How do you make love stay?

I was looking into a HAI workshop today and found this
list of "How to Make Love Stay" guidelines on Chip
August's blog.

Then I was reminded of Tom Robbin's
quote about how to make love stay in one of my
favorite books, "Still Life With Woodpecker." I'm
sharing both with you here.

I am finally realizing that love isn't something you find--
love is something you make. A relationship isn't
something you discover -- it is a co-creation. A co-
creation that like any other magnificent work of art or beauty
requires dedication, teamwork, risk and hard work.

This discovery is a major "ah hah" for me.

------

Ten Promises That Invite Love To Stay, by Chip August


1) I promise to listen to you.

2) I promise to tell you the truth, saying both
the hard stuff and the easy stuff.

3) I promise to always make time for us.

4) I promise to choose being in love over being
right.

5) I promise to always look for the joy in our
relationship.

6) I promise to do all I can to have my passion
for you grow.

7) Talking to each other is very important to
our relationship.

8) Loving, intimate touch is more important than
talk.

9) I choose to love you, and if I forget,

10) I promise to choose to love you again.


How to make love stay.

by Tom Robbins:

Who knows how to make love stay?

Tell love you are going to the Junior's Deli on
Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn to pick up a cheesecake,
and if love stays, it can have half. It will stay.

Tell love you want a memento of it and obtain a lock
of its hair. Burn the hair in a dime-store incense
burner with yin/yang symbols on three sides. Face
southwest. Talk fast over the burning hair in a
convincingly exotic language. Remove the ashes of the
burnt hair and use them to paint a mustache on your
face. Find love. Tell it you are someone new. It will
stay.

Wake love up in the middle of the night. Tell it the
world is on fire. Dash to the bedroom window and pee
out of it. Casually return to bed and assure love that
everything is going to be all right. Fall asleep. Love
will be there in the morning.”

More from Tom Robbins:

“We waste time looking for the perfect lover,
instead of creating the perfect love.”

“Love is the ultimate outlaw. It just won't
adhere to any rules. The most any of us can do is to
sign on as its accomplice. Instead of vowing to honor
and obey, maybe we should swear to aid and abet. That
would mean that security is out of the question. The
words "make" and "stay" become inappropriate. My love
for you has no strings attached. I love you for free.”

“When two people meet and fall in love, there's
a sudden rush of magic. Magic is just naturally
present then. We tend to feed on that gratuitous magic
without striving to make any more. One day we wake up
and find that the magic is gone. We hustle to get it
back, but by then it's usually too late, we've used it
up. What we have to do is work like hell at making
additional magic right from the start. It's hard work,
but if we can remember to do it, we greatly improve
our chances of making love stay.”

“When we're incomplete, we're always searching
for somebody to complete us. When, after a few years
or a few months of a relationship, we find that we're
still unfulfilled, we blame our partners and take up
with somebody more promising. This can go on and
on--series polygamy--until we admit that while a
partner can add sweet dimensions to our lives, we,
each of us, are responsible for our own fulfillment.
Nobody else can provide it for us, and to believe
otherwise is to delude ourselves dangerously and to
program for eventual failure every relationship we enter.”