moving from manic love to true love

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Larval
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29 Dec 2005, 3:24 pm

What is the difference between manic love and true love? How do you know when you've moved from one stage to another?

It looks like, at least from my vantage point, that manic love is a first step to being truly in love but that it takes a lot of work to hold a relationship together to last beyond it. Of course this could easily be something else as well, say infatuation.

If manic love really is a step in the process of obtaining true love, what are the other steps? I assume that even after marriage a relationship will continue to evolve and grow to new levels, new heights...but what are they?



midge
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29 Dec 2005, 5:04 pm

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If manic love really is a step in the process of obtaining true love, what are the other steps? I assume that even after marriage a relationship will continue to evolve and grow to new levels, new heights...but what are they?

That's a really good question, Larval. I can't speak for anyone else, but I know my relationship with my SO has grown and evolved and we aren't even married yet. One of the first new levels was the one we reached after realizing how scary it was getting close and feeling like we needed to push the other person away as a defense mechanism, but never giving up on each other and staying with it despite how frightening it was. We've ended up growing to the point where we can tell each other anything, and be ourselves completely, without being as scared and knowing we won't be judged. Another new level was knowing that it isn't all about me anymore, but about us-all the difficulties we both had, and knowing that sometimes things were going to be really hard and we were going to have to really take care of the other and put the other person first. Rather than two separate people, we became like a unit, and when one of us is feeling bad and has no self-love, the other person can fill in the empty spaces with their love and care. I think that's one of the signs of moving from manic love to true love-if a person realizes that things aren't going to be all great and happy and exciting all the time, but is committed to their partner no matter what, because they want to be with them, and they care for them deeply, and they love them warts and all, then I think they've moved into true love. Here's another way I look at it: manic love is like a weekend fling in some far off exotic place, dinners by candlelight, dancing and passionately kissing in the moonlight on the beach, deliriously happy. True love is like dancing around in your living room with your partner to all your favorite songs without feeling the least bit self-conscious even though you've always thought you were a horrible dancer (that would be me :lol: ), eating supper together in your kitchen and getting up to give each other a hug right in the middle of the meal, feeling so happy that the other person is feeling better after having had a bad meltdown the night before, and feeling relaxed and content and like you're home. :)