Relationships: what are you looking for?

Relationships are important in our lives and I believe that if we are not happy in our relationship we can’t attain “Eudaimonia”. When people face death, they usually tend to feel sorry for the words they didn’t share with their beloved ones or they want to spend the time left with them. They never want to spend their last day at the office reading deadlines and numbers but want to be with the people they love.

It’s all about love and healthy encounters after all and the happier we are in that field, the happier and more successful we can become. It’s the energy of love and affection that improves our quality of life and the quality of our life depends deeply on the quality of our relationships. So what is going on and things are so complex in the dynamic of a relationship?
I asked the other day my children if they know a couple that is passionate about each other and feel deep love as well, and they could not name anyone. I asked them if they believed that love and passion can be alive after 30 years of marriage and said: Naaaaah, no way ….

I was frightened. When I was young romantic love was everywhere, I believed in the spark. What has happened here? Why can’t we find happy couples everywhere and instead they have become the exception to the rule?
Because things have changed radically and new tasks need to be fulfilled but there is no manual. We do not know the skills required for a close encounter and we end up sinking the most important enterprise of our lives to which we put, at first, all our passion and intense dreams. The relationship of couples has undergone tremendous changes.
We all want to find the one. But what does the one mean?

How can we be sure that one is the one? Especially nowadays where technology helps us have access to a huge amount of people and freedom of choice is almost available to everyone. That freedom is one of the biggest ontological issues that one can face though. Yalom explains that for each yes you must say millions of no so imagine the burden of the choice. What if I choose wrong?

A few years ago it was either John or David from the village. Now it can be anyone.
Well, the answer is if you feel it go for it and try to make it work. Cultivate what you have chosen since no one can ever know if that is the right choice. There is no such thing in life. We are all humans and have our problems. We are not perfect but we are good enough. Find someone who is good enough and compatible.

My grandmother would go for security, economic support and qualities such as honesty and trustworthiness. These were the attributes a woman would look for in her husband to be and were offered in predetermined marriages. If she were lucky enough to have also compatible sexuality, she could asseverate to have everything!

But today if my grandmother asked me what I want now from the ONE I’d say all the above plus someone who can be my best friend, my perfect lover, a empathic listener, an intimate equal, someone who inspires me and is passionate with his life, who is willing to choose me and stay with me for ever, who believes in monogamy, who is polite and helps me with the kids and the house, sociable, tender, affectionate, clever and respectable, ambitious yet down to earth, funny, handsome, tall, athletic, generous, with great sense of humor, with manners, devoted but also free, autonomous but loyal, taking care of himself but also caring for my needs, adventurous but not impulsive, who is steady and can stand the force of our love and desire, who is self efficient and giver and the list goes on forever……

You see that is exactly the problem. Too many expectations that a whole town can’t meet, not just a simple man. Not even you can fulfill that expectation. You simply expect something impossible and thus susceptible to disappointment.
Try to find ecstasy and passion everywhere not only in marriage. Be spiritual, seek the divine, self actualize, offer service, love and take care, do whatever makes your life meaningful and makes you feel good. Look at your life as a whole entity, not fragmented.

We need to cut down on our illusions, not on our desires. Ask yourself: “ How possible is all that?” and more importantly “ what will I offer to him?” not what am I getting from him?

Who do I want to be not who do I want to meet?”

Of course we should not lower our expectations, on the contrary, we can keep them all and aspire for more, but we should work these qualities in us instead of waiting for someone to give them to us. We are the only ones who can make us happy. And we must stop breaking up so easily even for the slightest impropriety. Fortunately enough we do have the right and the freedom to leave if we are not happy. But because there is an escape door that we can open any time we should also have to learn to commit ourselves.
So what would be best is to try and see what we really want from life and how we live our life in order to find someone as compatible as possible.

Personally, I encounter life with trust and a sense of magic, even in its uncertainty. So I want trust and passion in my relationships because that is how I relate to life as well. Love IS about trust and desire IS about mystery and magic.
I also know that I want a partner and not need one to fulfill me. So I want someone to invite me to his world. If I feel safe I will explore it with him. And I will explore my hidden self too. That’s how magic and passion remain forever. Explore like kids, play together, rejoice at the magic of the world and you will never get tired. Play without wanting to change anybody but honor your self-actualization, both of you and things will go on well. Do not take care of them, trust that they can take care of themselves, just accompany the other throughout life and you will live the “aha” experiences.

You are responsible for your happiness and your messes. Taking responsibility means having the ability to respond. Wherever freedom of choice and basic needs are met, it’s ONLY US who are responsible for your miseries or our happiness.
Ask “what can I do here?” “what’s best for us?”

The best is to pour the core conditions of love, empathy and authenticity and a choice to stay rather than leave.
Stop mothering because desire fades away. Play and expand together. Touch often, kiss every day and passion will remain watered.
COMMIT, TRUST, EXPLORE, and passionate love should be expected.
But most of all start loving in your own way, because if we all remain stuck on how we were loved as a child, we might realize that this might not have been the best way!