Yesterday I opened a book. Not just any old book mind you. It was the first book I ever studied when beginning my work as a counselor. It’s by Carl Rogers and called ‘On Becoming a Person’. It’s a wonderful book and although I love the title, if I could rename it, I would call it ‘Open Heart Surgery for Beginners’. This is because it’s the first book that helped me to understand the connection between opening our hearts in order to experience truly meaningful relationships, and the reality that truly meaningful relationships are not available if your heart is even a tiny bit closed.
So it was very surprising, but exactly right, to find inside this book a love letter that was written to me in 1997 from a person I had met at a course, all those years ago. I remember that for those few days we created a connection that we both learned so much from. I recall that he had been having challenges staying connected to his wife – they were both ‘swingers’, a practice that is totally guaranteed to challenge a relationship in the long term and disconnect you from your partner. We had spent time talking about this and by the second day of the course, he was professing his love for me. Of course he did not and could not possibly be in love with me. It was simply lust and it was clear to me that he did not know the difference. For some reason though, (probably because we were on a course designed as a wake up call) he was ready for a metaphorical slap in the face (luckily I didn’t have to give him a real one) and I helped him realise that what he was addicted to was the excitement of each new conquest which inevitably left him feeling empty and hollow and in need of the next ‘fix’ to get the adrenalin high back again. That’s not love. The fact that I was able to see through what could have been construed as the ‘flattery’ of his attention at that time was because I remember having one of those moments that happens to all of us now and then; a really intuitive moment when I thought ‘I can see right through you’. What I saw was his insatiable need for attention and validation. An old need of his, born years ago and still running his particular ‘show’.
Mostly people who have affairs, or swingers who have multiple partners, are always trying to fulfill some submerged need. This is what I call ‘Closed Heart Love’ and it can never be satisfying. The only way to let love in is to take the risk to be ‘Open Hearted’ and risk vulnerability. When I work with couples and individuals, this is key in allowing them to become truly authentic in relationship.
His love letter ended acknowledging me so beautifully by saying ‘I love you for your understanding and insight; for your sensibility and ability to make things clear for us. You were the possibility of love for us and still are that possibility for love’.
The only reason I share these words with you is to let you know that nothing has changed for me in my life or in my work and what I extended to him is what I wish for you. He goes on to say ‘I enroll myself in the possibility of love and integrity in my own life’. I simply could not ask for a better outcome than that.
My objective is to support you to open your heart, to heal it when it feels like its breaking and to show you that no matter what life throws at you, to stay ‘Open Hearted’ will allow you to move all obstacles in your way, heal your heart and learn to love again.
Till tomorrow,
Love Francine
