There Is No Ultimate Safety in Love

Those of us who are most interested in love, who associate it with the summit of satisfaction and who long for a deep sense of emotional safety in relationships, may be haunted by an ideal: that we can – eventually – get it right.

One day, if we read enough, if we have sufficient therapy, if we are extremely thoughtful in our choices, if we communicate maturely and honestly, if we lay aside time every day to explore and process resentments, if we take care to understand the minutiae of our emotional functioning, if we put in the time, we will find ourselves in a supremely stable and flourishing relationship: one that is gracious, calm, cosy and tender; one where there’s a sense of complicity and mutual sympathy for past sufferings; one that lasts not just for a while, but until the end. Here, finally, there will be sweetness, there will be trust, there will be safety. We will have reached the harbour.

An old Jewish saying comes to mind: man thinks, God laughs. One might add: man plans, God laughs. Or: man imagines he might be able to work it out, God laughs. Or: man thinks he could conceivably one day reach the harbour, and God giggles.

We should take care. We don’t need to punish ourselves twice: once with an ideal, twice with a sense of sorrow and persecution if we fail to reach it.

The Ideal of Emotional Safety in Relationships

Naturally, we must do our very best. We can scan assiduously for mental imbalances at the dating stage. We should learn about attachment theory. We can ask probing questions. We can step away from the most obvious problems: someone who withholds, who is violent, who can’t control themselves. We can talk with a therapist about whether we may be drawn to rejecting goodness. We can insist on polite treatment, we can apologise and complain with diplomacy. We can read John Bowlby and Donald Winnicott, Melanie Klein and Janina Fischer. We can schedule regular check-ins. We can hold our destination firmly in mind: a secure base, laughter and forgiveness, a person who can welcome our reality and we theirs.

None of it is strange; all of it belongs to the noblest, most legitimate aspirations.

But it is also profoundly and thoroughly impossible. It isn’t a viable philosophy. It’s a fantasy dressed up in the language of therapeutic enlightenment. We mustn’t – to be kind to ourselves – ever be searching for eternal satisfaction. We can’t believe in total safety. We must never assume that we can reach any sort of a conclusive destination.

We can think we know everything about someone. But there may be another family, a different sexuality, a new sense of alienation or a fresh desire for freedom. Or else disaster comes from without. They lose the power of speech. The mind or the pancreas gives way. Then, once more, homelessness, grief, isolation, loss. Back out on the heath, bewildered and forlorn.

A More Workable Philosophy

Let us – therefore – outline and adopt a stiffer counsel, a more workable philosophy that can honour our longings and yet make proper room for disaster.

1. Never believe in safety.

So long as one is alive, one is exposed. Another person can never be adequately directed or contained. There is too much that is unpredictable and mysterious in everyone. We can never fully know who is in front of us. They can assure us of loyalty every new day – and still change their minds. We must keep our muscles trained. We can’t allow ourselves to fall into a deep sleep. We have to imagine that they might not be telling us the whole truth. To love is to surrender to unpredictability. The greatest sense of safety is born from knowing there is no ultimate safety. There could always be a need to leave home. We must keep a small bag packed at all times.

2. We can survive.

We have done it before and will be able to do so again. At any age; after any amount of cosiness. We may use baby language with them and yet we aren’t, thank goodness, small helpless children. We could dismantle the shared references. We could forget the nicknames. We could erase the memories, delete the photos and throw away the teddies. We might need to start again in our seventies or eighties. Nothing has been assured. Expect everything, reckon on everything. We are loving humans, not statues. We might need to return to one room. We might be crying every morning. We would survive.

3. We should not let our hopes rest on a single person.

The best defence against disappointment is to have a lot going on – and some very good friends too. This isn’t un-Romantic. It’s truly Romantic, defined as conducive to the support and sustenance of love.

4. Heave close to pessimism.

Darkness isn’t despair; it can be the most mature kind of protection. It’s compatible with a lot of laughter. We can crack jokes on the way to the gallows. We didn’t ask to be built this way, to be so exposed to accident and changes of mind, to be part of such a wayward and peculiar species, to have such longings for perfection and to be working with so much unsteadiness and doubt.

5. Because of it all, we must properly, with open arms, appreciate when things are going well.

When there is a week without an argument, when someone shows up with cheerfulness and open-heartedness, when there’s a very enjoyable holiday or Saturday afternoon. We begin to appreciate mere moments when we amply realise that eternity is never guaranteed and that emotional safety in relationships can never be wholly secured. There was a pleasant lunch, today went well, it’s been nice this week. These are the increments that the experienced delight in. Never again take stability for granted. Nothing is forever, we’re made largely of water. A penny dropped from one storey can kill us. Remember Sophocles: call no human, and certainly no lover, happy till they die.