Love can not be a sacrifice
The belief that love is made up of commitments , pacts that we establish with the person we love in order to give stability to the relationship. This is normal and healthy; After all, if someone cares about us, the natural thing is that we give them guarantees that the emotional bond exists and we take it seriously. Loving by word is very easy, and what matters are the facts.
However, not everyone is successful when it comes to defining what the nature of the commitment that should exist in their relationship should be. In some cases, the purpose that this type of agreement should have is confused, and instead of being a means through which to consolidate the relationship, it becomes the objective of the relationship, which gives it meaning. That is to say: it becomes a constant demonstration of sacrifices and the degree to which we are willing to suffer for the beloved.
This belief, which explained thus seems absurd, is more frequent than we think. In fact, it is the pillar on which the traditional conception of romantic love stands. How to recognize those moments in which we confuse reasonable sacrifices with the simple intention of lashing out?
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Love and sacrifices
Let's say it now: falling in love does not come free . From the beginning opens the possibility that we suffer a lot for the other person, even before this feeling is reciprocated (and even when it will not be reciprocated).
When the love relationship is consolidated, the possibility of going through bad times is still very close: everything that has to do with getting away from that person for a long time, or seeing her have a bad time, is something that produces a clear discomfort. In addition, in order for the coexistence between the two lovers to take place, it is also necessary to give in to many things.
Maybe that's why, because love relationships are not characterized by being comfortable but by being intense, some people decide, unconsciously, to add even more intensity to them through suffering, which is the easiest way to make us feel something.
And that is to mix that minimum of discomfort that the relations produce with the possibility of add huge amounts of discomfort manufactured by ourselves in an express way it is a way of making that, apparently, that love story be something more meaningful, more justified.
Of course, this tendency to turn love into a synonym for sacrifice is totally toxic, although when experienced in the first person it is difficult to see it. Unfortunately, this logic fits very well with the old ideas about marriage, so it often happens indecent because we assume that it is normal. Why does this happen?
- Maybe you're interested: "Emotional dependence: pathological addiction to your sentimental partner"
The origins of sacrifice: the family
In psychology there are very few things that are not related to the context, and love is no exception. Love is not something that arises in our brain without seeing another person: it is a consequence of the way in which several generations that have lived before us have learned to manage those intense affective bonds that arise from falling in love. And, for the majority of inhabitants, this way of managing that emotion it has to do with marriage : a way to manage resources and to organize people thinking of a small community.
In practice, love had to be experienced in a way that went hand in hand with the mentality necessary to maintain the family, and this has to do with personal sacrifice. Until recently, resources were scarce, so everything that could be done for the welfare of the other was justified and welcome. The weird thing was not give in everything in favor of the family , but to live as autonomous and free people.
When two things always happen at the same time, they usually end up being indistinguishable, and this is what happened with love and sacrifices. If we add to this that the predominant machismo turned the woman into a property of the husband, so that he had to watch over her and this had to do everything the lord of the house wished, the result does not surprise anyone: the normalization of relationships of emotional dependence. After all, in most cases our emotions accompany our actions, and the same happens with the need to constantly sacrifice for the other.
Common efforts, not punishments
For a long time the patriarchal model of coexistence has been the target of all kinds of criticism, and for the first time it is possible to live without having to depend on the family unit. There is no excuse for living love as autonomous and self-sufficient people, which means making sacrifices go from being the engine of emotional relationships to a consequence of the adoption of reasonable commitments , with pragmatic sense. The opposite would be to fall into the trap of dependence.
