Love Relationships: Romantic Love and The Mirror

Everyone in your life is there to mirror you... and vice versa.
When I tell a couple that they are perfect mirrors for each other, inevitably at least one of them has a fit. “I am not like him! How can you say that?” Often they can’t see this although it is literally true. This is quite comical to me. “He is so critical!” she might say, criticizing him. This, however, is not the main point.The key is that people in your life, be they lovers, friends, family or co-workers, hold a mirror up for you to see yourself.
By your reactions to others, you find out who YOU are.

I once heard Wayne Dyer ask, “What do you get when you squeeze an orange?” The correct answer is “orange juice” (unless you squeeze too hard and get a hernia.) Anyway, he follows up with “because that is what is inside.”
If someone’s actions bring out rage in you, it is not because of their behavior that you are suffering, it is because of your own anger (resistance) and ill-temper. Go deeper. Why is there an ill-temper? Perhaps you have unresolved anger welled up inside from having experienced unacceptable behavior in your past without dealing with it.

Stuff that hangs around too long ferments and stinks. It must come to the surface. When you “stuff” your pain, you have doomed yourself to suffer with it until it is released. The purpose of the “mirror” is to help you see yourself clearly, so you can take action and heal.

I complained once saying “women today are not available.” My skilled friend Jyude metaphorically held up “the mirror” for me to see. I sat there in shock realizing that it was I who was not available. Jyude wisely said nothing more. That was the day I got it. I was staring it in the face for years, but only when I saw that it was me could I begin to change my thinking and heal myself.

It is always necessary to handle one’s issues in the only place where they have ever existed ... in one’s own consciousness.
Sadly, so many people try to change the other person to make themselves feel good. That simply is not the answer—ever!

There is something called love which is spiritual, eternal and unconditional; and there are these things called relationships which are based on the barter system: “I’ll do something for you if you do what I want.” Relationships are conditional and based in the realm of the changeable. Love is not always required!

Clearly spoken, sex is not love, it is sex.It may need to be dealt with within the context of a relationship, but that doesn’t make sex the same as love.

Romance is not love when it is based in fantasy. Romance can be used as a substitute for tenderness and caring. It is, too often, more like foreplay than love. I recently read that certain scientists have concluded that infatuations not only are not love, they are delusional! This gives a whole new meaning to “madly in love.”
Some people who claim to be able to love unconditionally are merely co-dependent . Helpless and without boundaries, they don’t have enough self-esteem to speak up for their own sanity. Their attachment to their mate is due to neediness or fear of loss; certainly not real love.

On the other hand, it is such a pleasure to see people who really love each other. Imagine, two people who have worked through the compromise stuff and now are able to function as a team, mutually caring and sharing in a loving, healthy way.Human love does really exist!
Real love, however, is not rooted in fantasy. It starts with a healthy attraction, rather than merely sensual excitement.

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