{"id":1380,"date":"2019-07-14T14:44:50","date_gmt":"2019-07-14T14:44:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/?p=1380"},"modified":"2019-07-14T14:44:51","modified_gmt":"2019-07-14T14:44:51","slug":"lets-talk-about-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/?p=1380","title":{"rendered":"Let’s talk about love"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I’m over on the ARRA blog, talking about love. https:\/\/australianromancereaders.wordpress.com\/2019\/07\/14\/guest-blogger-elsa-winckler-3\/<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

My husband and I celebrated our 44th wedding anniversary this year. I adore him and I still get those stupid butterflies when I see him enter a room. Of course, that doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019s always been an easy road. Life, as we know, is messy and when two stubborn people share a house sparks are bound to fly, especially when you add three stubborn kids to the mix.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the midst of \u2018doing\u2019 life, we rarely think about why, despite the bumpy road, the many, many hills, the curve balls, the scorching winds, our marriages\/relationships are actually working. I was recently asked to give a talk on love, life and marriage and was forced to sit down for a moment to think about the why.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How do two people, each with their own background, their own set of \u2018rules\u2019, their own way of doing things, their own belief system, their own idiosyncrasies, manage to stay together for 30, 40, 50 years or longer?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Greek there are four words for love: storge, philia, eros and agap\u00e9. CS Lewis gave a series of talks about these words way back in 1958. Storge is the empathy bond (liking someone through the fondness of familiarity), philia is the love between friends, eros is the romantic love and agap\u00e9 the unconditional \u2018God\u2019 love, the love that exists regardless of changing circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eros is the love we as romance writers love to explore. The meet cute, the agony of not knowing why suddenly the whole world is upside down until our hero and heroine finally realise they\u2019ve found \u2018the one\u2019, when they\u2019ve fallen in love.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are told the buzz eros creates only lasts twelve months (although I have to add here, I don\u2019t quite agree), so there has to be more to the relationship than mere physical attraction for it to last over decades. Lewis describes it so beautifully: \u2018Falling in love is something that happens to us, staying in love is something we do.\u2019 And he goes on to explain: \u2018Eros needs a nest of storge.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also came across an article by Liz Steelman titled 8 Secrets of Long-married Couples<\/em>, in which she discusses the findings of the gerontologist, Karl Pillemer\u2019s research. He interviewed 700 couples and asked them how they managed to stay married for 30, 40 and 50 years. Do go and read the article<\/a>\u2014interesting stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What tickled me was the very first piece of advice\u2014\u2018Don\u2019t settle. Only get married if you\u2019re in love. Like, butterflies in your stomach love.\u2019 This is, of course, eros.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I love this, because I firmly believe if you marry the one who gives you butterflies, you have a great chance to be one of the lucky ones\u2014you\u2019ll have a lover who is not only your friend, but also your soul mate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

This is exactly the kind of love Dale Cavallo (An Impossible Attraction<\/em>), David Cavallo (An Irresistible Temptation<\/em>) and Darryn Cavallo (The Ultimate Surrender<\/em>) are looking for. Not consciously, mind you. They\u2019re much too in control of their feelings, too busy with the string of boutique hotels they own to admit what they really need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They\u2019re successful, passionate and they have the ability to love deeply, but they\u2019re busy, they\u2019re successful and when they need a woman, they never have a problem finding one. It is only when their brother Don marries Caitlin Sutherland that they meet the women who would bring them to their knees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And I\u2019d like to think these are relationships that will last\u2014all the ingredients are there: storge, philia, eros and agap\u00e9.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thanks to Tule Publishing for the re-release of these three stories. I hope you enjoy reading each brother\u2019s story as much as I enjoyed writing it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can find them here:
An Impossible Attraction<\/em><\/a> | An Irresistible Temptation<\/em><\/a> | The Ultimate Surrender<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m over on the ARRA blog, talking about love. https:\/\/australianromancereaders.wordpress.com\/2019\/07\/14\/guest-blogger-elsa-winckler-3\/ My husband and I celebrated our 44th wedding anniversary this year. I adore him and I still get those stupid butterflies when I see him enter a room. Of course,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,6,4],"tags":[172,173,116,75],"class_list":["post-1380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-other-blogging","category-books","category-writing","tag-cavallobrothers","tag-happyeverafter","tag-lovestory","tag-series"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1380"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1381,"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1380\/revisions\/1381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elsawinckler.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}