“Someone told me once, in every relationship one person loves the other person more than they are loved. Whoever loves the other person less winds up leaving. Do you think that’s true, P?” my husband, asked.
“No. It’s true in some cases but there is such a thing as two people who are equally committed and devoted to each other and the relationship. You do see this in the world.”
“Yeah.”
“I’ve heard this same thing another way. What I heard is that one person always loved the other person more than they were loved and you ought to make sure you are the one who loves the least. So you don’t get hurt, I guess.”
“Uh huh.”
“But I don’t agree with it. I think whoever loves the most is far better off. For example, I loved the AMF more than he loved me. I don’t know this for sure, I mean how can you know something like that? But if I did love him more than he loved me, I think the reason is because I have gobs of love. He loved me the best he could. He loved me all he had but I just happen to have a freakish amount of love.”
“You do.”
“Yeah. I have love that is limitless (Venus Neptune) where he was in a different circumstance (Venus Saturn). So while I loved him more than he loved me, what difference does it make? How am I harmed?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well I don’t think I was harmed at all. I figure the more love you have to give, the more love you feel, the better off you are. I don’t see how I could be better off loving less. This is my position, though I realize it may not be practical for others.”
What have you heard about imbalance of love in relationship and how do you feel about it?
I agree Elsa. If you love from the full capacity of your heart, whether the other person does or not, at least you know that you never held back. How can you be displeased with a relationship when it continues or ends when you know you loved with everything that YOU had?
The rest is out of your control.
I agree. After many years I think I have finally come to understand that true love has to be given without strings. If you can truly love someone with no expectation of return you will strive to make the other person happy. There will be other interactions in the relationship, of course, and this doesn’t mean you will never disagree, but the undercurrent of true love is unselfish love and that is a rare commodity in this world.
I have seen r’ships that are imbalanced this way and been in them too. But i dont stay in them whether its me loving more or the other. I need it to be equal or it feels wrong. I love you but if you cant love me back i’d rather release you to find another who does float your boat and then i can too (jupiter in 7th ensures i’m never lonely and gives me faith in r’ship). And if my feelings have wained then i cant stay either cos i’m wasting your time.
maybe it’s the combo of venus in leo (i need to be a ‘one and only’) and moon in scorpio (adding to intensity of feelings), but if i’m in a situation where my s.o. seems ‘lukewarm’ in comparison to my ‘passion’ — i’ll ditch because of their ‘disloyalty’…
I thought someone always loved more, but that’s ridiculous – how does one measure that? And is that even relevant?
I believe that the two people may have different roles in the functioning of the relationship…but to make it work, the commitment must be the same and the input that each one applies must be balanced.
it never would have occured to me to try to score it that way. when i love, i just love. the real harm to yourself would come in if you tried to ration it out, because you can’t do that without killing off the abililty to honestly feel everything inside.
even if you love more than someone else loves back, so what? loving someone else doesn’t diminish you. it expands you, regardless of what they get out of it.
oh-venus in scorpio…. 🙂
It’s funny. I was just talking to a friend saturday about this. He believed in what that person told you. His poor pisces moon loves someone who doesn’t feel the same. =(
I’ve experienced this imbalance. I love intensely, and when I’m committed, I really let go. Some people like you said Elsa aren’t as capable, but they do love in their own way. Love is love and feels good to be loved in return, regardless.
Hm. I kinda see both sides (says Libra Venus).
There are relationships that are unbalanced like this and they implode, but there are also relationships like this that are stable for years and years. And I also believe that for any relationship, even a stable, loving, giving one, there are going to be times when one partner loves the other more at a given moment. It’s life, and individuals, and both change almost constantly. *shrug*
But would I stay in a relationship where I was the one who constantly loved more? With Venus, Mars, and Pluto conjunct, hell no! I’m no martyr. 😛 I have been the one who loves less, though, and I always made it a point to let the person know. “Hey, I’m not fully committed to this thing, so if there’s someone else you want – go for it! Just let me know beforehand.”
