Where Love Resides

Sometimes after two people fall in love, they fall out of love.  I have even seen couples who were very much in love at one point become hateful toward each other.  As untrained observers we often cite these break-ups as a “poor match” or that they “grew apart” or had “little in common.”  Let me suggest that the explanation for the demise of a loving relationship may lie elsewhere.

Perhaps it is true that part of falling in love is the desire for more – more closeness, more acceptance, to get married, have more peak adventures, etc.  You may identify with this desire in these or other ways.  The question is where does the desire for MORE come from?

During childhood we want the five A’s: acceptance, affection, attention, allowing and appreciation.  If we do not get adequate amounts of these, we do not develop healthy adult relationship with ourselves and others.  As we enter relationships, our “lack” of adequate amounts of one or more of the five A’s shows up.  As David Richo points out, the adult version of these desires in a healthy person is:

1.  Attention to the present moment; observing, listening, and noticing all the feelings at play in our relationships.
2.  Acceptance of ourselves and others just as we are.
3.  Appreciation of all our gifts, our limits, our longings, and our poignant human predicament.
4.  Affection shown through holding and touching in respectful ways.
5.  Allowing life and love to be just as they are, with all their ecstasy and ache, without trying to take control.

Richo says that love is “not so much a feeling as a way of being present.”  When deeply understood and applied, these five simple concepts—what Richo calls the five A's—form the basis of mature love. They help us to move away from judgment, fear, and blame to a position of openness, compassion, and realism about life and relationships. By giving and receiving these five A's, relationships become deeper and more meaningful, and they become a ground for personal transformation.  An appreciation for all of this can be found in David Richo’s amazing book, “How To Be An Adult In Relationships.”

So when we fall in love and are not present with the love that is right in front of us, we are elsewhere wanting MORE.  We are striving instead of seeing, controlling instead of caring, maneuvering ahead instead of being in the moment and listening to the voice within that says “I deserve MORE!”  Loving relationships go bad because our egos are working hard to achieve MORE.  And when our partner does not meet our needs we judge, resent, criticize and blame because we are not getting the something MORE we think we need.  We grow apart. We lose our commonality. We are no longer a match.  We become needy.  And often, love turns into hate.

While most of us exhibit this type of behavior at times, Richo points out that we can learn to change how we behave and turn back to our partners in life.  If we did not get adequate amounts of each of the five A’s in childhood, our self-esteem might be severely challenged as adults, especially in relationship.  We must train ourselves to work on the five A’s and get back to the present moment -- where love resides – rather than being lost in the stories about what is missing, what we think is “right” and how things need to be different.