Can't Sleep? How Can Something So Simple Be So Difficult?
*My Words, My Canvas*
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Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Friday, May 18, 2012
The Stages!
The Beginning Stages
When you are just starting a relationship, it is important to:
Build. Build a foundation of appreciation and respect. Focus on all the considerate things your partner says and does. Happy couples make a point of noticing even small opportunities to say "thank you" to their partner, rather than focusing on mistakes their partner has made.
Explore. Explore each other's interests so that you have a long list of things to enjoy together. Try new things together to expand mutual interests.
Establish. Establish a pattern of apologizing if you make a mistake or hurt your partner's feelings. Saying "I'm sorry" may be hard in the moment, but it goes a long way towards healing a rift in a relationship. Your partner will trust you more if he or she knows that you will take responsibility for your words and actions.
As the Months Go By: Important Things to Recognize as Your Relationship Grows
Relationships Change. Changes in life outside your relationship will impact what you want and need from the relationship. Since change is inevitable, welcoming it as an opportunity to enhance the relationship is more fruitful than trying to keep it from happening.
Check in Periodically. Occasionally set aside time to check in with each other on changing expectations and goals. If a couple ignores difficult topics for too long, their relationship is likely to drift into rocky waters without their noticing.
What to Do When Conflict Arises
Disagreements in a relationship are not only normal but, if constructively resolved, actually strengthen the relationship. It is inevitable that there will be times of sadness, tension, or outright anger between you and your partner. The source of these problems may lie in unrealistic/unreasonable demands, unexplored expectations, or unresolved issues/behaviors in one partner or in the relationship. Resolving conflicts requires honesty, a willingness to consider your partner's perspective even if you don't fully understand it, and lots of communication.
Healthy communication is critical, especially when there are important decisions regarding sex, career, marriage, and family to be made. The following are some guidelines for successful communication and conflict resolution.
Understand Each Others' Family Patterns. Find out how conflicts were managed (or not managed) in your partner's family, and talk about how conflict was approached (or avoided) in your own family. It is not unusual for couples to discover that their families had different ways of expressing anger and resolving differences. If your family wasn't good at communicating or resolving conflict constructively, give yourself permission to try out some new ways of handling conflict.
Timing Counts. Contrary to previous notions, the best time to resolve a conflict may not be immediately. It is not unusual for one or both partners to need some time to cool off. This "time-out' period can help you avoid saying or doing hurtful things in the heat of the moment, and can help partners more clearly identify what changes are most important. Remember - if you are angry with your partner but don't know what you want yet, it will be nearly impossible for your partner to figure it out!
Establish an Atmosphere of Emotional Support. Emotional support involves accepting your partner's differences and not insisting that he or she meet your needs only in the precise way that you want them met. Find out how your partner shows his or her love for you, and don't set absolute criteria that require your partner to always behave differently before you're satisfied.
Agree to Disagree and Move On. Most couples will encounter some issues upon which they will never completely agree. Rather than continuing a cycle of repeated fights, agree to disagree and negotiate a compromise or find a way to work around the issue.
Distinguish between things you want versus things you need from your partner. For example, for safety reasons, you might need your partner to remember to pick you up on time after dark. But calling you several times a day may really only be a "want."
Clarify Your Messages. A clear message involves a respectful but direct expression of your wants and needs. Take some time to identify what you really want before talking to your partner. Work on being able to describe your request in clear, observable terms. For example, you might say, "I would like you to hold my hand more often" rather than the vague, "I wish you were more affectionate."
Discuss One Thing at a Time. It can be tempting to list your concerns or grievances, but doing so will likely prolong an argument. Do your best to keep the focus on resolving one concern at a time.
Really Listen. Being a good listener requires the following: (a) don't interrupt, (b) focus on what your partner is saying rather than on formulating your own response, and (c) check out what you heard your partner say. You might start this process with: "I think you are saying..." Or "what I understood you to say was..." This step alone can prevent misunderstandings that might otherwise develop into a fight.
Restrain Yourself. Research has found that couples who "edit" themselves and do not say all the angry things they may be thinking are typically the happiest.
Adopt a "Win-Win" Position. A "win-win" stance means that your goal is for the relationship, rather than for either partner, to "win" in a conflict situation. Ask yourself: "Is what I am about to say (or do) going to increase or decrease the odds that we'll work this problem out?"
