Why do we crave love so much, even to the point that we would die for it? To learn more about our very real, very physical need for romantic love, Helen Fisher and her research team took MRIs of people in love — and people who had just been dumped.
Tag: Love
Modern Love: Beyond Years
Tim and Sarah McEown never saw their 22-year age difference as an obstacle in their relationship, until Tim had a heart attack.
Curated by Erbe
Original Source
Why We Love, Why We Cheat
Anthropologist Helen Fisher takes on a tricky topic – love – and explains its evolution, its biochemical foundations and its social importance. She closes with a warning about the potential disaster inherent in antidepressant abuse.
Are You Falling in Love or Lust?
Are you tripping into infatuation or allowing time for real love to develop? Infatuation involves a projection of own needs, hopes, and dreams. While real love cares about the well being of others and not just their own desires.
How to Love and Be Loved
Are you giving as much love as you receive?
Through a story of one of his students, Billy shows the importance of loving others and of being loved.
Curated by Erbe
Original Source
What All Successful Couples Have In Common
Do you have these traits in your relationship?
Want an iron-clad marriage? Take note of these universal relationship techniques.
Marriage is hard work, whether you’ve been together for just two months or 20 years. No couple jumps the broom, breaks the glass or ties the knot without genuine hopes for happily ever after, right? But every couple inevitably has issues beneath the surface—it’s how they handle these obstacles that are the telltale signs of success. We tapped a few top marriage therapists to help us identify the common denominators among couples with healthy, enduring relationships. After all, what are the ingredients for long-lasting love?
They argue.
Occasional disagreements and “fighting fair” are not necessarily signs that a relationship is falling apart. “There is good data showing arguments are OK,” says psychologist Kristen Carpenter, PhD, Director of Women’s Behavioral Health at Ohio State’s Wexner Medical Center. “As long as you have positive interactions to offset them, you’re fine. These might include good discussions, date nights, affection or gratitude. Every couple is different, but arguments are definitely OK.”
In fact, arguments can actually be effective if they’re productive. By simply bottling up feelings, you’re creating a recipe for resentment and hostility, which can destroy a marriage.
So, how do you fight right? “Couples need to be able to identify and communicate their needs,” Dr. Carpenter says. “The minute one thinks, ‘He should know what I need,’ you’re setting yourself up for failure and disappointment.” No. One. Reads. Minds. Don’t lose sight of that.
They listen.
Just as much as you want to vocalize your own wants and needs, it’s imperative to hear the other person out, says marriage therapist Carin Goldstein, LMFT. “One of the biggest things that gets in the way of problem-solving is when a couple does not want to listen to each other,” she explains. “They do not hear each other, and they do not want to understand.”
If you’re struggling with this, Goldstein says the following re-framing exercise will help. “You effectively listen by repeating back what you’re taking away,” she says. “So, say to your partner, ‘What I’m hearing you say is that, when I do X, Y or Z, you feel attacked.‘” That way, you get temperature checks along the way, rather than barreling down a course of misunderstanding. If you want to be heard, you have to listen to your partner’s needs as well.
They absorb emotions without negativity.
If two partners are both negative nellies, Goldstein admits she wonders if they’ll be able to make it through the tough times. “Successful couples use positive language; couples that I really struggle with generally have a lot of criticism [in conversation],” says Goldstein. “It comes from such a deep place of contempt, where the other person does not feel valued or heard.”
To counter negativity, Goldstein has these couples consistently practice using positive language. “I have them start a conversation by saying what they genuinely appreciate about each other,” she says. “They also need to learn to listen to their spouse’s feelings without getting defensive. Emotions aren’t necessarily there to be rationalized. Sometimes, they just need to be expressed without interruption.”
They compromise.
Goldstein says, ultimately, the couples that succeed long-term are extremely adaptable. “I’ll have couples come into my office, and they are unwilling to compromise,” she says. “Sometimes I’ll tell them, if they’re not willing to compromise, they shouldn’t come back. It is impossible to be in any relationship without the ability to change and accommodate your partner.”
