Greg's Real Love Blog

Welcome to the blog that will change the rest of your life.

There is so much talk in the news about the destructive forces on the planet: AIDS, malaria, malnutrition, war, racism, and so on. But we're not paying attention to one influece that is causing more harm that all the others put together: ANGER.

Anger

* is the fuel of every conflict and even every war.
* eliminates love and happiness like no other influence.
* inflicts the deepest wounds.
* is a poison that spreads with astonishing power and speed.
* turns crowds into mobs.
* destroys marriages.
* crushes the spirit of children.
* makes learning impossible.
* isolates us from everyone around us.

Many courses have been developed and books written for the purpose of helping us manage and control our anger, but those have generally proven to be quite ineffective. Anger still rages over the face of the earth like a consuming fire. We need far more than anger management or anger control. We need to better understand the cause and nature of anger and thereby gain the ability to ELIMINATE it. Fortunately, in recent years we have acquired an understanding of anger that has given us the ability to do just that.

ANGER: A COMMON EMOTION

Anger is an emotion so common among us that it has become like a background noise. We see it almost everywhere we look, so we scarcely notice it anymore. We're angry

* when our spouses fail to do what we want.
* when our children are loud, resistant, or disobedient.
* when people fail to appreciate what we've done.
* at other drivers on the road who get in our way.
* at people who make us wait.
* when people break their promises.
* when our bosses are demanding.
* when things are "unfair."
* at the idiot who just took our parking space.
* when people fail to meet our expectations.
* when people try to control us.
* when people criticize us.
* when people are angry at us.
* at people who get in our way.

When we consider how often the above events occur, we realize that most of us are angry many times every day.

THE PRISON OF ANGER

Now, think about all the times you've become angry at a spouse, a child, a co-worker, or a friend. On a single one of those occasions did your anger ever bring you a sense of genuine peace or happiness? Did your anger ever bring you closer to another person? Or enrich your relationship? NEVER. Anger is uniformly harmful, both to us personally and to our relationships. And yet we keep getting angry.

It's like we're prisoners to anger. Every time I claim that you make me angry, you OWN me. I hand my ability to be happy over to you, wrapped in a bow. You can now make me angry and ruin my happiness any time you want.

Do we really want to live like that? Do we really want to be prisoners to our anger?

Sure, anger is understandable. Yes, it's a natural emotion. Yes, we have a RIGHT to be angry.

But the bottom line is this: Do we want to live in the chains that anger forms around us, or do we want freedom and joy?

Learn much more about anger and how to literally ELIMINATE its power over your life by going to my website at http://www.reallove.com/anger_management.asp
1. Click on the "About Real Love" navigation button at the top
2. Then click on the "Anger Management" bar to the left

As you do this, you'll be giving yourself and those around you a gift beyond price.

Greg Baer

I recently attended a five-day Real Love seminar in Phoenix, Arizona. What a treat. For five days I enjoyed the privilege of

* teaching seminars to hundreds of people on the subjects of Real Love, Real Love in marriage, Real Love in dating, Real Love in parenting, and Real Love in counseling.

* participating in Real Love groups.

* counseling dozens of individuals and couples.

In Phoenix I was reminded that everywhere I go I see consistent confirmation of the power of Real Love. I’m convinced there is no power in the universe like it. During and between the seminar sessions people shared comments like these:

"My husband and I had been married for twenty-eight years, but we were filing for divorce. We didn’t see any reason to continue. Then we read the Real Love book together, and since that day it’s been like our relationship started over. No more divorce. We’re seeing and loving each other in ways we’ve never done. It’s so simple."

"I’d been dating in all the wrong places, always attracting the wrong kind of men. It was miserable. Now I see what I’ve been doing. I have a lot to learn before I date again."

"I was completely at my wits’ end with my son. He was failing in school, using drugs, angry, and everything I did was just making things worse. Now I see why. I went home between two of the seminars and apologized to him for being such a foolish mother. I told my son I would try to learn to be a better parent. Then I invited him to come to the last seminar, and he said he wanted to come. Imagine that, a fifteen-year-old boy coming to a seminar on Real Love. And he loved it."

