Does Love Require Effort?

Does love require effort?

Love may begin with the natural feeling of simply liking someone. Yet, over time, that same love can become heavy and painful—something most of us have probably experienced.

If we love someone, why is it sometimes so difficult to understand them? If we truly wish for their happiness, why do we find ourselves noticing only their faults?

Today, I would like to reflect on the effort that love requires.

When a Home Became a Living Hell

There was once an ordinary family who had lived their lives with deep faith.

They had two children. Their daughter was bright and accomplished, while their son was quiet and introverted. The father, a strict and hardworking man, saw his son as unreliable and sometimes even felt ashamed of him.

As the father approached retirement and began looking forward to a peaceful and secure life, his son developed depression, left his job, and returned home.

But gradually, his condition worsened. He became severely disturbed and eventually began acting violently toward his family. Their once-peaceful home changed completely, and their daily life became a living hell.

“Could he be under the influence of an evil spirit?”

Desperate to save their son, the parents sought various forms of medical treatment and spiritual help. Yet despite everything they tried, his condition continued to deteriorate.

Just as the family was beginning to lose hope, they met a lecturer from Happy Science.

An Unexpected Piece of Advice

The lecturer gave the father a surprisingly simple piece of advice:

“You do not need to think about anything difficult. Every morning, when you pray, write down one good quality you see in your son and read it aloud.”

The father thought, “Finding just one good quality in my son should be easy.”

But when he actually sat down to write, nothing came to mind.

He thought as hard as he could and finally managed to write down one thing. The next morning, and the morning after that, he continued searching for one good quality in his son and reading it aloud.

As he repeated this practice day after day, a realization suddenly came to him:

“Have I been judging my son all this time?”

Then he looked back over all the qualities he had written down and was astonished. They were qualities he himself did not possess—qualities that had been missing from his own character.

“He is too gentle for a man.”
“He is so unreliable compared with his sister.”

The qualities he had regarded as weaknesses were, when seen differently, the very sensitivity and kindness that he himself lacked. What the father had dismissed as faults were, in fact, precious qualities that made his son who he was.

Discovering the Light Within Another Person

Then something remarkable began to happen.

As the father’s heart changed, so did the way he looked at his son. Gradually, his son’s condition also began to improve. In time, he recovered enough to return to work.

It was not that the father had never loved his son. On the contrary, he had been strict with him precisely because he loved him deeply and worried about his future.

But his own standard of what his son “should be” had prevented him from seeing who his son truly was.

Master Ryuho Okawa teaches us:

“To love is to understand. When people feel understood, they feel loved.”

Love is more than simply feeling that we like someone.

To love is to make the effort to understand another person. To seek to understand someone is to love them. The very act of discovering the wonderful qualities within another person is itself an expression of love.

The feeling of liking someone may arise naturally. But understanding who that person truly is—and continuing to discover the light within them—requires effort.

It means letting go of our own standards and judgments and trying to recognize the unique qualities they possess, especially those that are different from our own.

I believe it is within this effort that we find the discipline of love—a practice that continues into eternity.

This week, why not write down one good quality each day about someone precious to you?

Within something you once considered a weakness, you may discover a light that belongs to that person alone—something truly irreplaceable.