If you are enabling the person in a way that negatively affects your well-being, that isn't unconditional love-it's unhealthy, codependent love. This is especially true if you have tried to communicate clearly and still see no change. If you find that the relationship has devolved into behavior that lacks kindness and respect, then it's likely that a boundary needs to be set. If someone has harmed you and they are not willing to repair it, then you need to set a limit for your own well-being. The latter becomes apparent when the relationship is no longer offering the basic needs of a relationship. There's a distinct line between loving someone through the hardships vs. Again, this leads us to a place of unbalanced power and control rather than into a place of truly connected love in which we offer each person an opportunity to be responsible for their behavior with us. In codependent relationships, we are so set on maintaining the dynamics in the relationships that we excuse or enable unacceptable behavior.

Sometimes, we ignore these needs for boundaries in the name of 'unconditional love.' However, in those moments, we are not offering unconditional love. If we do not let our partners, parents, children, and friends know where we stand in terms of how we expect and need to be treated, then we will not have an equal voice in the relationship.

Love without boundaries can lead to unhappiness at least and abuse at worst 1. One of the most beautiful experiences in human life is learning to lean into the tension of those challenges by offering connection, love, and understanding and by accepting influence, creating compromise, and moving forward in a way in which both people win. And we also show our own quirks and flaws and challenges. When we enter relationships with other people, we are entering relationships with another human being-a person full of quirks and flaws and challenges. In fact, it is what every meaningful, lasting relationship is made of. Unconditional love means loving someone through hardships, mistakes, and frustrations. Otherwise, we are offering love with 'strings attached.' This creates power and control imbalances.

It is important to offer this type of unconditional love in our relationships. It means, 'I offer you my love freely without condition.' This means that when we offer our love, we offer it without expectation of repayment. The term unconditional love does not mean love without limits or bounds.

What does unconditional love mean