"Wow. I’m exhausted. This has changed the way I see everything in the world. Everything."

"This is what I’ve been looking for."

"I sat in the audience for five days, absolutely glued to every word. At the end I didn’t want to leave. I’ve been looking for this all my life."

"I told my wife that our marriage was over, but after this weekend I think we just might have some hope."

"My wife and I had been fighting with each other for as many years as I could remember. Just from the seminars of this weekend we can see what we’ve been doing to make things impossible for each other, and now I think we can do this differently."

The principles of Real Love are that powerful. They are changing lives all over the world. I encourage you to do whatever it takes to let that power work in your life and in your family. No effort you make toward that end could be too great.

To learn more, including how to receive a FREE Trial Membership on Real Love.com (dozens of hours of free video and audio), please visit RealLove.com.

As a principle alone, Real Love is transformational. As I have taught the definition and nature of Real Love to people all around the world, I have been impressed with how they have lit up with understanding. As they have realized the role of Real Love in their lives—and the role of the lack of Real Love—they have come to understand their own behavior, the behavior of the people around them, and their relationships. This understanding alone can have a profound impact.

The impact of understanding Real Love as a principle, however, pales virtually to nothingness beside the power of Real Love itself. As people actually feel Real Love

• they feel a sense of profound connection to the people who love them.
• they no longer feel alone.
• they lose their emptiness and fear.
• they no longer have a need for the anger in their lives, so it simply begins to gradually disappear.
• the other Getting and Protecting Behaviors begin to vanish, also because there is no need for them in the absence of emptiness and fear.
• they feel a deep sense of peace and happiness.

Studying the principles of Real Love is fascinating and productive, but the real goal is to feel the power of Real Love. So what does Real Love look like? Regrettably, the world has sold us a terribly deceptive counterfeit of love, so we see love as

• hugs.
• kisses.
• sex.
• more sex.
• romantic poetry.
• candlelight dinners.
• flowers.
• gifts.
• expensive gifts.
• elaborate and sentimental expressions of “I can’t live without you.”

Sometimes Real Love does involve some the elements we just listed, but just as often love has nothing to do with these expressions. Real Love means caring about another person’s genuine happiness. Again, what does that look like?

Recently I was presenting a seminar in Washington, D.C., and on the front row there was a woman who was obviously skeptical of what she was hearing about Real Love. She had had a most unhappy life to that point, and although she understood the words I was speaking, she just couldn’t imagine feeling unconditionally loved. In all her forty-plus years, that feeling had never happened to her, and that is not at all uncommon among us. As I spoke, she scowled, shifted in her seat, frowned, and so on.

Finally she asked a question that indicated her doubts, so in front of hundreds of people I simply kneeled down before her, looked her directly in the eyes, and said, “Real Love is genuinely caring about another person. It’s completely focusing on what another person wants and needs, as I’m doing with you right now. In this moment, there is nothing more important to me than what you need. That’s all that matters.”

She broke down and sobbed. I didn’t touch her. No hugging or kissing. No gifts. I didn’t actually use the words I love you. She wept because in that small moment she knew that I cared about her, and that feeling made all the difference.

We have so many opportunities to share Real Love with others. All around us people are drowning from a lack of Real Love. They need our loving touch. Some of the ways we could love people might include the following:

Look for ways to unconditionally care about the happiness of those around you. As you do, everyone—especially you—will be richly rewarded.

More than a year ago, a mother, Beth, came up to me after a seminar and said she and her adult son, James, had been having a difficult relationship for more than fifteen years, beginning when he was a teenager. In his rebellion and anger, he’d done it all: fits of anger, tears, screaming, running away, drugs of every kind, therapy, sex, prison. Over that period of time, their relationships had steadily worsened.

“I don’t know what to do with him,” Beth said.

“Oh, he’s not the problem here,” I responded.

“So who is?”

“You are, sweetie.”

“Me??!!”

“Sure. Remember, ‘bad’ behavior is a response to emptiness and fear—to not feeling loved—and the responsibility for loving him belong to whom? Who else could it be but you?”

