20 Jan.Falling in Love Again

Love and its affect on the Process of Change.

I once had a “lively debate” with a senior professor of psychology at London University; actually it got a bit heated. His premise was that love is such a strong emotion that it will overide everything else, including any attempts at change, whatever they might be. Therefore, he argued, when it comes to making changes love is a tricky customer and best avoided if at all possible during any therapeutic course. This has certainly been the case, and still is in most “therapeutic communities”, including drug treatment centres and residential counseling retreats. If residents in these institutions “fall in love” it causes no end of trouble, and usually results in either awkward agreements and comprimises or storming out and eloping. Certainly the good professor has a point.

But, and it is a big but, surely, I argued, love has a positive effect on our levels of confidence, ( why was it that Gene Kelly was singing and dancing in the rain ?) and if confidence is often the key that unlocks change processes surely love can have a postive effect on change? Infact it’s certainly the case that more men who describe themselves as problem drinkers curtail their drinking habits because they get married than those that get treated in residential alcohol treatment centres. Unfortunately, there is scant research into how many men start drinking problematically because of their marriage, so it may not be the magic answer after all.

The real problem would seem to be not whether falling in love is a positive indicator for change or not, but the impossible task of harnessing its power to achieve good effective change. I wonder how many people have started loosing weight and shaping up when they fall in love. Probably quite a few. But then again how many of us let ourselves go when we fall out of love. Perhaps just as many. 

Until more is understood about love and its effect on change I guess its safer to stick to our tried and tested methods to increase confidence. Also as I write this I’m aware that our Change Holidays would begin to take on a very strange shape, The Love Change Holiday conjures up some very wierd images indeed.