Love Doesn’t Need A Magnifying Glass, It Needs A Mirror

Some people in love act almost like snipers. They examine their partner with a magnifying glass to find flaws, errors, and weaknesses. They sabotage and eventually destroy the relationship.

It is a paradigm of cowardice. Someone who doesn’t understand that love needs mirrors – not magnifying glasses.

None of us know everything about relationships. Most of us have run away at least once, leaving behind the wreckage of dreams and hopes.

We have been shipwrecked by an impossible sea of ​​love and a cowardly passion, whether we are afraid or just hesitant.

There is one type of relationship that usually causes more destruction than any other. It is one in which one or both parties act as “identity destroyers.”

They pay attention to everything they don’t like, all the things that bother them in their partners. Why? To mock and control them. They do it because it’s their way of taking the reins and compensating for their wounded self-esteem.

Almost unaware of it, we are trapped in a hamster wheel and our own reluctance closes us to the dangerous dynamics of an accident where one person carries a magnifying glass but is unable to look at himself in the mirror to see his own internal wounds and immaturity.

The complexity of love: blaming another person

Howard Markman is a professor of psychology at the University of Denver and is one of the best-known researchers in relationships. His widely published works accurately and originally illustrate many of the problems that manifest in everyday life.

One of Dr. Markman’s most interesting thoughts is that most people who go into relationship therapy are convinced that all the problems are the fault of the other person.

They nurture the impossible hope that the Therapist will “cure” the partner’s misbehavior. If it were to catch them – and this is what they often expect from a professional – their partner will be taken from the ear and punished for their misbehavior.

Well, behind most couples ’problems isn’t usually a mental health problem, but a problem in relationship dynamics. The dynamics they have built and which determines how they react to each other.

For Markman, complaints that end up at his reception are often related to deficiencies in certain emotional doctrines and psychological skills. So he suggests that we should teach “psycho-education” in schools early on.

The goal of psycho-education would be to provide us with strategies, tools, and skills so that we can help ourselves. It would teach us to look at ourselves in the mirror, to recognize our own fears, insecurities  and, last but not least, to tear down the rigid roles and gender norms of society.

In love, some people go too far with these roles and norms. They may have inherited them from their own family.

Maybe they’ll learn that “it’s better to be quiet and put up with it,” and that “if he doesn’t do this, he won’t love me, so I should get angry.”

Basically, the idea is to create a foundation for self-awareness so that we can take care of ourselves and thus bring the best version of ourselves in a relationship.

Love will not heal if you do not love yourself

There will always be conflicts in this colorful, complex and ever-growing network of relationships. Instead of seeing it as negative like an infectious disease, we should see it as an engine that pushes us to feel better and strengthen the relationship.

Conflicts confuse the deepest part of our being. However, we still obsessively create unnecessary conflicts by holding a magnifying glass over another person’s faults.

We do it all the time without realizing our own emotional responsibility. We don’t realize that sometimes we go through life so naked and cold that we just want to have someone be our shelter. Our warm place.

But listen: this formula never works. Any person who acts as a “shelter” and a “doctor” feels useful only when he or she is needed. Unfortunately, it is a dependent relationship.

Sooner or later, their energy, life and dignity run out. Because this person lives under a ruthless magnifying glass.

We cannot let this happen. Let us all stand in front of the mirror and rediscover ourselves and our self-esteem. Don’t let yourself be drawn into a relationship where you have to sacrifice your own happiness in order to be loved.