Healthy and Problematic Expectations in Relationships
Each of us enters into romantic relationships with ideas about what we want based on family relationships, what we've seen in the media, and our own past relationship experiences. Holding on to unrealistic expectations can cause a relationship to be unsatisfying and to eventually fail. The following will help you to distinguish between healthy and problematic relationship expectations:
Respect Changes. What you want from a relationship in the early months of dating may be quite different from what you want after you have been together for some time. Anticipate that both you and your partner will change over time. Feelings of love and passion change with time, as well.
Respecting and valuing these changes is healthy. Love literally changes brain chemistry for the first months of a relationship. For both physiological and emotional reasons, an established relationship will have a more complex and often richer type of passion than a new relationship.
Accept Differences. It is difficult, but healthy, to accept that there are some things about our partners that will not change over time, no matter how much we want them to. Unfortunately, there is often an expectation that our partner will change only in the ways we want. We may also hold the unrealistic expectation that our partner will never change from the way he or she is now.
Express Wants and Needs. While it is easy to assume that your partner knows your wants and needs, this is often not the case and can be the source of much stress in relationships. A healthier approach is to directly express our needs and wishes to our partner.
Respect Your Partner's Rights. In healthy relationships, there is respect for each partner's right to have her/his own feelings, friends, activities, and opinions. It is unrealistic to expect or demand that that he or she have the same priorities, goals, and interests as you.
Be Prepared to "Fight Fair." Couples who view conflict as a threat to the relationship, and something to be avoided at all costs, often find that accumulated and unaddressed conflicts are the real threat. Healthy couples fight, but they "fight fair" - accepting responsibility for their part in a problem, admitting when they are wrong, and seeking compromise. Additional information about fair fighting can be found here.
Maintain the Relationship. Most of us know that keeping a vehicle moving in the desired direction requires not only regular refueling, but also ongoing maintenance and active corrections to the steering to compensate for changes in the road. A similar situation applies to continuing relationships. While we may work hard to get the relationship started, expecting to cruise without effort or active maintenance typically leads the relationship to stall or crash! Though gifts and getaways are important, it is often the small, nonmaterial things that partners routinely do for each other that keep the relationship satisfying.
Outside Pressures on the Relationship
Differences in Background. Even partners coming from very similar cultural, religious, or economic backgrounds can benefit from discussing their expectations of how a good boyfriend, girlfriend, or spouse behaves. What seems obvious or normal to you may surprise your partner, and vice versa. If you are from different backgrounds, be aware that you may need to spend more time and energy to build your relationship. Take the time to learn about your partner's culture or religion, being careful to check out what parts of such information actually fit for your partner.
Time Together and Apart. How much time you spend together and apart is a common relationship concern. If you interpret your partner's time apart from you as, "he or she doesn't care for me as much as I care for him or her," you may be headed for trouble by jumping to conclusions. Check out with your partner what time alone means to him or her, and share your feelings about what you need from the relationship in terms of time together. Demanding what you want, regardless of your partner's needs, usually ends up driving your partner away, so work on reaching a compromise.
Your Partner's Family. For many students, families remain an important source of emotional, if not financial, support during their years at the university. Some people find dealing with their partner's family difficult or frustrating. It can help to take a step back and think about parental good intentions. Families may offer well-intentioned advice about your relationship or your partner. It's important that the two of you discuss and agree on how you want to respond to differing family values and support one another in the face of what can be very intense "suggestions" from family.
Friends. There are some people who seem to believe that "I have to give up all my friends unless my partner likes them as much as I do." Giving up friends is not healthy for you or the relationship, except in circumstances where your friends pressure you to participate in activities that are damaging to yourself and the relationship. At the same time, keep in mind that your partner may not enjoy your friends as much as you do. Negotiate which friends you and your partner spend time with together.
You might ask: "Which of my friends do you enjoy seeing and which ones would you rather I see alone or at other times when I'm not with you?"
Eight Basic Steps to Maintaining a Good Relationship
1. Be aware of what you and your partner want for yourselves and what you want from the relationship.
2. Let one another know what your needs are.
3. Realize that your partner will not be able to meet all your needs. Some of these needs will have to be met outside of the relationship.
4. Be willing to negotiate and compromise on the things you want from one another.
5. Do not demand that a partner change to meet all your expectations. Work to accept the differences between your ideal mate and the real person you are dating.
6. Try to see things from the other's point of view. This doesn't mean that you must agree with one another all the time, but rather that both of you can understand and respect each other's differences, points of view, and separate needs.
7. Where critical differences do exist in your expectations, needs, or opinions, try to work honestly and sincerely to negotiate. Seek professional help early rather than waiting until the situation becomes critical.
