Fifth Core Element of Health

"And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth." In the account of the creation of the earth the animals were brought forth and commanded to be fruitful and multiply. Man was likewise commanded to do the same. The fundamental organization in which this is to occur is in the family. And the most fundamental cause which brings this about is love. The fifth core element of health is love with the central focus around love in the family.

All forms of love are encompassed by this element of health. There are different ways to express love, different types or degrees of love and different types of relationships in which love is expressed. Love is the mother of all emotions, so the emotional realm is included. The family is the place designed by God for each individual to learn the fundamental applications of love.

As children each of us learned love primarily from someone else; whether that was through parents and relatives or through people in the community. We learned to express love as we have learned to receive it. We learned to control it in a measure according to how we were taught. However, love is one thing that each of us has been familiar with since before we were born, and, although that direct memory is not had in our physical bodies our spirits are very familiar with this feeling.

Of the different ways to express love, some have been explored by people like the author of The Five Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts, Gary Chapman. He suggests that love is given and received through - words of affirmation, acts of service, physical touch, quality time and gift giving.

The different relationships in which love can be expressed are also related to the types of love. Of the different kinds of love there are unconditional love, friendship love, affectionate love and romantic love. This is according to C. S. Lewis in The Four Loves. There may be other kinds, but as for these four the differences are: Unconditional love is felt for all men no matter how good or bad they are. Friendship love is that had by people who are friends and help each other out. Affectionate love is the type had by those who are very close, normally in a family - parent/child, sibling/sibling. Romantic love is had by those who are seeking to obey the commandment to be fruitful and multiply as well as "a man [shall] leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh."

There are also counterfeits to love and these also affect our health in negative ways. Some counterfeits are lust and selfish love. Lust is a counterfeit to romantic love. This is where the love is entirely physical or fundamentally physical. Although romantic love does include sexual relations, for those who have formalized their commitment to each other through marriage, it is not the foundation of this love. Selfish love includes expecting more love than is given or feeding off of love from those who inherently give it. One example is children. Unconditional love is in the nature of children, for a parent to reject the romantic love of a spouse which brought about a child, while feeding off of the unconditional love of the child, is selfish love.

Love is the mother of all emotions. It is a fundamental need of all mankind. When love is not properly felt or expressed as needed by an individual there are negative repercussions on their health. Anger and fear can develop. Emotional addictions can be created. A void is created and the individual seeks whatever means they can find to fill that gap, even to their own hurt or the hurt of others. When love is properly felt and expressed as needed, the individual has a more fortified immune system, their body functions better overall. The desires change to uplift themselves and those around them to be more healthy, happy and open to help themselves and others heal.