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Heartbreak recovery programme
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Marriage Counselling – Where Do We Fall When We Fall In Love?

For several years I have been listening to the voices of both men and women grappling to understand what’s happening to them when they find themselves plummeting in to that other worldly place called “falling in love” as if we were melting like chocolate in the hands of the beloved, drained of all vulnerability, crumbling like scorched pastry as we sink deeper and deeper in to a place closer then home, a temporary domicile abode that we decorate with lavish soft furnishings in preparation for the candlelit feast and endless conversation whereby words generously over flow in to red wine whilst the slightest touch of each others finger tips is enough to erase us from the armour of the earth and suddenly dissolve in to minuscule pieces. An amalgamation of one another and finally the quintessence of love in all it’s perfection soaks us dry to the bone and at long last we are free in the company of a flawless stranger.

In the peak of this experience we can feel; a heightened state of awareness mesmerised by the feelings we are having in relation to the beloved one; More integrated and alive with a passion to create; an ecstatic euphoric state of being “in love” fluttering towards the loved one like a moth drawn to light. Sounds encapsulated by tiny droplets louder then words a, transitory feeling of going insane in love; an unbridled passion more significant then life itself. Crumbling like dried wheat in your arms, a gasped by overwhelming fuzzy and strong warmth in the pit of my belly, you wrap me up completely in you and we slept so deep that night as my head was enshrouded in the nape of your neck making it hard to differentiate who was who.

It can be experienced as childlike, naive, playful, ageless, devoted, sacred, seductive, enraptured, honest, unrestrained, thoughtless and expressive; a kaleidoscope of colours reflecting a mirage of splendour as we fall deeper and closer to this person who appears to hold the key to our heart and soul…that in itself is a miracle. Are we anybody until somebody loves us?

Being in love can often render us totally vulnerable at the hands of the person who has ignited this spark of love that has a familiar mysterious quality most like ourselves, often spoken about “as if” this other person is our soul mate in the mirror of love. Rather like, Wuthering Heights when Catherine Earnshaw utters; “He’s more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” This very narrative lays at the bedrock of my work, as many lovers merge and become lost in the beloved, losing all sense of their own autonomy and individuality and here lies the pivotal problem in merger relationships that can lead to co-dependency and an addictive hungry love, a ravenous love a long time starved of mutual loving contact, hoarding enough milk around the hearth just in case it is robbed from us in the middle of the night as this thing called love comes without an expiry date which might be sufficient for those who are not too thirsty.

For some it is as if the world were melting underneath them losing all sense of orientation, blinded by the eye of the camera lens that looks straight through you and in an instant you feel seen, known and understood. He or she has taken a photo of you and suddenly a replica of what you’ve always known yourself to be leaps out from the damp photo paper and the burdened past dissolves in to tiny droplets of tears tempering a new beginning, rewriting the shape of you, accompanying you towards a familiar terrain, hiding inside the warmth of cosseted arms and shoulders, inhaling a big sigh, so big that silence is louder then words themselves, softening under the stillness of each breath, eating each moment of life like ravenous lion, breathing you in like oxygen as if our life depended upon it. Desire screams out; don’t ever let this moment end as we crumble like dust and exhale…hold me close, hold me forever, don’t ever let me sense that you are slipping away from me. And then we sink deeper and deeper into passion and wonder; Clung together like cling film without a centre or anything to divide us only the hum of the candles burning reducing in size as our hours together draw close and dawn begins to break.

When we are too hungry for love, we find it difficult to bear any sense of distance and separateness, intolerable to let our loved one go even for a moment for fear of losing them forever and if that love is withdrawn we “literally” feel as if we are falling apart drenched with the most annihilating sense of emptiness and grief as if we no longer exist, no longer ourselves in the mirror – a shattered empty shell whereby every day life fades in to broken fragments flagging behind time unable to make any sense of the wreckage.

Within the loving relationship there is bound to be “a becoming one” an attachment to the very person who makes us feel so alive in the beginning, rather like “coming home to ourselves” but when attachment folds in to hungry love, it can lead towards an inability to be alone, self regulated and self sufficient, therefore only able to exist in the reflection to the other’s image, losing all identity of one’s own sense of self.

Circling in a state of light headed confusion as if we no longer know where our loved other begins and we end, bringing with it a high level of excitement and happiness yet can easily be coloured by an anxious thought in the pit of our belly…please don’t let this end and already without knowing we have fallen so deeply in to the physical state of falling in love.

When the love relationship is going well, it is a mystery…on fire with passion and capable of achieving anything and everything, inspiration and aspiration drives us towards making everything possible in the here and now; saturated with enthusiasm to live and produce, the elation of feeling awakened by some strange imperceptible quality.

Things that once appeared like a mountain, an effort, a struggle, miraculously dissipate and procrastination postponed in time. When we fall in to this other realm this heightened experience of love, literally anything and everything is possible to create, we yield and finally no longer alone as one becomes two together and suddenly life has a meaning and purpose like never before.

With this consuming sense of falling… we feel fully alive and awake, so sharply attentive, something so profound yet intangible happens, so much so that “reality” in its so called ordinary state becomes acutely sharp with colourful bursts of insight and excitement evoked by our loved ones presence. It has been described as a heightened sense of reality where-by the scent and touch of the beloved is of such a high intensity that it literally encompasses a divine quality carrying with it a sense of oneness and respectful attraction.

Its happened already, we have no say in it, this quality has a voice all of it’s own and is literally experienced “as if” we are falling in to some strange other worldly landscape not even knowing if arms and hands will catch us where we fall, frightened to let go, will they be there if I do? Will they stay close to me? Maybe they will leave? Question after question rolls around in our mind – all conversation falls betwixt and between a six sided crystal..Shell I, shan’t I, yes I want to trust… but then suddenly from nowhere that sense that we will be consumed by grief and then abandonment, that most primal of all fears.

Its better so much better trust, trust love and let go – trust, trust breath and exhale – that thing that can’t let go, won’t let go for fear that we are lost for ever and ever and ever, abandoned in to the space of time..Inhale – exhale – love partly throttled by life – corroding, burying itself and its dregs into a mercurial stillness – juggling, jiggling an almighty pleasure – bury yourself in to the bellowing music of life to face the moon Luna moon, the light and her sweetness –
And now after that “semi trance like state” that intoxicating feeling of love, I’ve awoken and suddenly we are hurting one another, we say things we don’t mean, we swallow pregnant silences and brush by one another as if we are strangers, we no longer respect one another, appreciate one another, or maybe we didn’t even have a chance to know one another, to understand one another, I’m confused it wasn’t meant to be like this…soaked to the skin in sadness ….how did we come to this?…from where?…. from when?

How did this discord happen…When did it begin and why? How did this happen when we were once so deeply in love? There are so many questions in suspense regarding the love relationship but there’s no denying something keeps us together, attached and familiar as if we were meant to meet and there it begins.

Understanding one another is the key as love can be damaged through time…

To know that person is an unrivalled blessing and to be understood a fundamental necessity that lies at the bedrock within every loving relationship….love that most mysterious thing that I’ll never get to the bottom of…its residue will stay with me for ever and ever as broken fragments of time, spilling out when ever loss brushes by….