In response to the Ayn Rand quote Dr. Bowery provided in a blog entry, I find myself very intrigued by it. When people first think of love, we often think of the commercialism of Valentine’s Day, and giving gifts, bestowing affection, spending time with another person, etc. Love seems in every way to be a relationship with some other person. It is an exchange. And so, I found it interesting that Rand views love as a self-relationship projected onto another. If we think about it, to love requires someone to be capable of love, which means they must possess certain qualities or capabilities. Does that mean that we must in some way love ourselves to love another?

As far as love being an expression of self-esteem, I wonder if that means that we must feel whole enough to give away a part of ourselves. However, if love is a response to our values in someone else, then it must follow that we find ourselves to be worthy of love. After all, how can there be real love between two people who share no similarities? I don’t think there can be, because in a way, to love someone who is nothing at all like you in any way means that perhaps you do not love yourself and also you probably don’t have an accurate conception of love. For that matter, does it mean that people such as Ghandi who professed love for numerous groups of people he did not know personally was speaking of true love? I’m not sure if there is some other type of love which can be directed towards unfamiliar people that is general, or if that wouldn’t be love but rather some other emotion. Perhaps it is strong like love, but isn’t the same.