A Lesson in Love
- NBC’s The Good Place actress Kristen Bell, 40, is sharing some really inspirational theories on love that we think are worth sharing with the SurvivorNet community.
- Bell, who has been a cancer caregiver with husband Dax Shepard, frequently shows empathy and generosity for healthcare workers or helping a family going through cancer by donating goods.
- Cancer survivor and single mom Sharon Galvin tells SurvivorNet how much love and support matters: “The warmth and the love you feel from others that are going through something similar was outstandingsomething I’ll never forget.”
Related: Actor Kristen Bell Honors Cancer Caregivers: 'I Know What it's Like to Lose Someone'
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“I think days where we celebrate love should acknowledge all the different kinds of love,” Bell writes on her Instagram. “There are 7 different kinds. Currently, my kids are watching a movie and dad woke super early so he’s resting, which means I’m able to sit outside and knit in the sun. I’m getting some (healthy) Philautia, and some intermittent Philia from the pups. I hope each and every one reading this gets one or more of the 7 today, and every day.”
1. Eros: romantic love
2. Philia: Friendship love
3. Storge(Stor-jay): familial love
4. Agape: universal love, as in strangers, nature or God
5. Ludus: playful or uncommitted love. Teasing, flirting, fun with no strings attached.
6. Philautia: self-love. Which can be healthy or unhealthy. “Unhealthy self-love is akin to hubris. In Ancient Greece, people could be accused of hubris if they placed themselves above the gods, or, like certain modern politicians, above the greater good. Many believed that hubris led to destruction, or nemesis.
Bell cites Psychology Today for the information she shares. “Healthy self-love, on the other hand, is akin to self-esteem, which is our cognitive and, above all, emotional appraisal of our own worth. More than that, it is the matrix through which we think, feel, and act, and reflects on our relation to ourselves, to others, and to the world.”
While she stresses the importance of self-love, Bell also frequently expresses “Agape,” or universal love, on her page, by featuring photos of various real-life families whom she doesn’t know, going through medical or financial struggles, and also has praised various healthcare workers.
Bell often helps families going through cancer, as her own family knows how hard-hitting cancer can be, having been cancer caregivers to Shepard’s stepfather who died from prostate cancer in 2018, not to mention Dax’s own father died from lung cancer at 62, according to the actor’s Twitter.
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Love in the Cancer Community
As many people facing cancer know, there is no understanding and support quite like the love that other cancer survivors show you. Melanoma survivor Sharon Galvin, a retired police officer and single mom, told SurvivorNet about experiencing love and support from fellow cancer survivors. When she went for her last clinical trial treatment, she had brought her children, but the support that she was going to receive extended from her family to everyone waiting in the doctor’s office. “I met with the doctors and found out that it was in fact working.”
As she walked out the door, she gave her a thumbs up as the leapt up to greet her, and her children leapt up to greet her, and the whole waiting room started to clap. “The warmth and the love you feel from others that are going through something similar was outstanding– something I’ll never forget.”
The Love That You Feel From Other Cancer Survivors is Outstanding
The Power of Love
Love is all around us. We don’t have to have a significant other to give or feel love from others. The history of love in our own family can be something fulfilling for us, giving us stories that we can cherish. SurvivorNet spoke with a family who shared a story of their parents’ love during World War II, and an amazing keepsake the family has from that time. A lovebox.
SurvivorNetTV Presents Lovebox A Love Story for the Ages
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