Most of us know of a couple or know of someone who knows a couple whose love has survived the ups and downs of life and yet their love persists and they seem just as in love now as they ever did at the very beginning. So, what do these couples have in common?
A study looking at the commonality of these couples showed that they inevitably saw their partner the same way as they did when they first met. It seems that when ‘love is blind,’ love not only survives, it thrives.
In this study, participants were evaluated based on qualities about their relationship. When the results were examined, it seems that those whose love survived and thrived had the common denominator of seeing their partner exactly as when they first fell in love. Even if the participants had aged several decades or gained/lost weight or they’ve gone through obstacles in life, the key factor in the solidity of their loving relationship was that the partner still seems like he or she hadn’t changed from when they first fell in love. This ‘love is blind’ phenomenon seemed to ensure the longevity of the relationship.
It’s amazing that the simple act of seeing our partner with a rose-colored lens of love per se is enough to optimize our chance of having a life-long loving relationship. Now, how does this information help us with our health you might be asking?
Our social environment and relationships in our life affect our health. Our mental and emotional status affects our health. Our perception of life and life events affects our health. So, what this study shows us is that simply by giving ourselves and our loved ones some room for imperfections may benefit not just our love life but our health as well. Forgiveness in how we perceive our body, our loved ones, our situation in life, and ourselves may indeed encourage a level of positive impact on our life, above and beyond what we might expect for such a small shift in paradigm of thought.
Another recent study showed that those who live the longest seem to be the most optimistic. This rose-colored lens optimism , forgiveness, and willingness to think the best of others and ourselves seem to be a recurring quality in many studies looking for commonality in people who live the longest and with the longest lasting love.
So, what’s the take-away point from studies like these? It seems that by giving yourself and your loved ones a preponderance of optimism, benefit of the doubt, and forgiveness may be the secret to a lifetime of overall love and health. With these fundamental tenets of daily perception, we may all be able to create that ‘love is blind’ effect in our own relationship with our loved ones and with our own body; whereby the reason why we love our loved ones and our body becomes an ever-present concept at the forefront of our mind, instead of a remote memory we have trouble recalling.
