Redefining Love, Affection, Desire, Passion, Emotion and Eros

We First Choose, Then We Feel or Not

2012-02-02T13:19:00.001-08:00

(Important Note: Each post in this blog builds on the previous postings. If you are new to this blog it is strongly recommended that you initially read the posts in order from oldest to the most current.)

Eros is manifested in our lives by a need for connection with objects of our affection. We feel affection by looking for the value/beauty in the object of our affection. Once we perceive the value/beauty we then feel affection which causes us to desire greater connection or in other words greater intimacy.

I recently realized that I was making the decision as to whether I was going to look for value/beauty or look for weakness in my wife before I even begin to perceive her. So it is not the attractiveness or desirability of my wife that determines whether I feel affection for my wife or not, I make the decision as to whether or not I am even going to try to feel affection for my wife before I even look at or think about her!

So what are the reasons for deciding to look for weakness instead of value/beauty?

Fear of incest

Fear of rejection

Egocentric need for perfection

FEAR OF INCEST

I think I mentioned earlier a bumper sticker which says that after you have been married a while you find you are in bed with a relative. Closeness to your partner makes them a relative and if you used a perspective of seeking weakness to prevent your feeling physical affection for your relatives (which you thought was sexual desire) then you will automatically apply this attitude of weakness-seeking to your perceiving of your partner to prevent this affection from arising.

I believe we can overcome this by doing the following:

Realize that what you are feeling is not sexual desire but rather physical affection. It is the degree and nature of your expression of the affection you feel that you need to keep within the bounds the relationship dictates. You kiss and hug your relatives to express your affection but you allow greater intimate expression (sexual expression) with your spouse.

Allow yourself to feel physical affection for all your family members. You may need to look at pictures of your mother, father and siblings when they were younger and think of them as just people first. See the physical beauty that shows through and allow your self to feel the mild pleasure of physical affection.

FEAR OF REJECTION

Many of us feel we are generally inferior as human beings. We may not have a perfect body or we may think we are not that smart or we believe we have any other real or imagined weakness. I felt just plain inferior to almost everyone I met. This belief in one's inferiority will hinder one from wanting to be connected because if you become connected the one you connect with will see your true, "inferior" self. You will fear being rejected.

Another important aspect arises from the higher priority you place on other people's opinions rather than your own. Since you are inferior, their opinions are more correct than yours so you fear their negative opinion of you because you will believe them more than you believe yourself. So if you are intimate with them they will see your weakness whether true or not and you will be devastated if they express it to you. So you decide before hand that you do not want to be intimate with them. You do this by turning on your weakness-seeking mode instead of your value-seeking mode.

Since fear of rejection is a function of ego, part of the solution will be found in the following section, however one of the most important activities is feeling physical affection for yourself, for your body. The more you love yourself, the more you will feel like connecting with others.

EGOCENTRIC NEED FOR PERFECTION

The ego is the degree to which we identify with the self (Physical & Spiritual Bodies). Our core identity, our true identity is consciousness itself which is one and the same in all of use. We are simply consciousness or awareness or more correctly, the light of truth. If we believe that our primary existence is this self then we will seek to satisfy and protect it to the exclusion of others. In other words the more our primary identity becomes wrapped up in the self the more we will be concerned with self to the exclusion of others. People then become objects to satisfy our needs rather than a part of our bigger, true identity.

The selfish person will seek the most perfect being to be their intimate partner. A selfish person's love becomes lopsided. Remember that love is composed of affection and charity. Love becomes corrupted and selfish when it only consists of the affection component. Without the a sense of connection with all mankind one will not care for their well being and thus will have no charity. Egoic individuals care for the wellbeing of others only to the extent that it serves themselves.

You overcome this egocentric tendency by seeing what ego really is and by putting it in its place. The ego is really just an idea that has no real substance. The ego is the idea that my primary being is this self. Through meditation and prayer one can come to see that the ego is really no-thing. You are therefore nothing as an individual. That is, there is no you inside your bodies. What you are is the seeing of things and since things are the seeing of them, you are all things. Putting ego in its place is humility. You need to humble your ego. This does not mean you do not have self respect. Your self (body and spirit) is the greatest of all creations. Your soul is the creator's attempt to recreate himself (male and female).

So you are actually three. You are primarily awareness, you are secondarily a creation, a soul (body & spirit), and finally you are the idea of self as an individual (ego). Ego needs to be brought low so that your true identity as the light of truth that is in and through all things is revealed. You do not eliminate ego altogether. You just put it in its place. You cannot do without ego. Without ego there is no one to have joy, pleasure etc. So the ego exists just so that it exists. In other words me only exists so that me exists. The most perfect way of expressing this is "I am that I am".

So from one perspective (ego) you are less than the dust of the earth (because you are only an idea without substance). From another perspective you are and object, a creation but the greatest of all creations, a son/daughter of God. And finally the most important and primary perspective, your true and primary identity, is the light of truth, consciousness itself, awareness itself, eternal, having never been created and never ending, and therefore invulnerable.

So to overcome the ego you put it in its place. This can be done as follows:

Meditate on your own nothingness, on humility and on ego. Meditation reveals the truth and integrates your knowledge in the unconscious mind and thus matures ego.
See the beauty/value in all people (their souls). See that they are above you (the ego), equal to you (because of the divine potentiality of self), below you (because the light of truth is above all and is one).
Once you feel affection for them, express it by serving them, by giving your valuable/beautiful self to them as a servant, as a leader, as a lover, etc.

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Most Important Activity

2012-01-21T10:11:00.000-08:00

This post is about the most important activity for gaining and increasing affection.

Who is in the body is more important than anything with regard to affection. You feel affection for the hand, the foot, the neck, etc. of a person because of who you perceive they are. If you see a beautiful hand and see that it belongs to Adolph Hitler you will probably not feel affection for that hand. You must perceive the spirit or character of the person before you will feel affection. Therefore you must meditate upon them because that is the way you see the truth of any object or person. If your affection is diminishing or has gone for an individual then you are not taking the time to perceive that which is whole, good, beautiful, virtuous, etc. in that individual.

Meditation is simply the act of putting your awareness upon something and holding it there long enough to see its truth, meaning, etc. It is not thinking about the object, but only perceiving it. Thoughts will arise. Notice them and let them pass on, and then continue your task which is to keep your awareness upon the object of your affection.

“What if I see ugliness or weakness?” you may ask. As you meditate on them you will see weakness. "Weakness in others is temporary! Strength, virtue, and beauty are permanent!". Since weakness is temporary then it should be minimized and dismissed.

“How can you say this?” you may ask. “How can you say that weakness is temporary.” We are creative beings and when we imagine something, our creative faculties will all, automatically be employed to bring it about to the extent that we put our faith into that imagination. If you think “Oh he/she will never change” then you are contributing to that becoming true. To be happy we need to constantly be imagining the future as becoming or containing everything good and beautiful so that we are constantly manifesting that which is good, beautiful, abundant, etc.

