The Psychology of Love

Psychic development and love are inextricably linked. A healthy psyche = a healthy experience of love. 

About 17 years ago, during a time of intense heartbreak and confusion, I stumbled upon Jungian analyst and Episcopal priest J. Pittman McGehee’s valuable insights on the psychology of love. 

Through Pittman I learned that while English only has one word for love, in Sanskrit there are seventy-eight. Seventy-eight!! As Pittman sees it, “If it is possible to determine the sophistication of a culture by the number of words that exist for a concept, Americans are painfully unsophisticated when it comes to love.” 

My sophistication certainly grew —and so did my satisfaction—when I quite literally took to heart Pittman’s teachings on the Greek expressions of eros (romantic love/ nonrational desire to create), philia (brotherly/sisterly love) and agape (compassion/the love that lets be/I want my love to empower you to be your most authentic self and to experience what you need to be self-sovereign). Differentiating between these three aspects of love opened up my world so immensely and in such a rich way, I never looked back. I took all the pain I was feeling through the heartbreak, and channeled that energy of eros into new pathways. Where I had been myopic and constricted in my focus on romantic love, I opened up wider so I could experience philia and agape in new and deeper ways. I began feeling a heart connection with more and more people day after day in more and more circumstances. 

I believe, a new system, a new mode of energetic alignment is essential for our survival and thrival. The heart needs to take its rightful seat as master of the house. As the ancient wisdom of Yoga psychology teaches, through concentration, meditation and absorption into the heart, knowledge of the mind can be gained. The Higher Mind (our Cosmic Mind) functions through Love, through its connection with the heart. Let’s meet each other there. Always. In All Ways.