When you say “I love you,” you expect an immediate and equally warm return from your partner—irrespective of his or her current emotional state.
Why do we feel our investment in love has to give us immediate results?
We don’t do the same with our money, our studies, or our career.
Building a career or becoming rich takes time: we invest slowly, year after year, to get there. Knowing it takes time, we keep patience, work hard, and have a strong will to hold on, even in rough times.
Similarly, we need to invest the same way in a love relationship. When you say “I love you”—it’s an investment in a relationship. Invest by expressing your love more and more, year after year after year, without expecting immediate returns.
Understand also that you build a relationship of love as much for yourself as for the other.
If you’re expecting an immediate return it means that you consider loving someone as a benefit only for the other—which is not exactly true. Rather, you loving someone is an investment that helps both of you in the long run.
Invest in love the same way you would to build wealth, to build your career, or to build any other long-term dream.
With a systematic investment in a love relationship, you can build a supportive partner for life!