8. Do your best to treat your partner in a way that says, "I love you and trust you, and I want to work this out."
When you are just starting a relationship, it is important to:
Build. Build a foundation of appreciation and respect. Focus on all the considerate things your partner says and does. Happy couples make a point of noticing even small opportunities to say "thank you" to their partner, rather than focusing on mistakes their partner has made.
Explore. Explore each other's interests so that you have a long list of things to enjoy together. Try new things together to expand mutual interests.
Establish. Establish a pattern of apologizing if you make a mistake or hurt your partner's feelings. Saying "I'm sorry" may be hard in the moment, but it goes a long way towards healing a rift in a relationship. Your partner will trust you more if he or she knows that you will take responsibility for your words and actions.
As the Months Go By: Important Things to Recognize as Your Relationship Grows
Relationships Change. Changes in life outside your relationship will impact what you want and need from the relationship. Since change is inevitable, welcoming it as an opportunity to enhance the relationship is more fruitful than trying to keep it from happening.
Check in Periodically. Occasionally set aside time to check in with each other on changing expectations and goals. If a couple ignores difficult topics for too long, their relationship is likely to drift into rocky waters without their noticing.
What to Do When Conflict Arises
Disagreements in a relationship are not only normal but, if constructively resolved, actually strengthen the relationship. It is inevitable that there will be times of sadness, tension, or outright anger between you and your partner. The source of these problems may lie in unrealistic/unreasonable demands, unexplored expectations, or unresolved issues/behaviors in one partner or in the relationship. Resolving conflicts requires honesty, a willingness to consider your partner's perspective even if you don't fully understand it, and lots of communication.
Healthy communication is critical, especially when there are important decisions regarding sex, career, marriage, and family to be made. The following are some guidelines for successful communication and conflict resolution.
Understand Each Others' Family Patterns. Find out how conflicts were managed (or not managed) in your partner's family, and talk about how conflict was approached (or avoided) in your own family. It is not unusual for couples to discover that their families had different ways of expressing anger and resolving differences. If your family wasn't good at communicating or resolving conflict constructively, give yourself permission to try out some new ways of handling conflict.
Timing Counts. Contrary to previous notions, the best time to resolve a conflict may not be immediately. It is not unusual for one or both partners to need some time to cool off. This "time-out' period can help you avoid saying or doing hurtful things in the heat of the moment, and can help partners more clearly identify what changes are most important. Remember - if you are angry with your partner but don't know what you want yet, it will be nearly impossible for your partner to figure it out!
Establish an Atmosphere of Emotional Support. Emotional support involves accepting your partner's differences and not insisting that he or she meet your needs only in the precise way that you want them met. Find out how your partner shows his or her love for you, and don't set absolute criteria that require your partner to always behave differently before you're satisfied.
Agree to Disagree and Move On. Most couples will encounter some issues upon which they will never completely agree. Rather than continuing a cycle of repeated fights, agree to disagree and negotiate a compromise or find a way to work around the issue.
Distinguish between things you want versus things you need from your partner. For example, for safety reasons, you might need your partner to remember to pick you up on time after dark. But calling you several times a day may really only be a "want."
Clarify Your Messages. A clear message involves a respectful but direct expression of your wants and needs. Take some time to identify what you really want before talking to your partner. Work on being able to describe your request in clear, observable terms. For example, you might say, "I would like you to hold my hand more often" rather than the vague, "I wish you were more affectionate."
Discuss One Thing at a Time. It can be tempting to list your concerns or grievances, but doing so will likely prolong an argument. Do your best to keep the focus on resolving one concern at a time.
Really Listen. Being a good listener requires the following: (a) don't interrupt, (b) focus on what your partner is saying rather than on formulating your own response, and (c) check out what you heard your partner say. You might start this process with: "I think you are saying..." Or "what I understood you to say was..." This step alone can prevent misunderstandings that might otherwise develop into a fight.
Restrain Yourself. Research has found that couples who "edit" themselves and do not say all the angry things they may be thinking are typically the happiest.
Adopt a "Win-Win" Position. A "win-win" stance means that your goal is for the relationship, rather than for either partner, to "win" in a conflict situation. Ask yourself: "Is what I am about to say (or do) going to increase or decrease the odds that we'll work this problem out?"
Healthy and Problematic Expectations in Relationships
Each of us enters into romantic relationships with ideas about what we want based on family relationships, what we've seen in the media, and our own past relationship experiences. Holding on to unrealistic expectations can cause a relationship to be unsatisfying and to eventually fail. The following will help you to distinguish between healthy and problematic relationship expectations:
Respect Changes. What you want from a relationship in the early months of dating may be quite different from what you want after you have been together for some time. Anticipate that both you and your partner will change over time. Feelings of love and passion change with time, as well.
