#034: Finding Healthy Love with The Angry Therapist

Love Types

Mark Groves and John Kim explore the distinction between young love and healthy love. Young love is often characterized by intense emotions and a sense of fate, while healthy love requires time, effort, and overcoming resistance. John emphasizes that healthy love is built through mutual exploration and overcoming dysfunctions together.

Healthy love takes time, it takes peeling layers, and it's also going to bring up resistance. And you may define that resistance as not being attracted to someone.

--- John Kim

They discuss how the excitement of young love can be addictive, filled with dopamine and serotonin, but often leads to self-sabotage and repeated dysfunctional patterns 1 2.

   

Nurturing

Nurturing love involves consistent effort and communication. John and Mark agree that healing within a relationship requires both partners to address their wounds and develop new behaviors. This process helps build trust and fosters a deeper connection.

Relationships can also heal the wounds. A corrective relationship. And so that's why it's so important for people to choose healthy relationships.

--- John Kim

Mark shares a personal revelation about his difficulty in allowing himself to be loved, highlighting the importance of overcoming false beliefs and self-sabotage 3 4.

   

Media

The media significantly shapes our perceptions of love. John discusses how our 'love buds' change over time, much like taste buds, as we grow and work on ourselves. This shift helps us move away from toxic relationships and towards healthier ones.

If you have been in many relationships where there was the Telemundo or the drama or the toxicity, abuse, whatever, you get to a point when you start working on yourself where your love buds change and what you were attracted to before, now you're almost repelled by.

--- John Kim

Mark and John also touch on the misrepresentation of love in movies and TV, which often leads to unrealistic expectations and dysfunctional relationship patterns 5 6.

   

Building

Building a relationship is a continuous process that requires daily effort. John compares relationships to a living, breathing entity that needs nurturing and attention. Mark adds that love is a daily choice, involving micro moments that contribute to the overall health of the relationship.

Love isn't like a con. It's not like you switch the light switch on, and it's a constant. For me, it's a dance. It comes in moments and it fluctuates.

--- John Kim

They emphasize the importance of bringing awareness and a desire to heal into the relationship, which can help both partners grow and heal together 7 8.