Remember, no one person is right or wrong, Goldstein says. It’s never black and white; there’s always a middle ground, and lasting couples put in the time to find that place where both can coexist comfortably.
They savor their time together (and apart).
Relationships take work—and more importantly, perhaps, they take time, says Carpenter. “This means staying in touch and protecting your time together,” she explains. “It looks different for every couple. For some, it’s texting throughout the day; for others, it’s a quick phone call at lunch. It might be a week-long getaway once a year, one movie night a week, a date night every so often or just 15 minutes of cuddling a day.”
No doubt you’re being pulled in a hundred different directions, thanks to work, family and friends. But value your time with your partner by making sure your time together doesn’t keep slipping down the totem pole.
Carpenter adds that you need to find what works for you—and “if you’re feeling off, maybe it’s not enough time together and you should address it,” she says. “Or maybe you’re not taking enough time for you. It’s impossible to be your best self in a relationship if you’re not your best self on your own. Sometimes, it makes sense to take a step back and look inward.”
So if it’s getting a little too close for comfort: take that solo spa trip, or make dates to decompress with your girls. Your marriage will probably be a whole lot healthier (and you’ll both be happier) when you rejoin forces.
By Jenna Birch
Curated by Timothy
Original Article
Calling in True Love
He will see my heart first – its strength, its resilience, its magnitude, its determination, its power.
He will see my brain, and value the way I think, the logic intertwined with compassion, the depth, the simplicity.
He will see my eyes, dark brown eyes, wide with excitement, creases in the corners from smiling, and a depth that says, “I’ve been there. I understand. I’ve come through it, I’m here for you, and we’re here together now.”
He will see my skin, smooth and tan, and the curves of my body, my legs, my chest, and he will see femininity in every inch; he’ll see a softness he desires to touch and a firmness that signifies strength and health.
He will listen for my voice, the tone, the articulation, the animation and emotion injected into it that will carry him like a wave.
He will take pleasure in causing my laughter because all he wants to do is give me joy, levity, happiness.
He will recognize the rarity of my attributes and how they fit perfectly with his, and because of this, he’ll know I am the only one for him.
He’ll know this with the force of a tidal wave. He’ll know it is God’s will [greater than us, and for great purpose], that we are One, and he’ll claim our union with relentless determination, swiftly, wholly, and completely. There will be no room for interpretation. He’ll know. I’ll know. It will simply be.
By HWK
The Most Steamy Sexual Phrases From Romance Novels
Steamy phrases from Romance Novels can be quite funny on their own!
Why can’t we just say … *whisper* penis and vagina?
Romance novels have a language and style all their own. Though they contain sex scenes, they’ve always aimed to be more tasteful than your standard pornography fare. Hence, the flowery descriptors for male and female genitalia and sexuality. Romance novels are the proper, eloquent statesman to pornography’s grunting caveman.
What makes romance novels so much fun on a comedic level is just how creative the authors often get with the language. What do you say when you don’t want to mutter penis or vagina?
Blogger John Ferri found the humor in romance novels, as well. His wife is a fan of the genre and after reading a few himself, Ferri started compiling lists of some of the more hilarious sexual descriptions.
WARNING: Blushing and junior high-level giggling ahead.
Curated by Timothy
Original Article
Love Rules – Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Marriage Equality
This affirms healthy and committed relationships for all couples!
I am overjoyed at today’s Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges. As I’ve said many times over the last several years, marriage equality had the stamp of inevitability on it — it is not a matter or “if,” but “when.” Today, we know the answer: Marriage equality is here.
