How to Distinguish Between Love & Desire

What is the difference between love and desire?

Love and desire relate and conflict:

Love is: When you care, worry, feel responsible for someone. You want to minimize threats, reduce the distance, and nurture them.

Desire is: an expression of freedom and autonomy. Many can feel freer with people they are less emotionally involved in. Why do women like the bad boys? You don’t have to worry about him – don’t’ feel safe with him, but it’s freeing in terms of desire.

Sometimes the very care, worry, feeling of responsibility we feel for our beloved is what stifles the unselfconsciousness and freedom necessary for desire. What nurtures love is not necessarily what fuels desire and what turns us on sexually isn’t always what is emotionally safe.

But most long term relationships involve responsibility by design… indeed women find it much harder to give themselves he permission for pleasure, sometimes any pleasure such as sitting down when drinking their coffee. When they are organized around attending to the needs of others they can easily forego their own. The first need to go for some of these woman is their erotic needs.

For women, they loose themselves because they can’t sustain desire when the nurturing starts. We choose love over desire because that’s what we feel we should do. Men and women trade off the adventure for the predictability. They trade their erotic needs for security needs.

In a long term, committed relationship, how do love and desire coexist?

We like the unexpected at first – allow the unexpected to be part of the relationship. Break the routine – what you talk about, activities, how you react to each other. Bring vitality back – shake things up! Fire needs air, couples need to fan the flame. The excitement is rooted to uncertainty—keep mystery and adventure alive by alternative between what makes us feel safe and secure and by allowing the unpredictable and the unexpected to jolt us out of the flattening habits.

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