Fascinating Article about Love

[EricaR]

I came across this and had to share. I really like the message here.

Is it love, or a mutual strangulation society?

The message of this article is great. You can love your partner without losing yourself in the love and in the relationship.

 

[rubybeth]

I really like the down-to-earth message of this article. It''s all so true. It''s the couples who can say/think these things and still stay and commit to an attitude of love toward each other, even when they aren''t ''in love'' who will make it through the long haul and who are more likely, I think, to fall in love with each other over and over.

 

[Delster]

There's a lot of truth in there, interesting article!

But why does it misquote King Lear right at the beginning?!?!?

In the version I learned Cordelia sure didn't tell Lear she loved him "as meat loves salt"?!?

 

[sandia_rose]

Date: 1/17/2008 11:04:26 AM
Author:EricaR

The message of this article is great. You can love your partner without losing yourself in the love and in the relationship.

My boyfriend and I had a conversation similar to the message in this article earlier this week. We were flipping channels and "Jerry McGuire" came on one of the OnDemands. He looked at the screen and said (putting on a girly voice), "You complete me, B" and then cracked up. I said, "I hate that phrase." Which sparked off our conversation on what we think true love is verses isn't.

One of the things I said was, "If you need someone to complete you, then you need therapy. I am complete as I am. I just happen to want someone to share my life with. But if I ended up alone, I'd still be Me. I think it's an awful burden to put on someone to expect that they will provide you with A Life." My boyfriend agreed.

My boyfriend and I also have interests and lives apart from each other. We don't live together right now, but we spend several days a week together. On the days we are not together, his band practices, he does something with one of his kids, I do something with my son, I have dinner or drinks or go somewhere with one of my girlfriends, I take a class (over the summer, Tuesdays were Hatha Yoga Night for me) or he tinkers with his music equipment or goes motorcycle riding with one of his friends. While we know the details of each other's lives, we're not tangled up in each other. We infom each other of what we're doing to be considerate....but we don't ask each other permission, unless it's for something like, "Do you mind if I go to the city for the weekend with x friend? We're going to see a show/shop, etc." This is a huge difference between my marriage and this relationship. My ex needed to control where I went, what I did and with whom I did it with. I could not have a simple dinner with one of my friends without him calling me at least twice on my cell to "check up." My boyfriend's ex is insecure, and she resented his being in a band and was overly (and not rightfully) mistrustful about his doing anything that did not include her. Our ex's both have that in common - few personal interests and thus the need to "attach" to someone else - so this is why this relationship works very well for both of us.

And one thing to remember, too, is that people fall in and out of love many times over the course of a relationship. There are some days when your partner will tick you off soooooo bad that you are

for days. As I've said to my boyfriend after a really bad argument, "I love you, but right now, I don't like you very much." And then I get over it, of course. There are also times when I notice something new about him or he does something that makes my heart get huge. This past Thanksgiving here in CT was unseasonably warm - 60s. I was in my boyfriend's kitchen cooking, and he was in his backyard playing ball with his daughter and my son. Seeing this 6'6", 310 pound bear of a man running around in his yard with my 45 pound 7 year old and having a ball made me grin. And seeing his compassion and caring towards his terminally ill mother (who has since passed away) for most of last year made me cry several times. And last week. It was very early morning and I was sleeping at his house. I had just woken up and he was fast asleep. The light from his bedroom window streams across the bed, and a ray of it went across his face. His hair is salt and pepper, but his eyebrows and eyelashes are still black. Except for one white eyelash that I saw in the light. And I sat there in bed watching him sleep and looking at that eyelash and thinking how much I love him. (I can be soooo sappy that way).

Interesting twist on this: my boyfriend and I are friends with a married couple that are swingers. No, I am not kidding. They go to "play parties" and they each....how do I say this in an appropriate way??.....indulge their interest in whomever catches their eye. This couple dated for 3 years and have been married for not-quite 1. And they are both attractive, nice people who should be more than satisified with each other. I said to my boyfriend, "Don't you think that's messed up? I mean, why get married?" And he said, "Well, yeah. I am not like that and know you're not either. If I am with someone, I am with just them, always. But in a way, I can almost understand their thinking - total freedom to do whatever and know that your partner is OK with it." Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but marriage to me incorporates faithfulness. Not possessiveness or control, which are different concepts than being faithful. If you are married, it should just be the two of you - not everyone else, too! I'm not a jealous woman, but the thought of some other woman being with my man while I am in a relationship with him or married to him makes me sick to my stomach. The whole swinging thing is just wrong to me. Or am I just being an old lady?

Bridget in Connecticut.

 

[bensbride]

To me, its okay to complete a part of each other...because I do feel that each of us has a piece of ourselves that is meant to be shared with the person we love. However, I agree that you certainly shouldn''t depend on something or someone outside of yourself to have a fullfilling life. Codependency is a tricky thing. It can turn the best people and the best relationships into a trap. I can and did live before I met the person that I want to be partnered with. I think we are two people that have a common desire to share our lives, which is what unity means to me. I think things get twisted around to make unity sound like a bad thing. Its not impossible to be united and still have independence.

 

[NewEnglandLady]

I completely agree with this article, so long as you don't remind your spouse about how perfectly happy you'd be on your own TOO much Usually the "I don't need you" thing is understood without being voiced.

We decided on the officiant for our wedding based on how well his views of marriage matched with ours. We were very clear from the beginning that we did not want the term "unconditional love" used in our ceremony because we agree that it does not exist between two rational adults. Nor did we want anything said about us becoming "one". Even our reading was about two complete individuals choosing to be together. We knew we had a good fit when the officiant completely agreed with us.

ETA: About 10 years ago I saw an interview on 60 minutes or 20/20 or something where they were interviewing a couple who'd been together for 60 years. Naturally, they asked the secret to marriage and she looked at her husband and said "You know, we just never wanted a divorce at the SAME time". She was half-joking, but I think there is some truth to it.