“But I have loved him.”

“Beth, darlin’, I know you’ve loved him as well as you could, but how often have you expressed disappointment and anger at him? We talked about that. Every time you express those feelings, the other person can hear only I don’t love you.”

Beth began to cry. She could feel the truth of what I was saying, and she could also feel that I was not criticizing her, only describing how things were.

Beth went home, sat down with James, and said, “All your life, all you’ve ever wanted from me was unconditional love—what I just learned is called Real Love—and I’ve never given you that. Instead I’ve loved you conditionally. I’ve approved of you when you’ve done what I’ve wanted. I’ve also controlled you and used you, and I just didn’t know I was doing all that until today. I won’t change my behavior overnight, but I do make a commitment that I’m going to learn how to love you.”

Shortly afterward, Beth wrote and said that her son’s anger instantly began to go away in the moment she described her mistakes, and their relationship began to change. After that there were many ups and downs, to be sure, but the overall progress was remarkable.

Their last hurdle was the issue of money. James really enjoyed his mother’s financial support, and when she didn’t give him as much as he wanted, he manipulated her with disappointment and anger. She felt trapped, because she didn’t want to lose her son’s love. Again, she asked me what to do.

“The decision is obviously yours,” I said. “What you’re doing now, however, is not helping James. By giving him money while he’s capable of standing on his own, you’re actually hurting him in several ways: First, you’re eliminating the possibility of Real Love in your own relationship with him, because you are buying his love. He can’t feel unconditionally loved by you. He can only sense that you’re his hostage. Second, you’re teaching him the lesson that love is purchased, and that lesson will hurt him the rest of his life. Third, you’re crippling him. By continuing to give him money when he could make it on his own, you’re teaching him to be dependent and weak. Until he’s responsible and independent, he can’t be happy, so you’re actually interfering with his happiness. I know you’re not meaning to, but you’re still doing it.”

Beth then explained to James that she wouldn’t be giving him anymore money, not because of something he had done, but because she had been making a mistake with him. She explained it to him using the reasoning I had given her above. She emphasized that he wasn’t being punished, just that he was being given an opportunity to be more independent and responsible and therefore happier.

James didn’t appreciate his mother’s decision at first, but over time he began to understand that she was actually loving him by withdrawing her financial support. Just the other day, she received the following letter from him:

“My beloved mother,

“Our phone conversations sure have become interesting, haven’t they? When I talk to you now, I feel so much freer and more alive than I ever did before. So much has changed in the last year or so. I’m seeing now that your decision about the money is right. It'll feel good to have a clearer mother/son relationship without the influence of the finances. I've really enjoyed your generosity over these past years, and I also recognize the wisdom of altering that relationship. Thanks for initiating that change. While it's something that I can certainly recognize as being good for me, I probably wouldn't have spearheaded the effort on my own.
I love you.
James”

I get teary-eyed as I read that. This mother has utterly transformed the life of her son. It took a tremendous amount of Real Love, faith, persistence, and courage on her part, but look at the results. If she hadn’t done what she did, she’d still have a son who was angry, miserable, and probably still on drugs and in jail.

Real Love has infinite power. Of that I am certain. I also know that before we can experience it, we must exercise great faith and persist in its application. There will be many occasions when we’ll be confronted with opportunities where we’ll be tempted to quit, but on that road is death. Real Love is life and happiness. If you take the steps required to find and share Real Love, the infinite rewards are absolutely guaranteed.

We’re approaching the season when many people begin to shop for Christmas. When I was a boy, Christmas shopping began in December, but then it moved to the day after Thanksgiving, and now malls all over the country begin to advertise for Christmas shopping as early as October. So it’s time to address this season that has become the super marketing event of the year.

Several years ago, I got a letter that typifies what many of us go through every Christmas season.

Dear Greg,

“I like a lot of things about Christmas: the lights, the carols, the food. Some people even become nicer than usual. But there’s a lot I really hate about it. Every year I run around trying to get just the right gift for dozens of people, and for what? Half the time I don’t get the right thing, and the other half of the time, people are happy for a few minutes and then it’s forgotten. It’s a lot of work for not much in the long run. But if I don’t buy any presents, people will be mad, so what can I do?”