I’m Venus square Neptune so it seems like I’m *always* the one who loves more… but just like you, I feel like I have tons and tons and tons of love to give, and how does it hurt me to give it? It gives me so much pleasure just to love.
My mother used to tell me to marry someone who loves you more than you love them – makes me wonder.
I have heard that the one who loves less has all the power in a relationship.
I once loved a guy more than he loved me. Maybe I’m just not very evolved in this arena, but it hurt like hell when he left without a backward look.
How do you quantify love? There are so many ways of showing it. And everybody expresses it differently. So I find it hard to answer this question.
But there can be an imbalance of attention or energy or focus, as well, which is easier to notice.
Sometimes the person who “loves the most” is the one who leaves, too. Rather than get used up.
I have a friend who loves someone more than he loves her. He’s extremely rational, (they both believe in rational self interest/selfishness) even loving his work (Virgo) more than he loves her. And she, Scorpio, takes a while to care a lot about people and the fact that she loves him so much is a big deal. It kind of sucks.
I think saying someone loves more than the other is odd….no one loves in the same way. E.V.E.R.
I love my kids but I love them different. I love them different because they are different people just as the love that goes out of me is different so is that love that comes back to me.
For the intesity that I have the capacity to love…I don’t love enough. But my level of love even in the smallest bit is more intense than someone that doesn’t have the same heart.
My history from teenaged/20s years was being the person who was ‘loved less.’ I had multiple partners say what one said directly: ‘You knew you’d love me more.’ I was always emotionally struggling to get more and get what I thought I deserved.
It is hard to quantify emotions, but basically the less/more idea is brought into play with the lack of choices in the lexicon. And I do believe it exists, but people stay involved from fear and weird obligations.
I can see from my 20/20 vision that I was forceful in love with the wrong people (Venus in Aries).
Hm, Venus/Neptune trine. Don’t mind me, I maybe delusional.
You can’t put love in a jar. I think it either exists or it doesn’t. I see love as a verb rather than a noun. Your love is as much as you are capable or else it’s perhaps not love. Perhaps the expression of love is what is being weighed up here. I think it might hurt if you are trying to judge whether you love someone more or less than they do. I just love to the best of my ability. I used to hold back when I was younger and afraid. I realised what always hurt was that I hadn’t given my best, no matter whether I left or he left.
I think Joh is right about love being a verb rather than a noun… at least, you have to “do” the verb (make some love) before you get the product (love).
And I think when people don’t understand that concept, you end up with a struggle for “who gets more,” whereas when you have two self-aware people who understand how to make a relationship work & survive, you have more verb to go around.
Love? — > Unselfish and with no expectations
For me Love and Kindness are never wasted. I dont count how much love I give. I just give it to everyone!
”Where love rules, there is no will to power ; and where power predominates, there love is lacking. The one is the shadow of the other” Carl Jung
Hmm, I may have a fire triplicity, but my Pisces Ascendant makes me alot more humbled than other fire signs.
I think people who love you less just to get on your nerves are a**holes!
But, like, Elsa said, some people love less than others just because that’s just the way they are, not because they don’t care about you.
You’re absolutely right Elsa. I love this post. 🙂
I love when you have certain realizations and it fits like a glove with the astrology. In this case, we can understand why Venus is considered exalted in Pisces 😉 … the whole, Limitless Love/Neptune bit.
“I’d rather be the one who loves, than to be loved and never even know.” – Josh Ritter
Sums it up for me.
Love this post – lots to think about.
Some may think this is dark but – The one who loves the least in the relationship holds the most power..
(Take that several different ways, but there is truth to it.)
Probably because I’ve seen too many people who love too much, and have been either deluded or unable to see and have been cruelly treated and hurt…
I’m living this right now. My Venus in Aquarius can’t get enough of my husband (Venus in Capricorn) who is all MEH but coming around. It has been more of a seesaw. My goal is to eventually get to a point of equilibrium.
