How do people fall in love? And maybe just as importantly, how
do people fall out of love? Well, it's not magic. But there is a
secret to it. And we want to tell you about that secret in this
episode of Relationship Radio. I'm Dr. Joe beam, along with
Kimberly Holmes, our CEO. So Kimberly, when people talk about
falling in and out of love, I remember doing a workshop in
Corona, California, many years ago, where that when a particular
lady who was in the workshop, she was an architect, when I
explained the process of how people fall in love and out of
love, she actually began to weep. And I asked her what I had
done to a fender. And she said, I thought what I had with my
lover, she was there with her husband, I thought what I had with
my lover was something magic and special. And you just taught me
that basically, it's like architecture, if you do certain
things, certain things occur. And it shocked her to our core.
Yeah.
And that's part of what makes what we've done in our research
and our experience with couples unique is we realize that there
is a process that people can follow that if they follow it, they
will fall in love. But if they stop following that process, then
they can fall out of love, even if they don't mean to. And
that's where many married couples end up, they stopped following
that process somewhere along the line after a couple of years or
more of marriage and wake up one day and say I don't feel in
love with this person anymore. But we can teach you how to fall
back in love.
As a matter of fact, I see these programs advertised on
television, like Married at First Sight and things like that,
never seen it adjusting the title. And I'm thinking they're
talking to the wrong people. Because we can actually show them a
process that any two people, if they both follow the process
will fall in love with each other, whether they want to or not.
But as we learned the process, if they start doing it backwards
with what you're talking about a minute ago, then they fall out
of love. And most people never understood the process that went
through to get in love. Therefore they don't understand what
they're doing in the process to fall out of love. Right. So
first, let's just to find out very quickly.
Yeah, let's define love, scientifically, right? Because I think
if we were to define it, or try to define it based on what
people feel, then people would say, if we were to do like the
Jay Leno thing, where you go on the streets of New York City and
say, what does it mean to be in love? I think a lot of people
would say it feels like the butterflies in your stomach, it
feels like wanting to be with the other person. It feels like
deep trust. But if we look at the scientific words used to
describe love, according to the research, it's really three
components. It is intimacy, which is a deep friendship, a deep
want a deep vulnerability and and into me see
with each other openness, transparency, openness, trust, fret,
yep,
like being with your best friend. And then there's passion,
which is the second component, which is a yearning for oneness,
could be sexual, but doesn't have to be right. And the third one
is commitment and commitment is the decision to continue doing
what's best for the relationship,
a decision that you will definitely do that. Now, those things
do result in emotions. If you had just one of them, like just
commitment, you might not have much emotion. But if you do the
three of those, you get to kind of look, that's referred to as
consummate love, which has both intimacy, and trust and
transparency in that kind of intimacy, and commitment and
passion. So if people fall in love with another person, the
first thing that has to happen is that to have some kind of
contact with that person.
That would help. Yeah.
And it used to be it had to be face to face. But now we have
electronics and the media and the internet. And so now you can
actually follow up with a person that you have never seen. But
it's still all part of the same first step, because of the fact
that the first step we call attraction is not just about
appearance. There are four factors, correct?
Yeah, there's four factors. So there is the physical factor,
which is more of the appearance factor. But then there's an
intellectual factor. And this one has to do with is this someone
that I can understand that we communicate well, that we have a
similar shared desire of things to talk about an interest in
life. And that's probably where a lot of people, when they meet
online without seeing the other person, that's what they are
being attracted to. At first, they're attracted to the intellect
of the other person,
they can talk about something and both feel that they're
understanding each other and being understood. But then what
happens after that is still part of this
emotional attraction. So we've done physical intellectual now
it's emotional attraction, and this is about evoking emotions
within the other person that they enjoy feeling. And this one is
really key, especially for a long term relationship. Because if
you don't have that, that evoking if you don't like the way you
feel when you're around someone else, you're not going to want
to be around them for very long. That's correct. So this one is
all about. Are you paying attention to me? Oh, Opening the
doors, so to say, you know, sending flowers, doing some of those
nicer things treating me in a way where I really feel respected.
