Love

This character embodies the archetype of romantic love, a slave to love in continuous search of the perfect other, or rather, the equal. They wait for the perfect partner, harboring the magical thinking that there is a saving relationship.

“The passionate search for an absolute love that I imagined to be pure, untouched by other motives, began in my childhood, filled with dreams and fantasies. The fantasy was, and remained for a long time, to find the ideal friend or partner, perfect in every way, capable of

completing me and healing my wounds. I expected them to love me unconditionally, thus calming the inner desolation that inhabited me.” – Ilaria C.

The "cradle of two," as this passion is sometimes called, does not materialize exclusively in the couple but refers to the mirror that looks at the other through an exclusive relationship. But it is so idealized that, as soon as there is real contact, it is immediately questioned.

“There have been many times when I thought I had truly found the person who seemed to embody this ideal, only to be quickly disappointed. In fact, in a short time, I began to observe flaws and imperfections that led to the first misunderstandings and irreparable disagreements: a sharp word, an obsessive gesture, or manipulation that was impossible for me to ignore or forget. Without realizing it, the other was subjected to tests that proved they met my expectations and the need for exclusive trust.” – Ilaria C.

The longing for love collides with a strong fear of invasion.

“After every contact I intensely experience (especially exchanges of love), I feel the urgent need to return to myself, separating from the other person and even isolating physically, if possible.” – Patrick M.

“Love intimidates me; love is something dangerous, vengeful, and manipulative. Love wants something.” – Michel T. Naranjo’s theory of love recognizes the admiring love as the most accessible to E5, which, among the admiring characters (E5, E6, and E1), is the most erotic. The sexual subtype has access to erotic love more easily than the other two. They have a self-image of goodness and kindness but confuse erotic love with compassionate love, using embraced Eros and receiving the warm attention they feel is infinitely lacking in mind. Eros is filial, instinctive love; it is our bodily connection with life, and the secular repression of this impulse disorients it to the point of making it hard to recognize. The erotic instinct for this character has been the most weakened, which is why the fixation here is greater. Eroticism is embodied in the body, but this subtype idealizes it in romance. It is even possible to say that, in sexual greed, erotic love becomes doubly predominant and, at the same time, dysfunctional, to the detriment of compassionate and admiring love. Because despite the shy and evasive nature of greed, when it takes the movement of trying again and not giving, it becomes excessively oriented toward personal satisfaction. In this way, the sexual instinct is contaminated and overpowers the desire for selfish satisfaction, and the result is a characteristic sad trait of disinterest in the other.

“Acting erotically is perhaps the path that seems easiest to me, though impermeable. Eroticism and sex make me feel appreciated and valuable. I try to satisfy myself through eroticism when perhaps I am yearning for intimacy... or maybe I feel appreciated, recognized for my courage and skills.” – Patrick M.

Erotic love in this character is marked by projections and attempts to repair childhood wounds through the romantic partner, who is their "savior." As already mentioned, the sexual instinct is dysfunctional, and therefore the way to give or receive love is also compromised in this subtype. This will “filter” any kind of love through the sexual sphere, whether in the form of compulsive overvaluation or a purely symbolic experience (a virtual sexuality); both preventing the recognition of the true face of Eros. Thus, it will be through their idealized objects (affective partners) that they will also expect to receive maternal love – care and protection they may not have had in childhood, including eroticization, as well as admiring love, since they desire to receive excessive admiration in return from the person who is the object of their projections.

“Very rarely did I have loving attitudes toward my siblings, parents, or friends, not even with girlfriends; I kept my love for the idealized woman, who never realized it.” – Alexandre V.

Idealization and divination are often reflected in sexuality as a rejection of what is strictly human, sometimes as a sexual renunciation in favor of the divine relationship, and at other times, in an exaggerated eroticism disconnected from affection, which can turn into perversion. Therefore, although they are extremely sexual, the person of this character does not suppress their emotional lack in sex: Their erotic love, being so idealized, is almost impossible to reach, and they confuse it, on one hand, with admiring love and, on the other, resulting in excessive excitement.

Although pleasure is experienced with the fear of being castrated, Eros is the preferred channel for contact. Sexual 5 accesses the game more easily than the other subtypes, and in the relationship, this is often confused with affection. This also happens with themselves: masturbation becomes the only way to give love, to feel pleasure, to contain themselves in the feeling of dispersion and emptiness. Unlike that idealized tender contact in the couple, in sex this character is not so tender. Sex, idealized as sacred and mystical, is in fact one of the few places where they actively assert themselves in the relationship, showing possessiveness and intrusiveness.

“Only when the initial phase of contact occurred did I let go completely, and this type of delicacy and shyness disappears. In sexuality, I can let go without restrictions, intensely, sometimes even roughly, often representing a relationship of dominance: perhaps I am not really free, but only my aggressive side. I am very much looking for this state where I can let go until the end.” – Patrick M.

The closed and symbiotic relationship they seek with their partner inevitably leads to the desire to receive all three types of love from the same person, since they are not open to other relationships or other dimensions of life. The link (pseudo-link) formed is so strong

that there is no space for anything else. However, Sexual 5 does not really see their partner, only their idealization.

