How to Make Love Stay
A valentine to romantic love
Then must you speak / Of one that loved not wisely, but too well. -Othello
Valentine’s day is on Friday. Being a fan of love, and believing that the world would be better off with more of it, I want to do my part to promote love-making—by making room for hate. I touched on the intimate connection between love and hate in last week’s note, The Circle of Hate. Before proceeding, a reminder that to protect privacy I always disguise identifying characteristics of patients.
To show what I mean by making room for hate, here’s the gist of a recent conversation I had with Pat. They’re disappointed and resentful but aren’t telling their partner of 16 years about it. They tried in the past to talk about hard feelings, but it just turned into an ugly fight: “She gets angry, and I back off because she’s too reactive for a real conversation. Not worth it.” When Pat says ‘I back off,’ they mean it. Over time their sexual desire has flagged, to the point of no return, they fear. But they tell themselves that, given how good “the rest of the relationship is,” this is an acceptable tradeoff.
I said it seemed possible that their mutual avoidance of negative feelings was driving them apart, not keeping them close. I added that I hoped we could explore ways that their connection might deepen if Pat and their partner could make room for the anger and hate, which is lurking nearby anyway.
Ultimately I suggested to Pat two thoughts, each counterintuitive in its own way. The first is that hate travels with love, as its intimate partner. This means that if love is to last, we need to work with the hate. Otherwise, we might commit some sort of crime against passion. Othello stands at one extreme, having murdered Desdemona, the love of his life, because he believed her guilty of infidelity—without actual proof. In one of his uncountably many great lines, Shakespeare has Othello say of himself, “Then must you speak of one that loved not wisely, but too well.” Passion without reason often destroys love.
At the other extreme, we can commit a crime against passion by exterminating the passion itself. Often we do this, as Pat did, for the sake of the “rest of the relationship,” which is code for the safety and security of the domestic partnership, kids, and so on. How lovers tacitly conspire to kill the romance is a key theme of psychoanalyst Stephen Mitchell’s excellent book, Can Love Last? the fate of romance over time. (You can read about this book in my monthly column for 3QD, Can Love Last? A (Mostly) Encouraging Story About The Fate Of Romance Over Time. Soon I will re-publish it here as a Monday Morning Note.)
Both extremes fail to make room for hate, and thus fail to love wisely. I know, ‘hate’ is a strong word; but I use it here as a kind of exposure therapy for those of us who fear the idea that strong negative feelings play a key part in love. (‘Hate’ is shorthand for everything from grudges, resentment, and irritation, to anger, fury, and rage.) Othello’s love turns to hate because he imagines he’s been betrayed. His reaction captures why hate travels with love. For when we passionately love someone, we are vulnerable to being hurt or abused by them, even to killing or being killed by them. Where we love, hate is lurking on the periphery, ready to spring should we feel we’ve been crossed.
The alternative to raging on the one hand, or killing the passion on the other, is to express our true feelings—wisely of course! It’s worth remembering, after all, that hate (like love) is a high-energy state that can be alchemized and directed toward increasing intimacy.
Which brings me to the second idea I shared with Pat, that simply learning how to talk about hard feelings promised to bring them closer. This can be counterintuitive because we fixate on the content of our grievances, when it’s often how we are (or are not) expressing them that poses the biggest problem. For instance, Pat typically defaulted to offering their “objective view” (which in fact was their subjective judgment) of the problem, and following it with advice on how to solve the problem. A common opener, but not a good one! (For a basic guide to that’s applicable in love, work, and friendship, it’s hard to do better than the book Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most.)
I suggested to Pat that a much better opener would be, “The story I’m telling myself…” By beginning this way, we make it clear up front that we’re starting with our subjective impression, not the Truth. If we follow the sound advice offered in Difficult Conversations, we’ll start our story by recognizing our contribution to the problem. For Pat, it might go something like this, “In the story I’m telling myself, you seem more interested in work and your friends than you are in me, and I feel resentful. I’ve felt this way for awhile now, and I’m sorry I didn’t bring it up with you sooner, since I know it contributes to the distance I feel between us. I’m curious how you see it.”
This opening makes room for hate to be metabolized, which helps close the distance. It is certainly more likely to bring love closer than the first draft Pat offered when I asked how they might approach their partner, which was, “Look, we need to talk. I know you’re busy and that I’m not a priority for you now, but I’m tired of being ignored by you.” No wonder she’s “reactive!”