Love, acceptance and forgiveness...and farts, not necessarily in that order

 

I'm throwing around a few words and trying to make sense of them. It's a work in progress, not a finished philosophy, so bear with me. But these 3 concepts, love, acceptance and forgiveness are on my mind, and I'm trying to make sense of them. How do they interrelate? Which of them is foundational? Can they exist independently, and if so, to what degree?

Let's start with love. What does it mean to love somebody? 

I probably have to go back even further to define terms. Who or what is the somebody that you love? Is it a body? With a brain? A soul or spirit? Is it the collection of likes, dislikes, actions and behaviors that make up a person's person? 

To love someone, do you have to love every single thing about that person?  Do you have to love all of that person's perceived sins and faults? Or can you "separate the sin from the sinner," so to speak. Or perhaps, rewrite the rule book altogether, so those faults aren't really flaws but unique personality traits. 

My wife used to tell me, "I love you, but not your anger." 

"I love you, but not your farts," was my response.

"You'll miss my farts when I'm gone!" she'd say.

As much as I am not a fan of farts, generally speaking, I had to admit it. I missed the farts, dammit!

Which brings us to acceptance. You may love somebody, but not love one hundred percent of what they are about.  You may not agree with their politics, their sexual leanings, lifestyle choices, etc.. What percentage of not loving stuff about them takes them out of the running altogether? Can you love someone and not like them? 

Acceptance is like a compromise. OK, you are completely different from me. We share nothing in common, except perhaps some DNA. You are my son, daughter, brother, sister, so I love you--on some theoretical level. But really, don't I have to first accept you, flaws and all, to claim that? Is love even love without acceptance? 

You love your husband, but he sleeps around. You don't like the fact that he does so, but somehow the percentage of other things that you love about him outweighs the infidelity. You accept what you don't love about him, because your love for the rest of the person he is overrides that. Or you kick his ass to the curb. No love lost, as they say.

Sliding right into forgiveness. Perhaps you don't love or accept the behavior, but the person you love has also declared that they regret said behavior. They promise to change. Or try to do better. No more anger. Or malicious farting. If you love them, you can forgive them. As many times as it takes. 

If you can't, then possibly at that point you don't love them anymore. It could be argued that you never did truly love them, because love is eternal and unconditional, not dependent on a person's conforming to certain standards. 

I suppose that type of conditional love could be considered to be a form of love, but not really. It's more like an agreement or contract, "I'll love you as long as XYZ, but in the case of ABC or 123, I'm out." 

If you love one hundred percent of everything about the person, this bypasses the need for acceptance or forgiveness. There is nothing to forgive, and everything about them is seen as a thing of beauty and is treasured, not merely accepted.

If one were required to love each and every thing about another to qualify as love, then true love would be about as rare as a DNA match. I think, as humans, we must be granted a bell curve in our definition of love. 

 

**Editor's note: (3-25-21) This disjointed, unfinished treatise was not published on its original date, but left a draft. As I go through my past posts, inserting pictures and editing for grammar, I am publishing older drafts, whether or not I deemed them worthy at the time. I think I just didn't like the tone I was taking in this one. Too pedantic and preachy. Like I know a fuck about love.