Psychology research is advancing our understanding of compatibility. Together with advances in technology, internet, and social networking, the Matchmaking industry, undergoing a sort of renaissance, is trying best to answer the questions, “How do you define best-fit?” and subsequently “How do you find the best-fit partner?”
In “The Love Compatibility Book”, Edward Hoffman, Ph.D. and Marcella Bakur Weiner, Ph.D. describe twelve personality traits that can lead you to your soul mate. They are:
1. Need for Companionship 7. Materialism
2. Idealism 8. Extroversion
3. Emotional Intensity 9. Aestheticism
4. Spontaneity 10. Activity Level
5. Libido 11. Subjective Well-being
6. Nurturance 12. Intellectualism
They explain that the closer or similar two people score on each of these “innate” personality traits, in particular in four traits that each individual values the most, the more compatible those two people would be in a loving relationship.
The book provides valuable insights. In fact, my wife and I utilized them to improve our marriage and to understand who we are, in what traits we find or do not find affinity and whether that is important or not. Yet, from my own experience, compatibility alone does not adequately illustrate the love relationship in its entirety. Devotion is the most important and necessary condition. What do I mean by Devotion? Let me first introduce my own holistic model on love relationship, as illustrated below.
I
believe all human beings need spiritual growth. The soul needs to
grow, and food for the soul is gathered through the body, mind, and
heart centers while connecting and interacting with others. The love
relationship could be the greatest source of spiritual energy. Of
course not all food is nourishing. Love is nourishing, but when Fear
sets in, Ego asserts itself to protect the well-being of the whole.For love relationship to endure, I believe the Soul first has to have matured to a certain level--at least the Soul has to be bigger than the Ego. There are two reasons why this has to be the case. One, your Soul is your true self, the Ego the false self. Choices and actions, however big or small, made by the false self often lead to unhappy outcomes, because what Soul wants differs greatly from what Ego wants. If you are not happy, your partner is not going to be happy. Two, the Ego is comfortable in a master/servant relationship. The Ego competes, controls and dominates, irrespective of whether it is in a master or servant position. If your Ego selects your partner, chances are very high that the relationship would be empty at best, destructive at its worst. A love relationship needs to be between two Souls cooperating. Both need to be “servants”, so to speak, devoted to providing for each other’s spiritual growth. Even here, the maturity level of each partner’s Soul should be similar. A nearly-enlightened Soul and an infant Soul cannot mutually provide for each other’s growth, in the spiritual sense.
Spiritual growth is crucial. As individuals, however, we focus on our own need for spiritual growth. As loving partners, our focus should turn to our partner’s spiritual needs. I consider this to be Devotion. Devotion is when one partner surrenders their Soul and Ego and enters into the partner’s body to sense their pain or pleasure, into the partner’s mind to understand how and what they think, and into the partner’s heart to feel their joy and vulnerability. Devotion is Love, focused, intended. Through Devotion you are energizing your partner’s Soul, but at the same time gaining greater awareness of your own Soul, and ultimately becoming one. Therefore, Devotion is tantra—a spiritual technique or process. Mutual Devotion creates a virtuous circle to sustain a loving relationship. Without it, I believe the relationship would ultimately fade.
Devotion alone is enough. Compatibility, however, makes it much easier for the virtuous circle of Devotion to take hold, and determines the potential strength of the connection and the intensity of the exchange. Two Souls connect through the body, mind, and heart centers. In “The Love Compatibility Book”, I believe the authors were trying to measure the potential intensity between two people in a relationship by defining twelve personality traits through which individuals feel affinity. In my holistic view, I like to think that “Need for Companionship”, “Emotional Intensity” and “Nurturance” involve the Heart Center. “Idealism”, “Aestheticism”, “Extroversion”, and “Intellectualism” involve the Mind Center. “Libido”, “Materialism”, “Activity Level” and “Spontaneity” involve the Body Center. Finally, I disagree with the authors on “Subjective Well-Being” as being an innate personality trait.
Let me give an example of a compatible couple. Each loves to go out and socialize, try new experiences, love the challenges of running their own company, and appreciates the finer things in life. As a couple, they would probably score very similar in “Spontaneity”, “Extroversion”, “Materialism”, and “Activity Level”. I would say that they are strongly body and mind-oriented and thus connected in these centers and less so in the heart center. They would probably view each other as great companions to start and through Devotion, their love relationship would grow more intense as the heart center connection strengthens. This is compatibility of “Similars”.
Another example would be a couple where one person is active, has a high libido, loves to socialize yet also strongly desires companionship and a strong emotional bond. The other is warm and nurturing and has close relationships with family and friends, yet is introverted and strongly desires a more active and “exciting” lifestyle. I would say that this couple too is highly compatible, but this compatibility is of “Opposites”. Each partner’s body, mind, or heart center’s strengths complement the other’s weaknesses. Neither of them have strong Ego issues, but somehow they were not able to develop one or more of their centers as much as they would like.
In summary, I have tried to define a successful, loving relationship considering both spiritual and psychological factors using my holistic model. Devotion is a necessary condition. Compatibility helps. Psychology has developed methods to measure compatibility. Whether these methods are effective is another argument. Yet, how do you measure Devotion? I
sn’t Devotion just the willingness of the partner to put in the effort towards building a loving relationship?
I believe Devotion is an innate desire and capability of the Soul, but fear and Ego obstruct this. One way of measuring Devotion (or lack thereof) is to measure the Ego. Psychological tests can do this. Anyone can do this by measuring the prevalence of hypocrisy. If we look back at my holistic model, the center of every being is Soul – Ego. Where Ego dominates, the relationship can last, but cannot be successful or fulfilling. There are ways to reduce the Ego. Meditation is one method. Where Soul dominates, Devotion can be taught, coached, or learned through one’s own experiences. Compatibility helps Devotion take hold because it is much easier to see through the partner’s eyes if they are similar to yours, your actual or ideal self.
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