conditional love is not real love.

I was thinking about conditional love this morning. This type of love goes for family, friends, and lovers in any type of relationship. Throughout life, we will all be subject to conditional approval at some point. However, this can become a way of life in some relationships.

You know the situations. You only feel loved at the times when the other person is in a good mood. Things in your life go awry, yet during those times, you [oddly enough] feel abandoned and unsupported in the relationship. You notice the ongoing trend. You only feel adored when you are making the other person feel good, or when you are not inconveniencing them. You hold out on hope, but the cycles never cease.

It is a dark and lonely place to be on the receiving end of. Those ‘walking on thin ice’ types of relationships are not real love. This is a fast track to completely blowing your self-esteem. You will never feel like enough. It will lead to emotional exhaustion. It is critical that the situation resolves, or greener pastures need to be sought.

It is not up to you to analyze why this person is acting this way. Maybe that is all the person knows from their past experiences; maybe not. Who really knows? Who cares? Unless you are their Psychologist, sticking around these types is not fully living your life by your own design. It is living your life by their design. How are you to reach for the stars, when you are expected to fill every void in this person’s heart? You have a choice. You always have options.

We all deserve love. We all deserve to be happy. We all deserve to have the people in our lives that lift us up during desperate times. If you are willing to do that for someone, then it should not go unrequited. If you are the perpetrator in this whole scenario, then you need to seek your own faith, inner peace, and understand true forgiveness.