Who Deserves Love?

When I was in college my friends and I often consoled each other when a relationship would end by saying "He (or she if it was a female friend) didn't deserve your love anyway." 

As I thought back on this defense mechanism, I started thinking about how often in life we apply this idea that someone doesn't deserve love because of a or b or c. Is this true? Or is love the thing that just might change a or b or c? I ask myself these questions often and have since I started trying to live from a place of love. If you want to put more love into the world, you can't base your worldview on hatred or on searching for people who "deserve" love.

When love is used as a reward and the removal of love is used as a punishment, we create a world lacking consistency and heavy on insecurity.

I know I don't always "deserve" love and some of the love that has been most impactful in my life has come when I didn't "deserve" it. It has come when I said something stupid or thoughtless. It has come when I've hurt someone's feelings. It has come when I've done something mean. It has come even when I pushed it away... hard. It has even come when I couldn't recognize it.

To love someone is to see their imperfections and still hold affection for them. To receive and accept love when one is imperfect is also an act of love.

Every person has had a moment or two or ten when they didn't "deserve" love, where their actions repelled love and still they needed love. Every person has struggled to love someone who has disappointed them or hurt them. Sometimes we have to work through negative emotions to get back to positive ones. Other times the only thing we can do is love our selves enough to get through the moment and let the relationship go.

When we base acting with loving kindness on who deserves it and who doesn't, we aren't really loving or kind.

Relationships need boundaries and sometimes require walking away, but that doesn't mean one has to hate the other person. 

Will Smith sang "Hate in your heart will consume you, too" in Just the Two of Us, and I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment. When we hate, that hate smothers love and healing. So even if we look at someone and know in our hearts that we can no longer love that person, the answer isn't hate, it's release. Releasing yourself and the person from what doesn't work liberates you both, especially when that release is done with loving kindness.

Perhaps instead of using love as some kind of reward and punishment system, we should try loving each other when it's difficult as well as when it's easy. Perhaps instead of using love as something to be doled out to the deserving, it's time to love without demanding people earn our love. Perhaps it's time to stop equating love with some unachievable expectation and start seeing it as a gift we share with the world around us.

I remind myself every day to practice loving kindness without demanding people earn that loving kindness. I remind myself love isn't a reward for good behavior or something to take away for bad behavior every day as I strive to live from a foundation of love. Every time something strikes the match of hate that wants to burn out the love and positivity and joy in my life, I take a deep breath and seek out some small way I can act with love, even if only toward myself.

Do you "deserve" my love? I don't know. I don't care. What I know is whether or not I love is my decision, it's my action to take, and it affects me far more than you.

Do I "deserve" your love? I don't know. I don't care. What I know is whether or not you love is your decision, it's your action to take, and it affects you far more than me. 

Maybe if we stopped forcing people to earn love, we could find a way to connect with more people across our differences to find our similarities...

You don't need to deserve my love. I don't need to deserve your love. Love is a choice. Love is a way of life.