We shouldn’t deny it, everybody wants to fall in love in their life. Some people want to fall in love over and again and feel the passion of life in a multitude of ways and have the love affair be as much with life itself as it is with a life partner. All understandable. The thing about love affairs is that it is so vital that we make them healthy and that’s not easy. We get a genuine rush around the person who we have a chemistry with and that’s irresistible. Sometimes we meet a person and in an instant, we are drawn to them and it can feel like an electrical jolt. It can be exciting because of the intense immediate connect and also frightening because we are walking into the unknown. And sometimes, if it is with someone we have had a long term platonic relationship with for business or personal reasons, it is charged with a special energy. A fabulous energy that is even more exciting because of the familiar bond and the trust that has been built. Either way, it is a very cool feeling that makes you thrilled to be alive but it also means being mindful and careful and lovingly considerate to yourself and the other person.
Even then however, things are a challenge to navigate because it is so important to be mindful, to consider what is at risk as well as what the gains can be. Love is easy to feel and frightening to sustain when it becomes genuinely intimate. Deeply intimate relationships give us our life force but we play games to protect ourselves from how vital they are for us.
In my work, people talk to me about love every day. I hear the stories of heartache and happiness, doubt and confidence. I hear the complications, challenges, and a consistent desire for it to work and be authentically happy. I believe it can be.
Loving relationships of every kind take a special formula that includes:
- chemistry
- patience
- courage
- admiration
- respect
- levity
- kindness
- passion
- attraction
- trust
- faith
- reception
- acceptance
- compassion
- like-ability
- promise
- understanding
- desire
- friendship
- romance
- mystery
- intrigue
- intelligence
- heart
- shared values
- ideals
- pleasure
- energy
And if you have those ingredients, you might just have a win if you both have an appreciation for it and you agree to it all and decide that the connection is important, of value, and of mutual benefit, like a shared happiness. All that with the heat still turned on–and up. Every love affair needs the heat. I saw my mother and father had it, full throttle. 
As I contemplate the love affairs in my life, I know that I have learned how essential it is for me to remain dedicated to continuing on the path of building my inner strength and retaining a core focus on my desire for a life of total, wholistic fitness. I want to get more youth filled as each year passes, to become increasingly more vibrant, to prepare for years ahead that are active and athletic and about feeling good, not compromised and lamenting. I want to be a healthy and reliable partner in a love affair and want to inspire a man to be all that in return. Beautifully happy couples seem to understand that they are working in tandem to create a life and lifestyle that is replenishing and energizing and magnetic, not a drain that is polarizing. I wonder how different my life would be now if I knew this decades ago.
I wonder how different our cultural picture of marriage would be if we had a societal agreement that this was a perspective to adopt and adapt ourselves to. Building upon inner strength is what inspires us to be healthy enough to create a bond based in wellness to another. It takes effort…but what better job is there? What is more rewarding than having a beloved one who is there authentically and happily and eagerly and intelligently and tenderly?
When I take my last breath, I hope to be fortunate enough to have the face of my dearest present…for to gaze into the eyes of deep love on my exit would assuredly be of comfort. Death offers us a choice between integrity and despair and without deep love, it seems that despair would surely be present.
I’ll continue my work and commitment to well-being, inner strength that is genuine, authentic, and ready for a great love affair. How about you, have you arrived? Are you ready?
It is never too late to step into betterment.
