the glossary · concept
what does comfort mean in a relationship?
comfort · also called in a relationship
Comfort, in the relationship sense, is staying because leaving is harder than staying. It feels calm, because nothing is wrong. And it is easy to mistake for love, because love is calm too. The tell is direction. Comfort is avoiding an exit. Love is choosing a person. Try it this way: if there were no shared lease, no shared friends, no awkward conversation to have and no years already spent, would you cross a room to pick them? That is not a trick question and there is no wrong answer. But the answer arrives fast, and you usually already know it.
how to tell
- you describe the relationship in terms of what would be hard about ending it
- cancelled plans land as relief rather than disappointment
- you cannot remember the last time you were genuinely curious about them
this one has a whole chapter under it. read: is it love, or just comfort? →
what to read on this
- Too Good to Leave, Too Bad to Stay Mira Kirshenbaum thirty six diagnostic questions for the stay-or-go fork. it is a whole book about telling inertia from love, which is the question i get asked most.
- The Art of Loving Erich Fromm love as something you do, not something that happens to you. his phrase is standing in love, not falling for. written in 1956 and it still ends the argument.
amazon affiliate links. buying through one costs you nothing extra and keeps this page free. every book i recommend →
also asked
is comfort in a relationship a bad sign?
No. Comfort is not the enemy, and a relationship without it is exhausting. The question is whether comfort is the floor or the whole building. Comfort underneath choosing someone is what security feels like. Comfort instead of choosing them is what inertia feels like, and only you can tell which one you're in.
come think with me
one word a week.
this is one of about thirty words i have collected for feelings most people never got names for. i send one a week, with the reason it works that way.
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all of this is free and it stays free. if it gave you a word you didn’t have, you can buy me a coffee.
sits next to
- companionate love Intimacy plus commitment without the fire, in Sternberg’s model. The calm, chosen, long-haul love people keep mistaking for settling. It’s not the absence of feeling, it’s a different feeling: steady instead of loud.
- limerence An involuntary, obsessive state that feels like love: intrusive thoughts, a hunger for reciprocation, and a charge that gets stronger with uncertainty and weaker with security.