Making Real Love Calls

In the Real Love community, people commonly encourage each other to “make more Real Love calls.” That sounds like wise counsel, because more calls should equal more love, right? Not necessarily.

We all have a tendency to believe that more is better: more money, more sex, more approval, and so on. But more is often not better. More, in fact, can be distracting or harmful. Using more nails to fasten pieces of wood, for example, is often harmful, not better.

We must remember the purpose of making calls, which is to create opportunities to feel loved and to share it with others. It’s all about the feeling, which requires trust. If you call ten people who are inexperienced at loving, you may actually become confused and less trusting. It’s far better to call one person who is truly able to love you—reinforcing your trust—than to call ten people who are capable of loving you inadequately.

Moreover, it’s important to call not just people who are kind but people who are capable of helping us see the truth about ourselves. If you’re a victim and you call people who are sympathetic to your cries, you might feel better for a moment but will only be encouraged to continue in a behavior that consistently leads to unhappiness. When people tell me they’re making lots of calls, I ask them exactly who they’re calling, and often they’re calling people who will sympathize with them or agree with them. That’s not helpful, so I suggest just a tiny handful of people on their list who would be capable of loving AND teaching them.

I’ve known people involved in Real Love who have made very little progress despite years of work. They were simply making calls to people who couldn’t help them. When they made calls to people who could loveandteach, their lives began to change.

It’s far better to deeply trust one person and feel loved than to shallowly trust many.