From the author: The article was written for my seminar “Anatomy of Love” Love is a very complex and strong feeling. People dream of love, they live and sacrifice their lives in the name of love. When the feeling is mutual, a person is filled with joy and incredible lightness, he seems to soar above the ground, and his love spreads to those around him. Remember how pleasant it is to be next to a couple in love; they seem to radiate warmth and light, of course, if you don’t feel like a third wheel. And at the same time: “No one feels so defenseless against suffering as he who loves,” Freud said. Unrequited love, or just a shadow of doubt about the feelings of a loved one, plunges us into the abyss of despair and hopelessness. And even the brightest love-passion fades over time, undergoes a series of transformations and turns into... anything. From love to hate one step. From passion to warm friendships, the path is longer and more difficult. We move from romantic love to a joyless routine unnoticed, and only after finding ourselves there, in this swamp of relationships, do we begin to feel sorry for ourselves and look for past joys with a new partner. And we continue to believe and hope to meet that one person who is our other half, who will make up the happiness of our entire life. But life is long, and you can tell yourself: yes, I will fall in love many times, being at the peak of bliss, and I will pay for it with emptiness and bitterness in my soul when parting, but every time I will know that my new love is waiting for me somewhere. Not a bad prospect, isn't it? I am a psychologist. I counsel couples on the verge of divorce, men and women after divorce, people who want to change something about the way they structure their partnerships, and people who just want to talk about themselves. The topic of relationships in couples is the most popular. Once upon a time, many years ago, I began asking couples who had lived in a happy marriage for many years what they saw as the secret of their marital happiness. The range of answers amazed me with its breadth. I have seen such different happy families that I want to argue with Lev Nikolaevich, who said: “All happy families are alike, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” Happy families are different. But there is something common in people who have lived several years in a good marriage. I call a good marriage in which the partners are still passionate lovers, and at the same time friends, understanding and respecting each other, appreciating and protecting their other half. What they have in common is a sense of responsibility for how their relationship develops. Love is a process that proceeds in accordance with its own laws. It would be a mistake to think that our feelings, like a valuable gift sent to us by heaven, will remain with us for many years. Even the most passionate love is a defenseless, trembling feeling that requires attention at all stages of its development. In order for “they lived happily ever after” to become more than just a traditional fairy tale ending, you shouldn’t hope that the relationship will take care of itself, no matter how magical it may be. Doesn't it seem strange to you that we devote much more time to studying our new computer toy than to thinking about how our feelings are born and die? Let's take responsibility for what happens to us. We can make sure that we love and be loved, that we have confidence in ourselves and those we love. Differences in interests and desires are not a reason for conflicts, but an impulse to comprehend new things, a reason to be surprised and appreciate these differences, so as to use them with pleasure. We can still, as in childhood or early youth, wake up with the joy that we have a long day ahead of us, in which interesting things await us, tasks just complex enough for us to cope with them, surprises and surprises that provide the thrill experiences, and love, which colors everything that we feel andwe do. When we are in love, we are happy, and we don’t ask ourselves questions: why is this happening to us and who is to blame for the fact that our feeling is mutual? But as soon as a relationship breaks down, we desperately ask: who is to blame? And we answer. Of course, not me, and if I do, then very little, because he (she) does something wrong, says the wrong thing, doesn’t say something, doesn’t do something, drinks, doesn’t like company, doesn’t like that what I love, is jealous, is not jealous, etc., you can insert your own answer if you have ever been disappointed in love or observed such couples among your friends. This is similar to the situation: your computer is not working, and you begin to figure out what kind of virus spilled coffee on the keyboard, under what circumstances, and what its hidden intentions were. The research will involve intense passions and tears, but by the evening you still won’t be able to check what’s new on VKontakte. It would be much more effective to figure out what we can do to fix the situation and do it. When I counsel, it is important for me to know not why two people can't get along, but what we can do to help the crush grow into a mature feeling called love. I would love to counsel couples who are getting married or just starting to live together, but they don’t come. When we are in love, we tend to believe that our love is forever (or almost forever), although we know, perhaps from our own experience, that relationships often end in disappointment. But we believe that not this time. It would be very good to