My response:

What we all really want is to feel loved unconditionally. We want relationships where people care about us and enjoy being around us no matter what we do, but very few of us have known that kind of love—Real Love. Instead, we’ve always had to do the right things to make people happy, and if we didn’t, it was obvious from their words, tone of voice, posture, and other behaviors that they were disappointed in us, even irritated.

If we can’t have Real Love, we settle for buying the approval of other people. We try to be cooperative and successful so people will like us. We try to look good, say the right things, and do nice things for people in order to win their approval. Somehow we sense we’ve had to buy other people’s “love” with our behavior, but it still feels better than no approval at all.

Earning the affection of other people is a lot of work—most of us devote our entire lives to it—but what else can we do? Because we can’t live without that approval, we’re willing to keep on earning it, no matter what effort is required. Eventually, the feeling of conditional approval loses its thrill, but we still can’t stop earning it, because the feeling of losing it is intolerable.

So now we’re stuck. Earning conditional love isn’t all that fulfilling, but losing it is awful, so we keep pleasing people just so they won’t dislike us. As you said, if you don’t give any presents, you’re afraid people will be mad. At Christmas time especially—and on birthdays, Valentine’s Day, and some other occasions—many, perhaps most, of people the people around you expect you to buy gifts and in other ways prove your affection for them and earn their approval.

If you don’t do as they expect, they see it as proof that you don’t care about them, and then they’re disappointed and irritated. Regrettably, their disappointment and irritation prove without doubt that they don’t really care about you and your happiness. If they really cared about you, it wouldn’t matter what you gave them.

People who require gifts are telling you they don’t have enough Real Love in their lives, and they’re give you the job of filling their emptiness. The pressure to do that is greater than usual at Christmas, because our culture virtually decrees that we must do something at that “special time” for those around us. We ignore that tradition at our peril. Unfortunately, although no material gifts you give will ever fill the emptiness that results when people don’t have enough Real Love, those people will nonetheless insist with great energy that you try to do just that. With that demanding and ungrateful attitude, however, there are only two possibilities: They can briefly be satisfied with you in a superficial way, or they can be enormously disappointed.

You do not have to be a slave to these demands. Make your own choice about giving presents. You may still choose to give gifts to some people, but do not do that just because you fear what they’ll do if you don’t. If you give gifts from a sense of obligation, in effect you become a hostage to the people who have these expectations of you, and that’s a terrible way to live. When I hear people describe their Christmas shopping, the word I hear in conjunction with that activity more than any other is the word HAVE, as in “I HAVE to do my Christmas shopping.” There is so much obligation and duty associated with it, and something is wrong with that picture.

Understand that I’m not suggesting you change what you’re doing, only describing a possible solution to your frustration. So what will happen if you simply don’t give gifts to people who have traditionally expected them? Many people won't care a bit. In fact, they'll be relieved, because your gifts always made them feel obligated to give you something in return. Some other people will be disappointed and/or irritated, especially if they gave you a gift, but then what have you really lost? Those who become angry will only prove that they’re not really your friends anyway. They’ll be demonstrating that they’ve just been trading Imitation Love with you.

You can’t control what people think of you, but you can make your decision about Christmas gifts easier on them if you simply tell them about it ahead of time. You could explain that all the shopping has begun to interfere with your enjoyment of the season. You could tell them that you don’t expect anything from them, either, but that you’re not telling them what to do.

For years, I’ve made no Christmas purchases whatever. My wife, Donna, and I enjoy Christmas music, the food, the decorations, and a fire in the fireplace. But I don’t buy her a thing, nor does she get me anything. We’re not trying to make a point of some kind. We simply don’t need such gifts in order to feel loved. Instead we enjoy spending time with family members and friends. When we started doing this, a few people were offended, but either they got over it as they realized our intent, or they decided our friendship had no value to them. In both cases, it was a win.

A couple of years ago, a man asked my wife what I’d given her for Christmas. She said, “Every day of the year—many times a day—he kisses me, touches me, and looks at me with an affection I never thought possible. And that’s what I got for Christmas, too.”

