Love, Marriage, and Dating.

This week we talked about dating, marriage and love. There is so much information, and so much one can learn on these subjects. I will focus on just a few.

First off is something that John Van Epp taught in his book. It is called the;

Relationship Attachment Model

Or RAM for short. It talks about the importance of understanding your relationship attachment. This picture explains what it looks like. If you will notice the bar is highest on know, then trust, rely, commit, and finally touch. We talked about when you are dating if you put say touch above know, you may find yourself in an unhappy or compromising position. This was just one mans theory about the best way of dating, but it does give some helpful insights to what we may want to pay attention too.

            We also talked about the Know-Quo. As you can see by the picture above, the three T’s are Time, Talk, and Togetherness. This idea is talking about the best way to “know” someone. I found this very interesting, especially in our culture to date for a very short time before marriage. This is saying that it takes you 3 months to begin to know someone. Not that I am against people getting married soon, but I wonder if we are to hasty sometimes in our desire to be married. Interesting to think about!

            The last thing I want to talk about is the Greek’s four “loves” or way of loving. As the picture shows we have;

Agape: This is the kind of love often referred to as charity. Someone in my class described it as a commitment to someone’s well being, without expecting something in return.

Eros: This is the passionate, sexual, or romantic love. It is where the word erotic comes from.

Storge: This is the kind of love parent have for their children. Some people also say it is the love children have for parents.

Philia: This is brotherly love, friendship, affection, or fondness.

Which kind of love do you think is best in a marriage?

It was really great to read, and learn about these different loves, as well as about dating and such. There are so many things we can learn about love, I found it really fascinating!

(I do not own images.)