Discover love’s ingredients and learn how to

measure and use them to strengthen your relationships

Lewis E. Farsedakis

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INTRODUCTION

Love is one of the most intense and powerful human experiences. At its best, it is what

makes life most worth living. At its worst, it has started wars, ruined fortunes, and

destroyed families.

People use the word ‘love’ to describe how they feel about a person, a friend, an animal,

an object and their beliefs. Why? Can the same word that describes how parents feel for

their children also describe how one feels about a painting? Do different forms of love

exist or is there just one type?

These questions can leave one dissatisfied with how the word is defined, understood and

used. Certainly, a word everyone uses almost daily and so widely needs investigation.

But to do so is to tackle the same philosophical question that great minds have pondered

for thousands of years...what is love? Philosophy brings us various theories of love, one

being Plato’s that love is born of need or lack, a desire to complete oneself. Aristotle

believed that love is an intrinsic appreciation and concern that one feels for another.

An ideal example of love is difficult to identify. Surely it cannot be the love one feels for

a thing like a painting, because people acquire objects they love and still search for a

greater love. The same holds true for our bond with animals. Ideal love cannot be

identified with the institution of marriage, given how many marriages end in divorce and

how much malice some people show towards their spouses. Nor can it be identified with

the bond between parents and children. Consider how many children stop talking to their

parents, and how many parents abandon or mistreat their children. An ideal example of

love would have to show a prolonged, complex bond, dominated by satisfying

experiences; however, such an example of ideal love is not easily found in reality--only

in fantasy.

Such inquiry leads to this crucial realization: the difference between reality and fantasy

with love is essential to understanding ideal love. But how does one separate reality from

fantasy when it comes to an experience as subjective as love?

First one must understand the word ‘love’ as it is used today, in all scenarios and contexts

in order to explain how someone could say “I love my car” with the same conviction that

another says “I love my dog” or “I love my spouse.” We can find a greater value in love

if we develop a deeper understanding of the emotion; only then can we truly develop

meaningful love relationships.

The theory behind OMADAMO, explained below, shows what love is and how it

develops. More importantly, it establishes a methodology for how we can all work at

developing and maintaining better love relationships. Love, like anything worth having in

our universe, is something we need to work at. Just like seeds that we plant, love can

wither and die due to neglect, or it can blossom and flourish through nurture. Ideal love is

something achieved.

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What does it mean to achieve love? Aristotle tells us that some activities help us achieve

something separate from ourselves. For example, if you build a table, you perform

actions that lead to a separate product, the table itself. If you dance a tango, the tango is

inseparable from the sequence of movements you perform. Love, therefore, is more like

the tango than the table.

“For one human being to love another; that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks,

the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation.”

Rainer Maria Rilke (Poet)

WHAT IS LOVE?

Definition Love is a complex emotion consisting of seven essential ingredients of varying quality

and intensity, such that the accumulation over time of actual pleasant experiences is

greater than non-pleasant ones. The ingredients are:

• affection

• respect

• admiration

• empowerment

• loyalty

• intimacy

• appreciation.

It is crucial that these ingredients be real and not fantasized, so that reality remains

distinct from fantasy. There is only one love with many manifestations. Ideal love, which

this theory calls “OMADAMO,” is the most complete, complex, real, and pleasurable

manifestation of love.

Love’s Pitfalls

Love has its pitfalls, mainly because it is so hard to tell fantasy from reality. We all tend

to project our feelings, both good and bad, on to others. For example, a man who feels

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intense love for a woman may believe that her feelings for him are equally intense.

Fantasized love can last a long time if reality does not challenge it. If reality does

challenge it, and people are receptive, a couple can expect their relationship to be

increasingly based on reality as time goes on.

A dangerous pitfall is the desire for a perfect mate that matches the stereotype engraved

in our minds when we are young. We are victims of the idea that there is a perfect prince

or princess out there for each of us. Thus, many throw away love relationships--one in

which our positive experiences surpass the negative--because it does not conform to our

fantasy, especially during a rough patch. It is all too easy to project today’s bad feelings

into the future and then to dissolve the relationship. It requires imagination and discipline

to resist this tendency. For example, suppose that a couple has had a good relationship for

fifteen years. For ten months, one of them suffers from depression, which makes him

withdrawn and short-tempered. It tends to be easier for the other person to lose

perspective, to forget their history and to leave than to imagine ways of helping him and

to envision the current situation as temporary.

When fantasy is completely absent from a relationship that is missing one or more

ingredients, one may feel bored and look elsewhere, seeking to find the missing

ingredients in another. For example, if you are so familiar with your loved one that

admiration no longer offers intense experiences, you may seek to admire someone else to

experience intense admiration once again.

