Posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2005, at 3:54:32
In reply to Re: romantic love, posted by alexandra_k on October 19, 2005, at 2:47:44
The notion of 'soul mates' in the sense that there is someone who you are 'just meant to be with'. There is the love at first sight and happily ever after fairytale...
And yes, there are some anecdotal reports of couples who say that they have been married for 60 years or however long and thats just the way it was. But... If you talk to them more you hear about how things were tough at times (they did not feel that way at times), and how they made a decision to work things through because they considered their marriage was a committment to do just that.
And there are other anecdotal reports of couples who felt romantic love and decided to take the plunge (why pass up your one and only opportunity to live happily ever after?) And then the feeling passed... And they saw one another as people for the first time. And things deteriorated from there.
It is surely UNDERSTANDABLE (and perhaps even FORGIVEABLE) if someone were to adulterate or desert if they believed they were 'in the grips' of romantic love. I mean it is their one and only opportunity to live happily ever after. What do we expect them to do? One *should* not pass up such an opportunity surely! The myth of one having found ones 'soul mate' compels one to act.
It gets me thinking...
The idea was around how much these social forces (in this case the romantic love -> happily ever after, soul dmate notion) control the EXPRESSION of the emotion. In this case it seems to provide a COMPULSION to adulterate / desert (though I am also extending it to marriage too I suppose).
And also... The more speculative idea that these social forces may control the PRODUCTION of the emotion in the first place. Perhaps we feel that feeling because others are more likely to excuse our behaviour as a result of that (which is not to say we realise this intentionally - we can also use this to justify our behaviour to ourselves).
Our society promotes the 'romantic love -> happily ever after' myth. How much is that just more of an excuse for adultery and desertion?
And how much does that encourage people to conflate feelings of romantic love (which surely come and go at times) with the different notion of respect for one another as people and a decision to commit?And what on earth does romantic love have to do with the latter?
poster:alexandra_k
thread:568417
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/relate/20051002/msgs/568756.html