Aren’t All True Love Transactional and Conditional?
Should the lover not be loved?
I won’t be dabbling in any love that I have not witnessed or experienced, so my thoughts here only speak to the love I’ve known at the time of my writing this.
And by the time you’re done reading everything, I may have succeeded in making you see true love as a wild card: conditional and unconditional, transactional and non-transactional. Now… read on.
What is love (the love I’ve known yet)?
Love
A feeling, an attitude, or an action of care — or affection — toward a thing of value. The thing could be a person, an animal, or an object.
That’s my definition.
How about “transact”?
Transact
“To transact” is to buy or sell value, where something is exchanged for something else. In business, money may be offered for a transaction to be successful. But it mustn’t be money. One can offer their attention, time, or skill in exchange for something else.
So, can love be offered in this sense? Can it even be love if I’m transacting it?
No, and Yes.
No, True Love Shouldn’t Be Transactional
In a non-commercial context, a kind person won’t wait till he’s offered something before he shows kindness — when it is safe to do so and he’s able to do so. He won’t trade his love.
Say I meet a stranger on a sunny hot afternoon who asks me for water to drink. As a loving person, showing love means giving him water enough to quench his thirst. I won’t be petty, asking that he sign an agreement to help me tomorrow before I give him water today.
Also, say I’m in a close relationship with you and your shirt needs ironing. I won’t wait for you to say, “Sweetheart, I will help you wash the dishes later, so help me iron this shirt.” No.
Yes, True Love Expects to Be Loved
Now, if you’re thirsty and I offer you some water, it’s natural that I expect good feedback from you. You may say “Thank you” or “I appreciate it”. However, I will find it odd or disappointing that you spit at me or slap me in return. I don’t want you to pay me, but I expect that you offer a Thank you or a good gesture that shows gratitude.
And, say I’m in a close relationship with you and I regularly help you wash the dishes. If you visit me and see me doing laundry, it’s a natural, human thing (I believe) to expect this person whom I love and have helped on several occasions to show love, too. I’m not calibrating my love for you, nor am I expecting that you give the exact amount of love in return. But I hope that you come over to assist me in the way you can or at least ask if there is another thing you could help me with.
Also, as a parent who naturally has to love his child, I expect that my child loves me back — in good behavior and respect for me. But if she mocks me, steals from me, or plans to kill me, she isn’t doing her part. And I will find it difficult to be silent or pretend all is okay. Yes, I don’t want her to pay me for loving her, but I expect that she loves me back by being respectful and responsible. If she’s ungrateful and doesn’t do her part at all, I will be disappointed — it will hurt.
In being transactional, true love expects to be loved or appreciated. Maybe with a “Thank you”, a good behavior, or a grateful smile. A relationship hinging on true love is meant to be symbiotic, where all affected parties give what they are capable of at a time. They will do or offer what is loving enough in their capability, such that the loved is a lover and the lover is loved.
A relationship hinging on true love is meant to be symbiotic, where all affected parties give what they are capable of.
Unconditional Love: The Love That Means Just Doing Good
In the Christian Bible, Matthew 5:44–47 teaches that followers of Jesus must be charitable even to their enemies. And, usually, anyone who is an enemy should have little or no good to give. To me, that means that the love I show an enemy is the “just do good” kind of love. They shouldn’t want my good or appreciate my success if they’re truly enemies. So my loving them is to be kind without expecting anything in return. It will be unconditional — or conditional on the basis that they’re living human beings, created in God’s likeness as I am, and hence valuable.
To drive it home, say some wealthy businessman was informed about a poor village without a health facility. He knows nothing about the behavior of the people in this village, hasn’t been there before, and has no plans to visit. But he believes that it is right to help needy people whoever they are. So, single-handedly, he funds the building of clinics in the village from start to finish, furnishing them with the necessary equipment.
The rich man does even more. He extends his acts of charity to widows and provides scholarships for children in the village. He knows nothing about their attitude or lifestyle — but he values them for being fellow human beings.
Now, if there’s anything like showing unconditional love, the rich businessman’s kindness is what unconditional love can be. That is, a love that knows nothing about the loved, has no relationship with the loved, a just-do-good-to-people kind of love.
But then, even this love is intrinsically conditional. Our wealthy man believes that the villagers, as human beings, are valuable things that should be cared for. He won’t build clinics to care for sick spiders or mosquitoes.
Conditional Love: The Love For Value
Let’s say we have a different scenario where the businessman chooses to pay a visit to the village to see things for himself before his charity. During his visit, he meets a culture of ungratefulness and stupidity among village occupants there: they are a wasteful and destructive people— they’ll vandalize and auction off costly clinic equipment if any is donated to them. Do you think our rich man would — in his right state of mind— just dole out money to help this village? I doubt that he would.
That said, I’ve yet to meet a practical and sane person who falls in love with poop or shows affection for shit! There’s always been some sort of condition whenever love is shown.
In the way some people describe it, if true love should be “unconditional”, then someone somewhere, in his right state of mind, will unconditionally have affection for something they find no value in, something worthless. But no sane person does that.
Nobody will love a thing that has zero value. And, if we can’t love an entirely worthless or valueless thing, it means that, intrinsically, we are wired to love only valuable things.
Yes, people only fall in love with value. It might be something tangible or visible, like a beautiful smile or a talent, or something felt or perceived, like a good heart or one’s ability to care for others or stand up for them. Whatever that value is, human beings only truly love what they value or admire.
Even when you think you’re loving someone unconditionally (when you think your love is blind), there are valuable things you’re consciously or unconsciously drawn to in them: the sound of their voice, their aura, smile, attitude, skill, patience, or something else. There’s certainly a thing you see or perceive in the loved one that makes you love him or her.
If we can’t love an entirely worthless or valueless thing, it means that, intrinsically, we are wired to love only valuable things.
The Problem With Prescribing True Love to Be (Just) Unconditional and Non-transactional
For close relationships, one problem I see with painting true love as some illusionary, unconditional, non-transactional thing — where one must love, whether or not the love is reciprocated — is this: the one who only does the loving will be drained, while the “love drainer” stays as an ungrateful love-me-unconditionally parasite.
As portrayed in the Bible, if the infinitely loving God demands that the people he loves love him back by believing in him (and obeying his instructions), why should a human being pursue or prescribe a one-way kind of love?
Disclaimers and Bottom Line
- The subject of love is complex, with certain things about it that I’m yet to learn or experience. My thoughts here may have only scratched the surface.
- The transactionality of love does not mean we should calibrate or count how much love we’ve gotten, or given, in order to know how much we’re to give or expect.
- To be honest, a true lover may be doing more in a relationship than the other involved person at certain points in time. But it still doesn’t permit the other person to be ungrateful or to intentionally do less than they are capable of doing at a time. To do your part is to not be purposefully selfish.
- With God’s love as the flawless model, no place does the Bible teach or suggest that we love God back in the exact, commensurate way that he loves us. As limited, created things that we are, we can’t even love him commensurately if we try to. Like, how can we pay him back in equal terms for his mercies, wisdom, etc.? If his love for me is valued at say a trillion Nigerian naira, the Bible doesn’t teach that God demands or expects a trillion naira worth of love from me. But, he wants me to do my part: that I love him by believing in him, doing righteousness, and serving my neighbor.
- Let the loved person love. If you’re loved, love back.
“We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. [17] If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion — how can God’s love be in that person?
[18] Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.” (1 John 3:16–18 NLT)
** Updated on 15th December 2023
** Updated on 13th August 2024
** Updated on 6th September 2024
