“Love all, Trust a few, do Wrong to None.” -William Shakespeare

I have admired this quote for as long as I can remember and in the past it has been a guide for me; a way for me to live my life. However, recently I have begun to dissect this quote more and more and as a result, it now means less to me. Let me explain; Since the 1960s, the hippie era, the ideas of “free love” and “love for all” has become increasingly prevalent. Proof of this can be seen in any store which caters to teens and young adults, with the abundance of shirts and other articles of clothing which have the word “Love” plastered all over them. I will always argue for love over hate, and I view the spreading of the word Love as a positive thing, but I have begun to realize the cons of this message; the idea to “love all” can be dangerously vague.

Just because you say you love someone doesn’t always mean you will treat them well. Many people have disrespected and mistreated their parents, children, friends, family, siblings, or spouses despite the fact that they loved them. To me, the issue is not a lack of love. People feel love for others on a daily basis. The issue is a lack of respect for others and lack of thought in one’s actions. Love is often thought of as a feeling; we think it does not need to be expressed or acted on because it’s something we know we feel, so we don’t think we need to prove it. We rarely think of love as a verb or something we need to take action to maintain. We like the idea of unconditional love in regards to all relationships, but this is not the case. We need to show appreciation for the people we love in order to keep a strong, healthy relationship. In other words, we need to respect the ones we love if we want to keep them.

We all like to think of ourselves as loving people. Some of us even take pride in being a “nice” person or being a “good” person. However, no matter how “nice” or “good” you think you are, assuming all types of love are unconditional is arrogant. Relationships need to be maintained and people need to know they are appreciated. Just as you have standards as to how you want people to treat you, others have standards as to how they want to be treated. This idea extends to strangers as well. You don’t need to love everyone you meet, but you should respect everyone you meet. It’s impossible to like everyone, let alone love everyone, but it is possible to respect everyone. Also, spreading the idea of respect is much less abstract than spreading the idea of love. Love is often thought of as a feeling rather than an action and is therefore abstract and complicated. Respect is more tangible; we all hold ideas regarding what it means to act respectfully in our culture.

Furthermore, feeling love for someone (or saying you feel love for someone) means nothing unless one is willing to take the actions to prove it. Too often, people say they love someone, yet they do not show it through their actions; rather they end up disrespecting the person or people they claim to love. In many types of relationships, people use the excuse “You know I love you,” to justify rude or disrespectful behavior. Just because you say you love someone does not excuse rude or disrespectful behavior. Unfortunately, love can be (and has been) used as an excuse for disrespect in every possible relationship. Children who disrespect their parents by taking what they are given for granted and are unaware of how hard their parent/parents worked to provide for them. Parents who emotionally or physically abuse their children “out of Love” and are unaware of the negative impact this may have on the child. Abusive friendships as well as abusive romantic relationships in which one person will feel justified in taking their anger out on the other, unaware of how they are hurting the person they claim to love. Many of these negative relationships stem from one person thinking, “I love this person, so they will excuse my actions. Love conquers all, right?”

No matter how close you become to someone in a relationship, there are still standards and levels of respect that must be met to maintain the relationship. If you have a relationship that means something to you, then act like it means something to you. Positive intentions and feelings do not justify negative behavior and actions. As I mentioned earlier, we think of love as an emotion, but we think of respect as a way to act and a way to treat others. It’s easy for people to love others; it is much harder to show that love by acting respectfully. It’s the difference between good intentions (love) and good deeds (respect). Most of us would agree that good deeds are more important than good intentions because good deeds are tangible while good intentions are not. Good intentions do not always result in good deeds. Similarly, feeling love for someone does not always result in acting respectfully towards them. Many people are unaware of how they have disrespected people they love; they think that they have been granted unconditional love in that relationship, whether due to the length (number of years) of the relationship or the depth of the relationship (how deeply they care for each other). We all need to be self aware in our relationships and ask ourselves whether we are showing our appreciation for those whom we love.

However, I must acknowledge that nobody is ever taught how to show their love for another, whether friendly love, family love, or romantic love, and as a result everyone shows their love in different ways. Some choose to show it physically, through hugs or other forms of friendly touch, some choose to show it verbally, being complimented or told they are loved, and some choose to show their love through acts of kindness or gifts. People love (and fall in love with) other people everyday, but we don’t always show our affections towards others in the same way. In addition to our differing preferences in showing our love, everyone likes to receive love in different ways. For example, one may feel most loved if they receive hugs or physical affection as opposed to gifts or being told they are loved. On the other hand, some people are uncomfortable with hugs or physical contact and may value compliments or verbal expressions of love above anything else. We need to respect how others want to be treated in terms of our relationships. Although it is complicated trying to understand how to best love someone, it is much less complicated trying to understand how to best respect someone.

In plain terms, a respectful relationship is one in which both people agree on how to act in the relationship and both people feel comfortable with how they are treated by the other person. Some may argue, “What about sarcastic relationships? When two friends are constantly insulting each other, isn’t that disrespectful?” No, it is not disrespectful. A relationship is disrespectful when the terms of the relationship are not agreed upon. When two people agree on the terms of their relationship, it is not disrespectful to be sarcastic and play fight with each other. I myself have multiple friendships in which the majority of our conversations are insults and sarcastic remarks. However, we know our limits and would never say anything to seriously attack each other. If anything did go too far, we would communicate that the topic is off limits. Additionally, in these relationships we still show our appreciation for each other. We can draw guidelines for respect and tell others how we want to be treated. Sometimes we want to be treated with sarcastic remarks and insults because it’s our way of joking with each other and it keeps things interesting.

I do think it is important to love the people in your life. However, I think it is more important to respect the people in your life. There is no shortage of love in the world, but there is a shortage of respect. We need to be more conscious of how our actions affect other people, especially the ones we love. We need to show the ones we want to hold closest to us that we appreciate them and that we respect them to maintain a healthy relationship. Saying you love someone is not an excuse to mistreat or disrespect them.