The 7 Ways The Ancient Greeks Defined Love
Do You Know Love?
Hey Friends,
Over the last week, I attended my school friend’s wedding, discussed relationships, and read Esther Perel’s Mating In Captivity.
So it seems like the running theme is love.
Who’s in the mood for love?
The English word for ‘love’ is a bit lacking.
According to the dictionary, love is: “a feeling of strong or constant affection for a person, object or idea.”
Yet there are many forms of love.
I love falling in love.
I love going on a date and listening to a lady tell her story.
I love reading, writing and climbing.
I love my friends and family.
I love spending time by myself.
All these forms of love are driven by affection and attachment, yet they are all distinct.
To have one word encompassing all the different types of love doesn’t give love enough justice. The word ‘love’ is not nuanced enough.
To understand what love is, we’re going to have to travel back in time to the ancient Greeks. They understood the intricacies and nuances of love. Instead of 1 word, they used 7 different words to explain love in its many different forms.
1. Eros: Romantic Passionate Love
Most romantic relationships start like this.
Named after the Greek God of love and fertility, Eros is fueled by the desire for pleasure and attraction. It’s love that is intense and physical.
Eros can be crazy, erotic and obsessive.
This type of love in the modern world captures our physical attraction to one another and embodies passionate and romantic love.
2. Philia: Intimate Authentic Friendship
Love doesn’t have to come from a source of passionate romance, it can start with friendship.
Philia is knowing someone well enough you develop a soul-to-soul bond. It’s intimate, authentic and kind. It’s warm and encouraging.
Philia is based on goodwill and wanting what’s best for the other person. It’s having mutual trust. It’s calling someone brother or sister even when they’re not related to you.
The love experienced in this is of loyalty, kindness and affection.
3. Ludus: Playful Flirtatious Love
Ludus is built on infatuation, flirtation and fun.
It’s having a crush on someone and acting on it. It’s going out for a drink with a friend and being like a romantic couple for the night. It’s going to a club and dancing with a stranger.
This love is casual exciting, and fun. It has zero expectations to be loved. And it doesn’t need physical attraction or friendship to be love.
4. Storge: Unconditional Familial Love
Sometimes you can love a person even when you don’t like them. If you have any siblings, you will understand this concept.
Storge is the kind of kinship that exists between family members. When someone is family, you often develop a need to protect them, even if they may not be the nicest person.
This love is unconditional.
It’s not dependent on who the person is or what they can do for you. It’s the kind of love that makes you capable of giving a kidney without hesitation. It’s a one-way ticket. It’s the ability to love someone even if they may not have the ability to love you back.
5. Philautia: Self-love
Philautia is something you shouldn’t take for granted.
Take yourself out on a date and treat yourself. You don’t have to have achieved anything or crossed any milestone to celebrate how fantastic you are.
This love is when you stop comparing yourself to others, when you stop judging and forgive yourself for your past mistakes.
Love is when you wake up in the morning, look at yourself in the mirror and are proud of the person staring back at you.
Love is being kind to yourself – in your thoughts, words and actions.
Love is choosing yourself.
6. Pragma: Committed Love
Pragma is committed and compassionate.
Love is to have and to hold. For better, for worse. For richer, for poorer. In sickness and in health. To love and to cherish, till death do you part.
It’s accepting each other’s differences and learning to compromise.
It’s choosing to take all the broken pieces and put them together again instead of throwing them away.
Pragma is ever-lasting, rooted in romantic feeling and compassion.
Love is both a feeling and a choice. Falling in love is a feeling, but loving is a decision. It’s telling them, “I love you. I don’t know how we’ll get through this, but we’ll do it together.”
It requires a commitment to never let this person go for as long as they let you.
7. Agape: Empathetic Universal Love
Agape is a love inclusive of helping strangers, nature and those less fortunate.
It’s empathy towards humanity. Fighting for change even if you’re not directly affected by the issue. It’s altruistic. And it selflessly caring for humans, animals and the universe.
It’s a love that doesn’t expect anything in return – Love itself is the reward.
Agape serves as the foundation for humanity, without which we cannot thrive.
The ancient Greeks put together this beautiful vocabulary of love, but each type of love is not mutually exclusive.
We are complicated beings who love in complex and unique ways. But love, without a doubt, is fundamental to the human experience.
Love exists in all cultures of the world. There is something innate and biological about the experience of love.
We don’t know why love exists, but we do know how important it is.
Love With An Open Heart Even If It Hurts
My 2021 was filled with loss, heartbreak and failure.
I wanted to close down and shut the world out in the midst of the pain.
But through the struggles, I continued to love with an open heart.
Call it woo woo. Call it naivete. Call it whatever you want. But I believe if you’re able to keep loving the world, the world will love you back.
I sit here today at peace with myself, a smile on my face and joy in my heart.
When you are able to love with all of your heart, especially in the hardest times, your truth will shine bright as the sun.
“Love is the highest virtue and truth is its handmaiden” – Jordan B Peterson.
— Jason Vu Nguyen