support this belief with some practical steps. To begin with, let us imagine the process of origin, growth, preservation and disappearance of love. Knowing how the process works will allow us to choose our own ways and means regarding how we will build and edit our relationships at each stage of their development. Only we ourselves can find the best solution possible. Other people's recipes don't work here. Here's a map of the typical path people take from interest to breakup. Interest (liking) - Falling in love (passion) - Addiction - Expectations - Disappointment - Reaching the threshold - Confirmation - Breaking the relationship. You don’t need to be a psychologist to agree with this scheme, just look around you. The blossoming and fading of love is the main theme of cinema, literature, music and our heart-to-heart conversations in the kitchen. What makes one person predisposed to liking or loving another? The main factor that predicts whether sympathy will arise between people is territorial proximity and functional distance. It sounds dry and primitive for romantic people. But we really find our spouses and lovers among neighbors and colleagues, people who share hobbies with us, classmates and classmates. If you are a woman and your loved one suddenly decides to have a mistress, then the first candidate is your sister or friend, and only then - a colleague or girl who shares his interests outside of work. When a person often appears in your field of vision, you are more likely to find a lot of advantages in him, and even something that makes you similar. It is very important in what situation we often meet a person. If we see a person in an environment where we are relaxed, confident and cheerful, such as at a party or on vacation, we are more likely to have good feelings towards him. If we have a headache, or we have just suffered a fiasco, then those present at this event will not arouse our sympathy. “When you were sick, I was by your side, when you lost your job, I was by your side. Whenever you needed help, I was there for you. Why do you treat me so badly? “Because you remind me of the worst moments of my life!” The effect of “merely being noticed” is used by politicians and advertisers. Theythey try to catch our eye more often, preferably in a positive context, so that we rate them higher, because we like familiar faces. American social psychologists have carefully studied the issues of the emergence of sympathy, because their customers are business and the entire political system of America. It is not only territorial and functional proximity that enhances sympathy. There is also the factor of waiting for the meeting. The emergence of love is preceded by a vague “premonition of love.” It occurs under the influence of hormones and is caused by artificial stimulation: watching movies about love, reading erotic novels, watching friends in love who constantly kiss in your presence, thinking that it’s time for me to meet someone, etc. Here is a beautiful and quite accurate description of the “premonition of love” from the musical “Romeo and Juliet”. Romeo: A presentiment of love, You are woven from dreams, Indistinct, vague words, Unspoken poems..... Juliet: A presentiment of love, Some kind of vague fear. And a new secret meaning in everyday words. And tears without reasons, And stupid dreams, A presentiment of love ,That somewhere nearby you are, My chosen one, Bright as a holiday, My sadness and joy, You, my good angel.……. Psychologists talk about the need for belonging, the need to love and be loved. Be that as it may, the expectation effect does its job. We are not always aware of it as well as poets. And some of us use the phenomenon of premonitions of love to make our dates “mind-blowing.” Marina, whom I advised on another issue, once told me: “I don’t have bad dates. I prepare for every date. I take a romance novel, I watch a film about love, I buy new erotic lingerie, I try it on for a long time in front of the mirror. I bring myself to such a state that any man, even a homeless person without socks, seems attractive to me. (I think she exaggerated a bit with the homeless person, but the image is good!) And then I meet my man. And in bed it doesn’t matter to me what or how he does, I burn with passion because I’m ready.” Waiting for a meeting, expecting pleasant emotions increases the likelihood that the relationship will be successful. And now a person in a “premonition of love”, he has a choice among several possible candidates, with whom he often intersects, because they live nearby, work together or have common interests. And if he is still not in love, the next factor comes into play - physical attractiveness. No matter what we say about spiritual wealth, intelligence and a sense of humor, we fall deeply and for a long time for those who attract us physically. Men react more strongly to women with an irresistible appearance; women are more often willing to forgive ugliness for their status, wealth or talent. But both of them choose physically attractive partners from their point of view. It seems to all of us that a person with a pleasant appearance also has other advantages that are important to us. Moreover, we choose a partner in such a way that the assessment of his level of attractiveness coincides with the assessment of our own appearance. Some authors talk about imprinting the desired appearance of a partner, coming from early childhood, similar to imprinting in animals. This seems to be true, but has not been proven; nevertheless, we are more complex