We must continually be exercising faith that our loved one will continue to progress until they are perfectly whole! Don’t you think that this is why we are here; to learn and grow and become all that we can be.

Put your faith into your loved one that he/she will continue through their experiences in life to grow toward wholeness. If they don’t, well, “It is better to have loved and lost then never to have loved at all”. Doing everything you can to help your loved one become all he/she is capable of being is the only worthy course.

We therefore minimize the temporary weakness and maximize the permanent strength, virtue, and beauty of our loved one in our meditation. We need to exercise faith that they are going to become everything we desire them to be. The weaknesses will, bit by bit, one day, go away. If they don’t, then at least you have not contributed to the fact that the weaknesses are still there and I believe you will find another who is everything you imagined your loved one to be. We are ultimately meant to get everything we desire.

To feel/increase affection for your loved one you just need to mediate on your loved one. Close your eyes and meditate on their image. Better yet open your eyes and meditate on them by watching their image and their activity. Observe and cherish the beautiful and good; ignore and dismiss the negative because they are temporary. Imagine and/or feel the whole, beautiful, virtuous being that they are becoming and one day will be. They will be and are therefore irresistible, kissable, lovable, etc.

If you do this you will be drawn to be more intimate with them and to express love for them. They will feel valued, loved, and of worth and therefore will be motivated to be a better companion, friend, lover, etc.

Having a hard time seeing the beauty? You may want to take a picture of your loved one when they were young and in a more visibly whole state of being. The beauty you see in the youthful photo is still there it is just hidden by temporary weakness.

So what is the most important activity with regard to affection? It is to look. It is to perceive with faith all that is desirable in them now and realize that one day they will blossom into a whole, irresistible being. See the beauty that is there and feel that more is to come.

To Summarize

2011-10-22T12:31:00.000-07:00

This entry is a summary of some of the key ideas I have presented in this blog.

First of all my definition of affection is key. Affection is simply the feeling we get when we perceive something of value in an object or person. There are all kinds of affections. The nature of the feeling depends on what characteristic(s) of the person or object one is perceiving. The feeling I get when I see the physical beauty of the eyes of a person is different from the feeling I get when I view a virtue in an individual such as kindness. Also the nature as well as the intensity of our affections depend on what we value and how much we value.

Love is the combination of affection and charity. By charity I mean the attitude and feeling of caring for the wellbeing of an individual. This aspect of love causes us to be concerned if an individual is happy or not, healthy or not, etc. So love is both the value we feel for various characteristics of the person (affections) and the attitude of caring for that person (charity). At this point I believe it is as simple as that.

Eros is the foundation of all desire. Eros is the need to return to the source or primary element from which we come. Eros manifests itself in us as a strong desire for union. This need is irresistible. Everything we seek to do is an act of union and is an attempt to return to the source; to fill our imperative need.

Affection is the filter we use to determine what and who we will satisfy the need for union (Eros) with. The result of affection is a desire for greater union; greater intimacy. Affection for another human being causes one to desire to get closer, to touch, to embrace, to kiss.

I define physical affection as affection for the physical aspect of an individual; for their body. Beautiful eyes, lips, face, arms, etc. generate the emotion of physical affection which the world thinks is sexual desire. It is not sex desire, it is erotic desire. The feeling a man feels when he sees the body of a beautiful woman is physical affection and is not necessarily lust. It is not a sexual feeling. Physical affection can lead to sexual stimulation and expression but it does not need to.

Many of the problems with intimacy within marriage stem from our belief that we should not feel pleasurable feelings from looking at and touching the bodies of members of the family except a husband or wife. This is a problem because if a man is repulsed by the body of his mother, he will eventually become repulsed at the body of his wife because she takes the place of his mother as one of her roles.

It wasn't till I felt physical affection for my mother that I had a complete, wholesome love for her. This also relates to my relationship with other members of my family.

Another intimacy problem stems from the fact that we become one with our spouse in such a way that we will treat our spouses body just as we do our own. If you are repulsed by your own body you may eventually become repulsed by your spouses.

Since affection is based on perceived value, the ability to retain and/or change our values is very important. The more value we place on our spouse, the more affection we will feel for them. We can change our values by meditating and pondering. Meditation is simply focusing our attention on one thing. When focus on or have 'an eye single' to one particular object or person we will see the true value of that object or person. Pondering is thinking about. As we ponder things our values shift.

We sometimes forget the value we originally placed on our spouse. We must look again at our spouse without any preconceived ideas. We must look with a meditate state of mind. Just look without thinking. At other times think about his or her value. It is just a matter of not seeing the value that is there. We get in a mode of taking them for granted instead of seeing clearly.

2011-08-15T18:03:00.000-07:00

What prevents one from feeling affection? What causes affection that once existed to decrease or disappear?

To answer this we must first look to what affection is. Affection is the feeling we get when we perceive something of value in something or someone. Affection therefore is not present when we do not perceive value. We do not perceive value for the following reasons:

• The object or person has lost their value

• We can no longer see the value

• What we valued before is no longer of as great a value to us (our values have changed)

• We for some reason we do not value this characteristic in this particular person or object even though we do value it in others

• We block ourselves from seeing the characteristic or value of the characteristic in this particular person or object for some reason

• Negative feelings/thoughts override the value

• We are in the habit of looking for the negative in the person or object (we are prejudiced or that is just the way we view people or we are trying to validate our own worth by seeing the weaknesses in others)
The object or person has lost their value

We may have valued the physical beauty of our spouse when we first married but now the physical beauty has faded somewhat. Although the affection in some may grow cold for this faded aspect of their spouse, others, remembering and feeling gratitude for the beauty that once was and the pleasure it gave, still feel affection as if the beauty is still there.

We no longer see the value
One reason we no longer see the value is that we no longer look. We tend to remember our abstracted definition of the object of our affection instead of seeing them directly. You can look at a tree and think 'oh, a tree' and then move on without seeing the tree anew. You just pulled up your stored abstract definition of a tree to identify it and you did not actually let your senses rest on the object unobstructed by your generalized definition of a tree. We tend to look at the new things but only remember the things we have had around for a while. To remedy this, one has but to see again. We think we know our spouse so we don't look anymore we remember an abstracted image of our spouse. To see instead of remember we need to put our awareness upon the object of our affection and not allow any judgment from the past to come up, just look. If you just look and let whatever affections arise you are truly seeing. Look for that which is of value to you. Let your eyes rest upon the object of your affection until you perceive the inherent beauty.