He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “That’s all you got? He didn’t give you a gift?”

Donna smiled and said, “He loves me with all his heart. He’s my best friend. What could I possibly want more than that?”

I’m not telling anyone to stop giving gifts. If my children were small, we’d still be putting gifts under the tree. There’s something magical and unique about believing in Santa. Donna still sends gifts to some of the young children in her extended family. I can tell you, however, that since we quit feeling the least bit obligated to give gifts, we don’t feel pressured or rushed at that season. Christmas is a delightful time to share with our friends and family the unconditional love we feel for them, just as we hope to do all the other days of the year.

After seven years of marriage Oscar winner Reese Witherspoon and movie star Ryan Phillippe have called it quits.

How could this be? Just months ago in her Oscar acceptance speech, Reese Witherspoon thanked her beloved husband, and now they’re divorcing. Wasn’t this a fairy tale marriage?

When people are looking for a partner, some of the characteristics they most commonly seek include:

* Good looks
* Sexual appeal
* Financial stability
* Sense of humor
* Ability to have fun

Didn’t Ryan and Reese have all those in spades? So what could possibly have gone wrong?

It’s virtually certain that their marriage—like almost all marriages—was doomed from the very beginning, from the word “hello,” not the words “I do.” Why?

In order to be happy, what we all want more than anything else is to feel loved. Our souls require feeling loved in just as real a way as our bodies require air and food.

A NEW DEFINITION OF LOVE: REAL LOVE

But not just any kind of love will do. The only kind of love that can fill us up and make us whole emotionally is Real Love.

Real Love is caring about the happiness of another person without any thought for what we might get for ourselves.

It’s also Real Love when other people care about our happiness unconditionally. With Real Love, people are not disappointed or angry when we make our foolish mistakes, when we don’t do what they want, or even when we inconvenience them personally.

Conditional Love

Sadly, few of us have sufficiently received or given Real Love. From the time we were small children, we observed that when we didn’t fight with our sisters, didn’t make too much noise in the car, got good grades, and were otherwise obedient and cooperative, our parents and others smiled at us, patted our heads, and spoke kindly. With their words and behavior, they told us what good boys and girls we were, and we felt loved.

But what happened when we did fight with our sisters, made too much noise, got bad grades, and dragged mud across the clean living room carpet? Did people smile at us then or speak gentle, loving words? No—they frowned, sighed with disappointment, and often spoke in harsh tones. Just as the positive behaviors of other people communicated to us that we were loved, we could interpret the withdrawal of those behaviors only as an indication that we were not being loved. Although it was unintentional, our parents and others taught us this terrible message: “When you’re good, I love you, but when you’re not, I don’t—or certainly I love you a great deal less.”

This conditional love can give us brief moments of satisfaction, but we’re still left with a huge hole in our souls, because only Real Love can make us genuinely happy. When someone is genuinely concerned about our happiness, we feel connected to that person. We feel included in his or her life, and in that instant we are no longer alone. Each moment of unconditional acceptance creates a living thread to the person who accepts us, and these threads weave a powerful bond that fills us with a genuine and lasting happiness. Nothing but Real Love can do that. In addition, when we know that even one person loves us unconditionally, we feel a connection to everyone else. We feel included in the family of all mankind, of which that one person is a part.

WHAT WE DO WITHOUT REAL LOVE: IMITATION LOVE

If we don’t have enough Real Love in our lives, the resulting emptiness is unbearable. We then compulsively try to fill our emptiness with whatever feels good in the moment—money, anger, sex, alcohol, drugs, violence, and the conditional approval of others. Anything we use as a substitute for Real Love becomes a form of Imitation Love, which includes, among others:

* Praise
* Flattery
* The conditional approval we get from people when we do what they want
* Sex
* Money
* Success in our careers
* Power
* Drugs and alcohol
* Shopping
* Gambling

Imitation Love feels great for a while, but the problem is that the positive effects always wear off, and then we have to earn more and more, and the effects wear off faster and faster.

