Kinds of LOVE – Instinctive, Emotional and Conscious Love

Love as a feeling is of three kinds based on its source.

Its source could be unconscious Instinct, impulsive Emotion or Conscious mind.

Based on its origin, its purpose is defined and its purpose determines its life cycle.

Instinctive Love –

Instinctive love is biological in nature and its origin is unconscious drive.

Its only or primary role is biological, that is to create off springs.

The lover could not be aware of the unconscious drive that triggered the feeling of love.

For the same reason, instinctive love would not be in lover’s control.

Lover may think it is long lasting love but instinct love follows its movement.

Once the purpose of unconscious drive is served / failed,

the unconscious would lose interest and subsequently instinctive love itself would become stale and fade away.

This may leave the lover disillusioned about the love because the lover never knew the real cause behind instinct love.

Emotional Love –

Emotional love is not based on biology and can be even be anti-biological.

It is based on emotional affinity towards another.

It can happen between opposite sexes or the same sex.

Movement of emotional love is directly linked to the state of emotion that triggered it.

That is, when the emotion withers or change, emotional love will also go with it.

So emotional love can be short-lived.

And as well, when underlying emotion fades, the lover may become indifferent to the object of love.

It is also possible that object of love would become object of hatred for the lover.

In this case, the lover would become the slayer of the object that he loved.

Like instinct love, emotional love also creates.

In mythology, emotional love creates strange creatures.

But in the real world,

Emotional love may create off springs and by heightened emotion may create artistic works and the like.

Both, Instinct and Emotional love are utilitarian in nature.

They are self-centered and seek their own gratification or other gains.

So, as long as love aids in realization of their objectives,

love will remain intact, then / otherwise it will fade or turn to indifference/dislike.

Conscious Love –

Conscious love is rare because it requires conscious effort, intelligence and diligence.

Conscious love is not self-centered but it is centered on the object of love.  

The lover wishes and aids the object of love to attain its own wholeness by being its complement.

So, conscious love is non-utilitarian in nature.

But, in its primitive form, conscious love is also utilitarian in nature.

For instance,

We exercise conscious love while nurturing a garden or pet animals but only to serve our own purpose.

Only at higher level, it becomes non-utilitarian and elevating.

To do that, the lover has to make a conscious decision regarding love,

Then, its source cannot be unconscious instinct or transient and unstable emotion.

So, in the case of conscious love,

Lover is conscious of movement of love at every stage and in complete control;

nothing escapes from the lover’s awareness.

Lover is intelligent enough to identify the essence and nuances of the loved object.

Lover is diligent enough to accept pain and sustain the effort to nurture and elevate the object of love to its wholeness.

Generally, it is supposed that conscious love is reciprocated because lover’s sustained effort enters the subconscious of the other and brings about change.

Like Instinct and Emotional love, Conscious love also creates.

It creates a new being – rebirth of the lover and the object of love in unison

Conscious love may also create other things but creation of a new being is its plane.

Conscious love is possible only for humans.

Strangely it is very rare among humans,

Implying that human psyche is still dominated by instinct and utilitarian in its pursuit.  

Levels of Mind - Personal and General(Buddha and J Krishnamurty)

There is an incident in Buddhist traditional history.

A woman, who lost her son approached Buddha and

asked him revive her dead son with his power.

Buddha said to have told her that if she could bring food from any house where there was no death, then he would revive her son.

It is apparent that there can be no such house,

and then what could be his underlying message!

According to mystics.

All sorrows are human sorrows and there is nothing ‘personal’ about them.

It is ‘human sorrow’ that is manifested in an individual and personalized by the ego.

It can be understood this way.

Firstly,

We have evolved as a species, not as individuals.

So, the brain and mind we have is that of a species and doesn’t belong to an individual.

That is, physically one may have a separate brain, but in essence it is only a ‘human brain’.

Similarly, in essence ‘personal mind’ is only a piece of ‘General/Human mind’.

This is because all minds are conditioned by more or less similar environments. 

We can look at it like a hologram.

A hologram, if broken to pieces, each piece would again contain the whole image with distinct perspective, not the fragment of the image.

Similarly,

Each’ personal mind’ contains the image of a ‘general mind’ with a particularity imposed by the ego.

So, there is no ‘Personal’ sorrow, only ‘human’ sorrow.

Then, solution may not be at the level personal consciousness but at the level of

non-personal consciousness.  

But, ego-centric view personalizes the sorrow and blocks ‘general’ (unbiased) perception.

Moreover ‘personal mind’ tend to seek only fulfillment of its wishes and not solution.

For instance,

If I am thirsty, my mind may seek coke but solution is water.

This is only to say that our personal mind always projects its wish as the solution.

It may be obvious in the physical plane.

In the psychological plane, when our perception is entirely enveloped by the ego.

it is difficult to see whether we are seeking our personal wish or solution.

It is possible to distinguish, only when ego-centric view of the problem is avoided.

Being so,

If one can avoid egoistic perception of the sorrow,

then the problem behind the sorrow  can be depersonalized.

Once the problem is depersonalized, the mind would not be seeking ego-centric solutions. 

This creates depth in one’s awareness and brings balance and clarity.

And, it also enables one to approach the problem with more empathetic attitude than

frustration, anger and self pity, which are all part of ego-centric view.

Also,

One no longer wrestles with the problem to make it go or expect a wishful outcome.

Facts are faced as they are and it brings about its own resolution.

It may not be possible always to exercise such perception

and may appear even impossible in certain situations.

But,

This is the perception that can bring rational and objective approach to a problem.

Perhaps, this can be the underlying message that Buddha was conveying to the woman.

According to J.Krishnamuty ,

Problem at the level of ‘personal mind’ have solution only at the level of ‘general mind’. 

He states - “It is not an abstract answer, it is the only answer”.