This is an enormous victory for the LGBT community, and for all of us who believe that everyone deserves to be treated equally under the law. Whether loving same-sex couples live in Illinois or anywhere else in the nation, they will now be able to join in marriage. As a founding member of the LGBT Equality Caucus, I have been on this side of the fight for equal rights all along. I want to congratulate all of my friends and colleagues who have worked so hard to make this a reality — whether pushing for changes to federal law, challenging unfair policies, marching in the streets or talking to their families and friends about the need for equality.
This is truly a day to celebrate how far our country has come and I am positive that there will be more victories to come. We will enact the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) to stop discrimination in the workplace and Student Non-Discrimination Act (SNDA) to end discrimination in our schools. Today’s decision shows how far our country and we will keep marching on until we establish equal rights for all.
Curated by Tatiana
Original Article
What I Discovered with My First Love
I was in my early twenties when I found who I thought was my soul-mate. We were from similar backgrounds, both boarding school kids, classically educated, but under-qualified. He had dropped out of University and I was on a hiatus from community college. We were both the unconventional members of pretty conventional families. Jan was involved in the periphery of Music, and neither of us had a real job. Jan’s family was wealthier than mine, but I had the advantage of an English accent, and excellent table manners, which won over his mother, if not his big brother. His father was an American who had gone back to the US after a messy divorce, and was only fleetingly in his son’s life.
We met when my musician boyfriend was on tour. Jan was a friend of his, had visited him in LA, and brought back a message for me. Jan and I hit it off right away,we became so close in such a short time, that we were like brother and sister. We were both younger siblings, and had each come from a family of divorce.
When Guy, my boyfriend, returned he moved in to my apartment and found work locally. Jan and I would go and see him play, and to my chagrin Guy would often introduce us to “fans” as though WE were the couple! The reunion lasted six weeks, and when the relationship began to flounder, Jan was right there to offer a shoulder. When the BF moved on Jan moved in.
At first it was a fairly typical rebound relationship: Jan wanted me because I was the rock-star’s ex-girlfriend; bohemian enough to interest him, and classy enough to be comfortable in his home world. I wanted him to prove to my ex that I had moved on, that my heart wasn’t broken, and that I was still attractive. We also cared about each other, which really helped!
In most ways that counted we were compatible, sexually, intellectually and in terms of what we wanted out of life. I was the more extroverted of the two of us, but he was also very social, and our apartment was always filled with friends, we were almost never alone. It was a wonderful life, and if I ever missed my ex I pushed it down.
We both went back to school, he trained as a Recording tech, and I as a Medical tech. we found a rhythm, and we became family.
Time went by fast and suddenly it seemed I was 26, and Jan was 27. I was working in a Childrens’ hospital , dealing with life and death every day, while Jan was working in a recording studio, where getting the right microphone for the drums was his most important task. He was working mostly nights, and I worked days.
I had matured, and it seemed he hadn’t. We had been living together for 5 years, Jan wanted things to stay as they were, but I was becoming restless, needing a change.
I felt that was no longer the same person that I once had been, and though I still liked to socialize, I no longer enjoyed the “sex and drugs and rock’n roll” lifestyle that Jan still lived. I was moving towards my thirties, and I realized that I actually wanted marriage and a family. My biological clock was ticking, and his wasn’t.
One of the problems of having a long-term relationship when quite young, is that we all mature at different rates. There is a reason why most couples have a younger woman/older man dynamic. (On average, husbands are two to four years older than their wives.) Young men are reluctant to commit while still enjoying themselves; on average they delay marriage and fatherhood until later.
I had often thought that perhaps we weren’t together for the right reasons, we were friends first, lovers later, which seems ideal, but I sometimes wondered if there was a lack of passion in our gradual growth to being a pair. Had we ever really been “in love”? was that a necessary component? was ours a “marriage of convenience”? It certainly wasn’t the grand passion that my previous relationship had been.
There reached a point in my mind at which we would either break up, or marry. Then I discovered that he had a key to my best friend’s apartment and they were hooking up behind my back. I guess he had already made the decision, and forgotten to include me in it! Diana was a tall blonde model, the complete antithesis of me – short, curvy and redheaded. (As a friend of mine remarked at the time, when your “marriage” hits a rough patch it’s not a good idea to have something that attractive in your life!).
