Unconditional Love

by Chet Shupe

Any cooperation among humans that is essential to species survival results in unconditional love. There are three A mother’s love for her child—which lasts for life; romantic love—which lasts long enough to ensure conception; and the love experienced by a group of people who depend on one another to survive. This love lasts as long as the individual perceives him- or herself as being dependent on the group to survive. In the natural world, unconditional love is for life. In a world ruled by money and law, people can survive alone or in pairs, which has rendered the unconditional love of interdependent relationships obsolete.
Without the love of interdependent relationships for emotional sustenance, we moderns are reduced to seeking life’s meaning in truths, be they religious, philosophical, ideological, legal, or scientific. But, life’s essence can be grasped only through the intimacy of unconditional love, not through knowledge, thought, or reason.
Given access to basic material needs, if we have love, then nothing else really matters. And, if we do not have love, then nothing else really matters, anyhow. By that measure, except for a mother’s love for her children, and for the occasional romance that we encounter on life’s journey, there isn’t much happening on this planet that really matters—not among humans.

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First published March 28, 2014