FALLING IN LOVE: THE NATURE AND EFFECT OF IMITATION LOVE

Even though Imitation Love cannot give us genuine, lasting happiness, it does feel good, and if Real Love is either unknown to us or unavailable, we’ll go to great lengths to get enough Imitation Love to feel good temporarily. In the absence of sufficient Real Love, we’re strongly attracted to anyone who gives us Imitation Love, and in order to get Imitation Love from people, we tend to give it to them. Most relationships, therefore, are based on the trading of Imitation Love. Men, for example, tend to offer flattery and conditional approval to women in exchange for sex.

When we find someone who gives us more Imitation Love than anyone else has, and when we give them more in return than they have received from others, we “fall in love.” Falling in love is rarely anything more than the relatively equal and abundant exchange of Imitation Love. That may not be romantic, but it’s nonetheless true. When a guy sees a girl across a crowded room and says to his friends, “I think I’m in love,” is there anyone on the planet who believe that his true meaning is, “I’ve fallen into a sudden unconditional concern for her happiness”? No, he’s expressing a belief that he’ll get more Imitation Love from her than he would from anyone else he can think of. We tend to start our relationships on the basis of how much Imitation Love we anticipate we’ll receive from that partner, and that’s a disastrous foundation for a relationship.

When Ryan Phillipe and Reese Witherspoon met in conjunction with a film they were doing together, the setting was glamorous and exciting. They both had all the praise, power, money, sex, and other qualities that anyone could want in a partner. The trading of Imitation Love was very abundant, and the feelings they got from that were exhilarating in the beginning. In order to guarantee that they would continue to get those feelings for a lifetime, they married each other. That’s almost always why people get married: to guarantee that their partner will keep making them as happy as he or she did in the beginning of the relationship.

As I’ve said before, however, the effect of Imitation Love always fades, as Ryan and Reese discovered—as almost all couples discover. They really enjoyed the initial exchange of Imitation Love, but it wasn’t long before that level of praise, power, and pleasure wasn’t as rewarding as it once had been. When people say the “excitement has worn off” in a relationship, they’re just describing the fleeting effects of Imitation Love.

What a miserable state of affairs. When they first met, what Ryan and Reese both needed was Real Love, but neither of them had ever felt much unconditional love, so there was no way they could have loved one another as they needed. We simply can’t give what we don’t have. In the absence of Real Love, they offered one another what they did have—Imitation Love in its various forms—and they gave all they had. Imitation Love does feel good, and because they were both giving it with all their hearts, they were satisfied with their relationship in the beginning. But Imitation Love is absolutely guaranteed to fail in the long run.

THE REAL REASON RELATIONSHIPS FAIL

I have counseled with thousands of couples, most of them married. Remember that people usually get married only after they have sifted through many potential partners, finally choosing the one they believe will provide them with the fulfillment of their dreams. Ideally, marriages should be the cream of all relationships, the best of the best.
And yet 60% of these dream relationships end in divorce, and the vast majority of those who remain married are settling for far less than they had once hoped for. When troubled couples come to me for counseling, invariably they ask some variation on the question, “What happened?” Both partners are absolutely befuddled, wondering how they could possibly have moved from being soulmates to being combatants.

In their attempts to understand what happened, it’s unavoidable that each partner would blame the other. After all, they reason, their partner once “made them happy,” and now that happiness is gone. The inescapable conclusion is that their partner has somehow failed them, somehow withdrawn the joy they once magically dispensed at the beginning of the relationship.

But now you understand the real reason relationships fail. When two people enter into a relationship without sufficient Real Love, their relationship is virtually doomed from the beginning because both parties lack the one ingredient most essential to genuine happiness and fulfilling relationships. In the beginning of their association they achieve the illusion of happiness only because they give one another enough Imitation Love. It’s better than anything they’ve had before, so it seems real. Then, when the effects of Imitation Love begin to wear off—as they always do—they’re left with the horrifying realization that their dreams have turned into so much dust.

Relationships fail not because of what each partner does or does not do. Relationships fail because they are not built on a foundation of Real Love, but instead are based on a counterfeit currency—Imitation Love—that can never buy happiness.