Contents
- 1. “Love yourself first”
- 2. “Ask yourself: would you like to be married to yourself?”
- 3. “Love takes time and effort”
- 4. “Trust your partner”
- 5. “Conflicts are inevitable, but don’t make love after a fight.”
- 6. “You have the right to cry”
- 7. “There is no midlife crisis, but there is a transition period
- 8. “Don’t try to cover garlic with chocolate – it won’t taste better.”
- 9. “Know how to forgive”
Love is sought, experienced, proved, given… But most often they try to save it. How not to waste the feeling in a series of everyday problems and your own doubts? How should conflicts in a relationship be resolved? A psychologist with great (not only professional, but also life) experience tells.
Edith Eger is 93 and has something to say about love. Despite her venerable age, the psychologist continues to engage in couples therapy, noting that most often her clients talk to her about sex, money and relatives from the spouse. Eger herself, who already has several great-grandchildren, is dating a 96-year-old man and loves to dance swing, although she complains that recently “her legs are starting to fail.”
She was born in Hungary and miraculously survived the Holocaust. In 1944, when she was 16, Edith and her family ended up in Auschwitz, where her parents died on the first day in a gas chamber. For many decades, she was not even able to talk about the horror experienced in the concentration camp.
In her latest book, The Gift: 12 Keys to Inner Liberation and Finding Yourself, she encourages us readers to break free from our own psychological prison and choose love, forgiveness, and hope over fear, anger, and stress.
Here are some valuable tips about life, love and relationships that will be useful to each of us.
1. “Love yourself first”
Eger advises every day in the morning to look in the mirror and repeat how you love and appreciate yourself. “This is not narcissism, but a manifestation of self-care. You are a unique, real, unique person, this will never happen again, and it is important to appreciate it. All other relationships will end sooner or later, the relationship with yourself is the only one that will last a lifetime.
There are many ways to show love for yourself. “Be kind to yourself – eat right, exercise, try to maintain balance. It is very dangerous to put your well-being in complete dependence on another person. Your life doesn’t really depend on what you get or don’t get from others,” says Eger.
2. “Ask yourself: would you like to be married to yourself?”
What do you like about yourself? Try to answer this question honestly and make a list of your strengths.
“Before solving relationship problems, it’s worth dealing with our own shortcomings – anger, irritability, resentment… Now, during a pandemic, it’s especially important to realize that if we don’t know how to be happy alone with ourselves, then no one else will bring us happiness either” .
3. “Love takes time and effort”
The psychologist emphasizes how important it is to maintain a balance between work, love and entertainment: “Life is full only if it is balanced. When you spend your time on something or someone, ask yourself – does it empower you or deprive you of them?
4. “Trust your partner”
No building can be built without a foundation, and for a relationship, the foundation is trust: “It is important to really believe that together you are stronger than alone. Nothing destroys intimacy between partners like chronic mutual irritation and bitterness.
5. “Conflicts are inevitable, but don’t make love after a fight.”
Edith Eger explains: “Conflicts are natural and inevitable, and if spouses come to me and say that they never quarrel, I understand that there is no real intimacy between them. The main thing is to be ready for compromises and not to strive at any cost to prove your case. But “conciliatory sex” is perceived as a “reward” and therefore only encourages us to new quarrels. Therefore, it is better not to resort to his help.
6. “You have the right to cry”
“It is not harmful to give free rein to feelings, it is harmful to keep them in oneself,” says the psychologist. “The opposite of depression is expression.”
7. “There is no midlife crisis, but there is a transition period
“When I was 40, my supervisor began to persuade me to start working on my dissertation. I said that it was impossible, by the time of the defense I would already be 50 years old! And he replied: “You will get 50 anyway!”
8. “Don’t try to cover garlic with chocolate – it won’t taste better.”
In other words, do not try to deny your feelings and pretend that you are not hurt when you are not. If you feel like something is wrong in your life or relationship, admit it. “Love and fear are incompatible,” emphasizes Eger.
9. “Know how to forgive”
Forgiveness is primarily for ourselves, and not for another person. “It’s okay to be angry, as long as the anger doesn’t turn into chronic resentment. Remember that when we get angry at someone, it is not him who suffers, but we ourselves.