Chapter 4
The Mystery of Love
Have ever been struck by Cupid's arrow? If you have, your symptoms are one or more of the following. You have sleepless nights and restless days. You daydream during class, forget your jacket, walk past your house, stare at your cell phone, constantly check your email, say stupid things, laugh too hard, tell all your secrets, talk all night, walk at dawn or rehearse what you are going to say the next time you meet "him" or "her." Now, what is it about him or her that makes us fall in love with them? Why do we fall in love with James as opposed to Michael, Christine instead of Lisa?
Psychologist John Money believes that all human beings have something called a "love map." Long before you fall in love with a particular person, you have already developed a mental map that determines who you will fall in love with.
According to Money, children develop these love maps between the ages of five and eight through their family, friends, and experiences. For example, as a child you get used to the way your mother speaks and listens, scolds, and pats you and how your father jokes, walks, and smells. You like certain things about your friends and relatives. You dislike others or you connect them with unpleasant events. Gradually, these experiences begin to form a pattern in your mind.
From this unconscious pattern, an image of your ideal love begins to form. Then in your teenage years, your love map becomes quite specific. You imagine exactly how your true love will look―his or her face shape, hair length, height, as well as personality, manners, and other features. So, long before your true love walks into your life, you have already constructed some basic elements of your ideal love. Then when you actually see someone who seems to fit the image, you fall in love with him or her and project your unique love map onto this person. Even if this person is actually different from your ideal, love is blind so you pay little attention to the differences.
Now do you think that you are more likely to fall in love with someone that is similar to or different from you? As in the famous expression "Opposites Attract," many people believe that we are attracted to people that are different. For example, a shy boy may be attracted to an outgoing girl. A tall girl may be attracted to a short boy. However, it seems that we are attracted to similarities as well. Studies have shown that people are attracted to those who have similar values and beliefs. It is only natural to want to be with someone that shares most of your views rather than someone that disagrees with you most of the time. Therefore, it is not similarities or
differences alone but the right combination of similarities and differences that makes us fall in love with that special person.
Sometimes, special circumstances can contribute to falling in love. For example, have you ever had feelings for someone that you knew you should not have these feelings for? More specifically, have you ever liked a singer or someone that your parents did not approve of ? These kinds of obstacles sometimes add fuel to the flames of love. If a person is difficult "to get," he or she seems more interesting. If the world seems to be against your love, that love seems more worth fighting for and keeping. This is known as the "Romeo and Juliet Effect," from the tragic Shakespearean love story.
Now, these are only some of the reasons for falling in love with that special someone. Of course it would be foolish to assume that a scientific explanation can describe the entire process of love. Even the genius Einstein said that you cannot explain love in terms of chemistry and physics. Perhaps, love was meant to be experienced rather than analyzed. Helen Keller summed it up nicely in a non-scientific approach to love when she said, "The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."
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