creatures than geese, in whose behavior this phenomenon was discovered. Imprinting is the recording of signs of a desired sexual partner, a possible enemy, suitable territory and food, mainly in the early stages of life, most often shortly after birth. As a rule, the result of imprinting is very difficult to further change. In people, we can observe that wives are like mothers, and husbands are like fathers. But is imprinting the reason for this? Who are your favorites like? Do you have a preference for a certain type of appearance? Will you remain in the prison of the choices imprinted on you in early childhood, or will you allow yourselfexperiment? And is it worth asking so many questions? If you know couples that do not match in appearance, then this is just an exception that confirms the rule. We choose a person who is inappropriate in appearance, very handsome or ugly from our point of view, for a short-term intrigue; marriage prefers equals. This is the other side of the coin called “beauty”. When an ugly person compensates for his ugliness with many virtues and finds himself in demand on the marriage market, the handsome man or beauty is often left alone. And when a character of suitable appearance appears on the stage of the theater of life, we can fall in love immediately and irrevocably, like Pushkin’s Tatyana. For a serious romantic relationship, we need to make sure that we also like this someone of suitable appearance. We love those who love us. He can let us know about his sympathy with a glance that is a little longer than usual, so as not to go beyond the boundaries of politeness, a small sign of attention, laughter in response to our joke, etc. There are differences in what behaviors we interpret as expressions of affection. The same long look is interpreted by one person as interest that deserves reciprocal attention, and by others as arrogance or immodesty that does not deserve attention. Refer to your experience, remember what behavior let you know that a person was clearly interested in you. I'm not talking about the moment when you already exchange phone numbers, but about the signals that you perceive much earlier, perhaps at the very first meeting. Men usually respond to the ability to listen. A slight tilt of the head, relaxed lips, an attentive look, interjections with an intonation of surprise and approval - all these minor moments of a woman’s behavior encourage a man to begin active courtship. In order for sympathy and light flirting to develop into falling in love, we easily and naturally put “rose-colored glasses” on our noses. Each of us has conscious and mostly unconscious ideas about what our partner should be like. From now on, everything that the character we have chosen does and says is perceived as confirmation that this is exactly the person we were looking for. We are very flexible and creative creatures when it comes to positively interpreting the behavior of those we love. The meaning of the actions of a loved one is not questioned, but is accepted as true, we react automatically and fully in each case. Even the most unseemly actions can be understood and justified in our eyes. He’s not sweet in a good way, but he’s good in a cute way. And we are just as creative in finding unworthy qualities at the stage of disappointment, when the “rose-colored glasses” fall off. And then similar phrases are uttered: “I don’t know what I saw in him,” “She didn’t show herself right away,” “What a fool I was for not seeing this (and now I’m not).” Or the veiled and less personally oriented statements of our days: “I need time to grow up and find myself (away from you)”, “Our relationship was limiting” (like from a neighbor, I want to move further away). But disappointment is still far away, we are in love, which means that the behavior of our beloved is loaded with a special meaning for us. I will illustrate this with a small example: Natasha and Igor are in love. He speaks very little, loves to sing old blues in company, accompanying himself on the guitar. She dresses modestly and reads a lot of books. according to popular psychology, retelling them at the right opportunity. Natasha perceives Igor’s silence as a sign that he is serious, smart and reliable, does not talk too much, and Igor sees his passion for the blues as a sign of sensuality. like others, smart, well-read and very sexy, because she reads books on this topic. Perhaps someone would say that Igor is a narrow-minded slow-witted guy who has been playing the same thing for many years. ANatasha is a gray mouse, stupid, does not have her own point of view, and can only retell someone else’s. But Natasha and Igor find each other magnificent, exactly what they dreamed of. She lets him know that he is loved when she sits next to him and gently touches his knee, she knows that she is desired by him when he sings and looks into her eyes in a special way. He feels trepidation, a desire to be near her, to protect her when she, talking about such “smart” things, suddenly takes off her glasses, as if undressing. Indeed, when a nearsighted person takes off his glasses, his gaze looks touchingly defenseless. But will myopic eyes cause a similar reaction in everyone? She really appreciates his ability to listen, and it doesn't matter that he hasn't read any of her books. There are many ways to let someone know that you are loved—certain touches, seemingly insignificant ones, intonations of voice when saying a name, helping when you are working or being silent and walking away when you are working, retelling jokes