I read somewhere that the standard plot of a Hollywood rom-com is about a stalker who gets
the girl. And I mean… they weren’t wrong. Think: Edward in Twilight,
Ted and Pat in There's something about Mary and Noah in The Notebook.
The love interest is often a horrible human being at least 50 % of the time: think Chuck in Gossip
Girl. Of course, they’ll have random moments of decency to distract us from their awfulness,
and by the end of the show or movie, love will have transformed them into a good person. The end.
Generalizing here, of course.
Behaviors that would likely end in an arrest in real life, are often portrayed as “romantic”,
“passion” and “being crazy about each other.” More on that later,
because… I’ve got some things to say.
And look, I’m not bashing it. The average relationship simply isn’t interesting
for a film premise. If it were, that’s what we’d see. Instead, rom-coms are fiction. And while
older viewers are better at discerning fiction from reality… younger viewers? Not as much.
I mean, I remember little me using the exact lines from the OC when communicating with my crushes.
In my pursuit of unpacking some of the common themes we see on TV,
I unexpectedly found answers to WHY many may not be finding love,
or at least, finding happiness in their relationships… Let’s talk about that.
Phase 1: The Idea of Love at First Sight
You know when you lock eyes with someone across a crowded room at a party, and you just know,
instantly... they are the one. A moment later,
you’re accidentally pushed into them, and the whole
“oh I’m so sorry” leads to a brief conversation that you don’t want to end. Those fireworks he’s
giving you are something you’ve never felt before. He must be a chemist, you think to yourself.
It’s not just gas, you’re sure of it. It’s something special.
A poll revealed that overall,
61% of women and 72% of men think the concept of "love at first sight" is real.
It also showed that between ages of 18-29, 90 % of women believed in it, and 84 % of men.
The number drastically changes between ages 30-39, where only 56 % women believe in it.
Here’s what you guys thought, when I asked you on instagram: (visa bild)
Despite this, most psychologists agree that that feeling is not, in fact,
love; but rather, immediate physical attraction, including things like,
the way this person looks at you and their voice.
“In one study, strangers were more likely to report experiencing love
at first sight with physically attractive people. In fact,
one rating higher in attractiveness on the scale that the researchers used corresponded with a nine
times greater likelihood that others would report that electric love-at-first-sight feeling.”
It’s a physical/sexual high - a dopamine and seratonin explosion,
making your brain look like that of someone who’s high on heroin.
Love vs infatuation
So, really, another word for it could be “lust at first sight” or “infatuation”,
which can be described as “a strong feeling of attraction, fascination,
and fixation toward someone, often without actually knowing them that well. Although it
often feels very intense, infatuation tends to be based more on physical attraction
and an imagined fantasy about who this person is. It can also involve rejecting information
that goes against the fantasy, such as ignoring red flags or early signs of incompatibility.”.
Why is this worth bringing up? Because we often get swept away by this idea that, if it’s not love
at first sight, it’s not love. And so, we may be dismissing any potential love interest that
doesn't give us that feeling, even though those initial fireworks say nothing about whether or not
we’ll acctually be compatible with that person. And while love at first sight can lead to
something long-lasting, the odds are apparently against it. Why? Because that physical/sexual
high are things that change as time goes by, and because that initial spark often makes
it feel like all the other pieces will easily fall into place, when in reality,
it takes a whole lot more than a tickly feeling in your body to make a relationship work.
Now you may be thinking, “but I know of so many couples who swear it was love at first sight,
I’ve even experienced it myself.” While that may be true, studies show that love at first sight
is often not reciprocal, and we may remember it in a way that wasn’t exactly true.
It may be that only one party felt the spark and jump started the relationship,
and as time passed, mutual love grew. But the narrative of the relationship is
reconstructed so that love at first sight was actually reciprocal.
There’s this thing called “positive illusion” in psychology, which is the story couples tell
each other, creating a “confabulated memory that adds meaning and uniqueness to the relationship,
meaning that you and your partner may think you fell in love immediately
because of the way you feel about each other months or years later.”
Skillshare integration
Phase 2: “The chase”
Remember I said rom-coms are about the stalker who gets the girl?
Let’s take The Notebook as an example, a classic.
Allie and Noah are both at a carnival, and their first words of exchange are
when Noah asks her if she'd like to dance with him, to which she says “no”.
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want to”.
He continues to stare at her, as she walks off and rides a ferris wheel with another guy.
He follows them, continues to stare at her, takes it upon himself to dangle
from the ride with one hand, threatens to slip until she agrees to go out with him.
I read the comments on this specific clip on YouTube, and the reactions are mixed. Some people
think his behaviour wasn’t romantic at all and, in fact, creepy at best. While others expressed
nostalgia for a time when grand “romantic” gestures like that seems to have been the norm.
