The Opposite of Love is Not Hate or Indifference, but Fear

Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel famously stated, ”the opposite of love is not hate, but indifference”.  While I understand his line of thinking, I disagree with this conclusion. Love and Hate are two sides of the same coin, each requiring an investment of strong emotion and energy.  Indifference is simply the absence of both Love and Hate. And how often have you seen people shift from love to hate and back again? It happens all the time, again suggesting that Love and Hate are too close in nature to be opposites.

The Opposite of Love

It is my contention that the opposite of Love is not indifference, but Fear. Fear springs from the belief that we are separate, and in separation, there can be no Love.  

So if Fear is the opposite of Love, and indifference is the absence of both Love and Hate, then what is the opposite of Hate? 

The opposite of Hate is Acceptance. Hate is a judgment against another, but with Acceptance, there is no judgment and there can be no Hate.

A Case of Chosen Indifference

I once had a friend who I had known for several years. Over time, she became friends with my wife as well. One day, she told my wife some hurtful things that someone else had said about a family member.  When my wife told me, I was initially quite angry, because I could not conceive of any reason why she would repeat these hurtful words. What did she hope to achieve? What good did she think would come of it?

I confronted her. As we spoke, she confirmed that she was repeating gossip, for which I have zero tolerance. It also became clear that she didn’t feel she had anything to apologize for, even though she couldn’t tell me what she had hoped to achieve by repeating these hurtful things. Finally, it made me wonder why those others, knowing we were friends of hers, felt so comfortable saying these things in her presence.

I explained to her that I had no room in my life for gossip. In an effort to distance my family and myself from this behavior, I ended the friendship. I wished her the best, but asked her not to contact me again. There were initially some feelings of anger, which I quickly let go. But I still had to decide what space she would occupy in my mind and my heart.

I could not and did not want to hate her. I knew she possessed many admirable qualities as a colleague, a wife and a mother, and was not deserving of hatred.  At the same time, I was unable to feel love for her because I could not accept her behavior.  So I settled for indifference. I aspire to hold her in a place of love again, while realizing that it can’t happen unless I learn to accept her as she is, with all her imperfections. My desire to protect myself and my family makes that a difficult choice, one which I have not yet been willing to make. I consciously choose to continue holding her in a place of indifference, for now.

Self Compassion

These ideas can be applied not only to our relationships with others, but our relationship to ourselves as well. You probably know someone (or maybe you are someone) who simply hates themselves. It might even be fair to say that most of us go through periods of self-hate, or at least don’t like ourselves very much.  This is not because we think there is nothing to love, but because we cannot accept ourselves as we are: imperfect, complex, and always in flux.  

Most people would readily admit that they do not expect perfection from others.  Why, then, do we not give ourselves the same consideration and compassion?  Humans are, by our very nature, imperfect, sometimes failing, and always changing.  If we can learn to accept ourselves as we are, with all our “flaws” and “shortcomings”, then self-hate becomes impossible.

Accept that you are exactly as nature intended, and treat yourself with at least as much compassion as you treat others. Realize that you are perfect in your imperfection!

Choosing Love or Fear

To take things a step further, I contend that every decision we make is, at its core, rooted in either Love or Fear. When I drew this conclusion several years ago, I undertook a deliberate effort to test my theory. When faced with a decision, I would examine my choices through the lens of Love versus Fear. I would challenge myself to make the decision rooted in Love, even when it was not what I wanted to do.  Especially when it was not what I wanted to do. This experiment transformed my life.

I was immediately struck by how consistently I had been making decisions out of Fear. It was my default. While it felt like the safe choice, that was only an illusion. It was just the defensive choice.

I was equally surprised, when faced with two choices, how obvious it became which was rooted in Love and which in Fear.  Once I had committed to making the choice rooted in Love, no matter what, I was able to proceed with a decisiveness, clarity and peace that I had never felt before. It was as if the decision was already made for me, and all I had to do was accept it.

Acceptance

In order to put this into practice, we must develop a strong and unwavering sense of acceptance in our lives. We must accept the situation in which we find ourselves and the choices we have available to us, letting go of the desire for things to be different. We must also accept the consequences, whatever they may be, of making decisions rooted in Love. This often means making the more difficult choice, risking an unpleasant outcome, or being the subject of ridicule. It could mean giving up something you really want or disappointing someone you care about.

Doing the right thing isn’t always easy, and doing the easy thing isn’t always right.  But the alternative is to continue to live and choose out of Fear. Living out of Fear is a self-perpetuating way of being. The more we do it, the harder it becomes to choose otherwise. We grow accustomed to the feeling of Fear, and the defensiveness and false sense of security that come with it. The more secure we think we feel, the more security we desire, feeding another self-perpetuating way of being.. In doing so, we miss out on opportunities to connect with others, to live with intention, and to become our best selves.

In the same way, making decisions rooted in Love becomes easier with time and practice.  

If we try to examine our choices through this lens of Love versus Fear, and strive to make Acceptance one of our core values, it can greatly reduce the suffering in our lives and open up new ways of being.

Remember:

• The opposite of Love is not indifference, but Fear. Fear springs from the belief that we are separate, and in separation, there can be no Love.

• The opposite of Hate is Acceptance. Hate is a judgment against another,but with Acceptance, there is no judgment and there can be no Hate.

• Every decision we make is rooted in either Love or Fear. Choosing Love isn’t easy, but it will transform your life.

• Acceptance is the key to creating a life and making choices rooted in Love.