Why Can't I Find True Happiness and Real
Love?
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They
say a person needs just three things to be truly
happy in this world. Someone to love, something
to do, and something to hope for.
Allan
K. Chalmers
We women are members of a society
with an evolving culture that progressively makes
the attainment of true happiness more and more difficult.
This problem is not just a matter impacting material
things but also spiritual things. We have trouble
establishing and maintaining families, finding mates,
finding love and what we believe is romance. Is there
any wonder that we women as a group are generally
not as happy as we wish?
But it wasn't always so.
Love in History
Ancient Egypt understood all that
was positive and negative in love and romance. The
Great God-Kings (Pharaohs) of the Nile Valley often
built fabulous temples and tombs for their beloved
as tangible symbols of their feelings for their Queens.
(Of course all Pharaohs were not men, there is the
reign of the famed Hatshepsut, as well as other women
who ruled as Queens.)
The closest thing we have to such
expressions in contemporary human society is the Taj
Mahal in India. It is a wondrous monument to love
built by the Emperor Shah Jahan of the Mughal, in
1631 as a tribute to his undying love for his wife,
Mumtaz Mahal. Whereas the Taj Mahal is generally thought
of as an astonishing exception in human relations
today, these kinds of expressions were fairly commonplace
in the ancient dynasties of the Nile Valley.
The Etruscans in pre-Roman Italy,
the Celtic Iceni (the society which produced Queen
Boudicca) in ancient Britain, were both fiercely egalitarian
and that was reflected in their policies of absolute
gender equality. This sociopolitical reality made
love between a man and woman much more positive for
all in the societies.
So, we see that humanity is capable
of doing better, so where are we going wrong? What
was it that societies such as the Nile Valley civilizations
understood about love and that we have apparently
missed? Let us look at that for a moment.
Love played a large part in the life
of ancient Egyptians. Love poems written by workers
to their beloved spoke of mundane everyday things
as in this excerpt:
I'll go down to the water
with you,
and come out to you carrying a red fish,
which is just right in my fingers.
While some love poems celebrated
proletarian activities such as retrieving the best
fish for your beloved, others were classical examples
of effusive worship of the beloved. Here are a few
excerpts as examples of such poetry:
I wish I were your mirror
so that you always looked at me.
I wish I were your garment
so that you would always wear me.
I wish I were the water that washes
your body.
I wish I were the unguent, O woman,
that I could anoint you.
And the band around your breasts,
and the beads around your neck.
I wish I were your sandal
that you would wear me!
To hear your voice is pomegranate
wine to me:
I draw life from hearing it.
Could I see you with every glance,
It would be better for me
Than to eat or to drink.
Love Sayings
Beautiful words of love and devotion spoken throughout the ages. |
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Women in ancient Egypt, generally
speaking were much more empowered than we are as
a group. In dynastic Nile Valley societies the spiritual
beliefs of the society - that is the absolute requirement
to meet the needs and concerns of the individual
citizen of the society -- tended to empower the
women generally. An important fact was the fact
that the ruler of the society could be chosen from
either the lineage of the woman or the man. Furthermore,
the many important Egyptian Goddesses, such as Isis,
Hathor, (here we are using the Greek names for these
Goddesses as they are most familiar to most people
in modern society). and a multitude of others, gave
women a very high status in temporal matters as
well as spiritual.
The musicians who played the music
that accompanied much of the poetry were mostly women.
Frequently the women were the author of such poetry
dedicated to their beloved men.
One of the most famous spiritual rite
of Nile Valley society was the "Festival of the Great
Meeting". This celebrated the annual reunion between
Hathor and her husband. The people celebrated with
singing, dancing, fine dining and sacred drink (generally
wine).
To get a feel for the spirit of the
Egyptian people's celebration of love and life let
us look at this poetic excerpt.
So seize the day! hold
holiday!
Be unwearied, unceasing, alive
you and your own true love;
Let not the heart be troubled during your
sojourn on Earth,
but seize the day as it passes!
Clearly the legacy of human history
offers us many positive examples of love and romance.
