Logic over heart

Dear "MP",

So glad you wrote to us for some advice. I'll try to help as much as I can, based on your brief letter.

I like to think of counseling as "healthy conversations," so I'll be responding to your letter line-by-line, as if we were in a real conversation... (The words in italics are yours...)

So here goes...

You said:

In my life I have been very lucky. I have been truly loved by people that deserved to be loved. But I am a mess. I think that I have never loved someone in my life. That's because I always put logic in front of feelings. I feel guilty because when someone is interested in me, I follow my feelings. So he fells in loves. But then, I think logically and I ruin everything in me and in them. I am frightened that I will never love someone and that I will always cause a mess for those who have feelings for me.

In order to love someone else, we have to feel well loved ourselves. The way it works is that we learn how to love by being loved. If this happens in early childhood, that's best. But it can happen at any point in adult life too.

If you find yourself absorbing the love of others now and being unable to love them back, that's OK! You are just doing what you need to do to Get enough love before you Can give it!

I don't understand what you are saying when you talk about being "logical" and therefore ruining things. If you mean that you stop following your feelings all of a sudden, then I guess there must be something that happens between you and these other people that SCARES you into ignoring your feelings - makes you afraid that if you follow your feelings further something bad will happen. If so, I'd need to know what it is that scares you into trying to be "logical" instead of noticing mainly where your feelings are leading you... (Love starts as a Decision. We DECIDE to love someone. After that, however, love is actually a FEELING that comes from being happy with the other person and from believing that this happiness will continue when we are together... If you have any other way of understanding adult love, I'd need to know all about it to try to help you further...)

When I listen to logic, is it that I don 't love?

No... But if you try to think or be logical INSTEAD of feeling, you can start to believe that you aren't feeling anything at all, so that would wipe out your awareness of feeling love too...

I always put feelings in the background.

This is dangerous, in a lot of ways... You need your angry and scared feelings to protect yourself!... You need your sadness to notice what you lose and to eventually replace what you lose in life... And you certainly need your joy and your excitement to help you realize that life has much good in it... Please do whatever it takes to get in touch with your feelings and let them help you make all the important decisions in your life... [I have a booklet I wrote about this... If you'll send me your address, I'll send it to you. I think my e-mail and web site address are at the bottom of this letter...]

So is it love or I have just never met the right one?

There are many people you can love in your life, so it might have been ONE of the "right ones"... but it can't be the ONLY right one...

Help please I am a mess and so are other peoples' feelings.

Are you referring to the other people you have had relationships with...? Please trust them to take care of themselves, and focus on yourself and how YOU are feeling... Remember, again, that your ability to love comes from ABSORBING the love of others - so that's what you need right now, to absorb the love of anyone who is safe and who loves you.

If you'd like to write more to me and give e-mail advice a try, I'd be happy to hear from you again. (I may not be able to work with you myself - depending on how busy I am, but I can definitely get you in touch with someone who can.)

Thanks for writing and for allowing me to try to help.

Tony Schirtzinger