Respecting and valuing these changes is healthy. Love literally changes brain chemistry for the first months of a relationship. For both physiological and emotional reasons, an established relationship will have a more complex and often richer type of passion than a new relationship.
Accept Differences. It is difficult, but healthy, to accept that there are some things about our partners that will not change over time, no matter how much we want them to. Unfortunately, there is often an expectation that our partner will change only in the ways we want. We may also hold the unrealistic expectation that our partner will never change from the way he or she is now.
Express Wants and Needs. While it is easy to assume that your partner knows your wants and needs, this is often not the case and can be the source of much stress in relationships. A healthier approach is to directly express our needs and wishes to our partner.
Respect Your Partner's Rights. In healthy relationships, there is respect for each partner's right to have her/his own feelings, friends, activities, and opinions. It is unrealistic to expect or demand that that he or she have the same priorities, goals, and interests as you.
Be Prepared to "Fight Fair." Couples who view conflict as a threat to the relationship, and something to be avoided at all costs, often find that accumulated and unaddressed conflicts are the real threat. Healthy couples fight, but they "fight fair" - accepting responsibility for their part in a problem, admitting when they are wrong, and seeking compromise. Additional information about fair fighting can be found here.
Maintain the Relationship. Most of us know that keeping a vehicle moving in the desired direction requires not only regular refueling, but also ongoing maintenance and active corrections to the steering to compensate for changes in the road. A similar situation applies to continuing relationships. While we may work hard to get the relationship started, expecting to cruise without effort or active maintenance typically leads the relationship to stall or crash! Though gifts and getaways are important, it is often the small, nonmaterial things that partners routinely do for each other that keep the relationship satisfying.
Outside Pressures on the Relationship
Differences in Background. Even partners coming from very similar cultural, religious, or economic backgrounds can benefit from discussing their expectations of how a good boyfriend, girlfriend, or spouse behaves. What seems obvious or normal to you may surprise your partner, and vice versa. If you are from different backgrounds, be aware that you may need to spend more time and energy to build your relationship. Take the time to learn about your partner's culture or religion, being careful to check out what parts of such information actually fit for your partner.
Time Together and Apart. How much time you spend together and apart is a common relationship concern. If you interpret your partner's time apart from you as, "he or she doesn't care for me as much as I care for him or her," you may be headed for trouble by jumping to conclusions. Check out with your partner what time alone means to him or her, and share your feelings about what you need from the relationship in terms of time together. Demanding what you want, regardless of your partner's needs, usually ends up driving your partner away, so work on reaching a compromise.
Your Partner's Family. For many students, families remain an important source of emotional, if not financial, support during their years at the university. Some people find dealing with their partner's family difficult or frustrating. It can help to take a step back and think about parental good intentions. Families may offer well-intentioned advice about your relationship or your partner. It's important that the two of you discuss and agree on how you want to respond to differing family values and support one another in the face of what can be very intense "suggestions" from family.
Friends. There are some people who seem to believe that "I have to give up all my friends unless my partner likes them as much as I do." Giving up friends is not healthy for you or the relationship, except in circumstances where your friends pressure you to participate in activities that are damaging to yourself and the relationship. At the same time, keep in mind that your partner may not enjoy your friends as much as you do. Negotiate which friends you and your partner spend time with together.
You might ask: "Which of my friends do you enjoy seeing and which ones would you rather I see alone or at other times when I'm not with you?"
Eight Basic Steps to Maintaining a Good Relationship
1. Be aware of what you and your partner want for yourselves and what you want from the relationship.
2. Let one another know what your needs are.
3. Realize that your partner will not be able to meet all your needs. Some of these needs will have to be met outside of the relationship.
4. Be willing to negotiate and compromise on the things you want from one another.
5. Do not demand that a partner change to meet all your expectations. Work to accept the differences between your ideal mate and the real person you are dating.
6. Try to see things from the other's point of view. This doesn't mean that you must agree with one another all the time, but rather that both of you can understand and respect each other's differences, points of view, and separate needs.
7. Where critical differences do exist in your expectations, needs, or opinions, try to work honestly and sincerely to negotiate. Seek professional help early rather than waiting until the situation becomes critical.
8. Do your best to treat your partner in a way that says, "I love you and trust you, and I want to work this out."
Monday, May 14, 2012
Relationships
I found this article very interesting and wanted to share it with my readers:
A healthy relationship is based on two people wanting to be together. Two people who are equally committed to the relationship and making it work. An unequal commitment will likely result in one person feeling trapped or manipulated, and the other person feeling insecure.