Where did we go wrong?
The Nature of the Problem
So what is our problem? Well, a couple
of things come to mind. There is much too much naiveté
about love and romance or alternatively too much crass
absolutely cynical acquisitiveness in the global society
we live in. Neither of these approaches bodes well
for us.
Let me give you one example from a
so-called Love Coach named Star Jones Reynolds. A
numbskull woman, with the typical scheming bimbo mentality,
she authored a quiz on what she called picking the
right man, entitled: Is He The One: What's In His
Wallet May Be The Key. Right under her lead in
to the quiz was an ad that ran, "If He Is Not the
One... Find Other Singles Just Like You"
The subtitle of her quiz was, "Are
There Any Deal Breakers? Referring to attributes that
she posited as disqualifying a potential mate.
The first thing she asked was, "What
should you do if your man doesn't have a credit card?"
-- and two options for answers are "Don't Worry About
It" or "Run", she provided a hint...the hint was Credit
Cards are needed for a good credit rating...if you
select the "Don't Worry About It" answer you are told:
"INCORRECT: This is a serious red flag that almost
definitely means your man does not have his own financial
houses in order."
This is indicative of how much relationship
and love generally are prostituted in contemporary
society. This quiz was a classical, cynical attempt
to reduce the man woman dynamic to a commercial deal.
The quiz validates the theories expressed
by Mary Batten in her book Sexual Strategies: How
Females Choose Their Mates. In the book she made
some piquant observations such as
"We may teach our children that honesty
is the best policy, but natural selection favors the
skillful lie."
"Human mate choice is one of the oldest,
coldest business deals known."
and
"Female (employ) choice functions
to screen males and select those of highest value."
and
"What do females want in a mate? How
do they choose which males they will allow to mate
with them? Why do men and women lie to each other?
Why are so many women attracted to wealthy, powerful
men?"
"Contrary to myth, it is the females,
not the males, of many species that actively select
which males will mate. Although Charles Darwin introduced
the theory of female mate choice more than a century
ago, only in recent years has this controversial idea
been appreciated by the scientific community. Studies
of female choice have demolished the age-old myth
of the passive female. From fruitflies to primates,
female choice plays a pivotal role in the evolution
of species.
"By understanding female mate choice
and the female's true role in evolution, we see our
own complex species with greater clarify. We gain
greater insight into why males and females, including
men and women, have built-in conflicts in their mating
behavior that spills over into politics and every
other aspect of life. Sexual Strategies illuminates
the roots of current social problems related to gender
competition and shows that they cannot be fully understood
outside a biological context."
http://www.marybatten.com/works.htm
Then there is the psychology at work
here...why is there so much confusion and tension
in what we would like to believe is the idyllic state
of being in love? Why is there so little real enthusiasm
and appreciation for actual romance? Scholars from
Freud, Jung to Engels; philosophers, song writers,
poets, novelists, clergy and God knows who else have
commented on the complexity and dynamics of the man
- woman interplay/relationship
One source quotes Ms. Batten in making
his point about the role of romance and love in camouflaging
what we are doing with and to each other in the mating
game.
"Mary Batten, in "Sexual Strategies:
How Females Choose Their Mates", New York: Putnam
1992, speculates that what we call love is an evolved
'psychological state beyond conscious control' to
help insure the continuation of the species. If love
isn't blind, then it certainly suffers from tunnel
vision. And evolution seems to have a narrowly focused
objective. Batten writes:
"Although the biological link between
love and babies seems clear enough, most of the literary
rhapsodizing about love omits any association with
reproduction. It's easy to understand why. The heat
of passion seems to have little connection with diaper
rash. Being on call twenty-four hours a day until
a child leaves for college is hardly the stuff of
love songs. Romance enables lovers to deceive themselves
about the likely consequences of their overwhelming
passion. And, like it or not, self-deception figures
prominently in love."
from "This Thing Called Love"
http://home.epix.net/~jlferri/love.html
and here is a more exhaustive examination
of the contemporary psychological perspective on the
subject of love and romance, one that relies exclusively
on psychotherapeutic analysis and processes. I don't
necessarily agree with everything in the piece that
follows, nor do I agree with everything Mary Batten
wrote, but on the whole their approach is a good
basis for non-sentimental, scientific thought on the
matter.