A principle of meditation is that you put your awareness on something and hold it there without any thought. If you can hold your focus on an object it's true nature will become clear to you and any beauty/value will become apparent and thus affections will arise.
What we valued before is no longer of as great a value to us (our values have changed)

As many of us mature we begin to value things and characteristics differently. For example where we may have placed a lot of value on physical beauty in our youth but now we might care more about an affable companion and the beauty of the spirit of an individual. Our values may become more 'spiritual' more mature or they could even erode and become more base.
We for some reason we do not value this characteristic in this particular person or object even though we do value it in others

Our spouse could be as if not more beautiful or handsome as another, but for some reason we do not value it in our spouse! I have discussed some of the reasons for this in other postings.
We block ourselves from seeing the characteristic or value of the characteristic in this particular person or object

If we become offended by someone, we may minimize their good features that would otherwise produce affection in us.
Negative feelings/thoughts override the value

When I went through my divorce I found no beauty and therefore no affection in anything. I used to love looking at the mountains as I drove to work, but for a while after my divorce they and many other things produced no affection in me and actually produced an oppressive feeling.
We are in the habit of looking for the negative in the person or object (we are prejudiced or that is just the way we view people or we are trying to validate our own worth by seeing the weaknesses in others)
For whatever reason we have gotten in the habit of looking for the negative in others. We are constantly judging others negatively, not even fairly. We have prejudices that we grew up with. A major problem I see is that because I may feel inferior generally, I am always trying to pull my self image up and at times I may do it by trying to see the weaknesses in others. If I see that someone is not as strong as me then I feel strong. If I make more money than someone else then I feel of value. This immature way of dealing with our own feelings of inadequacy will block us from seeing the value in others because we are not looking for it. We are looking for their deficiencies to build ourselves up.

Only One Kind of Love

2009-09-26T05:54:00.000-07:00

Love is one but there are many affections. My belief is that love is the combination of affection and charity. Affection being the part of love that is an emotional response to the perception of beauty, value or meaning in the object of our affection. Charity being the component of love that causes us to care about the well-being and happiness of the object of our love.

We tend to think that we love our father or mother one way and our spouse in a different way. Really the only difference has to do with what characteristic of our loved one our affection is based on. For example we may put a lot of emphasis on the physical aspect of our spouse but do not put emphasis on the physical aspect of our mother or father. This makes sense since we express our love for our spouse in a more physically intimate way. The extent and nature of the expression of our love is guided by what we believe is appropriate according to the relationship we have with the object of our affection. A problem occurs however when we totally block any affection for the physical aspect of our parents.

The confusion of the feelings of physical affection (emotions that result from perceiving the physical beauty of an individual) with sexual expression causes some of us to repress any affection which is stimulated by our parents bodies. We go so far as to be repulsed by the idea of seeing them naked. So hugging or kissing them becomes a duty rather than a pleasure. By restricting our affection for the physical aspect of our parents we are limiting our love for our parents. We are mistakenly excluding physical affection from our love for our parents.

The difference between the love of my mother and the love of my wife for example should just be the degree of my affection and expression rather what our affection is based on.

To kindle a richer affectionate component of my love for my mother I looked at pictures of her when she was young and considered what my feelings would be for this woman if she were not my mother. I soon found physical affection for my mother and I also found there is a natural boundary to what I feel and how I would express this for my mother.

If I were able to kiss my mother on the lips at this time, the feelings, the affections, the desire would be of the same nature as that which I feel when I kiss my spouse/lover but milder and therefore there is a natural boundary that limits the degree of expression.

The relational role of Mother/Son dictates that I do not go beyond a loving/affectionate kiss into a passionate/intimate kiss as I would my spouse/lover but the feelings the emotions which arise should initially be the same! My mother is a woman and there is a natural physical affection between a man and a woman. My mother is no exception, indeed her physical aspect should be more significant to me than others. There is greater respect for my mother and greater emotional connection than other women I have had no relationship with.

We have become confused in that we think that feelings of physical affection are sexual. We think that the feelings we feel when we enjoy the beauty of the naked body of our lover are sexual, but they are not. They are initially physical affection. Physical affection is the feeling we feel when we see the value, beauty and meaning of the physical body of another. It is felt in the heart and will lead us to want to connect more fully or have union with that body. The relational role dictates the extent and nature of those expressions of union.

If I accidentally see my mother naked I might smile and whistle at her and make an appropriate verbal expression of how beautiful she is. If I see my spouse/lover naked I might express my affection and resulting desire for union through sexual intercourse.

We should stop limiting our love for people and trust that the natural boundaries of proper expression will always be enough to temper our desires.

If one feels that having physical affection for ones parents or siblings is disgusting, all you need to do is stop and observe those feelings with curiosity. Basically, mediate on the feeling. As you do this, eventually that disgust will go away. This is assuming that the feeling of disgust is based on just the false notion that you should not feel physical affection for individuals in your family.

Lust vs Passion

2009-05-17T18:45:00.000-07:00

I think our society confuses lust with passionate desire. Lust is not a basic emotion. It is a combination of emotions. Lust does include passionate or strong desire but it is more than just desire. Lust has another element, another emotion mixed in with the passionate desire.

To determine what this other emotion is, we need to look closely at the nature of lust. When we lust after something we not only feel desire for it but we can’t let it go; we can’t leave it alone. There is an ‘urgency ‘ in lust that is not in desire alone.

When I see a Porsche I feel desire. I wouldn’t mind having a Porsche but currently I can’t afford it so I drop it. If I lust after a Porsche I will not be able to drop it. I will mortgage my house if I have to because I “need” that car or at least I will become depressed because I cannot obtain it.

I contend that the additional emotion that turns desire to lust is fear. I believe lust is the combination of desire for something and the fear of not having it.

Having affection which turns to the desire for greater union which may become passionate desire is one thing but when fear of not having the object of one’s affection enters in you are dealing with lust which is quite another.

Without lust the need for greater union can be sacrificed for the sake of respect for the rights of others and/or your belief’s with regard to right and wrong. Lust is an element of addiction. When we focus our need for union (eros) on just one or a few things in life then the “fear of not having” becomes stronger and thus lust becomes greater and we become more desperate.

Healthy relationships involve passion not lust. We need to stop thinking that passion is lust. Lust is a weakness. Passion is a strength.

Dominion and Submission

2009-05-17T18:24:00.000-07:00

As I have said, there is only one imperative need. It is the need to reunite with our source, with the light of truth, with pure consciousness, with God. This manifests itself as a continual need for union, for union with that for which we have affection be it food, study, people, adventure, etc.

