Strong Self-Respect Raise Passion Among Old Couples

Older couples often say, "All that lovey-dovey stuff is for kids," as they look enviously at younger couples expressing their mutual love. Passion in a relationship is a measure of both its satisfaction and its success. Yet passion is difficult to sustain in a long-term relationship.

Healthy self-esteem is a critical factor in successful relationships. If you want the passion to last, love yourself.

Our society emphasizes two important life paths: career and relationship. To excel at our career, we are encouraged, and forced by rule of law, to go to school for years, get training or attend higher education. Much energy and effort go into insuring our financial success.

Careers are intellectually based while relationships are emotionally based, which is less culturally valued. For the relationship path, no formal training is available, encouraged or provided. Regardless, the expectation remains high that our relationships will be good. Such expectations are unreasonable.

If there was formal training, it would focus first on self-esteem and how to build a strong and loving relationship with oneself. No other factor has greater potential when it comes to forming and maintaining passionate relationships. The more we feel good about ourselves, the less self-centered we grow and the more capable of loving others we become.

Upon hearing this, many of us are tempted to reply quickly, "Of course I love myself." Yes, you probably do. Still, our potential to love ourselves is infinitely deep, and can always be further developed.

Some of the many indicators of low self-esteem are negative thinking, past hurts that remain unforgiven, accumulated resentment, low confidence, self-criticism, inability to set good limits with others or ourself, judging ourself or others, not speaking up about problems, making choices we later regret, character weaknesses, conflict avoidance, ignoring our needs, being anxious and fearful and disliking our bodies. The list can continue, but I think you get my drift. Each of these limits our ability to love fully not only ourselves, but also to love our partner, other people and life.

Having passion within our relationship or marriage is essential. Our relationship's satisfaction, health, longevity and success depends on it. Some couples express passion through affection, some through kindness, others through an active sex life. To be a skilled lover, especially within the context of a long-term relationship, positive self-esteem is of prime importance because sex is emotional in nature. Emotional strength provides a lover the ability to relax while simultaneously allowing deep intimacy.

If the love for ourself is not deep, then deep love will be invisible to us, hidden behind the blind spot of our own emotional limitations. The relationship we have with ourself filters how we experience others and our world. If it is a poor relationship, then the world and others will not seem loving.