Romantic Love- Fact or Fiction

[beloved]

Some cynics scoff at romantic love as a myth invented by Hollywood. Some sincere Christians consider romantic love the whipped cream on the sundae of marriage- decorative, but unnecessary. They say this as a lower form of love that husbands and wives should disregard in their search for higher ground. Some individuals feel uncertain about the value of romantic love because they confuse the genuine article with that frothy substitute known as temporary infatuation. Some try to suppress all thought of romantic love because they are not experiencing it. Some rationalize, " I don't have it; it must not exist." Others think, "It's not possible in MY marriage."

In spite of all this, just about everyone inwardly longs for a thrilling love relationship involving oneness, spice and excitement, and that wonderful, euphoric, almost indescribable sensation known as "being in love".

Many men and women believe (or at least try to believe) that romantic love is a "woman" thing. However, therepists will tell you that it is a human need; men are just less apt to admit that they also need close personal contact filled with expressions of warmth, gentleness, softness, and caring. Therepists would also tell you that men often misunderstand this need because they have been told it's unmanly, so they try to fill the void with sex, when what they really need and crave is physical reassurance and loving closeness.

Men often "fall in love", which is this romantic kind of love, and then deaden their own emotions out of fear of weakness. It is sad that this lie continues to flourish not only in the world, but in the Christian world where God commands that a husband love his wife and children (that includes showing them how they feel for them). It is unpopular for a man to show what God naturally gave him; a need to feel loved and the ability to love others emotionally. How many marriages have ended on the rocks because of foolish pride, and the fear of what other men think.

So, what is the answer to wounded and/or broken marriages? FALL IN LOVE!! Romantic love is not only real, it can be lasting and ever growing. 'But you can't just fall in love at will!', you say.
Yes, you can. I will explain how.

According to Dr. Ed Wheat, romantic love can be learned emotionally:

There are two ways to set up the conditions under which this love can be learned. First, by utilizing your own God-given falculty of imaginative thought; second, by providing the right emotional climate for your mate.

'But I can't make myself feel something!' You are wrong, you can make yourself feel something. That is because our emotions follow our thinking. Also, you both spend time loving each other in agape ways during the daily grind, and the feelings will come more easily during personal alone time.

How do I fall in love with my mate (regain romantic love)?

1. Choose to surrender to your feelings of love. This will require forgiveness first of wrongs done to you by your spouse. Once that is done, conditions will be set for romantic love to flourish.

~ Surprisingly, research has found that although men find it more difficult to make this deliberate choice, once they do their strong romantic feelings are awakened, and then they are even more apt than women to to be controlled by and make decisions based on those loving emotions than their female counterparts.

2. Purposefully meditate and reflect on the good things that you love about your spouse daily. If you can't think of anything, remember what drew you to them to start with.

~ Whatsoever things be pure, lovely, of good report, praisworthy......... think on these things the Bible says. Our emotions and mood are always a dirrect result of our thought life.

~ Remember postive, loving, fulfilling times spent with your spouse. Replay them in your memory often.

3. Use your imagination to provoke loving emotions.

~ Anticipate future pleasure with your spouse. Fantasize about them, and about them alone; emotionally and sexually. The frequency and intensity of these positive, warm, erotic, tender thoughts about your partner, strengthened by the imagination factor, will govern your success in falling in love and staying in love. Never fantasize about anyone else- that is not only adultery but it will draw your heart away from your spouse to and toward others; killing the marriage. Many people begin daydreaming about someone else in an attempt to fill an emotional vaccum when they no longer feel in love with their spouse. Forsake this and focus your thoughts on the one you married.

4. Quit expecting perfection from your spouse. Don't be so judgemental or critical. No one can fall in love or stay in love in an enviroment of harsh, judgemental, critisism. Give up your mental critsism and practice appreciation instead.

~ Always remember that you both are human. You are not perfect and neither is your spouse. And guess what? Neither of you will ever be perfect; although you should strive to be perfect as God is perfect. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses. Some things are better confronted and changed, others should just be accepted and left alone. Choose your battles and try to always be kind in your approach.

