Is falling in love a conscious choice you make?

A workmate told me of being friends with a woman from church. It wasn’t mad passionate love but they decided they were good together because of their shared religious values. After a few years together, it did become a passionate deep love. That was a conscious choice that worked.
 
Magna-Carta said:
That's really interesting. Some years ago a woman I had become friends with after about 6 months wrote me a letter explaining that she had become very self-conscious when she was around me, and after a long ramble in her letter felt that she was about to jump off a cliff with her following statement, and wasn't sure whether she could jump or not.

She said after long thought, she had decided to close her eyes and jump off the cliff, then she said in her letter that she was in love with me.

UPDATE: I thought why the hell did it need a two page letter? Was she kind of gently easing me into the idea, protecting herself from any possible rejection? :)

Anyway, after a further two years, we became engaged.

I might have become in love with her before she with me. Did I just admit to that? :rolleyes:
Click to expand...
I think your post epitomizes the topic.

If I'd have gotten a 2-page letter from a woman, I'd have chosen to walk away. The relationship would be over. No matter how physically appealing she was, no matter how much we had in common, no matter what, I would have thought "Here's a woman who's going to water-board me with her feelings and views and whatnot for hours on end" and I'd nip that in the bud.

So, love is chemistry, no control over that, but a person can choose to ignore it for reasons that make sense to them. (psychos excluded)
 
Not sure it really *matters* at our age whether or not it's what someone else defines as "love"... or just finding someone who's really great and we could easily spend the rest of our life with? Is defining "love" not just semantics because it means such different things to different people?

Did you see Fiddler on the Roof? Golde says: “Do I love you? For twenty-five years, I’ve washed your clothes, cooked your meals, cleaned your house. Given you children, milked the cow. After twenty-five years, why talk about love right now?” (And the conversation between them continues.)

Well anyhow, those are my personal thoughts... at 18 it would have had to be some toe-tingling magic and nothing else would be considered. At this age, it's subjective and many things could be defined as love. 🤷‍♀️
 
Last edited:
Don't write off that toe-tingling yet. Magic can still happen, though just as always it merely primes the pump of something more solid.
 
Obviously, some young people impatiently start intimate seks relationships for lust and pleasure but then after time are surprised to find deeper emotional feelings have developed that is due to hormonal amplified neural plasticity whether they wanted that or not. That is a strong reason in many cultures, marriage wisely is only allowed after months of non seksual contact, so those deeper feeling don't form before two people are clearly committed.
 
bobcat said:
Ha ha. Good point. I guess I would think that falling off a cliff would be more instantaneous, whereas falling in love would be more gradual, that as infatuation grows, you keep moving forward till it becomes something deeper we understand as love. But even so, it may be something we have little control over.
Click to expand...
IDK some people fall very fast. My parents were friends with a married couple who met as teenagers, married almost right away and were still blissfully married decades later. I lean towards thinking love is largely biochemical.
 
Jogging lack something (questions?); dancing lacks something, (MORE QUESTIONS?)
Lots of screwing leaves little to wonder about!
 
Magna-Carta said:
Love is different for everyone. If it is real, you've found someone you can't live without. If the one you love doesn't feel the same. Keep looking, Lessons learned. Don't try to make someone love you. Or maybe kick back and see who's looking for you. :cool: Of course, I'm just an old man, but I've been happy for many years.

I
Click to expand...

 

You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top