What is love?
I think love is a commitement between two people. Trust, communication, closeness and mental & physical attraction are the bridge to developing a strong connection and building a relationship. Many people would argue that love is a feeling and it is.
There are actually different kinds of love. The one I'm talking about above is real love, which is also called mature love. Romantic love is more of a mixture of strong feelings of mental or physical attraction and a strong feeling of caring for the well being and safety of another.
People can feel romantic love for a long time, but it typically only lasts for 2 years. That doesn't mean that people cannot fall romantically in-love with each other again many times throughout their relationship, but it's important to understand that romantic love is more of a chemical thing that mother nature uses to make sure we make babies, and we should not expect those feelings when we first met to be there all the time. Romantic love is just too intense to sustain indefinitely.
It's completely normal for your romantic feelings to change. Sometimes you may feel very passionate and other times you may feel more like a best friend and that's completely normal, because every relationship goes through phases. That's why its so important to have a strong friendship. Sometimes you will want to be closer and other times you'll want to feel more independent. The main things that will influence your romantic connection with your partner are stress, trust and mental & physical attraction.
Stress is the number one reason why couples fall out of romantic love in less than 2 years, but they can get it back by removing the stress and rebuilding their connection. However, this requires you to rebuild trust with your partner and forgive them for their mistakes. After all, we are all human and there is no one that doesn't make mistakes or piss off their partner. There are lots of examples of people who are happily married, yet each partner does things that are irritating to the other person. The important thing is learning from your mistakes, taking responsibility, and remaining optimistic about your life and your partner.
This is why coping with stress and really listening to your partner are the most important things in any relationship. Everything is great when people are happy; when long term stress enters the picture, the romance dies.
People cope with stress in a variety of ways: by avoiding stressful situations, changing jobs, changing friends, and changing their lifestyle. In most cases, people are happier when they make small changes in life; big changes typically make people less happy than they were when they thought they needed to make a big change, and it's very common for things to not go as expected and then be unhappy about that too. The key is to manage your stress before it becomes overwhelming and effects your relationships and your self esteem.
Different ways of dealing with stress include: sleep, meditation, positive self talk, power naps, exercise, tanning, chocolate, massage, jumping in the spa, small amounts of OTC meds like asperin or tylenol, getting out into nature on a nice day, physical intimacy, good food, laughing, smiling, talking to people about what's bothering you, playing with your pet (especially puppies), giving and receiving physical affection, talking to people that are in a good mood, anything that would make you feel better about yourself and anything that would bring back postive memories that would make you feel better.
All these things essentially distract your mind and body from the things that were bothering you to let them recharge and feel rested. Over time you can forget or at least become desensitized to any traumatic experience (through counseling, time and sleep, or sharing what happened with someone that is emotionally supportive); the hard part is not letting that trauma affect how you react in negative ways. This is called emotional baggage or emotional scars; and, almost everyone has them if they were in a relationship that didn't work out or had traumatic experiences in their life.
The number one barrier to loving and developing a strong connection with another person is trust, which means sometimes you have to make a leap of faith, open up, and let yourself be vulnerable to the person you love. If you don't take a risk by trusting your partner, even when they make mistakes, you are dooming yourself and your relationship to failure.
There should also be a healthy balance between work, sleep, personal time, time with your significant other and time with your family and friends. It's okay if things overlap as long as it doesn't create additional stress. If you notice that you're spending way to much time driving, working, playing games or watching tv, then it would be a good idea to find a way to restore balance in your life.
The best way to manage stress is to prevent it and not set unrealistic expectations of yourself or the people in your life. You'll notice that people won't irritate you or make you angry as much if you truly accept them for who they are, with all their faults, and really understand them. Being judgemental, critical or setting unreasonable expectations is a quick way to mess up any relationship by making your partner feel uncomfortable.
People will change if they want to, but only if they are willing and believe the change will benefit them. Bad habits typically take two months to completely break, and people quickly become overwhelmed when they are expected to change too many things at once. Remember that building a great relationship takes time and a lot of open communication. Sometimes the easiest way to help a person change their habits is to change their environment or the aspects of it that trigger the bad habit. It's unrealistic for a person to change more than 1-4 habits in any two month period depending on how compulsive the person is, their ability to monitor themselves all day, and how difficult the habit is to change. In some cases they may need someone to help them consistently because they won't realize that they're doing it. Just remember, we can change how we behave to fit in and meet social expectations, but we cannot change who we are unless our values change priority.
Sometimes people have to realize that everyone is different for a reason and those differences make us stronger in some areas and weaker in others. This is just like valueing diversity in the workplace, except we're valueing diversity in our friendships and relationships. The important thing is that we learn from each other and value our differences without trying to change others against their will. This is why it's really important to listen to people and not think you already have it or them all figured out.
What does it mean to say "I love you"
I love you can mean I care about you deeply or I'm falling in-love with you, so they feel comfortable saying it. It could also mean I'm in-love with you, which is totally different. Often when someone tells you they love you for the first time or even the hundredth time, it means that they care about you a lot; it rarely means they are in-love with you unless they don't really understand their own emotions and they're confusing romantic love with real love. In other words, there is no reason to freak out just because someone says I love you and it hasn't been that long since you started being boyfriend and girlfriend. Intimacy makes people bond a lot faster and develop feelings for each other. Just don't be afraid to ask questions and be honest.
If you read the beginning of this article, I mentioned that real love is a high level of commitement and trust in another person. It's possible to give that level of commitement to someone in a short period of time, but it wouldn't be wise unless you did a lot of thinking from a very objective and analytical point of view to really know that they are the right person for you.
When is I love you too much?
It's too much when your partner isn't reciprocating your feelings, and saying it all the time even though your feelings may be strong isn't necessarily a good thing because your partner may think you're insincere about how you really feel. If you notice your partner is getting overwhelmed with emotion, mellow out and apply the breaks on what you say. Usually good times and friendly communication can get them to open up to you again as long as you didn't go too far.
What does it mean to be in-love?
Being in-love with someone is more than just loving them; it's a serious commitement and a level of faith that few people are willing to give. The best way to describe it is having a very strong connection and feelings for another person to the extent that you would do almost anything for them. You would protect them if that meant putting your life in danger, put them first above all others, and treat them like they are a part of your family. You think of them all the time unless you're really busy, and you are willing to put them first, compromise by doing things that you may not want to do and do almost anything to help them or avoid losing them.
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