you just read, or not burdening you with yours. worries, a compliment, an unexpected gift, attention to your relatives and friends, a prepared dinner or an agreement to fast with you for medicinal purposes, trust and giving you complete freedom, or a demonstration of jealousy. “He hits, it means he loves” - it happens like that. Of everything that lovers can notice, they perceive only that which enhances their feelings. At the stage of falling in love, we are in the grip of illusions; we are unable to form a complete picture of the person we are in love with and truly appreciate him. And despite this, falling in love can last a very long time. A good way to prolong falling in love is to know specifically what kind of behavior of a person makes you feel happy, and to be able to induce such behavior. And also know what you are doing to meet the desires and needs of your loved one. How does a person whom you know for sure loves you behave towards you? How would you like him to behave so that you can be confident in his love? What can you do to get him to behave in the desired way? What words and actions of yours make your chosen one (your chosen one) smile and tenderly look, excite her (him), put her in an intimate mood? When an acquaintance grows not just into friendship, but into passionate love, the feeling can be a confusing mixture of delight and anxiety, joy and pain, uncertainty and hope. Passionate love is like a drug; with constant use, it becomes addictive. When it declines, and this inevitably happens over time, all the signs of “withdrawal” appear - malaise and depression. It’s strange that we perceive such a painful altered state of consciousness as a good reason to tie the knot. The stage of falling in love can be very short, and after it comes a period of addiction. The “rose-colored glasses,” which are no longer so “rose-colored,” are still on the nose, but the uncertainty is disappearing. This is a very pleasant state for those who value comfort and stability. We stop noticing what previously caused delight and euphoria, but we have the opportunity to pay attention to other aspects of our existence. We feel comfortable and calm, and we are happy if we can sometimes return to the state of being in love. Short separations or thrills that we experience in connection with some events allow us to look at our partner as if for the first time, and “fall in love” again. Excitement caused by extreme, stressful situations is automatically mistaken for a romantic feeling. Delight and uncertainty, fear and joy return to us. Only now all these feelings are determined by the situation, but we tend to attribute them to our partners. The phenomenon of “passion from stress” applies both to people who have just met and to spouses who have been living in a stable marriage for a long time. If we, together with someone, experience fear and anxiety when danger arises anda happy release from an impending disaster, we are inclined to look at this someone more affectionately. This applies to simple things: watching horror movies together, riding a roller coaster, and really dangerous ones: skydiving, skiing, any extreme or not so extreme sports, and even such things as implementing a joint risky business project . It is this stage of adaptation in the development of feelings that we tend to call mature love, and we are ready to live happily ever after. Some couples are lucky and naturally linger at this stage without giving any thought to what is happening to them. Others make a lot of effort to balance between love-passion and love-friendship. Still others, just as without thinking at all, easily and naturally smoothly move from habituation to expectations. We quickly get used to good things; it seems that it has always been with us and belongs to us by right. This is true of material values ​​and everything related to love. What do you choose? Rely on the will of fate or, using your mind, take responsibility for the development of your feelings? I know couples who only after marriage gain confidence in each other, excessive uncertainty and intensity of passions and reproaches disappear, their relationship becomes warm and even, so that they both like it. Others, on the contrary, after visiting the registry office, make a list of obligations for themselves and for their partner. And even what was once a fabulous pleasure becomes a “marital duty.” A person who is in the waiting stage takes on many obligations, and expects that by fulfilling them, he will receive many prizes in return. What was previously valued and pleased becomes what it should be. We are now more likely to notice that the glass is half empty than that it is half full. Olya did not appreciate the fact that her husband left work early to take her to training on the other side of the city, but she noticed dirty carpets in the car and grumbled about it for a long time. Nikolai is no longer so proud of his wife’s rapid career growth, but complains about the lack of dinner. Naturally, we have many expectations, and we expect to receive something in return for our commitments. When we make sacrifices for our family, we expect our sacrifices to be rewarded. If we give money to the seller in a store, we will not be loyal to the fact that he will simply take it without giving us anything in return. In this case, our reaction will be justified. But should the principle of equal exchange be fully applied when it comes to love? Our cordial relationship is not a trade relationship or a work relationship. How willing are we to act