Indeed, it is their clinical rational
approach to romance and love that is important not
necessarily their views. As I firmly believe that
a less sentimental perspective on love and romance
is the best way to feel comfortable in love and to
be able to express valid romantic notions. This is
important because the critical, but very rarely comprehended,
social dynamics of that are the foundations of the
phenomena of love and romance, is essential to the
progress of human civilization, both from a standpoint
of culture and biological reproduction. I have quoted
this source extensively, so bare with me:
"Courtly Love
" If you study the history of human
sexuality and marriage through ancient and primitive
cultures, you will find that communal sex and polygamy
predominate. Communal sex tends to predominate in
matriarchal societies that is, societies in which
power tends to pass through women, and property is
more or less communal "where women mate with whomever
they want, without any particular, or lasting, emotional
attachment.
"In patriarchal societies, where property
passes through the male lineage, knowing a child's
father is of greatest importance; hence men tend to
be promiscuous, while women are carefully guarded
sexually.
"And then there are those curious
mixtures of elements, such as in cultures where a
man would offer his wife for the night to a guest,
as a token of hospitality.
"Yes, there are occasional stories,
some very poetical and tragical about men and women,
each promised in an arranged marriage to another,
who became passionately attracted to each other. But,
as with most things in life, these exceptions only
prove the rule: through most of human history, about
the only thing that hardly ever seemed to influence
mating was romantic love. Yet, when we think about
finding a mate we tend to think of romantic love.
And one of the most enduring images of romantic love
is the medieval knight in shining armor, the strong
but pure man who rescued the lady in distress . .
. and they lived happily ever after.
"In reality, most medieval knights
were anything but pure, and marriages, as in pagan
cultures, lasted only as long as convenient. If you
read medieval history carefully, you will find that
feudal society, especially under the influence of
the Albigensian heretics in the 11th to 13th centuries,
was barbarian and chaotic, rife with murder, massacre,
and cruelty. Knights, if they were anything, were
nothing more than thugs and rapists who preyed upon
any defenseless persons they came across. The knightly
sexual ideal was to seduce a married woman, and, if
she refused, to rape her. The literature of this "age
of chivalry" essentially idealized adultery.
"Wait a minute," you say. That's not
what I learned about courtly love. Courtly love was
pure and ideal. So what happened?
"Well, the troubadours and their Provencal
poetry happened."
"In the later middle ages, the troubadours,
under the influence of Christianity, transformed the
earlier romantic literature based on hedonism into
a new literature based on the idealization of love.
Thus the knights went from lusting after their friend's
wives to swooning in love over a woman's glove. The
literature idealized love to such an extent, and set
so many obstacles in front of it, that this love became
almost impossible to attain. And so romance became
a sort of poetic quest.
"The aristocracy upheld this ideal
of courtly love on the surface while doing what it
wanted behind the scenes, of course, and it provided
the underlying European moral influence for the masses,
for the last several centuries. Consequently, bolstered
by Hollywood cinema in the 20th century, romantic
love became the obsessive secular quest of life. And
then, with the collapse of sexual morality beginning
in the 1960s, the final association was made: the
chalice of courtly love is filled with sex.
"Notice, however, that this courtly
love is not pagan, and, though it was influenced by
Christian morality, it has nothing in common with
real Christian love either. Like the famous quest
for the Holy Grail, courtly love is a literary creation.
"Which is why the brilliant French
psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan, declared that courtly
love "is an altogether refined way of making up for
the absence of sexual relation by pretending that
it is we who put up an obstacle to it."
"In other words, the chalice of courtly
love" and all the romantic sentiments and sexual activity
that fill it" is an illusion. It's impossible to heal
your own emotional brokenness through the body of
another person as mortal and broken as you are.