By forming a relationship with someone just because they convinced you that you should be with them, you are giving away your power. Being with someone you do not genuinely want to be with, is allowing them to make your choice, even though you know deep down it’s not the right choice for you. That is not the recipe for a healthy relationship, or for happiness.
Alternatively, if you know, or even suspect that your partner is in the relationship because you have persuaded or manipulated them into being with you, you will never feel secure. No matter how good you are at keeping someone with you, if you know on some level that they might rather be elsewhere, your life will be spent fearing the moment they summon the courage to leave.
Knowing that we would be happier in a healthy relationship, what makes us form relationships that are based on such an unhealthy imbalance?
Being persuaded to be in a relationship is a sign that you are not taking responsibility for your own decisions and happiness. You are giving up control over a big part of your life, and allowing others to decide what you should do, even though you know in your heart that this is not what you want.
Sometimes we allow others to control our lives because we are too afraid to take responsibility for our own choices. If I go along with what you want and it doesn’t work out, then it is clearly your fault not mine. But if I am bold, and go for what I really want, and then it fails, that means I have failed.
Sometimes, we have become so used to listening to what other people think we should do, we have forgotten how to listen to our inner voices, or have allowed them to be drowned out. If your choices as a child were criticized as being inappropriate or just plain wrong, you may have accepted the fact that you really don’t know what’s best for you.
This is not true! You are, in fact, the only person who knows what’s best for you. You just need to learn to listen to yourself and drown out the loud voices of others insisting that they know best. If you have been used to going along with what other people think is best for you, making choices for yourself can be daunting. I suggest you start with small decisions first. Try thinking about what you want to eat for dinner, and then expressing that wish loud and clear, instead of your usual ‘whatever you want is fine.’
Once you have mastered the art of expressing your small desires, and feeling the satisfaction of having them met, you can build up to bigger choices.
Slowly developing the ability to think about what you really want, and then going about having it, is a vital skill in creating both happiness and a healthy relationship.
What if the shoe is on the other foot and you are the one who is convincing a reluctant partner to be with you? This type of approach to a relationship is almost always based on fear. We may fear that if we don’t attach ourselves immediately to the first person who comes along and shows a minimal interest in us, then we may ‘end up alone.’
We may also believe that having the upper hand in the relationship, and being the ‘stronger’ partner gives us control. This is untrue. Trying to control another person never gives you control. It is an illusion to think that you can truly control anyone else. The only thing that is really within our control is the way we respond to situations in our lives.
It is doing yourself a great disservice to be with someone who does not wholeheartedly want to be with you or whom you do not wholeheartedly want to be with. You deserve more. You deserve a healthy relationship with someone you really want to be with and who really wants to be with you.
Be patient. There is someone out there who will want to be with you just as much as you will want to be with them!
Source: http://www.choosing-life-my-way.com/healthy-relationship.html
A healthy relationship is based on two people wanting to be together. Two people who are equally committed to the relationship and making it work. An unequal commitment will likely result in one person feeling trapped or manipulated, and the other person feeling insecure.
By forming a relationship with someone just because they convinced you that you should be with them, you are giving away your power. Being with someone you do not genuinely want to be with, is allowing them to make your choice, even though you know deep down it’s not the right choice for you. That is not the recipe for a healthy relationship, or for happiness.
Alternatively, if you know, or even suspect that your partner is in the relationship because you have persuaded or manipulated them into being with you, you will never feel secure. No matter how good you are at keeping someone with you, if you know on some level that they might rather be elsewhere, your life will be spent fearing the moment they summon the courage to leave.
Knowing that we would be happier in a healthy relationship, what makes us form relationships that are based on such an unhealthy imbalance?
Being persuaded to be in a relationship is a sign that you are not taking responsibility for your own decisions and happiness. You are giving up control over a big part of your life, and allowing others to decide what you should do, even though you know in your heart that this is not what you want.
Sometimes we allow others to control our lives because we are too afraid to take responsibility for our own choices. If I go along with what you want and it doesn’t work out, then it is clearly your fault not mine. But if I am bold, and go for what I really want, and then it fails, that means I have failed.
Sometimes, we have become so used to listening to what other people think we should do, we have forgotten how to listen to our inner voices, or have allowed them to be drowned out. If your choices as a child were criticized as being inappropriate or just plain wrong, you may have accepted the fact that you really don’t know what’s best for you.
This is not true! You are, in fact, the only person who knows what’s best for you. You just need to learn to listen to yourself and drown out the loud voices of others insisting that they know best. If you have been used to going along with what other people think is best for you, making choices for yourself can be daunting. I suggest you start with small decisions first. Try thinking about what you want to eat for dinner, and then expressing that wish loud and clear, instead of your usual ‘whatever you want is fine.’