~ A sure way to fall out of love is to concentrate on the things you do not like about your spouse, to watch them and ridicule their every shortcoming, and giving yourself reason to loose respect for them.

5. Use that agape love as a catalyst into romantic love.

~ Remember that romantic love, unlike agape love, is based on the way you make each other feel over all. Romantic love is a pleasurable learned emotional response to the way your spouse looks (do not be harsh in this area since everyones looks fade and not everyone can be a supermodel) and feels, what they say and do, and the amount of good emotional experiences you both share. Agape love is in contrast a choice, regardless of feelings, to do what is best for the beloved.

6. Romantic love will either grow or die. It cannot stay the same. It is always either in a state of addition or subtraction emotionally, so we must DO in order to FEEL. Love can't be lazy. It takes work and commitment, but the pay off is huge.

~ If you want your spouse to fall in love, or stay in love with you, provide them with the right emotional climate to make that possible. They need to feel safe, and accepted, and appreciated by you before they will even open their heart to romantic possibilities.

~ Romantic love can only flourish when you are together alone.
That is another way to provide the right emotional climate for the two of you to engage in some love making, love rekindling moments. Also keep in mind that men seldom act romantic in the presence of others. Examples of a good atmosphere include:

* dim lights
* candlelight
* cozy winter nights in front of a fireplace
* sitting outside together in the moonlight
* close to beautiful scenery such as water and mountains
* walks along the beach, in a flower garden, on a mountain trail, or in the woods
* scenic drives
* picnic lunches in a quiet, secluded as possible place
* intimate resturaunts
* hot tubs and bubble baths

7. DO NOT allow anyone you know (including your parents) to critisize your spouse to you. Usually when someone is doing this, it is not out of care or concern for you anyway, but out of their own selfish desire to either have your spouse, or to have you all to themselves again. Keep in mind that what I am speaking of is the little things. It is the little foxes that spoil the vine. If they are trying to save you from abuse, that is another story altogether. But don't allow anyone to pick on the little things about your spouse and make them into mountains of problems for you both.

~ For example, I once was friends with a woman whose mother continuously told her daughter that the son- in- law was not good enough. The mother constantly pointed out this young mans short commings to her daughter until that daughter began to see her husband through her mothers eyes; not that that was correct or fair because the mother actually wanted the daughter to see her husband unfavorably so that she would divorce him. It eventually ended the marriage because the daughter looked elsewhere for "someone better".

8. Respect each other. If you don't hold the other in value and esteem, it is hard for them to feel anything but contempt for you. I know there is a popular new "phycho babble" book going around about men needing respect and women needing love, but according to God's Word (and we will always try to follow God's word here), both men and women equally need love. Part of love is to show respect for each other. If you don't treat each other with mutual respect and acknowledge each others equality and worth, there can be no romantic love affair. You cannot treat someone else with disdain, disrespect, degradation, and contempt, and have them fall or stay madly in love with you.

Researchers have found that shared emotional arousal is the catalyst in developing romantic love. The emotions don't even have to always be positive ones, just mutually shared. This is why sometimes people fall in love in hard times instead of in good. They share those hard emotional feelings and comfort one another. The more shared emotional experiences, the more deep the romantic love.

Make or remake your relationship into a love affair. Think of every tender, generous, romantic word or act toward your spouse as an investment into pleasurable memories and emotional experiences that will grow and multiply into a strong romantic love affair.

[godhelpme]

I like these little devotions that you put on here for marriage. I have a lot to learn to make things right with my husband.

[lostlove]

I married for all the wrong reasons- just for security and the "status" of being married. We have stuck together for a long time, but I can see from the advice given that is probably up to me to make it romantic. But there is little to build on.

At the moment, I can't see much I like about him except that he's reliable and can mend things. We haven't got a thing in common now the children have flown the nest.

Once I went for counselling but they said my marriage was a sham and more or less advised me to leave.

