What are the Four Different Kinds of Love?

Love is a choice. It is as simple as that. Love is not a feeling but it can sometimes be defined as the feeling of emotions towards someone or something. If love is a feeling then we ought to have about 1000 spouses or girlfriends and boyfriends but it’s not a feeling.

According to Wikipedia, love is a  range of strong and positive emotional and mental states, from the most sublime virtue or good habit, the deepest interpersonal affection, to the simplest pleasure.

You feel hungry and after you have eaten something, the feeling goes away. You feel angry and after a while, you don’t feel angry anymore. So, can you boldly say that love is a feeling? I bet you can’t because this already contradicts your definitions.

To love someone or something is to choose that person or thing. Have ever been in a situation where you have to choose between two people you like? What made you choose the other person instead, knowing that they both have flaws and the other person that you didn’t is even better? You made a choice and you chose that person because you accept that flaw and you’re ready to live with it to the degree of how long you can endure it.

Why can’t you say you have feelings for your parents or your siblings? Those feelings would have died a very long time ago because family tends to be the first people that make you think otherwise about saying I love you. But you still hug them and say I choose you despite how annoying you’re, how uncaring you can be, and how imperfect you are. Now that is love. Because you still have the power to choose.

I believe you now understand what love means from a human standpoint right? You say I love you means you choose this person no matter the flaws and shortcomings.

So, now do me a favor the next time you want to say I love you remember you saying to this person I choose you even with the presence of all your flaws.

1. Storge(familiarity)
   This means the natural affection you have for your family. It is the first kind of love we experience. Like a mother with her newborn baby. Storge is common and it happens at the instance of birth and having siblings from the same parent or extended family.
   

   Have you ever wondered why you tell your parents I love you even when you don’t understand what it means? Well, that’s Storge working on you. This love is natural and almost automatic.

   You can easily say I love you to your brothers and sisters without having sensual lust for them and you feel comfortable saying this.

   Storge is the first interpersonal love you experience. It is the everyday love we experience from siblings to parents, to uncles, and aunties. Even your grandparents have this love for you.

   Among the four kinds of love, Storge is one of the love that you can’t lose. You can lose the love your family has for you no matter what happens, you will still be in love with your family.

   Even when you pass on, you are still loved. Have you ever heard the phrase that says, “A monkey is ugly, but the mother still loves him”?

   That’s how it is with family love no matter how disfigured you’re, they still love you from the depth of their heart and soul.

   What a sigh of relief I get each time I remember that no matter where I find myself, my family will always be there for me.
2. Philia (Friendship)
   
   This is the kind of love that exists between friends. Philia is not romantic, so if you’re having a romantic feeling towards your friend then you need to understand that you have eros. Friendship is attained at the instance of an intimate relationship, respect, and understanding. You get familiar with your closest friend as a result of the secrets you share and the understanding of what you want and where you are going. Friendship is what most people don’t seem to understand. It is not everybody you can call a friend just because you grew up together and went to the same school doesn’t make you friends. You should use the word acquaintance instead of friend. Because the person who you call a friend doesn’t have an intimate relationship with you and they don’t know secrets about you. What makes you a friend apart from having to be a burden bearer, a life-changer, a friend ought to have secrets about you that you can’t share.This kind of love is stronger when you both have secrets that bind you together and the purpose of your friendship is to keep growing together and not apart. There’s nothing sensual about this love and as we see today most friendship relationship, especially between the opposite sex leads to marriage. I call friendship the ability to be naked(intimate) and have no shame for who you are. You feel a need to help each time your friend shares anything of importance with you. You are drawn closer by the secrets you share.

   A deep sense of respect arises when you want to lessen their pains and understand the sufferings they are going through. Philia is the best relationship among humans. This will take us to the third kind of love which is eros.

3. Eros (Passionate/ Intimate)Eros is passionate love, with sensual desire and longing. This love is the affinity you have for a person or thing just for the reason of satisfying your lustful desires.Eros is very dangerous because you can think you are attracted to the person because of their beauty but only to realize that after you lay with this person, you no longer feel what you once called love anymore.
   

   This love works with the eyes and not the heart. Eros is mostly in romantic relationships today, not it has ruined a lot of lives. According to high existence, Eros is fluid and ever-changing.

   Imagine someone got married because of beauty alone and not love. The moment he/she sees another person that has more beauty than the person they married, they will cheat in split seconds. Those who get into relationships because of beauty are not going to last. I believe you should have seen more of that in modern society.

   Eros according to some people may evolve into something passionate but come on if your motive from the start doesn’t change how can your lustful desire change to philia? I tend to believe that eros can change but I don’t believe it can evolve.

   If it evolves, so they may still be traits found in that person that can lead them back to that lustful desire again. The last kind of love is something no man can get into it is called agape.

4. Agape(Unconditional Love) Agape is an unconditional love between God and man. This kind of love cannot be seen in men because it doesn’t come with a catch.All other kinds of love come with a catch but this love doesn’t come with a catch except you’re born. Being alive or dead is still a factor in this love. It doesn’t matter what you do or have done. God’s love for mankind is way beyond anything a man can find out.

   It is all-consuming love. It is not tied to what we see. Agape is the compelling love God has for mankind that makes him come back to look for a man to help him even after violating his laws. God first loved man before man ever come into the reality of God’s love.

   Agape is powerful and Spirit-kind. Any man who has this love is no longer a man trust me when I say this. Can men ever love with nothing in mind to get? I don’t think so. Men love with something in return and it may not necessarily be love. Well, this kind of love is possible but the price is bigger than you can think of.

Now that you know what the four kinds of love are and what they mean, don’t fall victim again. Know what you mean each time you say I love you or each time you want to say it. Let knowledge guide you to saying I love you next time. Don’t forget to share with your friends, partner, and family.