They are also not interested in offering love, but only sex or something virtual. The care for the other, when it happens, comes from selfish motivations to receive something in return. They can hardly offer their partner a bit of admiring love, given their immense idealization, but it is a love that only lasts as long as the idealized being continues with the status of being divine and infallible. Once the illusions fall, so does the admiration for the partner. Once affection and strong physical attraction disappear, so does the idealization of the partner, and they doubt whether what remains is love. Having lost the erotic charge, sex becomes mechanical.

“By withdrawing my feelings, eroticism has emptied and become raw, disconnected, and mental. I did not support the intimacy I aspired to and could not live up to the ideal of reliability that I imposed on the other. So the only thing I had to do was wait for the bond, from my point of view, already damaged, to slowly dissolve by inertia, wearing out as if by itself.” – Ilaria C.

Sexual 5, therefore, leaves no room for a real and human relationship. It is also not easy for them to understand what devotion is and how to access it. Naranjo described them as an iconoclastic and arrogant character who does not recognize authority. Their behavior may almost seem enviable, considering their competitiveness, but it actually reflects the fear of losing their value the moment they recognize it in the other.

Their ability to admire the goddess woman or the God man may offer some opening for admiring love, but it is also a search for love as compensation for a distant or weak father figure. They often seek it in the form of spiritual, intellectual, or artistic guidance. But this love is also subject to the same setbacks as in the couple, according to the itinerant idealization → trust → distrust → lack of love.

“Approaching a teacher or someone superior in the work hierarchy, for training or experience, is difficult for me. Externally, I become submissive and secretly rebel. I do it by working poorly, carelessly, withholding, sabotaging my work. I enter the same dynamic I have with my parents, like an adolescent.” – Michel T.

What is devotion for them? First of all, nature fascinates them, they idealize it for its perfection and justice, it is a sacred element where they can take refuge and isolate themselves, where no one questions anything and where it would be good to die, away from social rituals.

“Culturally, in my family, I was raised in a scientific manner, in a place where God was repudiated and replaced by knowledge, so I could not have space for spirituality. What I

had was admiration for Creation, for nature; not for man and his work, which still seems impure to me.” – Michel T.

They also have easy access to aesthetics and recognize beauty in objects, art, and people. Like the social subtype, they have a passion for knowledge, which they experience more as a collection of information, books; in search more of a pleasure of possession in series than restitution to others of the acquired knowledge; books become silent talking parents.

“Sometimes it was hard for me to accept the value of the other and I tend to place myself above or, if that’s not sustainable, below. I love being appreciated for how much I know and how intelligent I am, and I avoid situations that could place me in a position different from my value.” – Patrick M.

“I felt like I always had to stand out for my intelligence and wisdom.” – Ilaria C.

The little that Sexual 5 left for maternal or compassionate love is in its understanding of how to keep things orderly and correct, but its social behavior quickly becomes distant and cold.

The sacred, mystical bond, unearthly, and transcendent is almost beyond reach, evoking a long search that finds no answers, and the hopelessness of this search turns into a form of self-love and a potential fatalism.

The little that the Sexual 5 left for maternal or compassionate love is for children, and nothing more. It is their least developed love. It tells of a sexual love that compassionate love was what they found in their life, and that, despite all their search for love, a great erotic and admiring treasure, it was this love that saved them from their own selfishness and transformed their inner dryness into a blooming field.

This character knows how to adore a person, but not how to approach their humanity, their pain. The feeling they experience when they are near the pain of others is one of overload and fear of being "swallowed." Their idealization of the relationship tends towards fusion in search of the lost maternal bond, while they fear merging with the other and losing their subjectivity.

"I realized how much I had lost an intimate and loving connection with my mother, how she had been absent in a way that scared me – I remember her eyes lost in the void – or bothered me because I felt used by her, even violated." – Ilaria C.

They are cynical with all of humanity and with themselves, a consequence of the improper reception of their feelings by the family.

There is no memory of maternal love, and they are in contact with this lack, resigned and angry at the same time. When they receive this type of love, as if they don’t know what it is, they confuse it with contempt or devaluation.

"In my family, you cannot suffer, only my mother can. I don’t remember a place to embrace the pain, not even with my father’s death. I don’t remember the warmth of my mother; I remember the hands that beat me. Then she called me to go to her bed, where she opened me up, she rubbed and caressed, but her hands were hard, and she couldn’t calm me. In that hug, she trapped me." – Michel T.

They pretend to be sweet and adorable to seduce and manipulate a potential substitute mother. It’s the sweetness of the dog ready to play and have sex. They know how to be formally in a relationship, they know how to caress and speak to give pleasure, but not to give comfort or acceptance. They don’t know how to give or receive that quality of love that is compassion.

"Approaching the women I desired, and deeply feared, was difficult, I never felt adequate or entitled to love, I was a beggar for love. The only way to get it was to steal it, and what I took wasn’t love, it was objects." – Michel T.

Giving oneself to others is giving without receiving anything in return: there is no return from the other when one truly gives oneself. But the childish structure of the Sexual 5 doesn’t understand that, by falling for the other, one receives in return in other ways, beyond the interaction between erotic love: well-being, happiness, or spiritual peace. Unfortunately, they are still addicted to erotic love exclusively.