Psychology Awareness

Ah, love! A subject that’s been written about in countless books, sung about in countless ballads, captured in countless movies. But what’s the difference between the love that keeps one person jumping around from fling to fling and love that makes two people stay together for fifty years? Below is an overview of the two main types of love we’ll experience in our lives. If you’re interested in learning more, check out the links below. If you like this article, make sure to give the other PsychAwareness posts a read!

Have you ever been in love? I’ll bet you have. We’ve all undergone that toe-curling, butterfly-inducing, heart-pounding feeling of making eye contact with that one person and having fireworks go off in your head. You’ll waste hours doodling their name in your notebooks and making up scenarios and waiting for your phone to light up with a notification with their name attached to it. Sound familiar? That’s passionate love, which one can also call infatuation. This is that intense, all-consuming love that often occurs when you first develop a crush or get into a relationship, which may be why it’s sometimes referred to as the ‘honeymoon phase.’ In this situation, you tend to have very passionate feelings for the other person. This typically comes with certain characteristics, such as idealizing the person or the relationship, a need to maintain physical closeness, and strong emotions about the object of affection, whether that’s intense happiness when things are going well or devastation when things go a bit off the rails. Additionally, this is the stage of love often associated with butterflies, sweaty palms and nervousness, and constant thoughts about her strikingly blue eyes and long flowing hair and the way she smelled like blooming honeysuckle…. Sorry. I got distracted. What was I talking about? Right, right. So that’s passionate love. On the other hand, we have compassionate love, also called companionate love. Often, when describing companionate love, it’s within the context of romantic relationships, but it can exist within a friendship or other personal relationships. While passionate love is all about intensity, companionate love is usually more about trust, affection, and intimacy. That’s not to say that companionate love isn’t passionate, but the intensity is often less immediate and urgent (less “I need to talk to them or my heart is going to explode” and more “I wonder how they’re doing, I’ll check in on them.”)  This is often the stage after a period of passionate love. After the ‘honeymoon phase’ you have the whole rest of your marriage to look forward to. It’s steadier. More grounded. It’s about long-term commitment, shared values, trust, and emotional intimacy. While passionate love is mostly about physical attraction, companionate love is about deep emotional connection. Relationships governed by passionate love usually start with a strong spark and emotions, but the relationship itself can also be volatile (think high highs, low lows). Relationships governed by companionate love tend to be more stable and enduring. The sense of security and trust, which comes from a strong emotional base can contribute to long-term relationship satisfaction.  I’d like to leave you all with a story I heard from a post online. In a college class, a teacher asked a group of students whether love was a feeling or a choice. Every single one of them, being teenagers, said it was a feeling. Then afterward, the students were made to interview a dozen adults who had been married or been in a long-term relationship of some kind. Every single one of them said it was a choice.  At some point in your relationship, the butterflies and excitement will fade. Feelings are ever-changing and it is dangerous to build a house on such a shaky foundation. Take note, this does not mean that you shouldn’t look for chemistry and excitement in a relationship. The point is to not make that the entire base of what you’re looking for in a relationship. Sure, passionate love is great. Nothing is quite like the feeling of your heart fluttering or your head spinning with love. But companionate love is where you’re more likely to find someone who you will be happy to spend the rest of your life with. It’s not about who sees the brightest stars in your eyes. It’s about who will continue to look for those stars, over and over again, even when the night is darkest. 

Love, Justin 🙂

Works Cited:https://www.verywellmind.com/compassionate-and-passionate-love-2795338https://www.mindtreepsychology.com/love/