Love Myths

Today I consider myself a romantic – I’m a sucker for a homemade candlelit dinner or roses and the occasional sappy movie. However, I didn’t consider myself a romantic until I fell in love, before that I was like most people and I just didn’t believe in the four letter word. When I came across and article on MSN Lifestyle called Four Common Misconceptions About Love I couldn’t resist reading so see if other people had learned the same lesson as I.
The article from MSN was the byproduct of an interview of John Bowe who was commenting on Americans Talk About Love a book he recently edited that tell the story of 44 ordinary American’s love lives.
Apparently one of the most common misconceptions is that “love at first sight” almost never happens. Bowe says that when he started the book he too didn’t give much credit to the idea, but following its completion he has found that love at first sight undoubtedly exists. This does not mean though that the relationship will last any longer or go any smother but that people who are attracted to each other instantly are more likely to pair up and make it official – at least for a while. This make sense considering what a huge role physical chemistry plays in a relationship, many people will tell you that attraction and that feeling of discovering new things about your partner (like when you first met) is a great way to keep those lovey-dovey feelings around.
The second misconception was one that I didn’t entirely expect but it makes sense, “you can’t prepare yourself for love” it just happens. Bowe notes here that granted you cannot force love to happen but it doesn’t necessarily just sneak up on you either. He says that, “It involves making choices. Like a choice to be fun. A choice to go the extra mile. A choice to 'not be pissy.' A choice to forgive. . . You have to choose to be honest. Choose to not defend yourself by hiding or playing games or keeping someone else around on the side as a backup plan.” After reading that I agree, one has to be open to love and to the relationship and while the depth of your feelings may surprise you as well as how quickly they show up you do have the choice to love someone or not too.
The third misconception is one of my favorite because I realize just how much of a misconception it is. The idea that both people must WORK HARD to keep the relationship alive isn’t true. Love should never be viewed as work but rather as something that you enjoy – when “working” through something both people should grow as a couple not just struggle through it and throw in the towel at the end of the day. I’m not saying that love doesn’t have sacrifice and difficult times, but instead that they and your relationship should be so much more than a job. A separate article on MSN is the Secrets of Happy Couples and it goes more into detail.

The final wrong idea about love is probably the biggest one, and that is that no one can will love you if there is something wrong with you. While love is a choice, we don’t always choose who we fall in love with, we can’t all dream up that perfect guy or girl but rather we have to find them. And often these very real people may be damaged, depressed etc. but we find reasons to love them anyways. Bowe gives the example of a couple who were happily married then an accident left his wife delibitated and hurt. They stuck through the troubles though and eventually when she recovered (18 years later) they went back to their normal lives still totally in love.
I realize that not everyone’s love story deals with these particular misconceptions but examine your relationships or even your ideas about them and pick some other people’s brains and I bet you’ll be surprised at what you find. However, until you have actually fallen in love you can’t truly understand what a wonderful (and complicated) thing it can be.