My belief is that those who deem it romantic may do so because,
well, it’s fiction, and we know the plot of the film; we know Noah isn’t a psychopath who’s
out to hurt her, and we as the audience, know that they’re meant to be together.
In real life, we don’t have that information about someone who approaches us.
It also doesn’t hurt that Ryan Gosling is a conventionally attractive dude.
There’s also this thing called the “Dobler-Dahmer theory”, which essentially means
that, “if both people are into each other, then a big romantic gesture works,
but if one person isn't into the other, the same gesture comes off as creepy and crazy.”
My take on this is that, in real life, if someone is interested in going out with you,
they will agree to, and if they’re not, they won’t. And if they are, but they say they’re not,
well, why would you want to go out with someone
who isn’t communicating their wants in an honest, proper manner anyway?
Phase 3: The Idea of “a soulmate”
Believing in a “soulmate” is believing that there's a 'one and only’ person whom one is
destined to be with forever and who is waiting for you. The assumption that you and your
soulmate are like two puzzle pieces, which, when finding each other, will align in perfect harmony.
"While an attractive notion, the general consensus within the psychological community
is that soul mates are for the most part an imaginary concept steeped in romantic idealism,
with no pairing perfect or “meant to be.” Source
Yet, one survey showed that 88% of people believed in the idea of soul mates.
In a different poll, however, 81 % of women rejected the philosophy of a soul mate,
and instead, believed in the possibility of more than one potentially well-suited partner.
Here’s what you guys thought, when I asked you on instagram: (visa bild)
Author and psychologist Ty Tashiro said that “The problem with soulmates is that
people tend to think that fate is responsible for producing them. The reality is that enduring love
is the byproduct of intentional, clear thought and action, as well as a healthy dose of persistence.”
“Couples that approach love as a journey are happier than
those who consider it a destination, research has
shown. More reason to leave the notion of soul mates to the movies and romance novels.”
I like what Sabrina Romanoff wrote for womenshealth, where she said to replace the idea
of “finding” your soulmate, with “creating” one through years of learning about them, navigating
challenges, creating a family, and loving each other through all the happy and hard times.
Now, why does this matter? Well, for a variety of reasons.
For one, psychologists have found two scales that influence how we start and maintain relationships;
one that measures how much we value first impressions and early signs of compatibility,
and one that measures how likely we are to work through problems in relationships.
Soul-mate believers may feel very intensely and passionately about a partner at first,
but as soon as problems inevitably arise, they’re convinced it’s because they’re not meant to be and
that that person isn’t their “true match” because a true match would be perfectly compatible.
They’re also more likely to, for example, abandon or ghost a partner, because they believe that
you either click with someone or you don’t and you should just move on.
What you get, as a result, are intense, but short-lived relationships.
On the other hand, people who believe in relationship growth are more willing to work and
grow with their partner and to tackle conflicts as they arise. Though they may not feel as
intensely or “passionately” in the beginning stages, their relationships tend to last longer
and be more satisfying over time, since they don’t reject a partner over minor disagreements,
but rather, seek to evolve together and grow a satisfying relationship.
It’s also just a case of confirmation bias. When you’re with someone who you’re happy with,
it’s easy to proclaim that they’re your soulmate. But the reality is that
you could probably be equally as happy with someone else in the world.
“If soulmates exist, they are made and fashioned, after a lifetime partnership,
a lifetime shared dealing with common duties, enduring pain, and of course, knowing joy.”
My personal thoughts on this is that: I don’t believe there’s one person out there who,
at birth, was assigned to be our other half. I believe that we meet people
through life who we connect with in a special way; either immediately or through time. And
whether that person remains in our life or not, they’ll always have played an important role in
who we are and why we are the way we are. It doesn’t need to be romantic,
either, it could be platonic. So, I don’t know, perhaps there are several soulmates.
What do you think?
Phase 4: The all consuming love
In film, “doing everything for a person” is romanticized,
even if you've known each other for no time at all. Did you know that Romeo and Juliet
knew each other for about FOUR days, from the time they met to the time of their tragic ends?
In fact, Romeo & Juliet is a perfect example of the all-consuming type of “love” we often see.
Somehow, the more struggles, fighting and back and forth you go, and the more intense
the make-up is in-between all the fire, the more passionate the couple, and the more…
we melt… watching them, being “crazy” about each other.
The Notebook is an example of this where Noah and Allie would constantly be fighting, pretty
brutally, both screaming and hitting each other; they basically never agreed on anything. Yet they
always make up and find a way back to each other,
except the time when they broke up for a year and Allie was with someone else,
who she cheated on with Noah, and somehow we’re supposed to be rooting for them still.
Again, for entertainment purposes, which IS the purpose,
it’s great. I’d watch it again. And obviously, the ending is very heartwarming where Noah ends up
taking care of Allie as they grow old together. What are your thoughts on all of this?