An Interview Series

Comment posted by: kez
Date July 11, 2010

Hi Al, thanks for your comments. My spouse refuses point blank to go to a marriage counsellor and just says he is 'done and dusted'. Still wants to be friends (why do they always think that is so easy? When you genuinely love someone you don't go from love to feeling 'nice' just like that!). I did ask if he would at least give me three months to work on positive actions and reconnection etc. ( I thought this would be reasonable since I had complied with his three month time out). However, won't budge. I have given him Harville Hendrix's book and requested he read that with no expectation on my part - but hopefully it will help him sort out some of his stuff. I will now just continue to work on me. I told him that I truly wish him to be happy and this is heartfelt on my part (yes I love him that much!) Anyway thankyou again al, you have really helped me in some of my darkest hours (does the pain ever go away Al?)

regards, kez

I suppose it is an horrid understatement that relationships seem to often involve tragedy. Well, I believe we are designed to recover from such. Yes, the pain does go away, but hopefully the wisdom gained doesn't.

I found it useful in this life to become better and better at "metabolizing" loss and the pain of loss. Seems we are all in for a lot of loss throughout our lives. Studying grief has been useful for me. Therer are many books on the subject. I particularly like Tom Golden's work - though he is focused on men's grief.

Best Wishes, Al

Hi Al,

Thanks for replying and suggesting that book - I will have a look. After waving the white flag, and retreating to lick my wounds I am still working tirelessly on myself - I want to enjoy life and not let this make me bitter! I still very much want to achieve the biological dream, and now accept that perhaps he is not the one - so I am planning things for me. Al I have been thinking lately about 'love' and how we (men and women) all seem to have different ideas about it. What stimulated this thought was that my spouse has said to me a couple of times now that he 'loves me but is not in love with me'. When I asked him did he mean that he doesn't feel that romantic love (or infatuation, or that passionate rush and so on) he said no, and that I just didn't understand. I said that to me love was about all those things, but also still loving someone with all their strengths, weaknesses, flaws, etc. and through the good and bad times was what it was all about. But he only replied with that sentence again! I also remembered reading some of your thoughts on love in one of your essays (can't remember which one). Have you more thoughts on love or perhaps doing an essay?

regards kez

Ho. Good for you. Wondering about this "thingy called love." Perhaps a couple of ideas may help.

I personally stopped using the word "love" for some years during my first marriage. The problem for me was the we seemed to be in a rut where we would say "I love you." "I love you, too." without any meaning to it at all. I was embarassed and said I wouldn't use that word till I knew what it meant. This was about 1967 or so and was one of my many mistakes/attempts.

Secondly it is worth repeating the idea that "words have no meaning. People have meaning and use words to try to share that meaning." This is part of my wisdom in Mirroring. It came originally from studying General Semantics. Using that principle, the issue is not what the word "ove" means, but who is using it and what do they mean by that word at that moment.

Thirdly, I have written a lot about the word "love". Just stick it into my website as a search word.

I generally think of three meanings: Romantic Love, Vintage Love and simple love. Simple love for me is a decision to spend energy on nurturing someone or even yourself. Romantic Love is a temporary condition energized by many emotional chemicals including PEA, triggered by the Biological Dream. Romantic Love is characteristic of being in the presence of a potential Imago Match, a candidate with whom you can (if you work your butts off) reach Vintage Love. Romantic Love never lasts very long. Vintage Love is a dreamed-of state, sometimes made real, where people act in congruence with what I call the Biological Dream.

I believe that to reach Vintage Love, Romantic Love must end, and a lot of very specific learning has to happen in both people.

When people say they are In Love, I look for a lot of dreaming and delicious fun. I also anticipate the "crash." When people say they are "no longer in love" I tend to look for the Power Struggle, a lot of anger and grief, and that ever present decision to learn or not.

This is all in my Map of Relationships. Enjoy.