Once you have mastered the art of expressing your small desires, and feeling the satisfaction of having them met, you can build up to bigger choices.
Slowly developing the ability to think about what you really want, and then going about having it, is a vital skill in creating both happiness and a healthy relationship.
What if the shoe is on the other foot and you are the one who is convincing a reluctant partner to be with you? This type of approach to a relationship is almost always based on fear. We may fear that if we don’t attach ourselves immediately to the first person who comes along and shows a minimal interest in us, then we may ‘end up alone.’
We may also believe that having the upper hand in the relationship, and being the ‘stronger’ partner gives us control. This is untrue. Trying to control another person never gives you control. It is an illusion to think that you can truly control anyone else. The only thing that is really within our control is the way we respond to situations in our lives.
It is doing yourself a great disservice to be with someone who does not wholeheartedly want to be with you or whom you do not wholeheartedly want to be with. You deserve more. You deserve a healthy relationship with someone you really want to be with and who really wants to be with you.
Be patient. There is someone out there who will want to be with you just as much as you will want to be with them!
Source: http://www.choosing-life-my-way.com/healthy-relationship.html
Thursday, May 3, 2012
The Science Behind Infatuation
Science Has An Answer For Infatuation!
Research has confirmed the existence of an amphetamine-like chemical which is rapidly activated (like lightning!) when we begin to feel attracted to someone. This chemical is called phenylethylamine (PEA), that famous substance that makes laboratory rats press levers until they drop dead from exhaustion.
Diane Ackerman, author of The Nature of Love and A Natural History of the Senses, describes PEA as a "molecule that speeds up the flow of information between nerve cells", whipping the brain into a frenzy of excitement, sending ordinary attraction into overdrive and providing the assertive oomph! needed to take social risks and overcome any obstacles to mating. We can consider this a well-designed molecule from the point of view of species survival.
But... some other researchers at the New York State Psychiatric Institute claim to have discovered that PEA has a tendency to pave the way for that peculiar contemporary disorder, The Relationship Addiction. They point out that this internally-generated infatuation drug acts a lot like speed. Some people (and a lot of rats) not used to the rush begin to crave it.
In other words, some people are always infatuated, but not necessarily with the same person, and not long enough to develop a relationship that makes them really happy or leads to lasting happiness.
Is this what it means to be A Fool For Love? A Fool for Phenylethylamine? By many indications, once we are pierced by the arrow of attraction, the biologically compelling quality of infatuation insures for many people a helpless emotional state.
Psychology Has An Answer for Infatuation!
Biological models explain a lot about the "how" of infatuation, the mechanism governing the actual phenomenology of love foolishness. The social sciences have a lot to tell us about the "why". Why this particular man, why that woman?
Naturally, Freud would have said that it is all in your head. What else? His most profound contribution to modern thought was to show us the extent to which our behavior, especially our love behavior, is guided by unconscious processes. He might further have emphasized that we are attracted (compelled?) to experience specific relationships in an attempt to meet intimacy needs shaped in our earliest years, with our first love objects: Mom and Dad. (Just the basic meat and potatoes of attraction dynamics, folks!)
Carl Jung popularized the idea that opposites attract, and for very good reasons. He theorized that we are unconsciously drawn to those who exhibit qualities we find lacking - or somehow undeveloped - in our own psyches and that we always seek to complete or balance ourselves somehow through intimate attachments. In the state of infatuation, then, we are pulled like a moth toward the flame we wish to acquire for our permanent warmth.
The Imago Model of Infatuation
Harville Hendrix, author of Keeping the Love You Find: A Guide For Singles, has one of the best explanations I’ve heard for why we tend to fall so heavily and helplessly, if sometimes so briefly, into the infatuated state.
He says we each have in our memory banks a highly individual imprint, a mental construct called an imago, in which the best and worst attributes of our earliest caretakers have been crystallized.
The imago we have of our dream lover is like an intimacy template. It influences and filters our perception so that we are particularly attentive and sensitized to those who match our private patterns. This then accounts for the highly specific nature of our infatuations.
Dr. Hendrix thinks we have something like psychic receptor-sites for certain people who evoke highly idiosyncratic responses in us. He argues - as do many others - that we are unconsciously attracted to people who help us recreate early relationship dynamics in the (also unconscious) hope that things will turn out better and we will have a lot more control this time around.
