QuoteProject
Love does not alter the beloved, it alters itself.
Soren Kierkegaard
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Love transforms the lover rather than changing the object of their affection.

This quote by Soren Kierkegaard emphasizes that love is an internal experience that alters the individual's perceptions, emotions, and behaviors rather than changing the loved one. It suggests that true love requires self-reflection and growth, highlighting that the essence of love is a personal journey of transformation.

Themes

LoveTransformationSelfGrowthEmotion

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be used in a wedding speech to highlight the transformative power of love.

More from Soren Kierkegaard

Faith is the highest passion in a human being. Many in every generation may not come that far, but none comes further.
Soren KierkegaardRead
Men think that it is impossible for a human being to love his enemies, for enemies are hardly able to endure the sight of one another. Well, then, shut your eyes--and your enemy looks just like your neighbor.
Soren KierkegaardRead
How did I get into the world? Why was I not asked about it and why was I not informed of the rules and regulations but just thrust into the ranks as if I had been bought by a peddling shanghaier of human beings? How did I get involved in this big enterprise called actuality? Why should I be involved? Isn't it a matter of choice? And if I am compelled to be involved, where is the manager—I have something to say about this. Is there no manager? To whom shall I make my complaint?
Soren KierkegaardRead
A possibility is a hint from God. One must follow it.
Soren KierkegaardRead
And when the hourglass has run out, the hourglass of temporality, when the noise of secular life has grown silent and its restless or ineffectual activism has come to an end, when everything around you is still, as it is in eternity, then eternity asks you and every individual in these millions and millions about only one thing: whether you have lived in despair or not.
Soren KierkegaardRead
I am so stupid that I cannot understand philosophy; the antithesis of this is that philosophy is so clever that it cannot comprehend my stupidity. These antitheses are mediated in a higher unity; in our common stupidity.
Soren KierkegaardRead

Similar quotes

But I always think that the best way to know God is to love many things.
Vincent Van GoghRead
there is a place in the heart that will never be filled a space and even during the best moments and the greatest times times we will know it we will know it more than ever there is a place in the heart that will never be filled and we will wait and wait in that space.
Charles BukowskiRead
You were made perfectly to be loved - and surely I have loved you, in the idea of you, my whole life long.
Elizabeth Barrett BrowningRead
From in the shadow she calls. And in the shadow she finds a way, finds a way. And in the shadow she crawls, clutching her faded photograph. My image under her thumb. Yes with a message for my heart. She’s been everybody else’s girl maybe one day she’ll be her own.
Tori AmosRead
And now good morrow to our waking souls, Which watch not one another out of fear; For love, all love of other sights controls, And makes one little room, an everywhere. Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone, Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown, Let us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.
John DonneRead
Don't threaten me with love, baby. Let's just go walking in the rain.
Billie HolidayRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.

Quote by Soren Kierkegaard | QuoteProject