For one object to unite with another one must give and one must receive. That is, if I am uniting with a banana, generally the banana must give its whole being to become one with me. One sacrifices or gives themselves to the other. One must be dominant and one must be submissive. We may try to create this synthesis or this satisfying of the need for union by both coming to some middle ground. This cannot be because you are not uniting with anything. Coming together isn’t uniting because there is no identity that is receiving. Union comes by one becoming a part of another. I don’t think two parts trying to become something else works. One must be the receiver of the other. One must submit to the other. The intensity of passion increases in proportion to the degree of submission or dominion. The more I give myself to another, the greater my passion and satisfaction. The more I receive or dominate another, the more intense the passion and satisfaction. The more affection I have for another (the more I value another), the greater the passion.

Union occurs when there is evidence of union. The one giving their self to the other must become an extension of the will of the receiver. Therefore for this to occur there must be activities that show this union. In the case of food the evidence is quite obvious. The food’s original form is destroyed in order to be consumed by the receiver. With human’s it is a little more complex.

The evidence of union between humans may start with a touch, then a kiss, etc. The intensity of the passion increases as the kiss becomes more intimate, more penetrating. The submissive and dominant roles may swing back and forth between the two so quickly that the fact that one is submitting and one is dominating at a given moment may be hard to see but that is how it works.

I have been saying that we need evidence of union but this is not really correct because the activities or evidence of union aren’t showing union they are union.

The passion obtained from human intimacy is great and easily susceptible to corruption or in other words to abuse. By abuse I mean when the need for union or erotic desire turns to lust. When the element of “the fear of not having” enters into it, the normal desire for union becomes prone to violence. The greater the sacrifice the submissive one makes for the dominant one, the greater the passion if the submission is voluntary. When one suffers pain for another, when one is willing to sacrifice for another the passion involved is increased. This is why a woman may want her lover to be more aggressive with her when making love to her. She wants to feel her submission more deeply.

Have you ever seen two lions mating? The male will bite the female's neck until she submits to him. Her passion is evidently dependant on his forcing her to a degree to show that she is one with him by his even using force to have her.

Trust is critical here. A woman who is forced by a man she does not trust is the same as a woman being raped. Rape is not erotic union because it is one sided. True erotic union comes when one gives and one receives. If one takes there is no true union. It is an illusion, it is false and it is abuse.

This need to see evidence of union is the foundation of sadism and masochism. The evidence of submission is the pain one inflicts and the other experiences, allowing the other to have this power over them. The fulfillment which they both receive is erotic (not sexual). One becomes the property or extension of the other. Sex might be used as a way of intensifying the union but it is not the main catalyst, Eros is.

The proof of union is the fact that the one allows the other to inflict pain on them and they willingly accept. This is the proof of their union. Their passion comes as the evidence of union is demonstrated. And again, the evidence of union is the union.

This fulfillment can be had at any time and with wholesome productive activities. We have not learned to do this. We don’t really give ourselves when we serve. We serve only to show that we are good or we think we are supposed to serve to be a good person. Our reward is that we now feel like a good person. Perhaps we feel the good feeling of helping someone in need. But there is more. To fully serve you must give yourself to the other. You become an extension of them. You bend to their needs, their will. True service is an act of passion.

We have long attached eros to sexual activity. Eros is just as valid in service. Discovering how to obtain this is one of my current goals. Somehow eros must be attached to more things. Many of the addictive problems of our society are due to the narrow range of things we attach eros to. A drug addict obtains their sense of union only from drugs. They cannot seem to attach it to anything else. One who has extinguished all capacity for satisfying eros will seek suicide or just wait in a numb stupor for death to come for that is the only way left, as they see it subconsciously, to satisfy the ultimate, imperative need to reunite with their source.

Normal vs Gay

2009-02-22T14:23:00.000-08:00

With my new definition of physical affection, meaning that it is the feeling we feel when we see the beauty and value of the human body, we can look at the issue of having physical affection for the body of someone of the same gender with a new perspective.

Because we have erroneously labeled the emotions of physical affection as “sexual” we may feel repulsed at the body of someone of the same gender because we don’t feel it appropriate to have “sexual” feelings for someone of the same gender. On the other hand those who yield to their feelings of affection make the mistake that the next logical step is sexual expression since these are “sexual” feelings. I suspect that the “homophobic” nature of many in the U.S. is from this incorrect identification of physical affection with sexual expression.

Physical affection leads to a desire for union (Eros). Therefore physical affection is “erotic” (not sexual) in nature and leads to a desire for increased intimacy. It leads to a touch, a kiss, a hug. Kissing and hugging someone of the same gender seems to have been more normal in the past than it is now.

When Judas betrayed Jesus he did it with a kiss. Jesus questioned him about it, showing how ironic it was that Judas would use something that was so special to betray him. It appears that kissing between men, at least with Jesus, was not only normal but special.

In the bible David indicated that he had great love for Jonathan the son of Saul. At the death of Saul and Jonathan, David lamented with the following words: “I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan: very pleasant hast thou been unto me: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women” (2 Samuel 1:26).

Did David’s love for Jonathan involve physical affection? In 1 Samuel 20:41 it says “…David arose out of a place toward the south, and fell on his face to the ground, and bowed himself three times: and they kissed one another, and wept one with another,..” (1 Sam 20:41). Again it appears in the past it was natural for men to kiss one another out of love and affection for each other.

I doubt that there was anything sexual about their love but I am sure it involved physical affection since their love exceeded that between a man and a woman. It doesn’t seem logical that physical affection was not part of it.

We have lost our “natural” affection for those of the same gender out of fear of sexual intimacy. Physical affection for one of the same gender is not abnormal nor does it have to lead to sexual expression. Indeed, if we do not have the capacity for physical affection for human beings of both genders, I believe we are lacking, we are not whole. The repulsion I felt for the bodies of other males is indicative of the confusion of sexual desire and the mild erotic feelings that are generated by physical affection.

Remember

2009-02-18T12:10:00.000-08:00

If my definition of affection as simply the emotion we feel when we see value, beauty or meaning in someone or something, is correct, then we lose affection by simply no longer seeing value, beauty or meaning in the object of our affection. I have found the very simple act of looking at the person I have lost affection for and re-experienceing what it was that inspired my affection in the past rekindles some of that feeling. This isn’t a thinking thing it's a perceiving thing. You just watch the person you have had affection for in the past and allow yourself to see what it is that you saw before.

We tend to not have as much affection after being with someone for a long time simply because we are not paying as much attention to them as we did initially. The same things that we loved about them are probably still there. We just need to pay attention.

If you think they have lost what it was that inspired you before, you are probably wrong. I will talk more about this later, but even if your affection was inspired by physical beauty and that beauty has faded your original affection was probably not for the form alone. The form of a human being is of value only because of the person inside. You aren’t attracted to the body by itself. The body has meaning and beauty because of who is in it or who you imagine is in it. When someone dies they no longer have the attraction that existed when they inhabited the body, only to the extent one imagines the person still being in the body.

