The meaning of love and its bittersweet nature

Abstract

Love is the core of human experience and central to our meaning in life and wellbeing, yet it is also a complex concept full of ambiguity and contradiction. The main purpose of this paper is fourfold: Firstly, we want to clarify questions such as ‘What is the meaning of love?’ and ‘Why is meaning of love so important to us?’ Secondly, we want to explain why love is both suffering and essential for our happiness and mental health. Thirdly, we identify the major types of love and clarify which types are constructive and which are destructive. We also identify the key dimensions of true love. Finally, we emphasise that love does not always mean happiness; rather, it is meant to be a school to teach us important lessons and to make us complete. Therefore, we need to embrace suffering and at the same time cultivate the constructive types of love to improve our mental health and to make the world a more compassionate place.

Keywords:

• Meaning of love
• love is suffering
• taxonomy of love
• constructive love
• destructive love
• agape
• cross-cultural differences
• harmony
• mental health
• wellbeing

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).