COMMITMENT AND LOVE 💕.

THE IMPORTANCE OF COMMITMENT WHILE BEING IN LOVE


UNDERSTANDING THE VALUE OF COMMITMENT TO LOVE

COMMITMENT IS NOT A VOGUE. Instead, relationships without commitment appears to be on the rise. Non-committal people say to each other ” I love you, ” but what they really mean is ” I want to be with you today. A better opportunity may open up tomorrow, and if so, i’ll take it. ” This is perhaps, not surprising. Dating apps have made meeting new people fairly easy(depending on one’s location), so why not take the advantage ? Why deny yourself the chance of meeting someone new, and perhaps, more interesting ? No less importantly, one can avoid blame for having multiple affairs simultaneously by simply never making any promises while there is something to be said for remaining non-committal and keeping one’s options open. When we first fall in love with someone, the mind of the other is to a great extent intransparent to us. Did he or she really mean it when he/she said he/she likes us too ? Has he or she changed his or her mind ? Did he or she enjoy our night or he/she being polite in saying he or she did ? At this stage, we often try to gauge the other’s thoughts, feelings and interests indirectly, by doing such things as talking to other people who is the object of our affection or spying on the other on social media. Due to this perceived initial impenetrability of the other’s mind, at the start of a relationship, nothing the other says is sufficient to give us the reassurance we seek. Anything and everything can make us jealous and insecure. We don’t know the other well enough to know where dangers maybe lurking. We underscore our tendency to see the object of a romantic interest as intransparent and unknowable when we are jealous, as we are apt to be in the early stages of a relationship. ” Jealousy is never satisfied with anything short of an omniscience that would detect the subtlest folds of the heart. “

WHENCE THIS INTRANSPARENCY ? We always knew little about the minds of others, but we don’t notice this because we don’t particularly care about what most people think and feel. As soon as we become seriously interested— as when we fall in love— we find that we don’t know. Jealousy reveals to us how obscure the lives of others are :

It is one of the faculties of jealousy to reveal to us the extent to which the reality of external facts and the sentiments of the heart are an unknown element which lends itself to endless supposition. We imagine that we know exactly what things are and what people think for the simple reason that we don’t care about them. But as soon as we have the desire to know, as the jealous man or woman does, then it becomes a dizzy kaleidoscope in which we can no longer distinguish anything.
WHEN THE OBJECT OF LOVE LENDS ITSELF to endless interpretation in this way, he or she remains unscrutable, an ” Other ” whose mind is hidden from view and whose motives are a matter of conjecture, never of knowledge. The impenetrability of the other’s mind at this point precludes intimacy. For this reason, falling in love is quiet different from love. When the other, at this early stage, addresses us by name or by saying ” YOU, ” we may find this exhilarating. The object of romantic interest is, in that moment, an opaque other we try to interpret from an external point of view, but someone who talks to us. Being addressed directly in this way, gives us hope that the other’s mind will not remain forever unreadable. A door, a channel of communication—however narrow— has opened up, connecting us to the object of attraction. There is hope for love. If we get lucky, as the relationship evolves, we need to rely less and less on indirect evidence of the other’s thoughts and motives. Instead, we can simply accepts what the other says to us. Trust develops, and our conversations play a key role in this development. At one point, 2 lovers may get to know each other so well that conversation—- which is so crucial in the beginning — becomes almost unnecessary. They can ” read ” each other’s minds. Silence itself becomes intimate.

A PERSON WHO IS VERY JEALOUS by nature maybe incapable of forming a WE-composite with the object of his or her affection. To the jealous lover, the other’s mental life remains subject to endless interpretation and conjecture, which breeds separateness and extinguishes closeness. The relationship never progresses beyond the initial state during which the other’s mind is seen as impenetrable, though here, perceived impenetrability maybe on one side only. THIS CAN EASILY LEAD TO A FAILED RELATIONSHIP AND TO MISERY. NONETHELESS, TO BE UNWILLING TO MAKE A COMMITMENT AT ALL IS PROBABLY THE BIGGER DANGER. THE RELATIONSHIP MAY NOT TURN OUT TO BE WHAT YOU THOUGHT IT WOULD. THE OTHER MAY NOT, AFTER ALL, BE YOUR SOULMATE. BUT IF YOU NEVER MAKE A COMMITMENT, YOU WILL ALWAYS BE ALONE. FAILURE TO FIND LOVE IS, IN ONE CASE, A POSSIBILITY, WHILE IN THE OTHER— IT IS CERTAIN. A SOULMATE IS NOT SIMPLY SOMEONE WHO IS A GOOD MATCH, BUT SOMEONE WE ARE COMMITTED TO, AND WHO IS COMMITTED TO US.