# Summary

The website content celebrates the profound impact of love in a relationship and describes it as a dynamic and resilient bond, particularly through the poetic reflections of the author, Athena Milios, regarding her relationship with her fiancé.

# Abstract

Athena Milios conveys the essence of an enduring partnership in "The Palpable Energy Created By Love," weaving poetry and prose to illustrate how together, she and her fiancé form a fortified, antifragile system. The bond thrives through external stressors, reflecting a love that is physically palpable and irrevocably interwoven with mutual growth, empathy, and genuine support. Milios contemplates the importance of embracing moments of vulnerability in which love can flourish when not restrained. Emphasizing the themes of mutual support, honest communication, and the phenomenon of shared emotions, her fiancé, the relationship itself, and the love they share stand as a testament to the transformative power of love.

# Opinions

- The author believes that shared experiences in a relationship strengthen the bond between partners.
- Milios views love as an energy that physically manifests, making their love feel tangible and powerful.
- A key opinion expressed is the necessity of open communication to tackle problems and foster a supportive environment.
- The text suggests that a healthy relationship is not just robust but also antifragile, growing stronger from external pressures.
- Milios emphasizes the magic of mutual growth, which is unique to the shared journey of a couple compared to individual paths.
- The author quotes Paulo Coelho, echoing the sentiment that trying to control love can lead to its destruction.

The Palpable Energy Created By Love

Growing through life with a partner creates a stronger more resilient system than either person could create independently — runner-up poem

© Athena Milios. The author with her fiancé; September 2021.

It’s Always Better When We’re Together

A poem (for The Lark’s poetry competition)

There isn’t a single place on earth I’d rather be than in this moment with you nestled next to me. These little moments may seem inconsequential, but for our bond to live forever they are essential.

There is a tangibility to our love right now, a beauty that gets sprinkled into us somehow. It seeps into every moment — can’t you see? Our love has arrested us in order to set us free.

When we stand by each other’s side, we can take on the world in our stride. There isn’t a problem we can’t discuss as we tackle all that gets shoved at us.

We take each other apart, piece by piece, and let all the harmful parts decease. Then we put each other back together, ready to take on the stormy weather.

Our love is the energy that seals our bond, both now and forever into the great beyond. When we fly together in the stormy weather, any door we come to, we can open it together.

When I say I love you more, I don’t mean I love you more than you love me. I mean I love you more than the bad days ahead of us, I love you more than any fight we will ever have. I love you more than the distance between us, I love you more than any obstacle that could try and come between us. I love you the most. — Unknown

Healthy Relationships Are Anti-Fragile

Whereas a fragile system breaks down and a robust system resists change, the antifragile system gains from stressors and external pressures. A healthy love relationship is antifragile: misfortune and pain make the relationship stronger rather than weaker. — Mark Manson

A good-quality relationship is antifragile because it gains strength from external pressures. This means it becomes more resilient and less likely to fall apart when tested by stressors involving discomfort, pain, and disorder.

When we have a dynamic partner next to us through life’s hardships, our entire being becomes stronger, down to our very core. Obstacles that might have knocked one of us down can’t knock two of us down as easily as long as we are tightly connected to each another.

I am extremely fortunate to have a powerful, antifragile relationship with my fiancé. Even though we feel each others’ pains, we also feel each others’ victories and successes, both big and small. We acknowledge each other’s problems and give each other room to address them while cheering from the sidelines.

A key ingredient for a healthy romantic relationship is supporting the other person in working through their battles, but NOT fighting their battles for them. The beauty of a supportive relationship is that your growth becomes intertwined with the other person’s growth. It is a process of mutual growth that would look different than if you were growing individually, on separate life paths. This is what makes it seem so magical to me. You are creating similar neural firing patterns with the other person and new, beautiful networks of patterns are blossoming in both your minds.

Another key component of a healthy relationship is open communication. When it comes to solving problems, it makes all the difference in the world to have someone that you can talk to unashamedly about your problems. When the problems are exposed through open discussion, there are suddenly two minds that can tackle them. The solution will appear faster when two people are looking for it!

True Love Can Feel Palpable

The best love is the kind that awakens the soul; that makes us reach for more, that plants the fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds. — Nicholas Sparks, “The Notebook”

Some of the moments I have shared with my fiancé sometimes leave me so awestruck that I can’t even figure out why. It isn’t that something spectacular has happened in the external environment, it’s just that my feelings are so rich that they are palpable. In the Cambridge English Dictionary, palpable (when referring to feelings) is defined as “so strong that it seems as if it can be touched or physically felt.” The word “palpable” perfectly encapsulates my emotions when I am around my fiancé. The qualities of palpable emotions are so unique and spectacular that they make me realize that the kind of love I have is an incredible gift, not to be taken lightly!

Let Love Flourish Instead of Restraining It

Something I realized when I first started dating my fiancé is that there was a connection between us, shared energy that felt like a starved being at first. It was something that needed to be nurtured and fed so that it could grow and become stronger. I didn’t know this at first, but what I did know was that there was potential there — between us — and I had to let things play out naturally. If I tried to control the size of that spark between us, like I try to control so many other aspects of my life, I might have ended up blowing out the flame entirely, before giving it a real chance to flourish.

Love is an untamed force. When we try to control it, it destroys us. When we try to imprison it, it enslaves us. When we try to understand it, it leaves us feeling lost and confused. ― Paulo Coelho