"Fear Of Love
" Believe it or not, most of us are
brought up in modern culture to fear love. This is
a radical statement, so pause a bit and consider it.
How often were you, as a child, criticized and laughed
at for expressing your honest feelings? How often
are you now used, in our culture of merchandising,
as an object to be manipulated in order to satisfy
some other person's desire for profit and power?
"How often do you shape yourself "with
diets, implants, workouts, jewelry, tattoos, makeup,
hair dye, and clothing" to meet the expectations of
someone's desire? So what does a person learn from
childhood experiences other than that this is a world
of competition, strife, and conflict, geared toward
the survival of the "fittest" or in today's world,
the meanest "in which honesty and compassion are foolish
weakness?
"And how often, in the midst of all
this exploitation, has anyone ever done anything for
your own growth and welfare, without thought of what
could be had in return? To offer real love is "to
will the good of another " is to be satisfied with
one's own weakness, humility, and insignificance.
Love is an act of will, not something that you "fall"
into.
"You can fall into desperate desire,
and you can fall into fatal attraction, but you can't
fall into love. Love is a sacrifice of sorts, and
it's a sacrifice of all that the culture deems valuable.
So to offer this real love, or true love, is to stand
against the culture...
"But, because romance is not based
in true love, romance is, in technical psychological
terms, a game and to play this game, you must put
yourself in competition with everyone else playing
the same game. This explains the essence of jealousy:
in your fear of losing what you desperately want,
you hate any person who might come between you and
what you want.
"True love, therefore, forsakes the
prestige offered by the culture in its illusions.
And, when we have been taught from childhood to covet
this prestige as our very identity, is it any wonder
that we fear love? Far "easier and safer" isn't it,
to hide behind illusions and games of wealth, power,
intrigue, and seduction?"
http://www.guidetopsychology.com/sex_love.htm
The Role of Popular Culture and the
Mass Media
Let us look at love and romance as
they are portrayed in some forms of popular music,
as music videos and other music media, are, along
side films and television, among the most powerful
influence in our society, especially among younger
people....
Today's lyrics are exceptionally graphic,
much more anti-female, much more violent, much more
about pimping, ho'ing and other absolutely foul forms
of "commerce" and social behavior. What's more they
are much more ubiquitous and pervasive. They seek
to popularize the terms bitch and ho and so on...these
recordings are nothing short of overt operant conditioning.
Indeed, they are an insidious form of psychological
warfare.
One researcher did an exhausted study
of the role of love in popular music.
"Several years ago in the course of
looking for a lyric, perhaps the one quoted above,
I happened upon an extraordinary website called Lyrics
World (now defunct). What was unusual about this site
was that it contained the Top Forty popular songs
for the last 70 years (1930-2000), over ten thousand
lyrics. As I began to read lyrics of love songs at
random, it seemed to me that the majority of them
fell into only three patterns: infatuation, requited
love, and heartbreak. There were also romance lyrics
which didn't fit, but in any given year, they were
never in the majority. .
"The study I later did (Chapter 5)
confirmed: about a quarter of all pop songs in the
Top 40, year after year, are about heartbreak, about
a tenth, about infatuation, and about a tenth, about
requited love. Another fourth involves miscellaneous
kinds of romance, and a little more than a fourth
are not about love or romance."
Prof. Thomas J. Scheff http://www.soc.ucsb.edu/faculty/scheff/29.html
So we see that love is a big part
of vocal cultural art forms. Hence many people derived
their basic understanding of being in love, love generally,
man-woman relationship from lyrics. Given this, then
one has to conclude that clearly the function of the
negative lyrics in songs such as those found in the
artificial, what I some times call "Frankenstein"
rap music, are to attack true love, as was the function
of predecessor genres in blues, r & b and so on.
Scheff, the scholar quoted above,
observed that "There is a dialectic of closeness and
distance, reaffirming not only the union, but also
the individuality of the lovers. The idea of the love
bond as involving both continuous attachment and a
balance between self and other solves a critical problem
in the meaning of love."