And that can vary person by person, like you would think maybe
well do All women want flowers, no, some of them actually will
only shot gonna go hunting with. So it has to do with what's
important to that person. And so so far we've talked about
physical that starts with the P intellectual, it starts with an
emotional, which starts with an E. And like, in that we've been
saying both of those two things, the intellectual and emotional
appeal can happen without ever knowing what the other person
looks like. And if you're thinking, well, they're in trouble
when they finally see each other physically, not necessarily the
case. We'll talk about this last one, and I'll come back and
talk about trade offs. So the last one is
spiritual attraction, we tend to look and are attracted to
people who we believe have a similar beliefs, a similar set of
beliefs and values as we do or a greater than a better set of
beliefs and values than we do.
Okay. And so we call those the past physical, intellectual,
emotional, and spiritual. And you're going to be attracted to
another person in at least one of those ways. If not all four,
you might say, well, apparently to this beautiful, gorgeous
woman, and she's a 10 on a P, the physical, then maybe I won't
even notice the others to begin with, to begin with. Maybe not.
You see, physical attraction is most important in short term
relationships. When people are looking for long term
relationship relationships, the one that's most important is the
E, the emotion. So let's say now one person's being attracted to
another person, we know just from history and from life, our own
lives, that just because of the fact that I found myself
attracted to a person does not mean that person is going to be
attracted to me. And so the attraction is the first part of it.
That's what sets it up. But really, what makes it into a
relationship?
Yeah, it's moving into that second stage of the love path, which
is what we call I don't know, if we mentioned it, our process
that we use for how people fall in love is called the love path.
And it is trademarked. Just so you know. But that first step, if
it's if it's attraction, which it is, then the second one they
gonna go into is acceptance. And that one basically asks the
question, with everything I know about this person, can I accept
them for who they are, without trying to change them?
Which, you know, there was always a joke when I was growing up,
that men marry women thinking they will never change, and women
marry men thinking that definitely will change. And so in that
old humor, it was like men will marry women thinking they'll
never age another day and those kinds of things. But women say I
see as flaws. But that's okay. Because I'm going to correct
those kinds of things. So acceptance is not based on the fact
that I'm going to form you into whatever shape I want you to be,
is based on the fact that I can accept you as you are, which is
difficult because of the fact that you're flawed, just like I'm
flawed.
And it's difficult. And I And that's why this stage can be.
Well, let me say it this way, I believe when people are dating,
they, when they come to this stage, there's a lot of things they
still don't know about the other person, because they've seen
the best of the other person on the first couple of dates. And
so what they're accepting about that person is pretty easy to
accept. But it's as you go deeper into the relationship and
especially after you get married because you don't know
everything about a person just because you say I do you find out
way more and more life circumstances happen as you get married
to where you really begin to, to be challenged with can I
accept? And do I continue to accept this person as they are? And
that's why people can begin to fall out of love and one of many
reasons on our path. But this one, I think, is one of the first
ones we come up to, which is we begin to really question do I
accept that, and we begin to act like we don't and that is what
begins to degrade the strength of the relationship.
So the attraction should lead to acceptance. And acceptance
means I can accept you as you are, I may not be happy with
everything about you. I may not endorse everything you think
believed or do, I may not encourage it, but I can accept it that
so you are so let's think about some celebrities. I saw a photo
the other day of when they first married. And now their marriage
many many years later, he is a major star. Not gonna mention his
name, people will figure it out. And and his wife was absolutely
stunningly physically pretty when they married. Now, they've
been married many, many years. He's still a major international
star, but his wife has become quite a bit larger than she was
before. And so when people think, well, it's the physical that
keeps a marriage together. It definitely has a part have a play,
but he loves her deeply even though she is not the same shape.
She was when she was young and they first married and people say
well, wow, you know in Hollywood, that doesn't sound like them.
It seems like they split it For anything, why is this guy still
with his wife, when she's not in the same kind of shape he used
to be, it will be because of the fact that the intellectual
attraction, and or emotional attraction, and or spiritual
attraction, either one, two, or all three of those are so
strong. That actually is more important to him than the physical
attraction, not saying the physical goes away, but when the
others are more important. And that's why you can still be madly
in love with each other when you're 90 years old. And you're
hobbling around on your canes, unless, of course, you're a
politician, and then you get to get elected office. So we look
at this and say, How many times have we heard about Hollywood
celebrities who will rare to be famous and very attractive
people who end up having affairs would say, their maid, or their
nanny, and when you see a picture of the maid or the nanny, then
you start saying, physically, there's no comparison. The wife is
gorgeous, physically, and all those kinds of things. So why
would this man want to losing his marriage and, and other things
that go with that, because of being involved with this woman who
physically can't compete with his bride, it would be because of
the fact that there may not be a very strong emotional
connection with the wife, or intellectual, or even spiritual.
