Definitions of words

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I'm posting this on a couple of boards 'cause it is something that I find really interesting and I'm curious as to other people's interpretation of these words, 'cause I just don't get them . . .

Love - my definition has always been that this is something more than 'friendship' and is something like really finding someone fun to be around and enjoing doing things for them and feeling really hurt if you think about not being able to be around them anymore
Actually, I was reading "The Curious Incident of The Dog in The Nightime' by Mark Haddon (which is a great book) and Christopher (who is classically autistic) describes love this way, and it is the closest thing I've ever seen to how I see it (he is talking about his father saying that he loves him):
"And I said 'Yes' because loving someone is helping them when they get into trouble, and looking after them, and telling them the truth, and FAther looks after me when I get into trouble, like coming to the police station, and he looks after me by cooking meals for me, and he always tells me the truth, which means that he loves me.'

Friendship - this is finding someone that you like to be around and someone who has csome characteristic that makes them interesting - and it is fun to do things for these people so that they like to be around you - this is a word that I'm trying to remove from my vocabulary and replace wiht 'people I like to be around' since I know that I don't see this word like other people
But, like my favorite person to be around is very nice and he tells great stories and he is so self confident that it is fun to listen to him talk and then my other favoite person to be around sees things so differnt from me that I love listening to her talk and she is nice to me most of the time and she loves animals like I do . . . she is the one who thought I might be an aspie, actually - and, also, I feel very safe around both of them, which is rare for me . . .

Attraction - for me this is really liking a trait about someone - like my favorite person to be around's husband is just beautiful - like a painting or something - and then I'm also usually attracted to self-confidence and physical strength . . .
Apparently this is more for NTs, though . . .

Family - now, I come from a super dysfunctional family, but for most people family seems to be something positive - and my family will give me some things and talk to me on the phone - but generally they make me feel bad and tell me that whatever I've done is wrong - so I don't understand why so many people see family as a good thing . . .

Anyway, I'm curious what your defnitions of these words are and also what other words you have problems with . . . 'cause I'm sure I'm leaving some out . . .

Your message interested me. I am not sure that my reply will be interesting too, because I have had some trouble defining the words.


Love
My definition is like yours. I see love as more than friendship, and I think that Christopher's definition is quite accurate (I have read the book). In fact, I would add respect the person to his definition.

Friendship
I think the words "people I like to be around" is indeed better. I have noticed that when I talk about friends, people do not really understand what I mean, and when they talk about their friends, sometimes I do not know what they mean by friends.

Attraction
It is something I do not really understand because to most people, it seems to be something particular and physical, and I do not pay attention to it. So for me, attraction would be that you think the person is beautiful, and that you like to see him or her. My definition is the same as yours again.

Family
I seem very odd to most people because of my definition of that, but it is based on the saying that you choose your friends, and not your family. To me, your family is just the group of persons you are genetically related to - and/or the persons you live with and have lived with for a long time. We love members of our family because
1. When you spend a lot of time with people, they just become a part of your environment so they are reassuring in most cases.
2. You have genes in common, which means you share something in common that can not be denied or changed. It shocks many people, but it would mean that you love more your siblings than your parents, because you are more connected to your siblings (all your siblings have, like you, half the genes of your father and half of your mother) than to your parents - because you only have half of your genes in common. This is what I have thought for a long time, but it not very satisfactory because it does not take into account genetic mutations.

This was a tricky question you asked because I am not very good at relationships, to be honnest. I like to understand things, even feelings, so I try to rationalize everything when I can. I find reasons, causes for everything. I do not really know whether it is good or bad, but I just can not help it.

Loy

The concepts of love and friendship - or realizing that I don't understand them like other people - has been one of the most useful things to me about this diagnosis . . .

Like today, I had to take one of my rats to the vet and the vet is by the office where I used to work, and most of the people I like to be around I met at work, so I thought I'd see how they were today - and my favorite person to be around gave me a big hug (he is the only known exception to the rule that I hate to be touched - for some reason - I don't know why) and told me how excited he was that I'd found such a perfect job . . . then he left to go to lunch . . .
And then two other people that I like to be around were there, too and I talked to them for a little while, but discovered that I really didn't have much to say at all, so I left after a little while . . .

And it the past that would have bothered me very much that I couldn't talk to people like that - but having given up on the concept of friendship as most people see it, I am not bothered at all . . . I'm just happy that I got to see three of the people that I like to be around for a bit today and that's all . . .

I agree with most of those definitions but have also found myself attracted to people because of the way they speak and/or their intelligence or humour.

Love:
My definition for this is pretty similar to the NT definition. I believe that love is something that happens to between people who have a strong bond. The bond is built by any, some, or all of the following factors: time spent together, length of time known, number of things in common, etc. At the same time, I believe that respect is way more important than love.

Friendship:
My definition of it is as follows: it happens when two or more people have certain things in common, and have respect for each other. In this case, respect, rather than love, is what forms the bond. I strongly believe in the saying "a friend in need is a friend indeed", and would never knowingly betray a friend.

Attraction:
I define attraction as "wanting something another person has or can provide", in the romantic sense. For instance, if a girl has a good sense of humor, a cute face, and an ability to carry a conversation, I want to be with her because of that. It also works the other way: if I have something a girl wants, she'll want to be with me because of it.

Family:
Now that's a tough one. I come from a very authoritarian family. My parents monitored my every move, put a lot of pressure on me over my grades, and punished me severely for every little infraction. So while a family is supposed to be "a group of people who love each other (see above)", I simply can't see it this way. I always defined family as a relationship where there are supervisors (parents) and subordinates (children); no more, no less.