Another pitfall is allowing things that have nothing to do with love to influence it. For

example, money is the leading cause of divorce; yet money is not an ingredient of love;

however, it can reveal problems with one or more ingredients. In some cases, loss of

wealth can strengthen a couple’s commitment to each other, and in others it can reveal

fundamental incompatibilities such as lack of respect, trust or loyalty.

An additional important pitfall of love is our own inherent laziness that begins to affect

relationships from the very first day. This is why in the beginning we are ready, able &

willing to make changes when asked, but as time goes on we are less willing. Without

understanding/believing that effort is needed on an ongoing basis, our own laziness

begins to deteriorate the relationship and we blame it on “not loving me for who I am”

instead of recognizing that no one remains static and unchanged. We need to accept as

inevitable that people change, which need not be negative.

Ideal Love The degree of pleasurable experiences in a love relationship increases along with:

• the quantity of ingredients

• the intensity of ingredients

• the equal presence of all seven ingredients

These conditions allow for varying degrees of fulfillment. A lesser presence or absence of

one or more ingredients results in a less satisfying love relationship, and possibly the

desire to “fill in” real experiences with fantasized ones. This is why love for an object or

a pet cannot rival love for a person, because only people have the cognitive abilities that

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can permit the most complex interactions. For example, a car cannot show loyalty and a

pet cannot empower a person to reclaim a lost moral compass.

It is possible to think we are in love when one or more of the ingredients is missing; so to

sustain the relationship, we fill the gap by fantasy or acceptance. An example of fantasy

would be to imagine that a loved one appreciates things we do even if they have

expressed otherwise. An example of acceptance is when one must settle for their loved

one’s inability to show affection as they used to, due to an accident.

When quantity, intensity and equal presence of love’s seven ingredients are coupled

with actual accepted experiences and the desire to continuously work on building a

stronger relationship, then ideal love - or OMADAMO - has been achieved.

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INGREDIENTS OF LOVE…

Affection (A): Feelings are demonstrated to you in ways appropriate to the relationship.

A child will show you affection differently than your spouse or significant other. Normal

human beings require touch and signs of fondness. Babies need to be touched and held in

order to thrive. Affection can be expressed through touch, tone of voice, glances, acts of

kindness and thoughtfulness.

“We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection.”

Tenzin Gyatso (14th Dalai Lama)

Respect (R): You are accepted and valued for the person you are intrinsically and

holistically, not just insofar as you benefit your loved one. You are respected because

your loved one cares about your values, interests, and choices, even if they have different

ones. For example, if you question a choice your loved one made, does he listen seriously

and consider your reasons openly?

“When men & women are able to respect and accept

their differences then love has a chance to blossom.”

John Gray (British Philosopher)

Admiration (AD): You admire your loved one for qualities that you yourself would like

to have. You see the one you love as exemplifying a quality or combination of qualities

that you value or hold in high regard. For example, the child you love may have a quick

wit or a sensitivity to other people that makes you see her as special. A loved one may

have the insight to make you realize something about yourself. You might admire the

gracious way that your loved one deals with other people. Some qualities that we admire

are ones we do not or cannot possess. Admiration presupposes that you see the person as

other, as separate from you; for if you do not, you are seeing the person as an extension

of yourself, not as they are.

“Love is the admiration and cherishing of the amiable qualities of

the beloved person, upon the condition of yourself being the object of their action” Samuel Taylor Coleridge (British Poet)

Empowerment (E): Your loved one wants to bring out what they believe is, or could be,

the best in you. Your loved one wants you to attain the autonomy necesary to achieve

your goals and to be psychologically free to pursue your desires without interference

from obsessions, fears, or unhealthy conflicting desires. This does not mean that your

loved one is trying to change you to meet their standards or fulfill their goals, but rather

that they understand your standards and goals and want to help you meet them. For

example, parents who love their children want them to become their best; they do not

want their kids to be trapped by the same fears or concerns that trouble them. If your

child loves playing the piano, do you try to find out about different teachers and

educational approaches, and then find the best you can afford to give them? Do you take

the child (or loved one) to concerts that you yourself would not go to otherwise? If you

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feel that your loved one has lost his moral compass, do you try to help him reclaim it? A

person who truly loves another tries to help him achieve his goals so that he feels

fulfilled.

“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two

chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.”

Carl Jung (Swiss Psychologist)

Loyalty (L): Your loved one is in your corner. You can count on them to be there for you.