And when those things are missing, it leaves a vacuum, it leaves
a hole in us, because we're made to be fulfilled physically,
intellectually, emotionally, spiritually, another way to say
that would be body, mind, heart and soul. And when that's not
there, we become susceptible to having that relationship with
other people because of the emptiness we feel. So you may look
wonderful in public. So if we talked about how people fall in
love, they go through attraction into acceptance. There are two
more steps, we don't have time for that. And how do they fall
out of love? Almost always. What goes first? Is the acceptance.
So why does it change?
Why does the acceptance change? Well, it, I really don't even
think it's rocket science. And we've, it's part of what we've
already covered. Because we stop after being married or with
someone for a period of time you get a bitchu ated, you get used
to each other, and you begin to realize the things about them
that aren't quite what you wish that they would be the things
they did that maybe you thought were really sweet and quirky
when you were dating now annoy the crap out of you. And so it's
those things that you try to get the other person to change. And
you may not even think you're consciously doing it. But it's the
little snide remarks. It's just the way you say, why are you
wearing that? Again? Why do you choose those kinds of clothes?
Do you have you ever thought about eating different or working
out, it's the little jabs that over time begin to make the other
person feel like, I don't know that you fully love me as I am,
it feels like you're wanting me to change, or it might not be so
covert, it might be very overt, in telling the other person that
they need to do something different in order for you to be happy
with them. And when that happens, it takes the safety and
security out of the relationship. Because all of a sudden, you
don't love me unconditionally, you love me conditionally. And
that doesn't make me feel warm and fuzzy, it makes me feel
scared of what the future is going to be.
Oh, that's exactly true. But here's something to remember about
them. Accepting the person that he or she is when you first
marry them. Understand that each of you over time will change.
Now, you may change dramatically based on circumstances and
situations, you may just have minor changes, but the acceptance
that you had for each other at the outset, will not be the same
level of acceptance you have for each other at the 10 year mark,
or 20 years or 30 years. Because the acceptance thing is not
just a once and for all, you have to continue to know each
other, learn each other and continue to accept each other even
when life moves you in different directions. So Kimberly,
wouldn't that be hard to do? Like, what are some of the changes
that occurred in my spouse? Or changes that I didn't sign up
for? Should I still accept him or her anyway?
Yeah, yeah, that is a hard one. Like what if you marry someone,
and then they become an alcoholic, and then they began drinking
all night and not coming home for a couple of days on end? You
didn't sign up for that. And it's not a behavior that you should
necessarily accept. But we're not talking about accepting the
behavior. We're talking about accepting the person. Can you view
the two things differently enough to say, I love and accept you
for who you are, but also love you enough to realize that this
is a behavior that's going to hurt you and is going to hurt the
people that you love. And that's a it's a hard road to navigate,
especially in a situation like that, because again, you can't
control them. Out of these behaviors. So how do you deal with a
situation like that.
So continuing to grow in love, means you always take care of the
physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual, as long as you
live, but at the same time, it means that you continue to try to
grow together. And if one of you chooses a path that the other
person just cannot accept, that's when you're going to hit a
major crisis. And it will become then how do you deal with that?
Well, we don't have time in this particular episode, but we can
help you go through that. If you're thinking, or this all sounds
pollyannish. And like, you know, like, everybody can do this.
Yes, you can. But sometimes you do have to put your foot down.
But that's a topic for a little another little bit later down
the road.
Yes. And many of these can be difficult circumstances. And like
you said, probably something that we've I know, it's definitely
something we've covered in past episodes, so people should
listen to, but probably something we'll cover again in future
episodes. And it's many of the things that the people inside of
our membership that we offer struggle with as well, which is why
we've made that community with the content that that goes
through teaching people, how do you fall in love? How do you
become your best self? And it's really helping people know how
to better navigate those circumstances inside of our safe
membership.
Okay, so we'll talk more about this particularly what we just
started into, like, as we go through life, and people change, my
spouse changes, I change, and sometimes they wind up doing
things that I've found unacceptable. How do we still accept how
do we still grow in love? And let's just choose the biggest one
of those we run into what if my spouse cheated or is cheating on
me? We'll talk about that. And the very next episode of
relationship radio