Is It Love or Companionship?

I've been watching a scene from an American soap opera, when I found the conversation very interesting. It took place between a man and his wife about the word Apathy. They were having breakfast before the husband goes to work. He was reading the newspaper and she kept looking at him and contemplating:

Wife: How about the word Apathy?
Husband: What! What did you say?
Wife: The most appropriate word "Apathy". You feel it. Don't you? Don't you?
Husband: I try not to.
Wife: That's the exact definition trying not to feel something.
Husband: I'm aware we have problems, but we also have life to live.
Wife: Oh let's go on with our lives and put our marriage on the backseat for everything else.
Husband: Is this all leading to some suggested course of action?
Wife: No just discussion.
Husband: Then it is a little self indulgence.
Wife: Well I'd like to be little self-indulgent in this issue if you don't mind. 
Husband: By all means, if it's what you want.
Wife: Of course, that's what I want.
Husband: You want to argue about this, is this what's leading us?
Wife: I can't recall the last time we had a GOOOD argument that's the problem you know? We're so polite so civil! no conflict! no confrontation!
Husband: You don't build what we built together on confrontations.
Wife: What we built? Big House in Beverly Hills, what we have 4 children, What about love, what about fulfillment? what about friendship? companionship? What we have together? We live in a big house in Beverly Hills, we sleep in the same bed and we are so far apart, absolute estrangement!
Is this satisfying to you? (he kept silent and didn't answer) Is it really? because it seems to be.
Husband: No, no it is not satisfying to me. Do you want to continue this discussion?
Wife (furiously): NO!!!!!!!!! Why don't you just go to work
Husband: I'll see you at dinner
Wife nodded Sarcastically

These two people loved each other, but what the wife misses is companionship. They got used to be in love with each other, do the same activities together every day because they have to not because they want to (We have life to live). Their relation became a daily use. However, they lost the essence of any fulfilling relationship whether love, parental relations, friendship, etc. which is Companionship.


When I thought of the idea, I started to understand why a person can feel lonely though he/she is surrounded by people who love him/her. It is not all about love, it is more about companionship: Sharing your feelings, thoughts, interests and whole being NOT merely sharing activities, Finding someone to understand you, someone with whom you can talk without boundaries, Someone you understand and ready to listen to without boundaries.

I believe that this kind of companionship can apply to any kind of relationship: brotherhood, motherhood, fatherhood, friendship, even with daughters and sons, NOT just your partner.

However, if you are lucky enough and your partner became your companion, this would be the most amazing and fulfilling relation you may ever have. At the same time, if you don't find this in your partner, either you start by being your partner's companion yourself or seek companionship elsewhere; with your sister, brother, friend, etc. But don't blame it on anybody, if you don't seek it first.


In the mid of shared activities, like raising children with your partner or working with your friend, you can search the hobbies and interests of the other party. Even if they are different from yours, you can start trying them, showing interest in them, asking to share your partner or friend in doing them. By time the other party's hobbies and interests will become a habit and an easy-to-do thing. If the other party really loves you, he/she will automatically show an equal interest in your hobbies and interest. Here begins the companionship. With time your companionship will grow, you will find yourselves getting to understand each other perfectly, and sharing everything else, your thoughts, feelings and being.



One of the other elements of companionship that a friend of mine drew my attention to is listening. Sometimes when someone wants to be listened, you may give him/her the deaf ear "You might be hearing but not listening". This often happens when you are not interested in the thing the other party is speaking about or not interested in or caring enough for him/her. In the conversation above, the husband showed no interest in listening "Is this all leading to some suggested course of action?". That is to say he is not ready to listen to just a discussion or an expression of feelings. If his wife wants from him a certain action, she can just state it and save him all this discussion. While this wasn't what she wanted, she wanted the discussion, she wanted to be self-indulgent on this subject, which he couldn't understand.

If you are looking for companionship, you should be ready to listen for things you are not interested in. The more you listen, the more you care for the other party and vice versa. The way you listen tells of the way you care for the other party. You are listening NOT out of an interest in the subject itself BUT out of concern for the other party. Being concerned about him/her helps you listen and understand. Understanding the other party will lead you to use his/her way of thinking and feeling to lift his/her burden. This is one of the main definitions of companionship, "Being able to become the other person emotionally and mentally, wearing his/her own glasses, seeing the world from his/her eyes to get to the essence of how to help him/her".

But what if you try and find yourself unable to understand? I believe that at this moment, if you are really honest and sincere in your trial to listen and understand, the other party will feel it. Your honest and sincere listening would be a proof of your companionship intentions for him/her.