I am usually the one who loves more. But I think as in my marriage, I didn’t realize that for 15 years and then when it finally hit home all the way, I found I wanted to be loved back, by someone who cared about how much I gave and how hard I worked for them. I have venus/saturn AND a 7th house neptune. So I left because I wanted that. But it was as clear to my ex as it was to me that I loved him far more, and because of that he was always kind to me about it.
I am always the one to give more, and when I feel that someone is not pulling their weight, I leave…this has been my pattern, for better or worse!
i’ve been loved more and i’ve been the one to be loved less, i’ve also experienced the dynamic flip-flop overnight–more than once. sometimes it is comfortable, sometimes it is soul-crushing.
but i should add that when i am loved more there is a tremendous sense of dread, because i know when the tables turn i will be sick knowing their precious love is gone and the guilt i will have for not honoring it–whether that was my intention or not
i will go into desperate ‘repossession mode’ and that is my own personal hell on earth
I guess many people confuse love with neediness. They pledge love while underneath it´s all about being loved “the right way”(the way they themselves can identify as meeting their needs). So that´s when the scales of love come to measure, and that´s when dependency and fear of getting hurt sets in, mostly for the worse.
For myself i found out that the more i love myself instead of throwing my secret needs onto the other person, the stronger and more loving i get towards him, and the more i´m loved back for what i AM, not for what i GIVE. I don´t need to love “unconditionally” (in the sense of giving myself up) when i start seeing the other as he is and loving him for what he is, not for what i might get out of him. As for my experience, love and partnership is not necessarily connected anyway… i´ve been loved by men that weren´t able to partner with me for different reasons, but i felt and enjoyed their love nonetheless, even though it didn´t seem to meet my “demands”, which turned out pretty different from what i thought they were anyway. Surprise! So, as i found out that it´s not really necessary to play the giving part especially since there are people out there that don´t want or need to be on the receiving end all the time, i turned to just being and let the other be. No more scales. Took my quite an effort, especially since i changed my ways within an ongoing relationship, but that made all the difference, from me being dissatisfied and pouting because i “wanted to give so much” he didn´t ask for to us being real close and enjoying each others company without any effort and without measuring. No scales. I give whenever and whatever i myself feel like giving, if, so does he, and even if it doesn´t always match, we´re tolerant and loving enough to just let it pass. It´s the cherry, not the cake.
So that would be what i recommend ;-). But then, relationships are a tool of self-evolving, one way or the other, so everyone should find their best way for themselves…
Greetings, Kundrie
I have the Venus in Pisces thing, so maybe it is that, but I can love a lot. Right now, I am loving someone who is withholding and not giving love like he used to, and I’m realizing it doesn’t hurt so much if I allow my myself to just keep on loving him. I do prefer the equal love thing, and that is how this once was, and that is the best, and it does exist. Come to think of it, he loved me when I was hurt and withholding, so maybe we are still being pretty fair and equal with each other.
Just wondering, when Saturn was in Virgo we dissected, and discerned our relationships. Now when Saturn goes into Libra we will try to find balance somewhere, either in ourselves or in our relationships with others. But during this transition venus is in virgo, so will relationships that don’t measure up, will they fall now, especially if they haven’t already stepped away from the dead thing? Does the divorce/separation rate go up during this time?
I read a statistic somewhere once that the average time period is 2 years from when a person first starts to think about leaving till they actually do? Well our 2 years are up and now venus is in its sign of detriment/fall, so is this where the rubber meets the road?
It never occurred to me to keep score. Is that weird for a libra?
daisy – do you know how insightful you are???
I think The book men are from mars women are from venus written by John Gray mentioned something about this. I too believe that people can love equally, but perhaps, like he suggested, some loved FASTER than others. Some got to a place of intimacy faster than the other. Two people in the same relationship are in different stages of the relationship. Their love grow at a different pace.
I think people have very different capacities when it comes to love just like some people tend towards happiness, others don’t.
https://elsaelsa.com/astrology/2009/11/30/1-minute-astrology-the-psychology-of-happiness/