About REAL LOVE

Group Guidelines

Real Love: Unconditionally caring about the happiness of another person without any thought of what we might get ourselves. There is only one kind of love -- Real Love. Everything else is counterfeit. Through no fault of our own, few of us have either received or given much Real Love, and without it we have a terrible void in our lives.

Imitation Love: In the absence of Real Love, we attempt to fill our emptiness with Imitation Love, which is conditional and which comes in four forms: praise, power, pleasure and safety. No matter how many of these substitutes we acquire, we remain feeling empty, alone and afraid.

Getting & Protecting Behaviors: Lying, attacking, acting like a victim, clinging and running. We use Getting Behaviors (lying, attacking, acting like a victim and clinging) to try to fill our emptiness with Imitation Love. We use Protecting Behaviors (lying, attacking, acting like a victim and running) to eliminate our fear of not being loved.

• Attacking: anger, irritation, expressing disappointment, being "hurt", criticizing others, sighs and other non-verbals, insisting on being right, defending ourselves, passive aggression like being late or forgetting to do something.
• Lying: pretending to be someone we aren't, modifying what we say or do to please another, spending too much time on appearances, not telling the whole truth about our mistakes, only telling the good things or bad things, bragging, false praise, not taking responsibility
• Acting like a victim: acting like we have no control, blaming others for our unhappiness, pretending to be totally innocent, grudgingly going along, acting like there is no solution, acting like we are not appreciated.
• Clinging: using emotions to control another, needing another person's time or presence to be happy, talking on and on to get and keep attention, acting helpless without the other person, excessive gratitude or flattery, telling people how much we NEED them.
• Running: leaving mentally or physically when there is conflict or tension, not speaking, escaping into addictions or activities, over-sleeping, changing the subject.

1. Live with it and like it
2. Live with it and hate it
3. Leave it.

Truth > Seen > Accepted > Loved...

Until we are really seen (warts and all) we cannot feel loved. Speaking in a loving group means that we give permission for a Wise Man to help us tell the truth about our Getting & Protecting Behaviors. If we simultaneously exercise self-control over using Getting and Protecting Behaviors while we tell the truth about ourselves, we can generally accelerate our feeling of unconditional love.

Wise Men: People who give unconditional love and wise teaching. We ask that only individuals who have read the book Real Love serve as Wise Men. They feel absolutely, unconditionally loving toward the person who is speaking, and share that love by asking questions to help the person tell the truth about how they use Getting and Protecting Behaviors to get Imitation Love.

If people have even the slightest feeling of irritation or judgment toward the person speaking or are seeking Imitation Love themselves, they are not appropriate Wise Men at that time. In a Loving Group, only one Wise Man speaks at a time, please.

Wise Men are loving friends helping friends. They are not doing therapy, trying to fix anyone or solving problems. Wise Men are not perfect and may make mistakes. We can be Wise Men at some times and not at others.

How to "see" the Speaker: As the Speakers describe themselves, the role of the other group members is to "see: them by simply listening, accepting and loving. We do this, first, by being quiet (not interrupting), then by expressing our acceptance non-verbally or verbally, by avoiding verbal criticism, and by refraining from telling our own personal stories. Wise Men are then invited to interact with the speaker (person sharing).

Wise Men may ask the following questions (What-What-Why-What-What)

• What did he/she do?
• What did you do?
• Why did he/she do it? Why did you do it?
• What could you have done differently?
• What are you going to do now?