Lust and Love are both four letter words.
They both start with the letter “L,” But the similarities end there. I find it funny and ironic that love rhymes with “dove” and lust rhymes with “thrust.” I think lust almost always clouds our view of relationships. and it used to make me wonder if I really knew what love is. Not love for your family, dog, or school.. that kind of love comes easy to us, without complications or questions. But the other kind of love… “Romantic love,” is a term often thrown around, but I’m not sure that’s exactly the word you’re looking for. Everything i’ve ever read has told me romantic type love eventually fades and you’re left with comfort, companionship, and intimacy.
Infatuation, is another word. One that took me a while to understand. But, in fact, is often the controlling factor in almost all relationships at the beginning. According to Sternberg’s triangular theory of love (yup, we did just get all technical and textbook-y), there are four types of love: Companionate, which includes intimacy and commitment, Fatuous, which includes passion and commitment, and Romantic, which comes from intimacy and passion.The ideal kind of love, the 4th one, is Consummate love. This includes intimacy, passion, and commitment. Most of us would hold that type of love above the rest and in a way it’s meant to be the ideal that everybody wants. But the truth is… so few people get it. While this is kind of sad, keep in mind that many many happy marriages exist with companionate love, and arguably the others as well… although I’m not sure how far you’d get without commitment.
While open to interpretation and opinion, romantic love and infatuation differ in a few ways, the most obvious being infatuation is passion alone and romantic love involves intimacy- or the deep personal sharing of thoughts and feelings. The question is, though, when does the shallow commitment and blind passion fall away? When do we truly start loving the person we’re with? Because it’s no secret that pretty much all of us start off in romantic or fatuous love. I’ve heard there’s a set number. A certain amount of months we are infatuated/in some other form of love with someone before it can be called “real” love. But I don’t know how much I believe this. Can you really put a time limit on something like this? Is it that precise? Do numbers have a place in romance?
I, for one, would like to think love has nothing to do with math. What is it about our society’s hangup on numbers? How long we’ve dated someone, how many dates to go on before you’re monogamous, how long before you get engaged, and that anything under age 20 is puppy love and anything over 35 is settling. It drives me a little nuts. I think about all this in my head and it’s very easy to get carried away adding it all up. Why is it so hard to stop?
Do you ever worry about the way you’re “supposed” to be feeling because you’ve hit a certain time mark in your relationship? Do you wonder what kind of love you share with your partner? Do you worry if it’s good enough?
You are not alone. As I’ve mentioned before, as much as I love T, I worry. A lot. I worry I’m doing something wrong, I worry I’m supposed to be feeling something else, etc. etc. That’s something quite personal about me, but I wanted to tell all of you because I’m sure there’s at least one person who has felt the same way. I felt crazy sometimes, but after my google search mania, I realized I’m not alone. So I don’t want you to feel alone either.
So to wrap up today’s post, here’s an online test I found that will tell you what type of love you’re in! I don’t know how legit it is because I found it off google, but to me the questions seemed pretty good, and it told me I had consummate love so I’m not arguing with that 😉
http://www.personalityonline.com/tests/engine.html?testid=4
I hope you all have a lovely valentine’s day… whether you’re married, engaged, dating, or single and ready to mingle, celebrate the day of love! Whether if it’s with that special someone of your best girl (or guy) friends. ❤
and for those of you that hate Valentine’s day, here’s an angry cat. hope you have a good thursday!
hugs & the suburbs 