We all have love patterns that follow us throughout our lives. These often change during our relationship development to better meet our needs according to our beliefs, experiences and values in relation to love. In other words, they are modeled in order to protect us and help us flourish as individuals. These “patterns”, when unhealthy, usually make us experience feelings of sadness, loneliness, incomprehension, rejection as well as many mishaps. We then find ourselves in a vicious circle of bad love choices; A feeling of disappointment subsequently settles in us.

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Healthy love patterns allow us to flourish in our relationship and unhealthy ones to protect us. Paradoxically, these are comfortable despite the many problems they cause, because we can predict them and therefore feel safe. Novelty, under any circumstance, causes anxiety in everyone. This anxiety, in love, reduces the will to want to change one’s routine. However, some manage to do so, which allows them to flourish in the relationships they maintain.

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Love patterns start with the first meetings with other people. In order to meet our pre-established criteria, we make a selection of who we seduce and who can seduce us. When we start thinking about the people we choose to seduce and those we avoid, we can detect a “pattern” of seduction. It is not uncommon to seduce people with whom we feel comfortable, even if they would not always be our first choice. We rarely approach individuals we don’t feel good enough to deal with, because we assume that we will be rejected and hurt. We therefore avoid leaving our love pattern because despite the difficulties we find in it, it keeps us in our comfort zone.

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In short, when we find ourselves in an unhealthy pattern, we avoid contexts where we feel discomfort, discomfort, fear, etc. However, by allowing us to experience moments and contexts of seduction that are more anxiety-provoking, we discover new aspects of ourselves and unexplored relationships. Here, clumsiness and mistakes should not discourage us because they are part of a process towards change and fulfillment. Eventually, a balance is created and allows us to become more natural in our way of being. The next time you find yourself in a context of seduction, choose the person you are really interested in, even if they intimidate you.

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François Renaud M.A.
Sexologist & Psychotherapist Montreal