Naked Nurturing

2009-01-20T18:38:00.000-08:00

One of the most effective therapies for me with regard to feeling better regarding my body was what I call “Naked Nurturing”.

Previously I mentioned how as a child we look to our parents for approval of our bodies when we are naked before them. I believe Children love to show their bodies off. I think they do this because they naturally know the beauty and sacred nature of their bodies and are excited to show others and also because they are looking for validation. Children look for validation that they (which they do not distinguish from their bodies) are OK, are beautiful and are desirable.

I once was doing an assignment for my church. I went to a house in my neighborhood to speak to a member regarding a church matter. When I got to the door it was not closed but was ajar. I rang the doorbell and soon heard the sound of little bare feet heading toward the door. Two completely naked little girls about 3 and 5 years old appeared at the door. They had just come from a bath. They looked at me giggling and then ran off. It is obvious to me that children naturally love to be naked and love to show their bodies.

My belief is that many of us were not blessed with parents that freely felt physical affection for our bodies as children. When we ran around the room naked feeling wonderfully free our parents may have unwittingly stifled our freedom and gave us the feeling that there was something wrong with being naked and perhaps even instilled a feeling of shame or disgust regarding our naked bodies.

Around the time I was divorced a friend of mine who had many health problems had, at the advice of another friend, gotten a massage. I thought I might like getting a massage so I asked her who the therapist was and made an appointment. In the past I might not have had the nerve to get a massage but through my Holosync® therapy (mentioned in a previous post) I had become more confident and less fearful about being close to others. I even looked forward to it with a degree of excitement.

The massage therapist was a woman in her forties. She was friendly and pleasant. She left the room while I got completely undressed and lay down under a sheet. Her touch was delicious. She showed gentleness, firmness and affection in her touch. I came out of that first massage session floating on a cloud. It was not just the physical stimulation of having my body worked on but it was an emotional stimulation. I was being nurtured in a way that had never happened before. I felt emotionally whole immediately after the massage.

I have found that good massage therapists love their jobs. They have special regard for the human body. They would not stay in the profession if they did not enjoy what they do; if they did not enjoy working on naked bodies.

What I felt was a warm nurturing feeling. I felt accepted. I went to this therapist several times and she told me she enjoyed working on me. This made me feel even better about my own body. My body wasn’t an ugly thing. I am in my fifties and I am not much to look at but I felt I was desirable. I got emotional benefit as well as physical benefit from her nurturing touch.

I have since gone to many different therapists. I always ask them if they like what they do. As I have said, the best therapists are the ones that enjoy their work the most. They are also the ones whose strokes have an affectionate feel to them. They are not just rubbing your muscles in a cold medicinal way. They touch you like your mother or father should have touched you. They touch you with the feelings that your mother or father should have had for you and your body when they bathed you, dried you off or gave you a back rub. I believe a good massage therapist is not only technically knowledgeable and skilled but also feels physical affection for the person’s body as they work on them.

An affectionate massage is “naked nurturing”.

Holosync®

2009-01-18T20:15:00.000-08:00

I would like to make mention here of the most powerful tool I have found for emotional change. This is a little off the subject but it is important that I mention it here.

I had gone through life consistently feeling anxiety and depression. Therapists provided interesting ideas but I was aware of most of them already from reading all the self help books. Ultimately traditional therapies were of little help. I had success with antidepressants but never felt quite normal because of side affects and never liked the idea of being dependant on drugs for an extended period of time.

At the time of my divorce the level of my anxiety increased to the point that I was unproductive at work. My family practitioner prescribed the drug Celexa. This seemed to help with the anxiety and the depression to a degree but life was still miserable.

A friend of mine introduced me to a technology called Holosync® that changed my life completely. Within a few days of listening to the Holosync® CDs I was experiencing changes in my sleeping and in my emotional state. In about a year I cut my Celexa dosage in half. After another six months I eliminated the Celexa altogether. I had become anxiety free!

I still feel down at times but it is more of a normal sadness because my life wasn’t going the way I would like or some other negative event in my life has occurred. I do not stay sad for long and am not incapacitated as I was in the past. I have had no need for any kind of drug to control anxiety or depression for the past six years and do not believe I will ever need any drug again for depression or anxiety.

I think more rationally and find myself freely conversing with people where before I always felt uncomfortable with strangers or in groups of people. Holosync® did all of this. I am now hearing of therapists using this technology for their clients with mental issues and also that the therapists are using it themselves.

This has helped me in many ways with regard to regaining affections as well as giving me consistent peace of mind unlike anything I have ever had in my entire life. The web site to find out more about this is http://www.centerpointe.com/. I am not trying to sell this product but only offer it as one of the best methods for reducing anxiety and depression.

Passion

2009-01-02T15:14:00.000-08:00

This is a review and the addition of one more element, the emotion generated when the need for union is being satisfied.

1. Affection is the emotion you feel when you perceive someone or something of value, beauty or meaning to you.

2. This affection causes the need for union (Eros) to kick in and to produce desire. Desire is simply the urge to unite. I have mentioned “erotic” desire but I am thinking that erotic desire and desire are the same thing. Is there are desire that is not the urge to unite; the urge for greater intimacy?

3. We then engage in activities to accomplish union (greater intimacy) such as talking, listening, kissing, reading, thinking, eating, smelling, touching, etc. which produces pleasure.

Pleasure is the emotion we feel as we accomplish union with something of value to us or in other words, as we satisfy the primary need. Passion is the emotion we feel when we are accomplishing union with something of great value to us. Just a side note: the things that are greatest in value are things that are sacred to us.

Because of misunderstanding we think we are obtaining fulfillment from the nature of the thing valued when it is simply that we have put into the object of our affection the need for union or in other words we have allowed our need for union to be satisfied by the object of value. The pleasure isn’t really in the thing itself but rather in the fulfilling of our need for union.

We think that the pleasure we receive from eating something that tastes good is from the taste itself, but this is not true. The pleasure comes from the accomplishment of union with a food that we value highly because of the taste. We have allowed ourselves to be satisfied (our need for union to be satisfied) by the particular food. The better the taste the more we allow our need for union to be satisfied and it follows that we feel greater pleasure.

The nature of the fulfillment (pleasure/passion) is colored by what is valued but the pleasure is actually generated by the satisfaction of the need for union.

Sleeping with Yourself

2008-12-03T12:24:00.000-08:00

I saw the following bumper sticker recently : "Marriage changes passion...suddenly you're in bed with a relative". This bumper sticker expresses my next point to a degree. I would, however, alter it to say “Marriage changes passion… suddenly you’re in bed with yourself”.

The apostle Paul makes this statement in Ephesians 5:28 in the Bible:

“So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.”

The Bible reiterates the “love thy neighbor as thy self” principle several times. This idea of loving others as yourself I believe is actually quite a natural phenomena. That is, I believe we automatically treat others and view others as ourselves as we become more familiar with them or in other words as we become more one with them.

