( reading time: 6 min 6 sec )
Love in an investment. The desired return can vary from a desire to be loved back to having the object of our love accept the gift being offered.
Having extra money can allow us to do things we could not do without it. Thinking this way makes it easier to miss the mark. More money means more potential, but what we gain in potential comes with more risk. Naturally, any of us expects something that costs more to be a better buy. Investments directed toward love need the same validation regardless of coming for free or for a fortune.
In this article, we will look at the differences and similarities between low-cost and high-cost acts of love. Expressing love successfully with little or much has common risks. Achieving meaningful acts of love also has similar keys. Surprise, it’s not about the money.
Money Cannot Buy Love.
Most of us know this. What is amazing is how knowing something doesn’t connect with our thinking in different seasons. Along comes a birthday, anniversary, or our festive family holiday, and we look to money as the key to letting others know how much we love them.
Too often, I looked at someone in my family, from my wife to my youngest child, and looked at my budget to see what we could do for a birthday or some other special occasion. Spending money on others is okay, but that shouldn’t be where the mind starts looking. It may be a reflex and familiar, but love is best expressed when it is personal.
Reflexes are generic responses. It doesn’t make them wrong, but it can make them blind. People have different needs in different seasons. A gift-giving tradition should not keep us from seeing the person we give a gift to. Besides the thought that money cannot buy love, we have another cliche that needs to be practiced.
It’s Not the Gift But the Thought That Counts.
Have you ever heard a person get a gift and respond, “That was so thoughtful!” One of the universal traits of love is thinking about others. Everyone would be confused if we said, “I love you, but I don’t think about you.”
It is also true that we only know if love exists once it has been tested. When love is tested, we see the strength and quality of the love. Love doesn’t have to be flawless to be genuine. One of the greater marks of love isn’t the instant decisions we make but the lasting decisions. Love makes the lasting decision to invest in another over investing in oneself.
Another durable cliche is money is power. When one gives up money that could have been used to invest in oneself for the cause of another, this is undoubtedly a candidate for the classification of love. If a person is so rich that a great gift doesn’t impact their ability to invest in themselves, the proof of preference cannot be answered by the measure of money.
How do we express love when we lack money to invest, showing a preference for another? We have to look beyond money for the answer. This is where the lack of funds makes the need for creativity clear. Ironically, when money is abundant, we may fail to be creative because our reflex is to use our wealth of funds to solve every challenge.
The common risk of not enough or too much money.
Not having enough or more than enough money is a test to see if we look to money as the only or primary way to meet life’s challenges. It is okay to use any tool in the toolbox, but when the only tool we reach for happens without asking if that tool matches the challenge, it may be the wrong tool or the wrong time for the tool.
Love is about the person we serve and always about service. Money can move our culture from a servant mindset to a demand for service. Regardless of the cause, love can restore us to remember it is a tool with use that, in season, is valuable.
Too much or too little money can distract us from a more significant truth in love. Love accomplishes what it can, but the pure nature of love is about trying without a need to achieve. Achievement is the goal, and our target is the good of the one we love. We will try and want to achieve, but the measure of love is not success but dedication to the task.
The common answer.
The common answer for the rich and poor is creative dedication. When money provides a creative answer, it is available, then use it. Creativity often finds a way to stand alone when our challenges are short on funds. Without creativity, we want to show love, but all we may show is tradition or affluence.
Beyond creativity, beyond finding an answer, we show dedication. The good of another is not just served by losing one’s resources. It is sometimes served by preserving one’s resources to sustain that service. The enduring commitment is another rich evidence of the beauty of love one person can share with another.
Gratitude doesn’t measure quantity.
The response of another doesn’t define the love being offered. Love doesn’t have the power to create the response it desires in others. Love is an offering, not a means to an end. Love isn’t forceful or vulgar. So, if we have love as a motive, how we use our resources will be creative but respectful. Our love will communicate openly but also with a sense of the comfort of the person our love focuses on.
In retrospect, we will also respect the love of those we love by understanding their sacrifice and dedication. When we love someone, we need to recognize actual acts of love with gratitude. The need to reciprocate love is debt, not love. To recognize love and have that stir up love in us is fine. Then, the goal will not be reciprocation but love.
Roadblocks to Expressing Love
Feeling like we need more money or having too much to slow down and be creative and dedicated can be a roadblock to showing love. Traditions are great expressions of love, but not when we close our eyes to those we love. Love is more than a box of chocolates and roses on Valentine’s Day.
Traditional acts alone may not make others feel heard, seen, or valued. This is why we have phrases like, alone together.
Keys to Expressing Love
To express love, you must physically, materially, and emotionally care for the person. I would also argue spiritually, but not everyone shares that sentiment. The person may not respond, but how we love them will help us overlook the return we seek for our investments. The return will be the benefit of the other person. We must learn to hear them without the need to agree with them.
Of course, a parent’s love for a child differs from the interest one adult may share towards another outside their family. When a child is older, their love for an aging-challenged parent is also a shift from the former relationship.
The joy of love is knowing it is understanding, creative, dedicated, and outward-minded. It’s about something other than the money first; if the resource helps, it is not held back. If the resource hurts, it isn’t given to make the one who wants to believe they love to feel better about the suffering of another. We don’t buy drinks for someone who struggles with alcohol. Love takes the same oath as doctors to do no harm.
Why the focus on love and money?
Because so much depends on our money and the creative things it can do. When we waste our money, we might not have access to better tools to work with the challenges of those we love today or in the future. Saying I will be creative as an excuse to waste money will put us on the path to regret in the future.
We also don’t want people to hoard money, thinking they don’t need to be creative. We don’t want people working to 10x their money, thinking money will be a substitute for their absence. To be creative, we need to be present to understand the people we serve and the challenges they face from an individual perspective.
We must keep ourselves physically fit, with sufficient sleep, financially fit, and more to serve well. It is a journey, and humans from many financial backgrounds have similar abilities to win in their efforts to love those around them. The challenges to offer love and the keys to being effectively loving are at least introduced in this article.
We wish you success as you find those who motivate you to serve, and we hope the financial side of what we offer here helps. We also didn’t intend this, but it will be Valentine’s Day in two weeks. This may help those who want to celebrate a day of love to have more clarity on what love is and how to approach it more effectively.