The perception of strong attraction then acts as an internal signal which flips the PEA switch (remember the infatuation drug?). Apparently, such attraction is relatively involuntary, primitively-driven, and seemingly beyond our control. Just like the drug itself.
Good News/Bad News
The deeper we go into this matter, the more infatuation seems to reflect its dictionary definition as the epitome of foolishness. The experience seems to take conscious choice right out of the picture. When we are infatuated with someone - or something - it is as though we become little love robots, biochemical puppets with no will of our own, without a rational thought in our heads! And what is the stupendous pay-off for what seems to be a love offering of mindless surrender?
Answer truthfully, now: How often have you experienced highly erotic and deeply gratifying love-making with someone with whom you were infatuated? How often has the object of your feverish desire turned out to be as you imagined him or her? How many smoldering, day-dreamed passions have actually burst into flame for you? How many times have you been a Fool For Love only to realize within weeks (if you are lucky) or months that there was no love there, only helpless yearning? How many sunny, companionable days have you actually spent with someone you worshipped and longed to possess? In short, how many times has infatuation worked for you?
The answers to these questions will tell you there is little happiness in infatuation itself, precious little daily satisfaction is possible while we are acting the Fool For Love. That is because the state of infatuation thrives on distance and frustration. It flourishes under difficult circumstances. It is not magnified by consummation and familiarity.
Please note: Infatuation cannot exceed its own expectations. It is the spark and the emotional kindling, not a steady, warming fire. It is an appetizer that makes you anticipate the full banquet. But it will not keep you warm and it will not fill you up.
Infatuation begins as an important emotional signal to point you in the direction of desire and get you moving. But it is not yet love and its impetus will never take the place of thinking about what you want and acting persistently on that intention.
Still and all... there is no reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater!
Transcendental Infatuation
When all is said and done, we will always want to fall in love with the pull of a potent attraction. We will always want to love infatuation and we will always reserve our right to be a Fool For Love. And that is as it should be. Who does not want to feel moved by the thrill of a profound, mysterious attraction that is able to overpower our ego defenses and cause us to open our soul to another with the impetuosity of a child? The state of infatuation is so powerful that we want infatuation to have a meaning beyond that of a chemically-induced trance phenomenon. And that is possible, but with just one little catch.
In order to make certain that infatuation can fulfill its true role in the natural discovery and growth of love, we have to stay semi-conscious and aware of our choices. Only conscious surrender and sustained attachment can make the original spark of infatuation eventually work to our benefit.
Research has confirmed the existence of an amphetamine-like chemical which is rapidly activated (like lightning!) when we begin to feel attracted to someone. This chemical is called phenylethylamine (PEA), that famous substance that makes laboratory rats press levers until they drop dead from exhaustion.
Diane Ackerman, author of The Nature of Love and A Natural History of the Senses, describes PEA as a "molecule that speeds up the flow of information between nerve cells", whipping the brain into a frenzy of excitement, sending ordinary attraction into overdrive and providing the assertive oomph! needed to take social risks and overcome any obstacles to mating. We can consider this a well-designed molecule from the point of view of species survival.
But... some other researchers at the New York State Psychiatric Institute claim to have discovered that PEA has a tendency to pave the way for that peculiar contemporary disorder, The Relationship Addiction. They point out that this internally-generated infatuation drug acts a lot like speed. Some people (and a lot of rats) not used to the rush begin to crave it.
In other words, some people are always infatuated, but not necessarily with the same person, and not long enough to develop a relationship that makes them really happy or leads to lasting happiness.
Is this what it means to be A Fool For Love? A Fool for Phenylethylamine? By many indications, once we are pierced by the arrow of attraction, the biologically compelling quality of infatuation insures for many people a helpless emotional state.
Psychology Has An Answer for Infatuation!
Biological models explain a lot about the "how" of infatuation, the mechanism governing the actual phenomenology of love foolishness. The social sciences have a lot to tell us about the "why". Why this particular man, why that woman?
Naturally, Freud would have said that it is all in your head. What else? His most profound contribution to modern thought was to show us the extent to which our behavior, especially our love behavior, is guided by unconscious processes. He might further have emphasized that we are attracted (compelled?) to experience specific relationships in an attempt to meet intimacy needs shaped in our earliest years, with our first love objects: Mom and Dad. (Just the basic meat and potatoes of attraction dynamics, folks!)
Carl Jung popularized the idea that opposites attract, and for very good reasons. He theorized that we are unconsciously drawn to those who exhibit qualities we find lacking - or somehow undeveloped - in our own psyches and that we always seek to complete or balance ourselves somehow through intimate attachments. In the state of infatuation, then, we are pulled like a moth toward the flame we wish to acquire for our permanent warmth.