He goes on to inform us that.
"One goal of communication between
persons in love relationship would be to balance the
level of shared identity so that it is roughly equal
on both sides, over the long run. That is, although
one partner might be valuing the other's experience
more than her own in a particular situation, momentary
isolation or engulfment could be managed over the
long term so that the experience of each partner,
on the average, is equally valued in the relationships.
This issue comes up continually, especially in marriage:
the dialectic between being two independent persons
and being a we: "I-ness" and "We-ness".
"A second issue that is dependent
on effective communication is shared awareness. Frequent
and effective communication can lead to revealing
the self to the other, and understanding the other.
This issue is particularly crucial in the area of
needs, desires, and emotions. By the time we are adults,
most of us have learned to hide our needs, desires,
and feelings from others, and to some extent, perhaps,
even from ourselves. Long-term love relationships
seem to require that these practices be unlearned,
so that we become transparent to our partner and to
ourselves. Unlike the extent of attachment and attraction,
effective and frequent communication can improve the
balance in shared identity, and increase shared awareness.
In this way, love, which is usually thought of as
given, may be increased intentionally."
If the necessary balance in love is
skewed and shattered you can readily see the consequences.
The message communicated by such artificially constructs
as we see in the works of some artist is what is commonly
called noise in cybernetics. Noise refers to sounds
that are out of synch with the system receivng the
sound and thus disruptive. Sound that is noise and
deliberately communicated to a system is intended
to destroy the functioning of the system it attacks.
This is precisely what is happening with gangsta rap
and similar forms of music.
This is not a new phenomena the attack
on true love has a long history. Scheff also documents
earlier efforts
"Certainly in the teachings of the
Church Fathers, beginning with St. Augustine, romantic
love has been viewed as a disorder because of the
sinfulness of sexuality. The 11th century scholar
Andreas Capellanas (The Art of Courtly Love 1969),
after an extended indictment of romantic love, concluded
that it was the work of the Devil. "The majority of
secular scholars have also taken the position that
romantic love is an affliction or madness. The most
elaborate description of romantic love is found in
Stendhal's Love (1975). Although he denies that passionate
love is pathological, he inconsistently acknowledges
that it is a disease. Certainly his description emphasizes
the painful rather than the pleasurable aspects. At
the beginning, one is lost in obsession."
So, we should be aware of the external
elements that effect society's perception of love.
Recently I received a submission call
from the Women's Study Quarterly, a feminist academic
journal. The call was for material on the female body
and its role in society and love. One thing that struck
me was that the issuers of the call were focused on
the issue of the use of race in this equation. As
any observer of western society can readily verify
the "race" question is often a big part of this equation;
however the callers were also concerned about the
possibility that "queer" theory was beginning to supersede
the normal feminist line on the subject. The call
also stated that it was open to a Marxist "labor"
praxis interpretation as well as Freudian and several
other approaches.
Now I tell you all this because I
think that the confusion about sexuality, sex, intimacy,
love and romance is something that holds human civilization
back and only benefits the lowest elements of society
and human culture. Those who enthusiastically exploit
the confusion for material gain and those who see
it as a means of achieving selfish sexual gratification.
Here I am not talking about the notorious serial fornicators,
or habitual philanderers, I am referring to those
who make billions and billions of dollars exploiting
this situation and who use the confusion to hold down
whole peoples around the globe. The woman's view of
her body and its ability to attract true positive
responses from men is a big part of this process.
It is a well known fact that virtually all women are
concerned that their body is not up to (a deliberately
contrived and completely ludicrous set of) standards.
A set of standards that is totally artificial and
created by people who wish to market concepts and
products; and various services and methodologies to
solve the artificially created problem ... they exploit
the fear and apprehension of women and cater to/engender
a false machismo among men that leads the gullible
and unscrupulously to value conquest before lasting
friendship. Is there any wonder many women are afraid
of relationships? Afraid of rejection? Just afraid?
What are our options?
