A love triangle is something we all have, and, no, it’s not the kind of triangle you might be envisioning.

For couples in a relationship, love can be broken down into three concepts that represent corners of a triangle as described in Robert Sternberg’s “Triangle Theory of Love.”

These corners are Passion, Intimacy, and Commitment. Through these three simplified concepts, we can comprehend, navigate, and even grow our loving relationships.

Passion
It can be thought of as emotional reactivity, physical arousal, excitement. We experience the feelings associated with passion as visceral and deep-rooted. Passion can be strong sexual or romantic feelings, strong feeling such as anger or fear, or an enthusiastic zeal.

Intimacy
This can be understood as a general interconnectedness we feel with someone, the level of closeness/comfort we feel with another. There are many types of intimacy including physical (both sexual and non-sexual), emotional (feeling of closeness), intellectual (shared ideas), professional (work related), spiritual (involves similar existential and/or religious view), recreational (involves doing pleasurable things together), artistic (shared sense of beauty), etc.

Commitment
This component is more cognitive or “cold," but often the necessary foundation of a relationship without which passion and intimacy are lost. A couple makes certain culturally and value based agreed upon promises to each other regarding exclusivity. Exclusivity may manifest in may ways including sexual fidelity, engagement / marriage / commitment ceremonies, intimacy and emotional fidelity, etc. Prioritizing and protecting the couple relationship on a daily basis is a manifestation of commitment.

An Unequal Triangle
If these three corners are given equal attention and energy from each person in the couple, the relationship is healthy, but if one side or two sides are dismissed, it creates relationship problems.

Only Passion = infatuated love (e.g. an affair)
Only Commitment = empty love (e.g. lost spark and business-like)
Only Intimacy = liking (‘friend-zone’)
Commitment + Intimacy = compassionate love (innate/visceral attraction gone)
Commitment + Passion = fatuous love (simple, shallow)
Intimacy + Passion = romantic love (‘don juan-ism’, often infidelity manifests)

Whether we are in a new relationship or celebrating our 25th anniversary, it’s important to take review the corners of your relationship triangle. By identifying which component needs enhancement, a couple can actively make changes to significantly strengthen the relationship.

Beauty & the Beast is a tale we continue to tell because the message to not judge a book by its cover is timeless. We all hope to have a partner that, like the Beauty, can ultimately look past the emotional reactivity of our “inner beast.”

Not surprisingly, many people report figuratively experiencing both characters; sometimes from one relationship to another and often within the same relationship.

We all have within us a beast that can and does emerge when strong emotions enter into a relationship, that we too have an inner conflict between the often competing impulses of fight/flight and healthy communication.

But while looking past a rough exterior to find the beauty, Belle also shows us she had the insight to look past a polished exterior and recognize inner darkness of someone truly unsafe like Gaston.

In each of us, we can find both Beauty & Beast, and so do our partners. Seeing past our loved one’s rough exterior, over time and particularly during difficult life transitions, can be increasingly hard without support.

Couple Therapy can assist in clarifying our values and self compassion as a protective factor helping distinguish between sporadic emotional reactivity versus pernicious emotional abuse.

We can help couples channel Beauty’s inner strength and resiliency when in a loving relationship either our partner’s Beast emerges, or we recognize our own Beast coming to the forefront.

Therapy provides couples and individuals tools and skills to navigate the often murky waters of relationships to safe harbor.

In the end, just like this tale as old as time, we can learnt to see past worldly distractions to see each other with a new and loving clarity.