Creating Unfeigned Love

 

Love.  It seems to be the center of all movies, books, and songs.  Deep down we all long to love, and be loved.  If you are anything like me, you have wondered, “how can I find that kind of love? (You know, “true” love.  The kind that lasts forever). In today’s world, this sort of love seems to be more and more rare. Divorce rates are ever increasing.  Abusive relationships prevail.  Sexual activity, separated from commitment, pollutes the quality of genuine relationships.  Is this the kind of love we want? Is there a right and wrong way to fall in love?  Does love just happen by chance, or can it be created? After studying these topics and discussing them with my peers, I have concluded that love is something that can, in fact, be created.  Of course, there must be some chemistry with the person we love, but there are also ways we can go about falling in love which avoid blinding ourselves with lusts and unhealthy attachments.

The first influencer of the way we love is the way we date. Traditional dating is becoming rarer by the minute. The type of dating where a boy plans a simple activity, asks a girl to do that activity, and provides the materials for the activity all for the purpose of getting to know her better.  Now days, dating is being replaced with “hanging-out” and “hooking up”.  This counterfeit for dating changes the way that relationships develop.

What’s the significance of dating versus “hanging-out?”  Well, it influences the way that we form romantic relationships.  Perhaps the draw to “hang out” is because it’s more comfortable, less stressful, and takes less thought and commitment than a formal, planned out date.  In traditional dating, a man plans an activity to do.  This act of planning shows that the man cares enough to plan something special.  Couples are  also paired off, rather than casually hanging in one a collective group.  What’s the significance of this? Pairing off creates intention.  It gives a couple the opportunity to commit to get to know each other better for just a couple hours.  It helps them be responsible for each other over the course of the date.  In a way, pairing off is a taste of the responsibility and commitment of marriage.  Traditionally, dates are also paid for by the boy who asks the girl.   What’s the significance in this?  It shows commitment, and responsibility for the partner, again giving the couple a taste of what a couple experiences in a marriage.

There is so much to be learned on a date.  Do you have similar interests and goals? Do you like the way that they work and the way they react to stressful situations? How do they problem solve? How do they communicate?  How do they treat you when you are stressed?  What do they prioritize? What are their habits and mannerisms?  These are all important questions essential to having answers to before marriage, and they can’t be learned merely from hanging out.  Going on dates equips you with specific experiences that teach you a lot about a person.  These learnings will most often be from unspoken lessons.  For example: if you went on a planned date to an escape room, you might learn that your date is really good at thinking straight in a confusing situation.  In contrast, if you were just hanging out with a bunch of people watching a movie, you might never learn that important attribute about the same person.  So going on diverse, real dates (rather than just “hanging out”) can better prepare you for marriage, by helping you truly get to know the person you are dating 

Have you ever become attached to someone who you don’t feel you love? There is a difference between becoming attached to someone and loving them.  The Relationship Attachment Model (RAM) is a brilliant concept that will ensure you don’t get attached to people in unhealthy ways.  It highlights five aspects of relationships that affect our attachment. The five aspects we can rate ourselves on are: the extent to which we know, trust, rely on, commit to, and touch the person we are dating.  In short, the RAM concludes that in a relationship, you shouldn’t trust a person more than you know them. You shouldn’t rely on them more than you trust them.  You shouldn’t commit to them more than you rely on them, and you shouldn’t touch them more than you commit to them. Following this model will help you avoid getting into a marriage/relationship where you fall passionately in love for a time, but when gray hairs fade in, you realize that you never actually loved your partner. 

In conclusion, I used to think that love is something that you just “fall” in to.  I have since learned, that when we are intentional about our relationships, we can make more wise decisions than just “falling.”  As my professor says: “If you fall into love, then you can surely fall out of it too.”  I don’t want love to just happen by chance.  I want to choose it.  I want to create it to last long after my wedding day.