Our spouses especially are subject to this. We become closer to them than anyone else. The closer we get the more we become one and the more we are likely to treat our spouse as ourselves and view their bodies the way we view our own. Our spouse becomes an extension of our own body.

As I became aware that I did not feel positive feelings about my own body I struggled to change my attitude. I found quickly that the more I cherished and had affection for my own body, allowing a degree of “erotic” (not sexual) desire for myself, the more I desired my wife. This wasn’t easy though. I still struggle with my more habitual feelings of apathy and dislike for my body, but it is obvious to me that having physical affection for my own body was imperative to my capacity to have whole feelings of physical affection, and therefore whole love, for my spouse as we became closer.

Boundaries

2008-11-08T11:30:00.000-08:00

How do we determine what is sexual versus what is erotic? It’s simpler than you think. Just look at where the feeling is coming from: chest = erotic, loins = sexual. This is how I discovered that there was a difference between erotic and sexual, by noticing that they came from two different locations in my body. I cannot emphasize the importance of this distinction enough.

If it is true, it reconciles those who say we must be chaste with those who say we must be more intimate. They can both be right. Sexual always begins with erotic but erotic does not have to lead to sexual expression. Sexual is always erotic. Erotic is not necessarily sexual.

The warm affection which we feel for the physical body of another is initially not sexual, regardless of the age or gender of the person. Once we understand this important distinction we have greater control over our expressions of intimacy.

The lines between what is proper in our expressions of affection and what is not become clearer when we can clearly identify the distinctions between affection, erotic desire and sexual desire

New Feelings for My Mother

2008-11-05T11:09:00.000-08:00

Generally we have a whole host of affections for human beings which are mixed together. When we look at our own mother or father we feel various affections. All I am saying is that if we feel nothing or even repulsion for their physical bodies as a man or woman then we are leaving one affection component out.

Again, many of us have cut off this physical affection or even put a negative feeling in its place to protect us from thinking of our parents in a “sexual” way. I didn't allow myself to enjoy the feel of my mother’s soft back when I gave her a hug; or the softness of her lips as I kissed her. Basically I didn’t even consider her a woman. She was something else she was my mom not a beautiful woman.

As I began to see the distinction between sexual and erotic, I began to allow myself to see my mother as a woman. I looked at old pictures of her and let myself feel warm feelings of physical affection for her as a woman. My mother had passed away but I longed to hold her and tell her I love her; to feel her body pressed to mine in the warm embrace of a mother and son.

As the distinction between sexual and erotic became clearer for me, so did the boundaries that are a natural part of relationships. My relationship with my mother, my enjoyment of her physically of course would never have gone beyond a hug, a kiss, a backrub. These expressions even though only imagined, since my mother had passed away, made my love for her more whole. Physical affection adds greatly to all our relationships with other human beings.

The caring love I had for my mother was enhanced by the warmth of my physical affection. When I feel affection for a person’s physical aspect as well as loving them, I am not only telling a person that I care about them but that I value them, that they are desirable just because they are a human being with a body.

Erotic vs Sexual

2008-11-03T11:01:00.000-08:00

The perception of beauty, value or meaning leads to affection, then affection leads to desire for intimacy. I am calling the desire for intimacy eros. If I want to say something has the quality of eros I would say it is “erotic”. Here I have a dilemma. I fear that most people think of “sexual” when they hear the word “erotic”. I don’t believe this is correct. Erotic only refers to the desire for union to satisfy the primary need. There are many, many forms of union, sexual relations being only one of them. I will stick with the term “erotic” and will qualify it at times by indicating in parenthesis “(not sexual)”.

To me erotic is not sexual. Sexual has to do with the activities of sex organs between two living beings. Erotic desires can lead to sexual expression but most of the time they will not. We have been conditioned to think erotic feelings are sexual feelings. Erotic feelings are strong and the satisfaction of Eros is very pleasurable. We have, I believe erroneously labeled these feelings “sexual”.

This splitting of the terms “erotic” and “sexual” accomplishes a lot. It narrows what is purely sexual. It allows us to feel physical affection for those of our own family when previously we may have cut those feelings off because we thought they were sexual.

Physical affection for a member of our own family or those we do not currently have close relationships with is mildly “erotic” (not sexual) because it has to do with our attitude toward their physical aspect or physical bodies. Remember, when considering physical affection we are specifically talking about what we feel when we consider the physical aspect of others; in other words the affection triggered by our perceiving their physical bodies. We see their youthful skin, their bright eyes, their beautiful arms etc. There is a natural feeling we feel when considering the inherent beauty of the physical body. It is physical affection which in turn arouses eros, the desire for union. I suspect many have unwittingly cut off these feelings mistakenly thinking they were sexual.

Intimacy

2008-11-02T11:25:00.000-08:00

What the object of our affection is will dictate what the nature of our relationship with that person or object will be. The nature of the relationship will dictate the nature and limits of our expressions of affection or the degree and kind of union we can achieve.

Greater intimacy with food is to smell, taste then eat. Greater intimacy with one of our children might be to hug, kiss or rub their back. So the word intimacy to me simply means greater union.

We can therefore be intimate not only with people but with things. We can be intimate with food, cars, houses, books, etc. These acts of intimacy serve to satisfy the need for union. Affection therefore is our way of determining what we want to have union with. Affections are what indicate to us that an object or person we are perceiving will satisfy Eros; our need for union to some degree. A person’s field or activity that they have passion for is what they have affection for which triggers the most desire for union.

The Critical Question

2008-11-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

There are few questions more important than how we choose to satisfy Eros, the one imperative need. How I satisfy Eros will determine if I am a concert pianist, a couch potato, a mass murderer, a nobel prize winner, etc.

What we put our need for union into is what we spend most of our time doing. To a degree the expression “follow your bliss” is really just saying follow what you feel will satisfy Eros the most.

I suspect that those who are most successful in any given field of endeavor are those who put most of their need for union into that field. This becomes their passion. But what determines what we choose to put our need for union into. What will satisfy Eros most?

To answer to this vital question we need to go back to the main topic of this blog, affection.

What is the response to a feeling of affection? In previous posts I stated that I believe we first see something we value and then we feel an affection. What follows affection is the desire for greater intimacy. Another word for intimacy is union. Intimacy consists of activities that accomplish greater union. Desiring greater intimacy means we want to be more connected to the object of our affection. We want to touch, kiss, drive, buy, study, taste, eat, smell in an attempt to become one with it.

