TRUE LOVE 101

Balboa Press

Contents

Preface................................................................viiAcknowledgments........................................................ixChapter 1: The Journey to True Love....................................1Part 1: Three Stages of Relationships..................................5Chapter 2: First Stage: Trust and Innocence............................7Chapter 3: Second Stage: Building Hopes and Dreams.....................12Chapter 4: Third Stage: True Love......................................18Part 2: Foundation of True Love........................................21Chapter 5: The Importance of Knowing Who We Are........................23Chapter 6: Spiritual Aspect............................................27Chapter 7: Mental Aspect...............................................31Chapter 8: Emotional Aspect............................................37Chapter 9: Physical Aspect.............................................45Chapter 10: Observing Aspect...........................................48Part 3: Creating True Love.............................................51Chapter 11: Core Needs.................................................53Chapter 12: Love and Connection........................................61Chapter 13: Safety and Adequacy........................................73Part 4: Sustaining True Love...........................................91Chapter 14: Truly Loving Practices.....................................93Chapter 15: Continuing the Journey.....................................113About the Author.......................................................117

Chapter One

I deeply care about true love. I believe, within the journey of learning how to discover and sustain true love, exits the best hope we have individually or as a planet to survive and ultimately thrive. I also believe that where we are most motivated to value love is in relationship to ourselves, our spouse or significant other, and our children.

Most people want to have a partner/spouse/significant other. There are various names for this primary person in our lives, but no matter what the name, if that most intimate relationship is working well, we feel much more excited, hopeful, and energized by life. If that relationship is causing disappointment, fear, jealousy, or physical or emotional pain, we are miserable. It affects how we feel about every other area of our lives. We so want a successful relationship, and yet most people do not know how to create what they want. Statistics vary but suggest that from 50 to 60 percent of people fail at being able to sustain a successful relationship, and many of those still in a primary relationship do not seem to be happy.

We all enter a committed relationship assuming it will succeed. However, most of us have never really received the education or the tools needed to actually be successful. People have often turned to religion as a way to find answers to help their failing relationships. They have grown up being taught that "God is love," so they reason that religious teachers should be able to help them. Unfortunately, too many people have experienced judgment by these teachers, as well as inequality and lectures about the various rules to follow, rather than learning how to sustain true love.

Today, many people are more likely to turn to psychology and psychotherapists for help. The literal meaning of psychology is the "knowledge of spirit." Ironically, while many psychotherapists strive to teach people how to love themselves and each other, they would never mention the word spirit.

There are many therapeutic approaches that work with one or more aspects of healing. For example, cognitive therapy looks at how we think. By comparison, cognitive behavioral therapy looks at how we think and behave. Most approaches are helpful to some extent, but most ignore wholeness. Consequently, I often compare psychotherapy to the story of the blind men touching the elephant to find out what it is like. When they describe their experience to each other, each is very confident that he is describing the elephant, while in actuality, each is only describing one aspect of the elephant.

"Whole-I-ness" is ultimately what we all need to heal. One definition of healing is "to make whole." Whole-I-ness is not about being perfect or alone. It is about each person choosing to become more fully who he or she is. When each individual strives for wholeness, one plus one becomes more than two. If individuals value who they are, each person in the relationship will find that he or she is better off because of the relationship, rather than diminished. To be whole, we must reclaim that we are spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical beings. All of these aspects of self are communicating important information to us about how to discover and sustain true love with ourselves and others. If we are willing to honestly listen, amazing wisdom and guidance resides within each of us.

Knowing how to discover and sustain true love in relationships has only become more relevant in the United States over the past few decades. Historically, marriage as a legal contractual agreement kept most unions together. Women were not allowed to own property or work and therefore literally could not survive without a man.

The 1960s were the beginning of liberating men and women from contractual law that required them to stay together. For the first time, there was a massive shift in thinking about relationships. Women rose up as never before and began the fight for equality and control over their bodies, which continues to this day. Phrases like "battle of the sexes," "make love, not war," "love the one you're with," "male chauvinist pig," and "sexual harassment" began to transform our relationships. Underneath all this confusion and conflict, the desire for true love remained.

Not only do statistics tell us that our marriages are not lasting, but also, more recently, the census data tells us that, for the first time, less than 50 percent of people are even bothering to marry. More people than ever are questioning the validity of the marriage contract beyond that of a document that defines the legal rights for their relationship and their children. Clearly, legal documents no longer have the power to bind relationships.

This book is a guide to learning how to discover, create, and sustain true love. It is based on my experience over several decades as a psychotherapist working with individuals and couples. During that time, I had one primary focus, which was to find the clearest and most helpful approach to empower clients to create the successful relationships they desired.

I will be briefly discussing the first two stages of relationships where most people get stuck and never really progress farther, to the true love stage. I will then be focusing on the elements involved in being able to discover and progress to this final stage. Finally, I will explain the practices involved in sustaining a truly loving relationship.

There is a very wise saying, "To know and to not do, is to not yet know." Because of this necessity "to know and do" in order to experience what we desire, at the end of each knowledge section, I have assigned homework to encourage you to practice what you have learned. It is my utmost hope that you will choose to learn and apply the...