They strive to defend you against assaults from the external world, such as gossip, unfair

treatment, criticism and life’s problems. Moreover, you’re confident that your loved one

is trying to reciprocate the emotions you are giving. Loyalty is related to empowerment in

that being loyal involves your loved one supporting and not undermining your mastery in

the world, just as empowerment involves helping you have self-mastery.

“The scholar does not consider gold and jade

to be precious treasures, but loyalty and good faith”.

Confucius (Chinese Philosopher)

Intimacy (I): You exist in an emotionally safe and private place in which you express

feelings or thoughts that your loved one would not reveal in other arenas. You cannot

imagine your loved one telling your secrets to others. If your loved one has a criticism of

you, they express it only in private. Intimacy is an important ingredient of love because it

creates a unique bond in a relationship that is unique and exclusive to those two people.

"Love consists in this, that two solitudes protect and touch and greet each other."

Rainer Maria Rilke (Swiss Poet)

Appreciation (AP): You take pleasure in being with the one you love, and this pleasure

makes you feel improved by the relationship. You want to be with your loved one and

loving them makes you feel like a better human being. You want to spend time with this

person. You want this person to be happy. For example, a parent might enjoy watching

his child discovering and enjoying things, whether it's watching ants on the sidewalk or

getting his college diploma. We also appreciate and are gratified when someone likes

being with us. A father may feel that loving his child makes him more patient, more

responsible, more in control of his emotions or impulses. He feels gratified that his child

has fun being with him, while they do things together. A man who is color-blind might

enjoy accompanying his girlfriend to a museum where she gets absorbed in a painter’s

use of color and brushstroke. He takes pleasure in how she relishes the artworks and also

in his own ability to appreciate her sensitivity.

“Appreciation is a wonderful thing: It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well.”

Voltaire (French Philosopher)

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WHY DO WE LOVE?

Pleasure We seek love, because it is the most pleasurable experience the universe has yet to offer

us. In addition to the number of ingredients; their quality, variety and intensity can also

determine how much pleasure or non-pleasure one derives from a particular love

relationship. You can quickly erase years of pleasurable experiences with one, powerfully

intense, non-pleasurable experience. For example, consider a couple who has shared

many happy times. Those happy times can instantly become insignificant if one

physically assaults the other.

“The reputation of a thousand years may be determined by the conduct of one hour.”

Japanese Proverb

Real Shared History

Our lives are sequences of experiences, some pleasurable, others non-pleasurable. We

want pleasurable ones to be as intense, varied, and numerous, as possible; but even non-

pleasurable experiences, while inevitable, may be worthwhile because they may lead to

moments of intense pleasure in the future. For example, dragging your unwilling child to

his tennis lessons may result in many wonderful moments of shared enjoyment in the

future when you can play together.

The more experiences we share with someone, the more intricate our history becomes.

The uniqueness of that history intensifies the quality of future experiences. Suppose you

are visiting the Grand Canyon in Arizona. Awed by its beauty and the aura of the

moment, you can relive it often with someone who experienced it with you. Having

someone to share our experiences validates our lives. We write the history of a

relationship by living it and keeping a mental account of pleasurable and non-pleasurable

experiences.

The greater the pleasurable experiences, the richer the shared history, and the richer the

shared history, the greater the desire to remember, defend, cherish, and work on the

relationship. It is important that we could, however, have a desire to defend and to work

on that relationship when it is only imagined love, because we are projecting what we

want the relationship to be, while ignoring what it actually is. This is so common in

human experience that it is the subject of much great literature. Conversely, we can

imagine many non-pleasurable experiences with another that they overshadow any

pleasurable ones, which leads to a desire to abandon the relationship.

The longer we are in a love relationship, the greater the number of experiences we have

accumulated. In a close relationship, these will be strongly intense. This makes our love

relationship stronger and allows for a greater degree of pleasure and non-pleasure to be

experienced. Therefore, the stronger the love relationship, the more disappointed we are

with non-pleasurable emotions we experience, and vice-versa.

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Simply being together, however, doesn’t mean there is a shared history; rather, it may be

a parallel history. For example, many couples opt to stay together for the benefit of their

children while leading essentially separate lives.

CONDITIONS FOR LOVE

In order to love, we must have self respect and a feeling of comfort in our own skin. This

requires that we be honest with ourselves. Self-regard is different from narcissism, which

is pathological.

Constant Effort

Being ready to love means understanding what love is and being willing to put the effort

into growing and nurturing a love relationship. Love has to be nourished and sustained.

We have the seeds of love within us, and if they are fertilized, fed, and tended, they will

grow. The other person can be a catalyst to its growth or an impediment. Our own

attitudes can act like water or poison. If we want to sustain and grow love, we must work

at it, which involves open, honest communication. Even though this is painful, we are

willing to do it because love makes us feel safe, given the challenges we face in the world

and our uncertainty about what will happen. People realize that we need to interact with

others in order to survive. This, in part, is the foundation of our need to love and to be

loved.

