Love. This simple but complex word has so many different meanings. We, as people, are in a constant search for love our whole lives. Trying to define love according to our own wants and needs, we get lost in an endless maze of confusion. C.S. Lewis once stated that “Just as Lucifer – a former archangel – perverted himself by pride and fell into depravity, so too can love – commonly held to be arch-emotion - become corrupt by presuming itself to be what it is not.” To avoid this trap of what is “thought” to be love, one must first know what love is and discover the various types of love felt, given, and received by humans. So to start off with, what is love? Is it a feeling, an affection, a gift, romantic pleasure, chemistry, everlasting? Is it an interpersonal relationship with a person such as “I love my child” or is it a harmless pleasure such as “I love cookies”. In the …show more content…
The love of affection is the least discriminating of all. It does not necessarily care if the person or object is so called deemed “worthy of love.” If the feeling is comforting, recognizable, and safe then all other factors are eliminated. However, this love can come into hazard of selfishness. The problem with it is that basically anyone can receive or give affection. For this reason, people start to expect the benefits from it and slowly become corrupt by jealousy, distrust, and hate.
The next form of love is Philia. Philia pertains to the friendship of two companions holding a common interest in which others do not share. It is pleasant but very demanding. In a sense, friends help us to know ourselves. The love of friendship points two people in the same direction focused toward a common goal. Aristotle explains in his book Nicomachean Ethics that there are three basic kinds of friendship: friendship of utility, pleasure, and