One Imperative Need

2008-10-28T20:08:00.000-07:00

I want to shift gears here and make a rather bold statement: There is only one imperative need. By imperative, I mean irresistibly imperative. You and no one else who has ever lived can resist this need. You can stop eating (you’ll die but you can stop, its been done), you can stop breathing, you can stop loving, etc. but you cannot resist the one imperative need. In fact your body will go on seeking to fulfill this need even long after your dead! All things are subject to this need. All matter is subject to this need. Can you guess what it is?

One of the most obvious examples of this need is sex. This need is the driving force behind sexual expression. It is what makes sex so satisfying. To identify this need all you have to do is look at everything we do and determine the one common element of all our activities. What aspect of our behavior is common to all our activity?

When we eat something we are causing the food to be merged with out body. Our bodies absorb all that they want from the food and discard the rest. When we study a subject we are trying to absorb the subject, to make it part of us. The most obvious aspect about sex is the urge to become one flesh. What is the common characteristic of all of these activities and I believe of all our activities? They are all acts of union. Everything we do is an effort to unite to some degree.

What is this one imperative need? It is the need for union.

Everything you do is an act of union. Your efforts are constantly to unite with the things you desire. Everything we do is either union or separation. When you are separating you are only choosing to not unite any further with the object or person you are separating from. So union seems to be the primary or foundation motivator of all we do, separation only being the cessation of our seeking to fulfill the primary need.

When you die your body will continue to dissolve until it reaches a certain point. Your body like all matter is continually trying to unite with, by returning to, its primary element. A discussion of this primary element is not within the scope of this blog, perhaps in another. You can call the primary element God, consciousness, energy or light and you would probably be right. What is important is that we are made out of this primary element and therefore we feel a constant urge to return to it. This constant urge manifests itself as a desire for union.

It doesn’t matter what we are trying to unite with, it will give some satisfaction if we do. Some things however are more satisfying to unite with than others.

French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist Simone Weil (1909-1943) said the following: "If people were told: what makes carnal desire imperious in you is not its pure carnal element. It is the fact that you put into it the essential part of yourself----the need for Unity, the need for God----they wouldn't believe it. To them it seems obvious that this quality of imperious need belongs to the carnal desire as such. In the same way it seems obvious to the miser that the quality of desirability belongs to gold as such, and not its exchange value."

I first saw this quote in Sam Keen’s book “The Passionate Life: Stages of Loving”. In this book he names this need; he calls it “Eros”. Eros was the first born god of the Greek creation myth arising out of primordial Chaos along with Gaea, the earth.

Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of the English Language makes this statement regarding Eros (the Roman god Cupid): “He was regarded as a capricious child who could not be resisted by either gods or mortals.”

I believe Chaos is a representation of the primary element or the original state of things which I personally believe is light or consciousness itself. As soon as something is formed from Chaos, Eros arises as the urge to go back to Chaos. To put it simply we are all basically made of some primary element and we all feel the urge to return to it. This urge is the foundation of all motivation, all desire.

Affection

2008-10-27T19:44:00.000-07:00

When affection is thought of as being a distinct feeling or a small set of mild, tender feelings I think we relegate it to a less significant place than what it really holds in the whole of what a human being is. To me affection is simply the emotional response we feel when we perceive something of significant value, beauty or positive meaning in someone or something. Therefore there is a whole range of feelings that are “affections”. The nature of the feeling is dependant on the person or object of our affection and the specific characteristic we are observing.

I feel one feeling when I look at my son and contemplate what he means to me. I get another feeling when I look at my wife’s smooth lips. In my belief both feelings are affections. Two different feelings are generated but of interest is the fact that these affections might motivate one to express that affection through the same kind of expression, a kiss.

Does a banana split evoke affection? According to my definition, if you like banana splits, it certainly does! Say you look at a picture of a banana split. If you have never had ice cream, hot fudge, bananas, whipped cream etc. the picture wouldn’t mean much to you, but if you have had experience with banana splits the picture evokes a feeling. The feeling is saying to you that you value banana splits. The feeling is actually an instantaneous summarization of your experiences with banana splits and it tells you this is something that is desirable. Then your system generates a desire; A desire for greater intimacy with a banana split. I will explain my use of the word intimacy in another post, but if you want to taste it, feel it in your mouth and make it a part of you, isn't that intimacy. You want complete union with it, you want to eat it!

Affection can be for food, for people, for houses, for cars, for animals, for anything. We feel affection for that which we value, for that which means something positive to us, for that which is beautiful to us. All affections as I have defined them lead us to desire greater intimacy with the object of our affection. The form and extent of our intimate expressions will of course be limited by the boundaries we have in our hearts related to the type of relationship.

Shame

2008-10-24T12:09:00.000-07:00

A greater understanding as to why my mother may have felt negative about us physically may be obtained by looking at how she felt about her own body. I found out in a rather dramatic way, what my mother’s attitude toward her own body was and which I believe was her attitude toward mine.

My mother had, in her later years, suffered from mental illness on occasion. Most of the time she was fine but from time to time she would have what we termed a "nervous breakdown". It was like she was trying to break out of all her repressed feelings. She would become embarrassingly honest in her behavior. While in one of these breakdowns her inhibitions were gone and she said whatever was on her mind. She would say and do things that were out of character as far as we were concerned. It was actually a time when she was just trying to be herself, to regain her carefree youth.

One night when I was in my early teens, I heard a commotion upstairs and I went to see what was happening. My father and one of my sisters were in my parent’s bedroom with my mother. My mother was having one of her breakdowns. My mother was on the bed completely naked and was very emotional. I was shocked to see her like that but it turned out to be important that I was there because she cried out "I am ashamed of my body!"

The whole experience was very strange but when I reflected on it later what was significant was that my mother’s body was actually not unattractive yet she was ashamed of it. Mom had a negative attitude toward her body and this same attitude, I surmised, was unintentionally directed toward us children in all her interactions with us and became our attitude regarding our own bodies and affected how we viewed ourselves throughout our lives. What is evident to me is that my mother had either no feelings about me physically or maybe even negative feelings.

I do not blame my mother for anything. I am sure she unwittingly picked this attitude up as she was growing up. Who knows where or when it started; probably over generations. I believe many in the United States have been affected by this same issue. I believe there are many who were given either apathetic or negative attitudes toward their bodies. I suspect that many are repulsed by their own bodies. I will discuss what I see as the reasons for this in a later post. It is important to point out that your attitude toward your own body affects your ability to feel and express physical affection. More on this later.

My Body, My Self

2008-10-23T16:00:00.000-07:00

How did this happen? How does one develop physical affection or lose it? There are two perspectives that enter into this and both need to be addressed. First is how I feel about my own body and second how I feel about my mother's body or the bodies of those in my own family.

I have already mentioned how there was a lack of affection for my mother's physical aspect but what about our relationship with our own bodies? How do we develop our attitude about our own bodies? It's simple. Our attitude toward our own body is a reflection of the attitude of our parents towards our bodies! We gain our attitude from the signals and feelings we get from our parents or other people whose opinion we value. If my mother feels and manifests apathy or even disgust regarding my body that is probably the attitude I will adopt.