The idea of two individuals finding each other to become one sets up the wrong

expectations. A more appropriate model is two individuals finding each other to become

great partners. And in any great partnership, everyone needs to participate in the effort.

When one does more of the work that the other, the inequality will eventually begin to

erode the relationship.

However, just like the lack of effort can hurt a relationship, putting in the time and effort

can strengthen it. We should constantly reveal yet unseen aspects of ourselves to our

loved one by being creative and thus keeping passion alive. For example, consider a

couple who has been together long enough so that their lives become routine. One year,

instead of taking his wife to their usual celebratory restaurant for her birthday dinner, a

husband prepares a private sunset picnic on a beach. Surprise and thoughtfulness can add

vitality to the relationship.

Shedding Illusions

Often, passion is the initial impetus that leads to love. Initially, passion is directed

towards a fantasy that we project onto someone or something. We see the person as we

want him/her to be, rather than their true self. For example, if a person is a great kisser,

we may project other favorable attributes onto him/her such as generosity and kindness.

With time, as we accumulate the essential ingredients that produce a love relationship,

our fantasy of the person will start to separate from the reality. So we may complain that

all he/she wants to do is kiss, rather than listening to me when I talk. “Fantasized love is

often mistaken for real love (i.e. ideal love). Ideal love is possible only when experienced

in actuality, not when experienced through anticipation, fantasy, or projection.

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We continuously test reality as we live our lives; thus, our real perception of our loved

ones gradually replaces our projected perception of them. The person cannot be identical

to the fantasized person, because fantasy and reality always depart. Our fantasy of the

loved one is never as nuanced or complicated as the image we come to have of the real

person.

One of the delights of a relationship is the process of discovering, over time, new aspects

of the person, at least when we find those aspects attractive. The behavior of the idealized

partner will deviate from the long term behavior of the real one. One of the great

disappointments is discovering unappealing features. So, as we spend more time with the

person, we find more features than we envisioned in our imagination. If the features we

dislike are powerful or manifested often, the non-pleasure they bring will outweigh the

pleasure we take in being with the person. Accepting and admiring the reality and

shedding illusions are important to the relationship. If we cling to the fantasy, then that

person will inevitably disappoint us when they do not do things that we expect they

would. With time, actual experiences outnumber fantasized ones. Our expectations then

either force us to adjust our picture, or they make us feel disappointed or even betrayed.

Ideals

Unfortunately, from early childhood we absorb the myth of the flawless prince or

princess. Of course, no one is flawless, so as disappointment with a person grows, we

begin to feel that someone better must be out there. The moment a problem surfaces,

those with immature expectations will simply move on and keep searching for their

prince or princess, sometimes leaving someone terrific behind. It is important to identify

if the disappointment is valid. Moving on to seek another relationship should be done

only with the realization that there is no perfect prince or princess; we should be seeking

a a partner who makes life richer and deeper, who helps us become more authentic in the

world.

Empathy Love requires empathy. Empathy is a necessary precondition for love as opposed to one

of its seven essential ingredients. Contemporary neuroscience has shown that normal

human beings are normally wired to feel empathy. In the early 1990s, Italian researchers

discovered what are now called “mirror neurons.” These neurons fire in the same way

when we act or feel in a given way and when we observe others acting or feeling in that

way. Prominent neuroscientist Vilayanur S. Ramachandran calls these “Gandhi neurons”

because these mirror neurons are responsible for connecting people to one another.

Aristotle said 2,400 years ago that human beings by nature imitate and enjoy imitations.

Contemporary science has proved him right. Empathy is a kind of mirroring or imitating.

If I see you suffer, then I can feel your suffering, through empathy. That feeling of

kinship widens my world and gives me a sense of connection. Love relationships thus

enrich life, except for those with certain pathologies.

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LOVE QUOTIENT™

“In the arithmetic of love, one plus one equals everything,and two minus one equals nothing.”

Mignon McLaughlin (American Journalist)

It is impossible to measure each pleasurable and non-pleasurable experience along with

its respective quality and intensity, every second, for all the love relationships that exist

in your life. However, it is possible to produce a snapshot of how you perceive your love

relationship by calculating its Love Quotient.

Love Quotient is a tool created to help you build stronger love relationships and to

provide you with insight to the discrepancy between real and fantasized love. The

objective is not to reduce love to a score, but to get a better grasp on how you perceive

your relationship and encourage open, honest communication. By understanding the

ingredients that compose love, motivated couples can work to improve their love

relationship.

