Love without sexuality?
When I feel like the muses have abandoned me to write, any situation comes to my aid. So, it happened to me these days. I took part in a conversation about "the physiology of love", a very interesting subject that generates a lot of curiosity. In the end, I was left with some concerns that I wanted to develop in this writing.
The biological look
For a long time I decided to believe that we humans are a soul that transiently inhabits a body. Therefore, these two components are present in our nature, the biological and the spiritual; the latter being the one that makes the difference to really consider us as human.
Listening to the physiology of love gives me the impression that something is not clear, I believe that in the use of that expression underlies certain equivalence between love and sexuality, but one thing and the other are not equal.
It is true, that the physical attraction can be the preamble so that between two or more people can emerge a relationship of love, there is always a beginning.
It is true that nature provided us, as well as other species, with very powerful physiological responses, to remind us of the need for reproduction as a necessary condition to maintain life.
From the field of biology, the quality of these responses has been exhaustively studied. We know, for example, that it is in the hypothalamus where a complex system of hormones is commanded to prepare the organism for a probable sexual encounter. The heart speeds up, there is more blood flow, hormones are secreted that cause pleasure. All this happens in every human body every time it is before the stimuli that activates the sexual response.
We know that the pleasure obtained in the sexual encounter produces a very high level of gratification, capable of creating situations of dependence similar to those produced by the drugs we know.
Love as sexuality
In the case of humans, these physiological responses are activated by the power of imagination.
The association between love and sexuality is clearly seen in the expression "to make love", an euphemism that we frequently use to refer to the sexual act.
Now, that entire biological device that unfolds in the face of sexual stimulation is not exclusive to human beings. In the same way, most animal species have it. In them, there are also processes that involve hormones, neurotransmitters and physiological changes that prepare them for sexual encounter. Can we conclude, then, that they know love? No. Animal species limit themselves to fulfilling the mandate that nature printed in their genes, they have no alternative, they do not decide on their answers.
Love is a strictly human quality because will intervenes in it.
Human love
In humans, love is a feeling that has its foundation in the need to want to procure the other well, not in enjoying or submitting him/her.
It may be that it is complicate to define what love is, we can get many definitions that little clarify about the subject. Perhaps it is easier to talk about it in its manifestations.
For those who share the Christian religion, the clearest idea of what love is can be found in the life of Jesus. He gave his life to fulfill a divine mandate that asked him to sacrifice himself on behalf of humanity. In this act, there is no gratification of those described in the section where I commented on the biological issue.
What explains the act carried out by that man, already two thousand years ago, is the conviction of wanting to do it. The will of wanting to procure good for others.
There, I do see an important component to be able to think about what human love could be.
When someone asks me what love is, I answer: think of a situation where there are feelings of surrender, need for protection, need to want to do good, enjoyment for the success of the other, will and conviction to want to do the best. When you are in the presence of that, you will know that love is there.
Thank you for your time.
But, what about animals that stay mates for life? Do you think there's something more to that?
The truth wouldn't know how to answer. One of the things I have learned is to respect the mysteries. It would be interesting to know what the feeling of these animals is. Thank you for the comment.