We broke up, and Jan and my friend became engaged. They married within a year of our break up (I was not invited).
I have had many relationships since then, and though I have been married twice I have never achieved the same “soul-mate” status which Jan and I had. I regret losing him in my live even now. Perhaps it wasn’t a grand passion, but in some ways it was something even better. Too bad we were both too young at the time to recognize it. Though I cannot say that we have remained friends, we have been in touch over the I have followed his career, and congratulated him when he was nominated for a Grammy. We both moved on and have done well, our lives enriched for having known each other.
Gay Men Will Marry Your Girlfriends
This gave us a good laugh!
We support gay marriage. Here’s why you should too.
Curated by Tatiana
Original Source
Foolishly Seeking True Love
Is love passing you by everyday? Handsome and Belle just might fall in love, if fate doesn’t get in the way first.
Curated by Erbe
Original Source
Loving with a Secret
When I was a teenager I was one of the legions of cliché kids who thought that our romantic futures would actually play out in the same way as they did for the likes of Lloyd Dobler, Say Anything’s amorous kickboxing enthusiast who doesn’t want to buy, sell, or process anything. I truly believed that the right girl was out there for me and that we would meet, hit it off, be separated by some turn of events and I would win her back through the cunning use of a move similar to holding up a boombox.
There were two major obstacles and one complication stopping that from being the case. First there’s the very simple fact that most lovestruck Romeos who seem charming and delightful in film would be creepy and overbearing in real life. Very few real Lloyd Dobler’s have had off-screen conversations between John Cusack and Cameron Crowe in order to decide the perfect song out of that jukebox, nor that same Cameron Crowe writing the woman he’s in love with. A real life Lloyd Dobler would likely be met by his new friend the restraining order. Second, there’s the much more pressing obstacle of the fact that unlike Lloyd Dobler, I was not a man. The added complication: I was the only one who knew that.
There was a significant time in my life when I didn’t actually think this second obstacle would really be one. This teenage rom com-obsessed version of myself had not fathomed that the idea of coming out could ever or would ever be a thing. Even using the term “coming out” wasn’t something I’d let enter my thoughts. I felt, and had convinced myself, that this tiny, inconsequential secret of mine would be one I’d live with my whole life with nary a peep.
I did come out though, at 27 years old. I want to say it was fortunate that I was single at the time of this revelation but the fact is that I have been single for most of my adult life, with the longest relationship I’ve ever been in lasting a mere five months. There are plenty of contributing factors towards this. I’m awkward, I’m geeky, and of course there was that pesky boombox I carried around for way too long. But the romantic impact of having a deep dark secret cannot be underestimated.
It wasn’t that I never dated, it was that *I* never dated. The person who would go out on dates with women that I was attracted to wasn’t me; he was this crafted male avatar, the person I presented to the world. I was a tiny, repressed woman sitting at a console somewhere driving this awkward dude around, so no matter how strongly I felt towards someone, no matter what feelings she may or may not have had back, there was always the fear that she would discover me, think I was a freak, and reject me. Living in constant fear that someone will reject you, usually is a number one cause of someone ultimately rejecting you.
As an analogy, let me reference something that may also further the case for my singlehood, the board game based on the reboot of the science fiction TV series Battlestar Galactica. Without going too deeply into the mythology of the series, one of the aspects of it includes robots passing themselves off as humans. In the board game, at least one player per game is given a card that tells them that they are one of these robots and must attempt to keep that secret hidden throughout the course of play. Of course, having this secret card informs every interaction you make in the game. Even if you’re not intentionally sabotaging the other players, every move you make runs the risk of revealing yourself. Furthermore, every player who isn’t a secret robot is constantly on their guard about these same slip ups and sabotages as well. In the world of real life, potential partners might not be searching specifically for secret robots but the scrutiny of what you may or may not be hiding is always there. While this adversarial tension might make for an exciting board game, it is not a recipe that bodes well for long-term relationship success.
