Love

There seems to be a lot of talk about love during the holiday season. Typically I would think that would be a good thing, but it seems that there is much lacking in this talk.

One example of love is portrayed in a commercial that is getting much airtime this holiday season. The commercial casts a series of couples in various scenarios telling their partners “I love you”. The last and most dramatic example is of a man and a woman walking down a nighttime street. The man pulls out a small package from his pocket, dramatically presents the gift to the woman, and then tells her “I love you”. The ad concludes with images of diamond jewelry with a voice reminding viewers “This Holiday, say ‘I love you’ like never before.” Love here means you are willing to buy someone an expensive gift, which I think has been tried many times before.

I came across another definition of love on the sign in front of a church that said,
“Love: putting someone else’s best before your own”. At first glance this definition seems more meaningful then the first, but on further reflection I had some issues with it. This version of love requires that you give up yourself for someone else. It means you cannot be true to yourself, but must be true to someone else. I do not believe that achieving my best is the result of someone else’s efforts, but my own. Others can help me, but unless I strive for it, it is not going to happen. This type of love tends to elevate us above others, in that it assumes they are not capable of achieving their best, except through us. I don’t have issues with helping someone out, but if it means I have to give up myself, then I don’t think that is in anyone’s best interest.

I heard the third definition while listening to the Death Cab For Cutie song “What Sara Said” , which was “Love is watching someone die.” This definition seemed to hit on a deeper meaning of love, but as I thought about it I wondered, so all I have to do is wait for someone to be on their death bed and then show up and watch them die. So where was I the rest of their life? Being present to someone’s struggles certainly can be about love, but there seems like there should be more to it then just that.

So what does Robert Greenleaf have to say about love? In his essay that started the servant leadership phenomenon, “The Servant As Leader”, he wrote:

Love is an undefinable term, and its manifestations are both subtle and infinite. But it begins, I believe, with one absolute condition: unlimited liability! As soon as one’s liability for another is qualified to any degree, love is diminished by that much.

Institutions, as we know them, are designed to limit liability for those who serve through them. (…). Most of the goods and services we now depend on will probably continue to be furnished by such limited liability institutions. But any human service where the one who is served should be loved in the process requires community, a face-to-face group in which the liability of each for the other and all for one is unlimited, or as close to it as possible to get. Trust and respect are highest in this circumstance, and an accepted ethic that gives strength to all is reinforced. (…). Living in community as one’s basic involvement will generate an exportable surplus of love that we may carry into our many involvements with institutions that are usually not communities: businesses, churches, governments, schools.

Without trust, respect, and acceptance – no gift, giving up of self, or watching someone die – can substitute for being in community, for being in love.