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CHAPTER II
WHAT BRINGS YOU TOGETHER Our attraction to another person is rarely as simple as we believe it to be at the time we experience that initial fascination. We may admire someone's handsome face or soulful eyes or lovely body or graceful way of moving. Or we may be drawn to their sense of humour, their intelligence or their personal power and self-confidence. But what we first register about another person is only the tip of a very deep and complex iceberg. You and Bill are two distinct individuals - two entirely different "substances" - each of whom brings to the alchemy of your relationship a defined personality with its own unique gifts, attributes and conflicts. But what is the specialness of the attraction? What has brought you together? George Bernard Shaw, cynical about relationships at the end of his life, once defined the state of being in love as the fallacy of believing that one person was actually different from another. Most of us, unless we have been deeply and perhaps pathologically embittered by experience, would not agree with him; people are ultimately irreplaceable because they are unique, and you and Bill create a unique chemistry between you. There may be areas where, in terms of your basic characters, you have an instinctive harmony and understanding with each other. That is usually why we believe we are attracted to another person: They seem to embody what we most admire and need. Yet in your relationship, as in every other, there will inevitably be friction and opposition as well as attraction, and you and your partner must accept a certain amount of compromise and adjustment in order to function together as a couple. And on a deeper level, there may be areas where you touch off highly combustible unconscious issues within each other, stirring up emotions and reactions which surprise you both. "But I didn't know that about him," you may say later. Or perhaps you really did know, but the glow of the initial intoxication obscured your own instinctive knowledge. A First Look We shall look first at what has drawn you together. You may recognise in the initial overview an attraction of temperaments which you have met before in other relationships. This is because all of us instinctively seek in another what we feel we are missing within ourselves, and if one relationship fails to provide it then we will continue to seek that sustenance from the next. But your bond with your partner is unique, for you and Bill are the highly individual human substances whose mysterious chemical interaction may ultimately change you both. A Romantic and a Philosopher Because you possess a volatile, imaginative and romantic temperament, you will inevitably be drawn to your partner's own fine imagination and intuitive gifts. The two of you share a similar sense of colour, adventure and spirit, and both of you in your individual ways contribute excitement, meaning and a vision of future possibilities to the relationship. Neither of you is especially willing to play the sensible stabiliser in the partnership, and although the result may be occasionally chaotic, your life together is not likely to be boring. You are also attracted to your partner's intellectual abilities, and are probably deeply admiring of what you see as his greater capacity for perspective, detachment and organised thinking; for you are by nature much more subjective, tending to react to most situations in a highly personal, inunediate and often emotional way. Bill in turn needs your warmth, enthusiasm and responsiveness to help thaw his innate emotional restraint, for in this sphere your partner is likely to experience considerable awkwardness in expressing his feelings. Thus you are each an excellent complement for the areas in which the other sometimes feels uncomfortable or constrained. However, your admiration of your partner's mental gifts may also be accompanied by considerable resentment at his apparent emotional coolness and inaccessibility, while he may feel your strong emotions and highly personal reactions are sometimes a little overpowering or invasive. But with care and effort, your partner can learn a great deal from you about emotional expressiveness and spontaneity, while you can learn a lot from him about detachment, separateness, and a more objective perspective about life. 2. Heart and Body The most obvious way in which you and Bill affect each other is through the activation of each other's emotions and desires. Although such a mutual stirring of feelings and passions may not always be comfortable or harmonious, nevertheless even through conflict this activation of heart and body gives life, energy and excitement to the attraction between you. Caution, Inflammable Substance Strong passions and intense irritation are both likely to erupt between you and Bill. Your emotional response to him is a tense although exciting mixture of desire and annoyance, and the line between anger and passion can easily become blurred between you. It is as though you both long to "win" your partner as an object of desire, and at the same time want to change him to fit your image; and he may feel intensely wanted sometimes and rather battered and bullied at other times. He is also quite capable of unconsciously being extremely provocative in several senses of the word, arousing your desire and then doing or saying precisely the thing which will inflame your temper. Your partner needs your abundant physical energy and enthusiasm, and he is warmed and vitalised by the strength of your feelings; but there is something about his overcautious pragmatism which not only attracts you, but also makes you want to quarrel. Bill may often feel pushed around, but he may also need to take his share of responsibility for helping to invoke the quarrel, rather than feeling sorry for himself and trying to make you feel guilty. There is a highly stimulating and exciting current running between you which serves as a powerful sexual stimulus, and if you can both keep your sense of humour, you can avoid some of the more aggressively theatrical manifestations of overload. Bewitched Your partner is likely to feel enchanted, bewitched