I agree with Freud when he wrote that
sexual impulsions contained within a framework of
the proper degree of interpersonal discipline is the
key to a long lasting affectionate relationship between
men and women. I also endorse Jung's view that the
question of love is a fundamental aspect of human
history and a vitally necessary component /aspect
of human culture and civilization,
I also agree with those, primarily
women, who advocate that women should become more
familiar with their psyches, spiritual being and their
body. How many women can actually know how their bodies
respond, for example where the famed G-spot actually
is? More important how many women feel comfortable
talking to their lovers about their bodies, their
needs and desires and so forth?
I agree with the men who advocate
that men should try to understand the needs of women
better and attempt to satisfy them. There are many
very positive evocative views on the subject matter
that are worth taking a look see. I cite one example
here, that of the triangulation theory of love, propagated
by Yale Prof. Robert Sternberg. Here is wikipedia's
summary of the theory:
"The triangular theory of love characterizes
love in an interpersonal relationship on three different
scales: intimacy, passion and commitment. It was developed
by Robert Sternberg. Different stages and types of
love can be explained as different combinations of
the three elements, intimacy, passion and commitment.
Sternberg states that a relationship based on a single
element is less likely to survive than one based on
two or more.
"Forms of romantic love
- Combinations of intimacy, passion,
and commitment
- Liking or Friendship - intimacy
- Infatuation or Limerence - passion
- Empty love - commitment
- Romantic love - intimacy & passion
- Companionate love - intimacy &
commitment
- Fatuous love (Whirlwind romance)
- passion & commitment
- Consummate love - intimacy passion
commitment
"The relative emphasis of each component
changes over time as an adult romantic relationship
develops.
- Liking includes only one of the
love components - intimacy. In this case, liking
is not used in a trivial sense. Sternberg says
that this intimate liking characterizes true friendships,
in which a person feels a bondedness, a warmth,
and a closeness with another but not intense passion
or long-term commitment.
- Infatuated love consists solely
of passion and is often what is felt as "love
at first sight." But without the intimacy and
the commitment components of love, infatuated
love may disappear suddenly.
- Empty love consists of the commitment
component without intimacy or passion. Sometimes,
a stronger love deteriorates into empty love,
in which the commitment remains, but the intimacy
and passion have died. In cultures in which arranged
marriages are common, relationships often begin
as empty love.
- Romantic love is a combination
of intimacy and passion. Romantic lovers are bonded
emotionally (as in liking) and physically through
passionate arousal.
- Companionate love consists of
intimacy and commitment. This type of love is
often found in marriages in which the passion
has gone out of the relationship, but a deep affection
and commitment remain.
- Fatuous love has the passion
and the commitment components but not the intimacy
component. This type of love can be exemplified
by a whirlwind courtship and marriage in which
a commitment is motivated largely by passion,
without the stabilizing influence of intimacy.
- Consummate love is the only type
of love that includes all three components--intimacy,
passion and commitment. Consummate love is the
most complete form of love, and it represents
the ideal love relationship for which many people
strive but which apparently few achieve. Sternberg
cautions that maintaining a consummate love may
be even harder than achieving it. He stresses
the importance of translating the components of
love into action. "Without expression," he warns,
"even the greatest of loves can die" (1987, p.341).
"Companionate love
"Companionate love is a form of love
that combines friendship and commitment. Companionate
love is generally a personal relation you build with
somebody you share your life with, but with no sexual
or physical desire. It is stronger than friendship
because of the extra element of commitment. The love
ideally shared between family members is a form of
companionate love, as is the love between deep friends
or those who spend a lot of time together in any asexual
but friendly relationship.
"Consummate love
"Consummate love is the most complete
type of love experienced in interpersonal relationships,
the three major components: intimacy, passion and
commitment, are all present and balanced.
"Consummate love may not be permanent.
For example, if passion is lost over time, it may
fade into companionate love.
If one wishes to embrace consummate
love.the most complete form of love.the kind of love
expressed silently and openly by many of us as our
goals in life, all of us, men and women, will have
to work at transforming the values of society to encourage
this form of love. Then we will be happy. |