of us is a positive regard for the real women that we both are. I honor her choices, her ideas and her life, she honors the me that I am. We are very different women. She is not the mischief-maker and yet she makes the most mischief. She is not hard-headed and yet, is a decade of stubborn. She, who is so child-like is all woman. Acceptance allows that which is different from myself, be what it is.
And lastly, I come to “regard”: to look upon or think of with a particular feeling. The last of the equation “unconditional positive regard”. Because the bottom of the discussion is this, unconditional positive regard is a goal and a guidepost, not so much the reality. To love is to experience a profoundly tender, passionate affection for another person and yet that is not enough if you wish to have a relationship. Of course I am speaking to a relationship that is deeply satisfying, that continues through hardship, that stands the test of time and keeps you alive. To have love and a relationship, you need unconditional positive regard, because we are human, because life can be difficult and because acceptance is as good as it gets…
