15 Characteristics of Real Un-Conditional Love

Love. It makes the world go ‘round, right? Well, at least that’s the how the saying goes. But is it true? It should be, but so
many people confuse love with things like jealousy or possessiveness. True love isn’t either of those things. But these 16
things are. So here are the characteristics of REAL love:

1. Love means saying goodbye to expectations.

Sure, we all want people to behave the way we want them to. We want them to be more affectionate. Or more outgoing.
Or smarter. Or more ambitious. All of these things are expectations. Expectations are just your requirements for
“acceptability” of loving someone. But true love has no expectations. It simply loves “as is.”

2. Love doesn’t play the victim role or blame others.

Love doesn’t think others are “out to get them.” Love doesn’t think their loved ones are wrong. Love works together. It
takes responsibility. It forgives and allows other people’s actions to be their journey. Love doesn’t take things personally.

3. Love includes letting go.

Love doesn’t equal possession. Just as the saying goes, “If you love something, set it free. If it comes back, it’s yours. If it
doesn’t, then it never was.” There is truth to that. Love allows people their freedom. It doesn’t hold tightly and crush their
wings in attempt to keep them. True love doesn’t want to possess. It is willing to set you free if you want to be.

4. Love doesn’t require you to continue a relationship.

You may love someone very much, but you may not be compatible with them. Or they may drive you crazy with their
continued disregard for your feelings. You can still love them, but that doesn’t mean you have to be with them. Love
doesn’t mean that you have to stay, and stay and stay. You can leave the relationship and love them anyway.

5. Love has no room for jealousy.

Like possession, jealousy doesn’t equal love. We think that if we’re not jealous of our loved ones that it means that we
don’t love them. True love has confidence in the quality of the relationship. It knows that the other person is happy and
content coming back to you and only you.

6. Love is the absence of fear.

You can put all emotions on a continuum. On one end, you have love. Then appreciation. After that, it’s joy, happiness,
contentment and satisfaction. On the opposite end of the continuum of love is fear. Other fear-based emotions include,
hatred, insecurity, jealousy or greed.

7. Love is not needing but desiring.

One of the things we try to teach kids is that there is a clear difference between a desire and a need. Needing someone is a
feeling based in fear. You fear that you can’t live without them, so you need them. And remember, fear is the opposite of
love. Desiring someone in your life gives them the freedom to leave, but still shows them you love them.

8. Love is an action, not just a feeling.

Humans tend to be addicted to intense emotion — especially when it feels good. So, when we’re in love, we want to feel
that way forever. But guess what? That higher than “Cloud 9” feeling goes away after a while. That doesn’t mean you
don’t love the other person anymore, it just means that it’s not new anymore. True love comes from the heart, I appreciate
the other and therefore I show appreciation with action. So this is where the action needs to kick in. Show the person you
love them. Don’t just assume they know.

9. Love is unconditional.
The word “unconditional” means that there are no expectations or limitations set. To love unconditionally is a difficult
thing, and most humans aren’t good at that. But true love really does love without trying to change the other person,
loving without conditions.

10. Love means putting other people’s needs equal to — or before — your own.
While people may be inherently selfish for survival purposes, this does not serve us well in relationships. If you don’t put
the other at least equal to your own, this creates an imbalance in the equal exchange between one another. Real love truly,
genuinely cares about the other’s happiness and will go to great lengths to make the other feel valued, from your heart to
theirs, it’s out of love that you share.

11. Love is the highest vibration emotion that there is.

Science has proven that emotions like love and fear have very different vibrations. They can actually measure them. Love
vibrates very fast, whereas fear-based emotions (think jealousy, possessiveness, hatred, greed, etc.) vibrate very slowly.
When you love completely and unconditionally, there is no fear involved. The vibrations of love make you feel good at all
times.

12. Love requires attention.

Love doesn’t ignore. It doesn’t look the other way. It wants to be present and be together. When people are in love,
sometimes they think that they don’t have to “do any more work.” But real love actually enjoys giving attention to another
person. It feels good and doesn’t see giving attention to another person as a chore.

13. Love understands and accepts differences.

Let’s face it: We’re all different. Even identical twins aren’t exactly the same. They have different experiences and
outlooks about the world. Real love doesn’t make other people wrong for being different. When people truly love another
person, they accept their differences and uniqueness.

14. Love makes you feel good, not bad.

Many people confuse being in a relationship with love. Just because you’re in a relationship doesn’t mean there is true
love present. If there is jealousy, possessiveness, constant fighting, abuse (verbal, emotional or physical), that is not
loving. Refer back to #6. Those are fear-based emotions and actions.

15. Love has empathy.

Empathy is the ability to put yourself into another person’s shoes and see a situation from his/her point of view. Love has
deep empathy. “When you hurt, I hurt.” People who truly love one another don’t want to hurt them. They want them to
feel good. They care about their feelings and try everything they can to make them feel valued and worthy.

Remember, love is happiness, appreciation and feeling good. Anything other than that is not loving. If we all loved one
another as ourselves, the world would be a better place! Here’s to Loving Unconditionally!