The Imago Model of Infatuation
Harville Hendrix, author of Keeping the Love You Find: A Guide For Singles, has one of the best explanations I’ve heard for why we tend to fall so heavily and helplessly, if sometimes so briefly, into the infatuated state.
He says we each have in our memory banks a highly individual imprint, a mental construct called an imago, in which the best and worst attributes of our earliest caretakers have been crystallized.
The imago we have of our dream lover is like an intimacy template. It influences and filters our perception so that we are particularly attentive and sensitized to those who match our private patterns. This then accounts for the highly specific nature of our infatuations.
Dr. Hendrix thinks we have something like psychic receptor-sites for certain people who evoke highly idiosyncratic responses in us. He argues - as do many others - that we are unconsciously attracted to people who help us recreate early relationship dynamics in the (also unconscious) hope that things will turn out better and we will have a lot more control this time around.
The perception of strong attraction then acts as an internal signal which flips the PEA switch (remember the infatuation drug?). Apparently, such attraction is relatively involuntary, primitively-driven, and seemingly beyond our control. Just like the drug itself.
Good News/Bad News
The deeper we go into this matter, the more infatuation seems to reflect its dictionary definition as the epitome of foolishness. The experience seems to take conscious choice right out of the picture. When we are infatuated with someone - or something - it is as though we become little love robots, biochemical puppets with no will of our own, without a rational thought in our heads! And what is the stupendous pay-off for what seems to be a love offering of mindless surrender?
Answer truthfully, now: How often have you experienced highly erotic and deeply gratifying love-making with someone with whom you were infatuated? How often has the object of your feverish desire turned out to be as you imagined him or her? How many smoldering, day-dreamed passions have actually burst into flame for you? How many times have you been a Fool For Love only to realize within weeks (if you are lucky) or months that there was no love there, only helpless yearning? How many sunny, companionable days have you actually spent with someone you worshipped and longed to possess? In short, how many times has infatuation worked for you?
The answers to these questions will tell you there is little happiness in infatuation itself, precious little daily satisfaction is possible while we are acting the Fool For Love. That is because the state of infatuation thrives on distance and frustration. It flourishes under difficult circumstances. It is not magnified by consummation and familiarity.
Please note: Infatuation cannot exceed its own expectations. It is the spark and the emotional kindling, not a steady, warming fire. It is an appetizer that makes you anticipate the full banquet. But it will not keep you warm and it will not fill you up.
Infatuation begins as an important emotional signal to point you in the direction of desire and get you moving. But it is not yet love and its impetus will never take the place of thinking about what you want and acting persistently on that intention.
Still and all... there is no reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater!
Transcendental Infatuation
When all is said and done, we will always want to fall in love with the pull of a potent attraction. We will always want to love infatuation and we will always reserve our right to be a Fool For Love. And that is as it should be. Who does not want to feel moved by the thrill of a profound, mysterious attraction that is able to overpower our ego defenses and cause us to open our soul to another with the impetuosity of a child? The state of infatuation is so powerful that we want infatuation to have a meaning beyond that of a chemically-induced trance phenomenon. And that is possible, but with just one little catch.
In order to make certain that infatuation can fulfill its true role in the natural discovery and growth of love, we have to stay semi-conscious and aware of our choices. Only conscious surrender and sustained attachment can make the original spark of infatuation eventually work to our benefit.
Advise before Bed...
Don't make a decisions before you have a complete understanding of things.
*My Words, My Canvas*
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Wednesday, May 2, 2012
Discharged
Two of my client's were discharged successfully today. I hope and pray that they continue to do well and prosper in life. I will miss one in particular. He had been at the facility for three months when everyone was about to give up on him and send him to another secured facility. I stood up for him and said, "I can work with him." My Director gave me 30 days to turn this kid around. It was hard at times, disappointing and in the end very rewarding. Nine months later ...He left today, successfully. I will miss seeing him.
*My Words, My Canvas*
*My Words, My Canvas*
Rambles at 5am!
Every week it amazes me on what I learn, usually its a life lesson. After each month usually on the first or second of the new month, I sit back and look at the life lesson learned the previous month. I usually don't share these thought however I believe expression is important in a persons life. Last month I realized how quickly a person/situation can change. "Everything can change in a blink of an eye." Let's see what I learn this month let alone this week.
*My Words, My Canvas*
*My Words, My Canvas*
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Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Advise of the day !
God will eventually call you back. Start living life with no regrets. Take chances!
*My Words, My Canvas*
Published with Blogger-droid v2.0.4
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