But something keeps me in the marriage. And since I became a Christian I know God wants me to love him. But there is something very wrong, somehow. I don't even like kissing him- well only a "peck" if we're saying goodbye. We are still intimate, but there is no kissing, first.

He wants me to take care of myself, and slim and stay young looking- he is always making remarks about women like "She's a funnny shape!" but doesn't see the need to make an effort himself as he was brought up to think men are superior anyway!! This will be difficult- as this is part of the "distain, disrespect and degradation"- he was taught by his mother that men are superior and "there would be no bad men without bad women." She treated his sisters with no respect at all- they were just there to wait on their brothers.
This lordly superior attitude makes it difficult to fall in love. Maybe I didn't see it before I married.

Maybe it's all my fault. But to me, he is always seeing the negative side of things, thinks life was better in the 1950s and moans about things all the time. I think he wants control and just "home comforts" rather than love, quite honestly. I don't feel I can confide my deepest feelings to him, there's no emotional intimacy. I feel better talking to my close woman friend- but isn't that quite usual? Men don't like discussing deep things, surely?

The advice you gave is great- but it says "think what drew you to your spouse in the first place"- in my case it was simply the need for a reliable husband. That isn't a basis for romance, is it?
We can't even converse at the same level.

There never was any spark. I didn't think, after a few let-downs, that it mattered after all. "Good husband material" was possibly the only thing to matter- being reliable and working. I hoped it might grow- but the only time I felt anything for him was when I was pregnant.

But surely a lot of woman over the years have felt like this. A lot of woman, especially my mother's generation, married for security, not love. If you wait for the right feelings, you could end up alone. I know a woman who remained unmarried rather than marry someone she didn't love. Now I think it's quite wise, but I wanted a family.

I didn't deceive him, though- I never pretended that I felt madly attracted to him. I just said I felt comfortable with him and that I thought we could make a go of it. We both wanted to settle down, and he was into his 30s.

Now the children have gone, we've lost the one thing we had in common. I feel sorry that I can't feel much for him, that's all.
When he was ill I felt compassion and looked after him. But I don't like the control he has over me- he doesn't give me any space to love him in, as he doesn't have friends like I have.

I will continue to act the part of a "good wife" - but if it wasn't for my friends and family, I'd feel totally empty.

O.K. Now that is a challenge. Where do I start trying to introduce any romance into this marriage?. How can I start feeling as I should? I am quite prepared to be told I am in the wrong- just convince me I need to change, because it is so hard.

[beloved]

Hello LL,

It is a very tough situation you are in because it sounds like your husband is not wiling to do anything to help you feel loving toward him. He is the way he is, and he is always right (as is his mother), and that's the way it is! Is that correct? Because that is the way it sounds.

In a situation like this, you have to be very lovingly clear about your feelings and your expectations of him to alter certain behaviors to improve the marriage. If he refuses to do anything to give you the love you need, then boundaries and/or a seperation may work. Seperation should be the last resort, in my opinion, and only for important issues (not every time we want our way about something). Good communication and a loving attitude goes a long way. If that continuously fails, boundaries can be enforced. If boundaries fail, insistance on christian couseling (or reading books can help). If none of that works, seperation may be the only thing that wakes them up, and scares them into postive action and change.

In the meantime, doing what is best for your beloved even when you don't feel like it (and when they don't deserve it) will set a tone that can allow for change on their part as well.

This may be especially hard for you because he believes that he deserves to be treated as a lord in the home as though he were superior to you. He was taught that he deserves only the best efforts from you and he has to do nothing to maintain the marriage and make life good himself. However, if you show contempt and do nothing for him back, then the tone in the home will make it nearly impossible for love to bloom.

Is falling in love with each other possible? Yes, it is. But it takes two ultimately. But one must start the ball rolling. It doesn't sound like that it will ever be him to make the initiative for change.

It's at least worth giving a shot, isn't it? Better than staying where you are right now in the marriage?

I wish you both the best.

God Bless,
beloved