On one occasion I watched my daughter-in-law bathe my grandson when he was an infant. His eyes were constantly fixed on her face. It seemed he was wondering "what do you think of me mom?" As far as a baby is concerned when he or she is naked it is not just his/her body that is exposed for his or her mother's reaction but it as far as the baby knows it is his/her self.

The reaction of the parent to their child’s body could very well determine how the child comes to feel about themselves as a whole. So what did my mother think of me? I remember when I was a young boy seeing mom bathe my little brother. She seemed stiff and did not seem to enjoy what she was doing. As I look back on this I thought perhaps she had some kind of negative attitude about my little brother’s body. If not a negative attitude at least there was no pleasure in her while bathing my brother. Is this the attitude she had towards me and is this the attitude I have toward my own body? Could this be or am I imagining something that wasn't true?

Mom

2008-10-22T12:34:00.000-07:00

One of the most important clues that indicated I was lacking affection, even in my early childhood, was that I took no pleasure in hugging and kissing my mother. Some might say I didn’t love her. It must be understood that I did "love" my mother. I cared how she felt. I cared that she was happy. I never wanted her to be hurt. I was sad when she was sad and happy when she was happy. I always wanted to be in her company. Isn’t that love? The love I had for my mother is more of an altruist love characterized by empathy. I feel sad when others are sa

d and happy when they are happy. My mother was always caring for our needs and had great empathy for us as well. I probably got my empathy from her.

My mother was unfailing in her responsibilities as a mother. She was valiant in serving her family. So I had gratitude for my mother's sacrifice, for all she did for me. So I felt altruistic love and gratitude for her but does this have anything to do with "physical affection"?

If you have great charity, in my opinion, you have one of the most important virtues a person can obtain to. But charity without affection is not as rich as it could be. A certain warmth is lacking. You feel compassion for someone and you help them but there is not necessarily the warmth of physical affection. Yes, as you contemplate what someone does for you or what they mean to you there might arise in your heart certain warm tender affections. This is not what I mean by physical affection. Physical affection applies specifically to the physical aspect of the person you are feeling affection for.

I am not sure when I realized it, but at some point I knew that I did not take pleasure in hugging my mother. What was missing? It was physical affection. I had somehow been turned off to the inherent beauty and value of my mother as a woman. I did not look at her as I did other women. Even though she was physically attractive I did not allow myself to feel anything regarding her physical being. I tended to look at the weaknesses in her appearance for some reason rather than the beauty. So I was turned off to her physically and and for that matter to the bodies of anyone in my family. I found it easy to enjoy the beauty of women I didn't know but once they got close to me they became family and physical affection vanished.

Expression vs Feeling

2008-10-21T11:48:00.000-07:00

A lot of emphasis is put on the expression of affection. I wonder if people in general think of the "expressions" of affection when they hear the word "affection" rather than affection itself.

For example if someone says that Mary is an affectionate woman generally they mean she tends to touch, hug and kiss others freely. Affection is a feeling or emotion while the "expression of affection" is just that. An affectionate person is one who feels affection whether they display or express that affection or not.

We more often hear of those who have a hard time "showing" or “expressing” their affection rather than those who don't feel it. My problem wasn't showing affection it was feeling it to begin with. Once I began feeling affection I had no problem expressing it.

I suspect the real problem is often feeling, not expressing affection so if I have trouble showing affection I should first ask myself "do I feel affection?" One of the predictions in the bible for the 'last days' is that men will be without natural affection. I think this is happening now.

People have only vague definitions of affection. People have trouble staying together. Do you think that two people who have strong, consistent affection for each other would divorce? One of them would have to have pretty severe problems in other areas for this to happen. My lack of affection was the cause of my divorce and I suspect is at the root of many divorces.

Affection?

2008-10-20T09:17:00.000-07:00

Even in my childhood I suspected that there was something missing in me. I didn’t seem to “feel” enough positive emotions.

When I married there were not a lot of romantic feelings. I felt more like my prospective bride was my best friend but I believed I would change. I believed I would develop romantic feelings for her through my efforts and through faith in God. I read several books on various subjects and came to an intellectual understanding of my problem quite quickly. I could easily verbalize my problem over and over again but this didn’t change me. I was still devoid of complete desire for my wife. My love for her was a charitable love which is not bad but it lacks warmth.

I read self-improvement books and followed their programs and suggestions. I accomplished some small changes in other areas of my character but for the most part the self-improvement programs were of little value in helping me change emotionally. I understood that I was missing something and decided I needed to first identify what it was.

The word “affection” kept coming to mind as I studied and pondered. Affection as it is commonly understood consists of some tender feelings and expressions. In fact, at least in the United States, I think there is no clear definition of what affection is.

I have come to think of affection as a specific feeling that people probably would not think of as affection. It’s a particular affection that is learned from our parents as they express this same affection for us. The presence or absence of this affection determines our feelings and attitude toward our own physical bodies and subsequently how we view and feel about the bodies of others. I come to realize that there are many affections. The specific affection you feel will be dependant on the object of your affection and what aspect(s) you are perceiving in that object which is triggering the affection. For example if the object of your relationship is a person, you may be perceiving their form or their relationship to you or some personality characteristic that generates a specific feeling of affection in you.

The specific affection I am refering to has to do with our feelings about the human body. Once I identified this affection I began to refer to it as “physical affection”. That is, the affection that is generated as you perceive the value, beauty, and/or meaning of the physical body. I think it is one of the principle feelings necessary to feel the emotions we think of when we hear the expression “falling in love”. I believe this affection is what is refered to in the bible as "natural affection".

Physical affection is lacking in our society either because it was not passed on to the children or children learned to restrict their capacity to experience this affection out of fear. This scarcity of affection results in a rather cold kind of love with romantic feelings being limited. I believe it can affect the health and appearance of one’s own body and that it limits the depth and warmth of relationships with family and friends.

Without Affection

2008-10-19T16:46:00.000-07:00

In December 2003, A few days before Christmas, after thirty years of marriage, my wife got in our car and left me to spend the rest of her life with another man. She didn’t leave me because she found the other man but she left, I believe, because she was starving for affection.

She had spoken of divorce long before meeting this man who she eventually married. So the choice she made that day had been brewing for some time.

For most of our marriage it seemed, every month, at a “particular” time of the month, she would express her unhappiness with our relationship. Intimacy was severely lacking, we were more like friends than husband and wife. We had faith that somehow things would change and our relationship would become richer. After many years however no change was evident.

I struggled and prayed for change, but change did not come till it was too late. After all those years of marriage I did finally gain some of the feelings I was looking for, but only after my wife had left.