and often baffled by your delicious elusiveness. There is a chameleon-like trait in your personality which Bill both invokes and is highly attracted to; and it may seem to him at times that you embody every romantic ideal he has ever longed for. Yet when he tries to pin you down in order to make this dream of perfect love a reality, somehow you keep slipping away from him or unwittingly disappointing him, as though the whole thing had been a fantasy. The sense of a mystical soul-union is likely to be very strong between you in the initial stages of the relationship, yet it seems to keep receding out of reach whenever the two of you try to anchor it in everyday life. It is as though Bill has fallen in love with his fantasy of who you are, and something in you needs this adoring love in order to feel needed and real; and therefore you unconsciously try to play the part he has written for you, even though the role may be too exalted and perfect. Your partner is more than a little in love with the romantic way in which you court him, because he can project his deepest romantic dreams onto you like a photographic plate. And you badly need his innate integrity and kindness because it seems to dissolve all loneliness and pain, and returns you to some magical Paradise Garden of the spirit. But the attraction between you has too large a component of fantasy and enchantment in it, and there is so much self-deception and need to please on both your parts that you may, unconsciously and unwillingly, badly let each other down by trying so hard to be something you are not and then resenting the effort. The magic between you is delightful but may not be quite what you think it is, and you both need ground under your feet in order to avoid your unreal dreams collapsing in disillusionment. Love Among the Carnivores You and Bill invoke a powerful erotic intensity in each other. Your partner is fascinated by your emotional depth and passion, and is probably in love not only with you but also with your almost obsessive desire for him, because this makes him feel attractive, lovable and worthwhile. You in turn experience an intense and possessive desire for his courtesy and offer of genuine friendship, and you may easily become quite jealous at the idea that you might have to share him in any way. The attraction between you is rich, vital and also extremely combustible because of its intensity, for you may react to your strong feelings by fighting to retain control over your partner. He may sometimes feel as though he is being subjected to highly manipulative behaviour - such as your making him feel jealous and insecure - but it may be very difficult for you to see, and for him to formulate, just what is going on and why he should feel that way, because it all happens covertly and through atmosphere as much as actions. If the two of you cannot be honest about the intense mutual need and vulnerability you arouse in each other, and if you indulge yourselves in too much manipulation and gameplaying, you may wind up in a power battle which destroys the relationship and leaves a lot of angry, vindictive feelings behind in you both. There is deep passion running between you which could transform and enrich both your lives; but passion makes all human beings feel vulnerable because of the sense of being out of control. You and Bill cannot afford to play games with each other's emotions, because the potential rewards of the relationship are too great, and the potential destructiveness too unpleasant. Underworld Pursuits The sexual chemistry between you and Bill is likely to be extremely intense, and - if you are unaccustomed to such strong emotion - it can feel somewhat threatening because of the sense of not being in control of your own feelings. Your direct and energetic way of going after what you want is both highly attractive to your partner and very challenging at the same time; for you invoke feelings of possessiveness and extreme need in him which can drive him into inadvertently trying to gain control over the relationship (and himself) through manipulative power games which create frustration and insecurity in you. These ploys are not likely to be deliberate or thought out, but are a reflection of the anxiety which such strong passion may arouse in anyone unfamiliar with it. If your partner unconsciously falls into such behaviour, he will inevitably arouse resentment in you, particularly because it may be hard for you to formulate exactly what is going on. At the worst extreme, such power games between you can lead to considerable anger, bitterness and poisonous atmospheres, and might destroy the relationship in the end. But this kind of intense attraction is a rare and potentially beautiful experience; and if you are both willing to open yourselves to the vulnerability which passion inevitably creates, the richness and intensity of the chemistry between you can transform you both, releasing many blocks and inhibitions, and deepening your insight into yourselves and each other. Rites of Spring The sexual attraction between you and Bill is likely to be very intense, and neither of you is going to want to loiter about postponing the day of fulfilment. What you have is the stuff of romantic novels, and certainly in the initial stages of the relationship you are likely to be very much in love (and lust) with each other. To you, your partner's grace, courtesy and civilised values epitomise all that is lovable and desirable, and it is probable that you have, overtly or covertly, initiated the sexual dimension of the relationship with a full-scale courtship in the grand old style. To Bill, you are the ideal lover who makes him feel attractive, desired and beloved, and he is especially fascinated by your enthusiastic and adventurous approach to romance. His admiration feeds your sense of strength and confidence, while your desire feeds his sense of self-worth. Whatever the outcome of the relationship, the erotic and romantic feelings are likely to run high (at least for a time), for you are also both attracted to the other's sexual style, and have an instinctive understanding of how to please each other.
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