Whenever you sacrifice your comfort and convenience with a positive aim, you’re showing love. By default- love is not easy. At the same time, it’s inherent difficulty is its beauty. You can think about this concept in terms of gifts; when you receive a gift that was challenging for the giver to acquire, the acquisition difficulty corresponds to the amount of meaning behind the gift. Think about the most beautiful handmade gift you’ve ever received; it’s probably so special to you because the sacrifice behind its construction is palpable.

While meaningful love takes sacrifice, not all sacrifice is love. For any relationship to be effective, coordinated sacrifice is essential to having the love be sustainably fulfilling. More simply put- the mere fact of someone sacrificing with a positive intention towards their partner, doesn’t guarantee that their partner will find the sacrifice, or even the intention behind it, meaningful. Realistically, everyone has a different set of things that they find meaningful. So the more explicit two people are about communicating what they find meaningful, the more love they can feel behind the sacrifice.

To illustrate, consider a case where one partner in a relationship finds no meaning in material things but their partner finds a lot of meaning in material things. The material partner may sacrifice a ton to buy a super trendy table and chair set as a gift for their partner, but when the immaterial partner receives the swanky furniture set, they’re more frustrated than elated. But the immaterial partner can only be as frustrated as they were communicative about where they find meaning and how they receive love.

Sadly, even if both people communicate what they find meaningful, their sacrifices may not be compatible or sustainable. Ideally, two peoples’ sacrifices for each other are easy to coordinate and have enough overlap in what they find meaningful so that there’s more life giving than not. Like in our example, when people find meaning in drastically different things, the sacrifices become draining. Yet, keep in mind that some difference in what people find meaningful can create more love from the sacrifice. For example, whenever the material partner from earlier receives a material gift from the immaterial partner, it’s extra meaningful because the material partner knew how much of a sacrifice it was for their partner to contemplate, find, and acquire an item they fundamentally believed was unnecessary. Of course, if the immaterial partner can stomach the material sacrifices over time, then the relationship works well, otherwise it will be a struggle.

While it’s clearly important that there’s alignment between the meaningfulness of the sacrifices for people to have a productive relationship, it’s actually not the most important element of sacrifice. Ultimately, any relationship can only be as strong as the individuals involved. This notion, paired with the idea that love can be internally facing and externally facing, brings us to the point that the best way to increase our love for others is by having genuine love for ourselves. Internally facing love is the less obvious type of love, but the definition is the exact same. True love for yourself takes sacrifice with a noble intention behind it.

First, you have to be honest with yourself about what you find meaningful and then sacrifice towards that end. For example, if your fitness is meaningful to you, then you have to sacrifice your convenience to workout, but the result of that sacrifice is a happier, more loved version of you. Then, the more love you accumulate inside, the easier it is to give to others. When you have a scarcity mindset about love for yourself, it’s harder to sacrifice for others.