When it comes to finding a long-term relationship, one must be dedicated and have a positive love-life with their partner. Here are 12 telltale signs that your love is genuine.
True and lasting love in a relationship is about all the small things that you and your partner feel on a daily basis and still find appealing. In our topsy-turvy, stressed-out world, true love may be the only thing we can count on.
Looking for that special someone has become a priority for many. Google shows over 300 million results for the search โonline dating sites.โ There are more than 40 million American singles heading online to find love.
It may not be easy, but most people are now able to find someone to love. But not everyone knows how to keep love alive and growing through the years. Iโve been a marriage and family counselor for more than 40 years. Iโve also been happily married for 35 years.
Read How Modern Dating Is Killing Real Love
Here are some things my wife, Carlin, and I have felt on our journey together. 12 Signs of True Love
1. Romantic love
We all know the feeling. We meet, we connect, we fall in love. When weโre in it our world is turned upside down. Weโd rather be with our beloved than eat, sleep, or work. We feel on top of the world when our love is returned and crash to the depths if it looks like our love is threatened.
2. The desire to merge
Lust is connected with romance. We want to merge our bodies, minds, and spirits. Orgasmic intensity isnโt just about pleasure. Itโs about wanting to share our hearts, souls, atoms, and electrons. We want to lose ourselves and find the divine.
3. Itโs us against the world
We no longer feel alone. We are now part of a pair. We feel the power of two and the joy of being us. Weโre still in the world, but the world seems like the background. We two are the center and the world is there to support and embrace us.
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4. Longing to create
The primal creation, the reason we are each here, is that a man and a woman came together and an intrepid sperm was welcomed by a wondrous egg and we were launched into life. But in a world with too many people, we also create art, music, home, healing, and other gifts for humankind.
5. Disillusionment
The honeymoon time comes to an end. Disillusionment sets in. Our partner seems to change. They are not who we thought they were and they arenโt giving us what we longed to have. We wonder if weโve made a mistake and begin turning away and looking for what is missing.
6. Incompatibility
Incompatibility is grounds for true love. When we become disillusioned with our partner, we often feel weโve become incompatible. But when we recognize that disillusionment can mean letting go of illusions, we can also let go of believing that incompatibility is a bad thing. It actually allows us to learn where our wounds have been hiding.
7. Discovering our wounded selves
In looking away from our partner, we are forced to look within. We feel the pain of the trauma we all experienced growing up in families that didnโt adequately meet our needs. We recognize that we were hoping that our partner would make us whole. We were looking for true love in all the wrong places.
Read What is Real Love? How You Know What Youโre Experiencing Is Real Love?
8. True love is Embracing Illness
Everyone gets sick, but thatโs not a bad thing. Sickness can be our greatest teacher, our greatest guide. I got depressed. My wife got breast cancer. We both developed heart arrhythmias. We learned the lessons of illness and healed.
9. Learning the mathematics of true love and addictive love
When we look for a partner to make us whole, we experience addictive love: โIโve got to have him/her or Iโll die.โ The math is ยฝ x ยฝ = ยผ. The longer weโre together the smaller we become. When we look to our partner to help us heal and grow, we are on the path of true love. The math is 1 + 1 = Infinity.
Read Lust Or Love? How To Know If Itโs Just A Rebound Or Something Real
10. Turning back towards our lover and committing to being real
Being real is not sweetness and light. It is passionate, painful, and creative. Much like making a baby and giving birth. Being real requires being part of a pair. Self-actualization is not something we do by ourselves.
11. Love is letting go of fear
All our unhappiness and illnesses are fear-based. Weโre afraid of losing what we have or not getting what we need. We always have two choices. Do we feed the fear or do we feed the love? Whichever one we feed gets stronger.
12. Accepting that real, lasting love is a journey, not a destination
Real, lasting love is something we create every minute of every day. Itโs the most difficult thing we do in our lives. It is also the simplest. But simple isnโt always easy. Learning to love is the graduate school of life. Admission is free but will cost you everything you have. Are you ready for the journey of true love?
So what is your experience when it comes to true and lasting love? Have you found that special someone or are you still on the lookout for them? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Written by Jed Diamond Ph.D Originally appeared in The Good Men Project Republished with permission
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