selflessly? How ready are we to step aside and relax when we don’t want to do anything, but seem to have to? At the waiting stage, delight and compliments give way to reproaches and complaints. Unmet expectations lead to disappointment. “Rose-colored glasses” drown in a puddle of women’s tears and grievances or are broken by men’s coldness and insensitivity. People complain that their partners are selfish with a lot of bad habits. Unmet expectations are experienced as feelings of rejection and unloving, lack of respect, etc. And the one who does not love me is not worthy of love. Uncertainty about the partner returns and the number of evidence of his unworthy behavior grows like a snowball. One unseemly act, which previously would not have been noticed or would have been forgiven (for example, betrayal), serves as the last straw that overflows the cup of patience. A person receives confirmation that he made a mistake in his choice, he does not love, and is not loved. A couple can continue to live together if they are connected by children, property, the length of their lives, and customs. They scatter to different beds and rarely talk, or, having messed up, fight furiously every day. Now that divorce has become the norm, couples usually break up. Somewhere here, in the process of disillusionment and collectionevidence in favor of the error of choice, there is a threshold, the crossing of which makes a return to love-friendship or love-passion unlikely. Evidence that a person is still at the threshold is warm memories of a wonderful past and the desire to return it. He or she talks about past love as if it were a wonderful time that somehow passed away. They still value their partner and find a lot of advantages in him; circumstances, relatives, workload, and the intervention of a third force (lover or mistress) are blamed for the cooling of feelings. But after crossing the threshold, a person forgets all the good things that connected him with his former partner. “He never loved me”, “We had problems from the very beginning”, “I started dating her because all my friends were already married and there was no love”, “I accepted his proposal so as not to stay alone”, “It was clear from the very beginning that he was not suitable for me (but who was clear?)” - such expressions indicate that the person is already beyond the threshold. A person may agree that it was not so bad, in response to compelling arguments from relatives and friends who remember everything differently, but he can no longer feel how it was. “Yes, he did a lot of good things for me, but not because he loved me,” “She is a person of a different culture and education, nothing could have worked out for us,” all this is said with sadness, resentment and often hostility, like “rose-colored glasses.” » are replaced by dirty gray ones. A person beyond the threshold rewrites his past, and often for a long time loses faith in the possibility of finding happiness in love in the future. This is a painful condition, but it passes. I once watched as a woman, in just a month, leapt over the threshold from the addictive stage in which she had been for several years, rewrote her personal history, and enthusiastically rushed to search for a new novel. A new passion can also appear in a person who has not crossed the threshold of disappointment. I will describe a typical situation using the example of a couple I observed many years ago. You've probably heard stories like this. Anya and Maxim have been married for several years, their child is already in school. Maxim has been “secretly visiting his mistress” for three years now, promising her to divorce his wife, first when the child grows up a little, then when the issue with the apartment is resolved, etc. Options for postponing a divorce could be: “my elderly parents won’t bear it if I get a divorce, it will kill them,” “my wife is seriously ill, I can’t leave her,” “divorce will greatly harm my career,” etc. This enumeration of circumstances that prevent an immediate divorce from his wife and a passionate reunion in a legal marriage with his mistress ends with the refrain: “We have to wait a little, of course, I love only you, and I have not had an intimate relationship with my wife for a long time.” Julia, Maxim’s friend, once at City Day sees Anya, Maxim’s wife, happy, healthy and pregnant. She is shocked, “how is it possible, they don’t have sex, but they are pregnant, he lied to me all these years, and I waited!” (stage of disappointment). Maxim, as they say, was caught red-handed. It is very difficult for him to lose both women. He belongs to the type of people who value thrills and risks most of all; the word stability for him is synonymous with boredom. When his relationship with his wife entered a stable, addictive phase, he felt deprived of the joys of life. Passion no longer scorched the walls of the marital bedroom; it was replaced by friendship, a comfortable life and mutual understanding. Maxim loved Anya and valued her very much as a life partner; they were connected by a child and common interests. But his soul and body asked for something sharper, and he became interested in a young employee, Yulia. Julia with her hot energy of first love, and his constant jumping from one bed to another, gave him a feeling of the fullness of being. In this way, not only men, but also women decorate the stage of addiction in marriage and premarital relationships. “It’s not that I love him, but he’s young and perky, it’s easy for me to be with him,” one very positive woman told me about.