The Difference Between Adoration and Love

If you want to be adored and worshiped, you’ll never be able to sustain a deep, satisfying, and challenging long-term relationship.

Beautiful and successful people often fall prey to adoration instead of the real thing — love. They think that a partner fawning all over them is fulfilling, but it never is.
No matter who you are, you probably fantasize about this kind of adoring love, even though it is shallow and superficial. You might get seduced because adoration is not vulnerable while love is. Being vulnerable means you’re open and susceptible to emotional pain. But you can’t safeguard yourself from suffering unless you never want to give and receive love.

When you express what you want to your partner, you’re exposed, dangling out on a limb. This vulnerable position doesn’t feel that great, but it’s the only way to have a life worth living and it’s the only way to save your relationship.

Often people who want to be adored have big egos and personas, but very little self-esteem substance because they don’t know who they are. They define themselves by what others think of them and cannot stand up on their own without an adoring audience. They don’t understand that approving of themselves is no one else’s business but theirs.

You can’t know who you are if you’re always dependent on your partner’s high opinion of you. What counts is what you think of yourself — not egotistically, but in a centered manner. It’s the only way you can be intimate with yourself, which is the first step to being intimate with your partner.

Partners who want to sit back, do nothing, and be adored cannot tolerate the vulnerability involved in monogamy. They often want an entourage of people or lovers constantly propping them up and telling them how wonderful they are. Or, they’ll play victim and never take responsibility for any conflict, claiming that it’s always someone else’s fault.

Worshiping someone, idolizing someone, is not deep and real. Don’t settle for someone who makes you feel adored. It’s compelling but it’s an illusion.

Are you a prisoner of what your partner thinks of you?
If you are, you can’t grow up to become an emotionally mature adult.