It weird, I think I live my life striving to strike balance between two sets of rule books, both of which I feel are extremely important. One rule book is the `principles of love', which is heavily influenced by the bible, but not limited to Jesus's teaching. I have also found incredible insight and wisdom in old Tibetan Buddist texts, and other love-based philosphies/theologies.
The other`book' is the `principles of responsible self empowerment' (thats not a real book BTW, lol). I started out only living by the principles of love, and was hurt very badly , many times, because I hadn't yet read the other book, lol. The reason we need both, is that we need to love, but we also need to be strong and to survive, in order to truly love.
I think my pendulum is a little too far in one direction right now, because i am trying to learn to be self empowered. I am playing catch up, because I never knew how to protect myself before, and my life went off the rails because of it. So I'm a bit too far in that direction. My ideal would be more middle road, if that makes sense.
X bella