What is love? Love conquers all? Defining love is not an easy task. We will find as many definitions as there are people who define it.
Define the love It is not an easy task. We will find as many definitions as there are people who define it. Many couples will describe it as the great reason, the great force that unites them and makes them want to be together. Although love is experienced in completely different ways, the reality is that psychologists and great thinkers have tried to clarify what this feeling consists of.
What is love?
Love In a couple, between family or friends, in addition to being intangible, it is extremely complex and variable. It is made up of feelings, emotions, passions, mood and beliefs or expectations. But also, to make matters worse, love as we see it in romantic movies only shows what happens in the first stages of a relationship, falling in love.
If you are looking for a definition of love It is very likely that you will come across many different theories and descriptions. Despite this, the meaning of love always finds the following statements.
- Willingness to prioritize the well-being of the person
- Feelings of attachment, affection and need
- Sudden, dramatic feelings of attraction and respect
- Commit to helping, respecting and caring for others
Today there is still a lot of debate about love and its meaning So much so that all definitions of love do not always point to the same thing, some suggest that it is a choice while others say that it can be permanent or fleeting. It seems that in some cases love can be voluntary and in others it appears as an uncontrollable force.
What is couple love?
It is possible that when you think of the word love, the first thing that comes to mind is your partner. Although it is the love that people seek the most, there is a true lack of knowledge about what the feeling of love really is in a relationship between two people. In general, the Couple relationships It goes through different stages in which different types of love are experienced.
Fall in love
During falling in love feeling of love is very intense. This phase of a couple’s love is mainly characterized by attraction, the idealization of the other and as the moment in which commitment arises.
Engagement
Spending time together, where we dedicate our time almost exclusively to leisure and showing affection. In this couple’s love phase most of what we share is rewarding.
Commitment and coexistence
“We are going to live together”. This is a stage where changes usually appear in the relationship and new difficulties arise:
- The idealized image falls We have more information about our partner and not only about their virtues.
- Routines appear The euphoria of such exciting newness begins to disappear. Routine and monotony is the couple’s great enemy at this stage.
- Domestic and family obligations appear The scale changes its position. Now we spend most of our time on obligations and the time we share in rewarding or pleasant activities decreases.
Not all couples can easily adapt to the new reality, to living together. This is where many of the problems arise and the origin of many of the ruptures. In a couple, what love means can vary a lot in each of these phases, which is why the definition of love It may look different depending on where you are in your relationship.
Theories about love
Some psychologists have proposed some theories that try to get closer to what does love mean for the people. These hypotheses about love can clarify what love really is.
1. Liking vs. Loving
Psychologist Zick Rubin proposed that romantic love was made up of three elements. These were fixation, care and intimacy. In this way, this researcher proposed that although many of us give the meaning of love When we feel appreciation and admiration for others, the reality is that this is just pleasure. When we refer to love, this feeling is much deeper and more intense since it is defined as a strong desire for physical intimacy and contact. So much so that when someone has a feeling of ‘real’ love they tend to worry about the other person’s needs as well as their own.
2. Compassionate love vs passionate love
The psychologist Elaine Hatfield and her collaborators stated that there are two different types of love The compassionate, characterized by respect, attachment, affection and trust; and on the other hand, the passionate one, which is one that develops intense emotions, sexual attraction and affection. In this way, passionate love ends up leading to compassionate love, but these ways of loving your partner must be interspersed for a relationship to last.
3. Love Color Wheel Model
In the book The Colors of Lovepsychologist John Lee shared different ways to approach what it means. word love in psychology So much so that she compared love to a color wheel. Therefore, just as there are primary colors, there are also three primary styles of love. These feelings of love are as follows.
- Eros: The meaning of this Greek word is ‘erotic’and according to Lee, in this type of love there is passion in both the physical and emotional part.
- Ludos: Its meaning is ‘game‘ and this is a definition of love that conceives it as playful and fun, even though the relationship may not be serious.
- Storge: Its translation is ‘natural affection’, and this form of love is mainly represented by family ties. This type of love occurs between people who share interests and commitments that allow mutual affection to gradually develop.
Knowing that these are the three main elements that you can have love Lee proposed that each link had different degrees of them and depending on their proportion they implied one type of relationship or another.
