Desire vs. Cherish

'To be wanted' is a universal thing. People are vulnerable to being desired. Desiring is so primal and over whelming and people want the bigness and brightness of it. Ordinary life does not really always co exist with desire. It is hard to keep up with anything intense when you have to work, pay bills and worry about your family all the time. In healthy relationships, cherish is what slowly follows from the sizzle. In a narcissistic relationship what follows is devaluing and discarding. Not cherishing.

To be cherished is to feel safe, to be valued and cared about. To cherish someone is to be aware of their needs in a way such that you meet people where they are at. You don’t push people to do things that are uncomfortable or rush them. You just take good care of them. To cherish someone means to balance your needs with someone elses. That idea of mutuality.

The fine art of cherishing and being cherished is something we should learn. It may look dull and unexciting but a relationship that starts off with cherishing, those are often relationships that stand the test of time.

Cherishing isn’t glamorous like cinema portrays it. Big proposals, big declarations of love, flying across the world so on and so forth. Cherishing requires, empathy, self awareness, valuation of the other person and the willingness to make adjustments for another person

So what does cherishing look like? It is listening. Really listening and shaping awareness around that. An example. You may share a vulnerability with me. I will attempt to ensure that that you’re kept safe in that vulnerability. Let us say you’re terrified to swim in the ocean, I don’t push you into it. I hear you.

Cherishing is making compromises without throwing a tantrum. It is about not pushing you in a way that feels uncomfortable whether, sexually or physically. Cherishing is about never weaponising your vulnerabilities. Cherishing is about not competing with you in a way because I feel threatened by you. Even if your success is eclipsing mine, I will still enjoy the fact that you are succeeding.

Now cherishing has to be a two way street because in healthy relationships, cherishing is mirrored. When one is a narcissist and one is a cherisher, the cherisher ends up as the care giver, and the compromise maker and the flexible one and the other party just keeps overwhelming you with big proclamations of love and may be some acrobatic sex.

In childhood not a lot of people are cherished and this carries into adulthood. It sets the tone to over value the intense dynamics of desire. Short lived moments that you have to always keep chasing. It starts to feel exciting when it comes along rather than the daily knowing that you’re important and special and cherished.

The dynamics of desire serves as a curtain that blocks us from seeing red flags that keep us stuck in an undesired space that is really hard to get out of. We all deserve to be cherished and we should all hold out for that.

On a day to day basis, cherishing is soft and quiet and looks like sweatpants and chicken soup and that my friend is the stuff of life and churns out relationships that are supportive and growth oriented for a life time