I have been helping men and women improve their love lives for over fifty years. There are two reasons this project has become my life’s mission. The first is that I know the pain and suffering that comes when a relationship we thought would bring us eternal love crashes and burns. In my welcome video, Confessions of a Twice Divorced Marriage Counselor, I share my own experiences. The second reason is that I also know the joy of a marriage that lasted forty-six wonderful years. I share what Carlin and I learned in my book, The Enlightened Marriage: The 5 Transformational Stages of Relationships and Why the Best Is Yet to Come.
I believe we all want to find the love of our life and learn how to build a relationship where true lasting love is a reality. I have learned a lot over the years, but there is always more to discover. I recently learned about a new book, Bonded by Evolution: The New Science of Love and Connection by Paul Eastwick. The book broadened my understanding of what goes wrong in our search for love and how the new science relational evolutionary psychology can help us all find the love of our life and build the relationship of our dreams. You can see my interview with dr. Eastwick here.
Paul Eastwick is a professor of psychology at UC Davis, where he serves as head of the Social Personality Psychology Program and director of the Attraction and Relationships Research Laboratory. He says,
“Modern media and culture have taught us a vast array of inaccurate ideas about dating and relationships. One idea is that romantic relationships are a negotiation between two parties who deliver value, extract benefits, and strive to maintain a competitive advantage. Sitting at the center of it all is a person’s personal ‘mate value’—their true, core market desire—what they want to be. She’s hot, he’s rich, let’s make a deal.”
In our modern world where everything has a price and we are driven to compete to get what we need, it is no surprise that dating and mating have become complicated and confusing for most people. Many men and women believe that they can never win. Fortunately, there is a better way to live and love.
The Science of Close Relationships
Based on the extensive research and study of Dr. Eastwick, helped me understand what makes a bond strong and what bonds do to help us survive and thrive. Support comes in two forms. In one form, two people help each other recover from adversity. He describes this form as Safe haven support.. In the other form, two people help each other to meet new challenges. That’s what he calls it providing a “secure base”.
I really resonated with these ideas. One of my most popular articles, read by over 4,000,000 people, is called “The One Thing Men Want More Than Sex.” In the article I say,
“We’ve all heard that Women need to feel loved to have sex, but men need to have sex to feel loved. Let’s take a deeper look at what men get when they have sex. Sure, there’s the physical pleasure, but there’s a deeper need that’s being met. I call it the need for a safe harbor.“
To appreciate the importance of safety and security in our intimate relationships, we must recognize the importance of attachment bonds in humans. Dr. Eastwick described the work of Dr. John Bowlby and his colleague Dr. Mary Ainsworth. In the middle of the twentieth century, Dr. Bowlby and Ainsworth studied what happens to infants and young children when they are separated from their caregivers.
In those days, popular parenting advice in the West warned against overdoing children’s emotional needs. Many believed that excessive affection equaled relaxation. To Bowlby and Ainsworth—and others, including Dr. Harry Harlow, famous for his studies of maternal separation and social isolation in rhesus monkeys—this advice was profoundly wrong.
Dr. Eastwick noted that natural selection installed a mechanism to mitigate the risk that existed for all babies as they began to explore their world. Youth sought specific familiar others, such as fathers, mothers, and other caregivers, who respond and engage them in play and comfort them when they are distressed.
With an understanding of relational evolutionary psychology, Dr. Eastwick notes that sometime during the last million years, natural selection repurposed the attachment system to apply beyond the relationships of our early childhood. Specifically, evolution applied the attachment system to adult mating relationships as well.
Understanding that adults have a similar need for security and support as children do is critical to understanding how to have successful adult relationships.
“Of course, sexuality and sexual desire remained central to mating relationships,” says Paul Eastwick in his book. Bound by Evolution. “These elements didn’t go anywhere, and they usually start the whole process. But the pairing was not just about sex now. It was also about an emotional bond, or ‘pair-bond’.”
Evolution-based relationship solutions for dating and mating in the real world today
Dr. Eastwick says, “We are creatures that evolved to form sexual relationships and romantic attachments within small networks. Mate value and competitive markets have limited influence on how these bonds are formed and shaped, and probably had even less influence on the environment in which humans evolved.”
Here are some real relationship solutions that can help you find the love of your life and develop an intimate relationship that lasts forever:
- Join a men’s group where you can share your truth and learn from others.
My wife, Carlin, tells friends that the main reason she and I have had a wonderful marriage of 46 years is because I have been in a group of men for 47 years. The group was formed in 1979 after a meeting with psychologist Herb Goldberg who wrote the book The perils of being a man. In the book it says,
“The male has paid a heavy price for male ‘privilege’ and power. He is out of touch with his emotions and his body. He plays by the rules of the male game and with a lemming-like purpose destroys himself – emotionally, psychologically and physically.”
Over the years we got to know each other deeply and supported each other as we learned to open up and share our deepest feelings. The team always supports our masculinity, but also respects and cares for women. In recent years, some males have attracted groups in the “manosphere” that see women as the enemy. The opposite has always been true in our men’s team. I have written about our experiences in my book, 12 Rules for Good Men.
- Create mixed gender networks.
Much has been written about the increase in loneliness, particularly among boys and men. There are many reasons for this, but the bottom line is that we need to connect with people where we can enjoy each other’s company and get to know each other by doing things we enjoy together. My wife, Carlin, and I met at an Aikido dojo where men and women learned this peaceful martial art.
In recent years, more and more people, young and old, spend time connecting each other on their mobile phones. There’s nothing wrong with that, but people are meant to interact with each other face-to-face, in small groups. Finding places where you connect with others not only helps reverse the loneliness epidemic, but is the natural way to meet that special someone we all want and need.
- Understand the pros and cons of online dating.
Dr. Eastwick points out that being online certainly gives us more people to choose from, but there is a downside. The first problem with online dating is selection overload.
“Having too many options,” says Dr. Eastwick, “tends to make people more unhappy with their final choice.”
Many believe that there is always someone better with the next stroke.
The second problem is that online dating is often humiliating as people feel judged and often picked against. It’s easy to feel like there’s something wrong with us, that we’re inherently undesirable when we’re not chosen. Dr. Eastwick also points out that when we do attract attention, a lot of it isn’t the kind of attention we want, especially if you’re a woman.
When we meet people in real-life social situations, our network of friends probably contains a number of people who have your best interests at heart. They encourage us to move toward people we know are safe and caring and move us away from those who may be hurt.
Dr. Eastwick offers good advice on finding a compatible partner if we choose to join the world of online dating: Limit the pool and stay for the third impression.
He says that people tend to go out with too many people from a pool that has been filtered too much. It reminds us that true compatibility cannot be predicted by surface characteristics. We need to get to know each other and see how we feel being together. He suggests a three-date approach, and research shows that first impressions are usually unreliable, but three impressions give us the best chance of success.
“By impression, I mean your physical attraction,” says Dr. Eastwick, “but also how they make you feel and how much you enjoy being around them. It includes how you feel about thyself when you’re together.”
There is a lot we can learn about love and life and finding the right relationship that will last over time. To learn more about Paul Eastwick, his book and his work, you can visit him here: https://pauleastwick.com/pauleastwick.
You can learn more about me and my work by visiting me at www.MenAlive.com. I invite you to subscribe to my free weekly newsletter where I share tips and guidance for living fully, loving deeply and making a positive difference in the world.
