{"id":46847,"date":"2021-08-20T13:26:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-20T17:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=46847"},"modified":"2021-08-30T11:37:23","modified_gmt":"2021-08-30T15:37:23","slug":"love-takes-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/love-takes-work\/","title":{"rendered":"Effortless Love Is a Myth: Love Takes Work"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Do you believe in effortless love? Or do you think that love takes work?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to psychiatrist M. Scott Peck, effortless love is a myth. Genuine love<\/a> takes work, and work requires attention. He argues that listening with full attention is a critical act of genuine love for parenting and other types of relationships<\/a>. He also discusses when love isn’t worth the effort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keep reading to better understand how and why love takes work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The Truth: Love Takes Work<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

We tend to expect love to be easy, rejecting the notion that love takes work\u2014and believing that, if it does, it\u2019s not \u201ctrue love.\u201d But effortless love is a myth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Love can be measured by effort and energy. You can only expand your limits through deliberate effort. Love takes work, and this effort requires attention. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Being a good listener is the best way to demonstrate attentiveness. When you genuinely love someone, you listen as an act of love. You determine that the person is valuable to you, and you invest your will to love in the form of attention. As a listener, you are both giving and receiving<\/a>. This is true for the speaker, as well. That being said, it\u2019s hard work. People who don\u2019t listen well either don\u2019t understand that it requires effort, or they are not willing to commit that effort. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Note on Parenting<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

With children, most listening approaches have some sort of merit. Sometimes kids need to be quiet, sometimes they need to chatter away and they don\u2019t care who is listening. Sometimes it\u2019s sufficient to make a few acknowledgments so they know you are there, other times they prefer to go in and out of communication which makes selective listening plenty. Other times it is essential that you listen fully. The difficulty of parenting is determining the proper balance of all these methods for your child\u2019s particular set of needs. Why listen to children? <\/p>\n\n\n\n