In Victorian era people found it quite normal to love someone without actually being intimate with them. Modern people have reached the other extreme, they can be intimate with someone without loving them.
Indeed, love and intimacy almost always go together. They are one of the most important things in a relationship between man and a woman. For many years people have tried to answer the question: ‘What is love and what is intimacy?’ and ‘What are their similarities and differences?’, ‘Is there love without intimacy and intimacy without love?’.
Here are a few starting points provided by psychologists:
Love and Intimacy
Intimacy is a physical and biological need of men or women. Its purpose is actually to achieve physical comfort and pleasure. Most people and some animals actually make love for pleasure and not just to produce offspring.
The need of intimacy in people is actually similar to hunger. It disappears as soon as the man or woman do it. But after a certain period of time, he or she has a new demand for food and intimacy.
Love and intimacy are two different concepts, but they’re closely interlinked. Some people argue that intimacy can happen even when both partners aren’t actually in love, while others say that love comes first, and when both partners are deeply in love, they’re intimate. But almost all people can agree on one thing, and that’s that intimacy is part of love.
Being intimate – Is it actually love?
Many people say that being intimate is an important part of all love relationships and some say that love can be a product of intimate relationships. Many people also try to compare love and sexual relations between partners. And even though love and intimacy can be connected, people agree that they’re different.
Many years ago, it was wrong to put love and intimacy together, because love was defined as something divine, and intimacy was regarded as an animal passion. Today people talk more freely about these things, but they still agree that being in love and being intimate are two different things. The conclusion is that being intimate is not the same as being in love.
Being intimate – Is it part of love?
After it’s concluded that being intimate and being in love are two different things, people asked themselves: ‘Is intimacy part of being in love?’. This view is based on descriptions of sex and love and sexual desire is seen as one of the main aspects of love.
The three most powerful emotions that people have when they’re in love are:
- A strong attachment to the person you love
- Grief, when the love ends
- Happiness in its revival, whether with it’s with the same person or with another
Intimacy takes part in the management of human thoughts and feelings. Sexual attraction is an important instrument of partners that are in love and they use it to express their feelings. So it’s actually foolish to deny that sexual desire isn’t part of love. This doesn’t mean that it’s something that must prevail in a relationship in order for it to be successful. A sexual desire doesn’t lead to falling in love and falling in love doesn’t necessarily lead to intimacy straight away.
In a survey, 70% of all participants aged 20 to 45, said that intimacy plays an important role in a relationship, and 65% said that it’s a major thing that keeps their marriage interesting. About 36% had partners. Only 14% didn’t engage in intimate relations because of moral or religious reasons.
Experts are now convinced that sometimes the lack of intimacy can show negative signs on some people, but some people have no problem to be abstinent.
So in summary you have to know that even though it’s important, intimacy isn’t love and being intimate with someone won’t necessarily make you fall in love with someone. Love without intimacy and intimacy without love do exist, but you should be wise and differentiate them so you’ll be happy and have a happy relationship.
