Love Is Not Enough In A Relationship
Love is not enough in a relationship. Loving oneself a lot or feeling a blind passion for the other does not save the bond from the crises or the challenges that arise in the journey of life. I wish affective correspondence would make the difficult easy, dissolve the problems of coexistence and communication and rise like the balm for all unmet need.
Some use the metaphor of spaceships to explain what affective relationships are like. Love is like that energy that acts as fuel for NASA rockets or aircraft to leave the earth’s ground and head for space. However, once out of the atmosphere and under the influence of gravitational force, those engines that propelled it are no longer so decisive.
At that stage of the journey, the wisdom, knowledge and good work of space engineers is everything. In a way, we are all like little astronauts orbiting around relationships that we don’t always know how to tend to in order for them to be successful.
Why is love not enough in a relationship?
Woody Allen used to say that the best phrases they can say to us in our lives are “I love you” and “it’s benign”. If there is something that offers us absolute happiness, it is knowing that we are reciprocated, that the person we love loves us too. Many times – especially when we are very young – we take for granted that this is where everything begins and ends.
If love is mutual nothing can with us. We believe we are invincible, the perfect and ideal couple who, as in any Disney movie, will be happy until the end of time and beyond. However, it was not long before the personality clashes began. The “is that you only think of yourself” or “is that here only counts what you like and that’s it” appear on the least expected day.
What had started as a joint trip to the stars sometimes ends with one is that “you are from Jupiter and I from Saturn”, two people who even loving each other cannot live together. Because as the studies of John Gottman and the professor of psychobiology at the University of Berkeley Robert Levenson point out, there are many causes that are behind the breakdown in a relationship, but the lack of love is not the most frequent.
Next, we analyze part of those causes of why love is not enough in a relationship.
You love me, but you don’t put yourself in my place
Love goes beyond a simple correspondence of affections and desires. What should truly build love is the ability to understand another’s perspective, as well as to connect with their needs and not just your own.
Intimacy and emotional security, the glue of happy relationships
Love is not enough in a relationship because we must become good artisans of emotions as well.
This implies knowing how to build a bond governed by intimacy and emotional security. A relationship in which trust is a central axis.
Factors such as self-esteem, identity and personal growth are not only safeguarded, but are also enhanced. Authentic love knows how to create alliances through enriching, respectful and committed emotions.
Love is not enough in a relationship if there is no good communication
Without good communication there is no harmony or harmony. The smallest problems will be walls and the differences as gaps that are opened to create great distances.
Love is not enough in a relationship if agreements cannot be reached, if there is no such dialectical complicity in which, sometimes, the early morning finds us having an interesting conversation in bed.
Thus, studies such as those carried out at the University of Georgia show us that good communication is an indicator of success in partner satisfaction. Let’s keep it in mind.
Laugh together, make plans together, be our daily refuge
Being a couple is also being the best friend of each other. Love is not enough in a relationship if there is no complicit laughter, the desire to put plans on the horizon and to share the same vital goals.
On the other hand, the loved one should always be that figure to turn to with any problem, concern, fear or need. If the couple is not our best refuge from day to day, that person is not to be trusted.
Perseverance, taking care of the little things so that the big ones move on
Love is not just a feeling. For this dimension to make sense, it must be complemented with the perseverance of daily work. What is wanted must be taken care of and this is shown in the little things. The interest for the other, for what he does, likes, dreams or wants is an example of this.
Affective relationships are authentic crafts in which it is required to be skilled in multiple subjects. We can all develop them, we all deserve to be loved and love in the best way, the one that allows us to travel as true astronauts to conquer new worlds, being two united in a common project.