Whenever I’ve spoken to former partners or read about some aspect of trans coming out during a relationship, often the gender identity is not the number one thing they cite as the reason the partnership ended. Almost consistently, the issue has always been, “how could this have been the case all along and I never knew?” The idea that someone so close to us could be keeping such a huge secret usually leads us to believe that they could be keeping more and that we wouldn’t know. For my part, I was never good at keeping secrets from those close to me, which was why I never let anyone get close to me. Now, almost six years out of the closet, I don’t even know how to let people in, because I spent 27 years keeping them out. But I think being honest with them is probably a good start.
10 Ways to Make Your Relationship Last
Keeping falling in love with your significant other!
Love that lasts is the result of partners embedding themselves in each other’s brains in a positive way. Memory circuits and pleasure get all wound up together so that the other person becomes integral to the very structure of your brain, and you become part of the structure of his.
Here are some steps toward making your love last:
1. Take your partner’s breath away. Do something amazingly thoughtful and out of the ordinary and try to incorporate an element of surprise to it: a loving note tucked into a pocket. A special dinner on an otherwise ordinary night. A playlist made up with his favorite songs. These thoughtful acts will embed you in his memory.
2. Do something special on a regular basis. Call him every day just to touch base for a few minutes. Make his favorite meal once a week. Once he begins to expect these things, you will always be close to his awareness.
3. Engage in lots of eye gazing. New couples seem to do this naturally, but don’t drop this strong bonding behavior just because the relationship has progressed. This is one way to keep the romance alive and is especially powerful when making love.
4. Learn what pleases your partner sexually. Make it clear that his pleasure is your pleasure, and you want to discover everything about what turns him on. He’ll be happy to have you experiment with him.
5. Teach your partner what you like. Likewise, making you happy will make him feel good. And research shows that the sexual pleasure of one partner increases the pleasure of the other partner.
6. Boost lasting love with sexual novelty. When things get humdrum and routine, there is not going to be as much of a hormonal/neurotransmitter reaction, and arousal is lessened. While you don’t have to break out the whips and chains, a little novelty can increase anticipation, which means that more hormones are secreted. The result? Hotter, more thrilling sex for both of you.
7. Do something edgy. If you get your partner’s heart rate up, he may associate the feeling of excitement with you and he may develop more powerful feelings for you. Going on a roller-coaster ride, taking a balloon trip, shooting the rapids—anything with a touch of danger to it—can make him fall more deeply in love with you.
8. Do something great for someone your partner loves. If you show kindness and love for someone he loves, you will earn major points. When you enter a relationship, you also enter a relationship with all his family and friends. Show him that the people who are important to him are important to you.
9. Summarize and immortalize loving moments. Don’t be afraid to give voice to your love. Tell him how you feel. Write a loving note or poem. Lovers have been doing this from the beginning of time because it works.
10. Boost the chemicals of love. There are many brain chemicals that go into the feeling of love and attachment. Oxytocin is known as the bonding, trust, and cuddle hormone. Oxytocin is enhanced by watching romantic movies together, holding hands, cuddling, and long, loving eye contact. Women usually have more oxytocin than men, but according to one study, a man’s level of oxytocin goes up 500 percent after making love. Being too busy to make love pushes couples apart.
Curated by Erbe
Original Article
Love Built Through A-Model Connection
Strong love for the ages!
In 1959, Charlie B. drove his brand new model-A Ford from North Carolina down to Florida, where a yearbook picture brought him and Penny together. Over fifty years later, the car has fallen derelict but his 50 year marriage with Penny has flourished.
This piece is a love story, told through the revival of an old car; it demonstrates the power of human connection.
Curated by Erbe
Original Source