Calculating your Love Quotient

This is an intimate exercise; do not share scores with anyone other than your loved one.

Dialogue with others is encouraged to learn from and help you with ideas on how to

improve ingredient scores with your loved one – but actual scores should remain private.

Begin any day keeping in mind you will most likely assign more positive scores on a

happy day and more negative scores on a gloomy day. A typical day may provide the

most relevant score, but extremely happy or upsetting days may provide deeper insight

into certain ingredients. Either way, it doesn’t matter since you are interested in the

longer term Love Quotient, not the initial score. As you continue to make entries, the

initial score will average out over time and the Love Quotient will become a better

representation of how you perceive your love relationship. The more entries you make,

the clearer picture you will get. Get into a habit of making a daily entry for any

experience affecting an ingredient, whether it was pleasurable or non-pleasurable. You

can use pen and paper, a spreadsheet or the free Love Quotient calculator found on

www.OMADAMO.com

STEP 1: Assign each of the 7 ingredients one of the following scores; -5, -4, -3, -2,

-1, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Use a negative score to indicate a degree of non-

pleasure, use 0 to indicate ambivalence and use a positive score to indicate

a degree of pleasure.

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*Be honest with yourself. You should only give a score of +5 if you

cannot think of anything else that your loved one can do to satisfy you

more for a particular ingredient. It may be helpful to list what a +5 score

should include according to you, and remove a point for each item that is

not present to your satisfaction in your relationship. The list can be used to

provide a detailed explanation to your loved one about your scoring

methodology. Nothing is set in stone; you can always edit your list as you

go along because it is what you perceive as important that matters. YOU

determine the score you feel your loved one deserves for each ingredient

(not what your loved one thinks they should score).

Add each ingredient score and determine your total score. The minimum

total score possible is -35 and the maximum is +35. The result is the initial

Love Quotient you calculated for your loved one. DO NOT show each

other your scores just yet.

. A positive score indicates that you perceive love at the moment

. A zero score indicates that you are ambivalent to the relationship at

the moment

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. A negative score indicates that you do not perceive love at the

moment

STEP 2: On separate paper, repeat step 1, however this time, score each ingredient

how YOU THINK your loved one should have scored you.

STEP 3: COMPARE total and individual ingredient scores with your loved one.

The closer the score you gave yourself in step 2 is to the score your loved

one gave you in step 1, the more your love relationship is based on reality.

The further apart the scores are, the more your relationship is based on

fantasy.

STEP 4: Discuss the variances and clearly communicate to each other what you

consider a +5 would be for each ingredient BEFORE you begin the

INTOX as described below. If your loved one brought up any issues that

you may have forgotten and agree with, feel free to alter your score (only

if YOU feel you should).

STEP 5: Each day, for the next 28 days, you and your loved one will both work on

(INTOX) the same ingredient and score it daily, starting with Affection. Score your

loved one on how you feel on that day, even if the score remains the

same. Over a 28 day period, you will score each of the 7 ingredients at

least 4 times, focusing on one ingredient per day. Consider the quantity,

quality and intensity of the experience when you are scoring an ingredient.

If you don’t feel an effort was made that day for an ingredient, score it 1

point less than what you scored it on the initial Love Quotient.

Communicate your score and its reasoning daily to open up the

communication channel. This will allow your loved one to hone in to your

specific needs and do better as time goes by, building a stronger love

relationship along the way.

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At the end of the 28 days, you will have scored each ingredient 4 times.

Adding up all 4 scores for each ingredient:

1. Divide each total ingredient score by 4 to get average score

2. Add up all 7 average scores to determine your current Love Quotient.

3. Compare the INITIAL Love Quotient and the INTOX Love Quotient

to determine if there has been any change.

4. Schedule some alone time to discuss why the results have increased,

stayed the same on decreased. The most important question at all times

is: are you both committed to working at building a better love

relationship?

STEP 6: Ideally you should work on an ingredient each day, focusing on weaker

(MAINTAIN) ones first until they even up with the others. The more frequently and

creatively you work at each ingredient, the greater the accumulation of

pleasurable experiences. With pleasurable experiences accumulating faster

than non-pleasurable experiences, your love relationship will continue to

grow stronger, provided both you and your loved one remain committed to

continuously work at it.

Remember, even if you initially score high with certain ingredients, there

will always be creative, passionate and enjoyable ways to work on each

ingredient. Similar to maintaining a healthy weight, growing and

maintaining love requires discipline, effort and math--except with

OMADAMO, you count experiences...not calories!

IT IS BETTER THAN LOVE…IT IS OMADAMO