4. Triangular theory of love
Robert Sternberg proposed another theory to try to find a definition of love in psychology to. In this way, he explained that there were three components in love: intimacy, passion and finally, commitment. By combining each of these components, a different type of relationship occurs. For this psychologist, relationships based on two or more elements are much more lasting than those that are only identified with one of them. Finally, he used the term ‘consummate love’ to describe his strongest and most enduring definition of love.
How do we know if we feel love?
He love After falling in love, it is characterized by having a strong personal involvement, there is deep affection, dedication, tolerance, the other is felt as a partner in vital projects, there is a commitment to solve problems together and support each other, a series of keys are created. between the members of the couple and sexuality is richer, more intense and more meaningful. Mature love is not blind, it also sees what it does not like, but accepts the other completely by being tolerant, empathetic, a dialoguer and a negotiator. In it love as a couple It is worth highlighting a series of basic elements:
1. Feeling
Human love is surrender, it is celebrating that the other exists, seeking goodness and happiness in a continuous act of giving and receiving.
2. Trend
Consequence of attraction. It is a tendency in principle sexual, but with progressive mutual knowledge and communication this tendency will also be psychological, spiritual and cultural.
3. Will
Love You have to take care of it, and that is done with willpower, determination and insistence on objectives.
4. Intelligence
Knowing oneself and the other, applying intelligence in the relationship lightens coexistence. Love It cannot depend only on feelings or it will be something immature and adolescent.
5. Philosophy and common project
If relatively equal criteria are not shared, differences in interpretation and difficulties in understanding will end up arising.
6. Commitment
To love is to choose, and therefore to give up other possibilities. He authentic love It requires a voluntary and responsible commitment to the future of the other.
7. Fluency and dynamism
As life goes on, things change, the members of the couple evolve, things are not what they were… Being aware of these changes and flowing with them will facilitate the relationship.
How to have a good love relationship?
Now that we know love and its meaning Really, it is very likely that we wonder how to make this durable and quality. According to most psychologists, for a relationship to prosper, it not only requires phrases with feeling, but it also requires a lot of effort, dedication and, above all, self-knowledge.
1. Leave aside idealisms
Put aside the fairy tales where each day is like the first, where the other is idealized. The greater the idealization and expectations, the greater the frustration.
2. Adapt
For the ones feelings of love are long-lasting, we must overcome new situations and know how to learn to negotiate as a couple, in the family and with friends.
3. Feed love
Love It needs to feed on gratifying behaviors, surprise the partner, show our feelings, share leisure, take care of relationships and intimacy.
4. Have your own space
Although it is necessary and healthy for each one to have their differentiated roles and individual lives, couples who find time to dedicate to each other have a certain shield against deterioration. Likewise, a network of common friends takes care of the stability of the couple.
5. Balance between good and bad
A good predictor of marital stability is the balance between good and bad. A simple formula would be to divide the number of intercourse by arguments, the result must be greater than one.
6. Know how to forgive
Forgiveness is a key piece in relationships based on love Forgiveness understood as an asymmetric act, the one who forgives forgets and guarantees to the other that he continues to have her love. In the couple there will be times when it is necessary to forgive, although it is not worth it that the same person always forgives, it must be something that both of them practice, otherwise it would be submission.
7. Have a feeling of mature love
A feeling of deep and mature love the reciprocal perception that the other meets most of the expectations, the lack of interest in another possible partner, a moral commitment to the well-being of the partner, and not taking for granted that the other will always be there since love does not last Alone, they are necessary factors in a stable relationship, although they are not sufficient on their own.
8. Don’t throw things in your face
Special care should be taken with accusations, to oneself and to the other. Accusations increase in conflicts, blaming each other is not good and it certainly does not help to overcome crises. In moments of conflict, accusations are insurmountable barriers. The accusations usually appear for something concrete (“you shouldn’t buy such an expensive TV”) and the concrete thing can be discussed and solved, but the abstract thing (“you’re a spendthrift”) is not usually fixed.
Love, be it in the relationship or bond, is only possible if it begins within ourselves. Therefore, it is essential to take care of our interior and exterior, and go to a professional psychologist if we need it. find the real one meaning of love It’s in your hands.
