How to understand different kinds of love

Begin with an open mind, as you accept the challenge to explore the different kinds of love. Start with the concept of romantic love where two people meet and gradually, or suddenly, fall in love. Romantic love has a high degree of passion, as the two people come to know each other and become one. There is culmination in a marital relationship and conjugal love. In a true romantic love relationship, the passion and romance can continue for many years.

Different kinds of love affect us in different ways. What is the most important of all is the reality that they do affect us. Parental love is another kind of love that begins to surface, when a child is born to a couple. Maternal love enables the mother to carry an unborn child to full term and bring it to birth with joy and a sense of celebration, in spite of the pain of childbirth. Paternal love is the love of a father for his child.

When we understand that love is always new and ever renewing, we begin to understand some of the basic features of the face of love. Familial love is manifest in the nurturing of a child or children, by parents and other family members, as an baby begins to grow and develop. When there is more than one child, the nurturing of the siblings includes teaching them to love one another. This is brotherly love or sisterly love.

Each horizon of love will expand. When we see a young child, we wonder which direction his or her multiplicity of pathways will lead. What does love hold for him or her? We cannot necessarily look into the future and find the answer, but we do know that there are other kinds of love this child will encounter in his or her lifetime. Initially, for him or her, it will be child's love directed towards the love of his or her mother, father and then others.

Best love songs of all time

The Carpenters - There's a kind of hush