In a simplistic version of the bestowing account, we attribute to the beloved her most significant properties. This approach can generate illusions stemming from our intense desire toward her. As the old love song runs, “When your heart is on fire, You must realize, Smoke gets in your eyes.” These illusions about the beloved’s virtues are likely over time to be found to be misleading, thereby placing into jeopardy a lasting romantic relationship.
We need both accounts to make sense of the lover’s attitude. To be sure, one’s traits trigger love. We do not fall in love with a shadow. Yet, we also view the world—and our beloved—through our evaluative glasses, as a constructed, interpreted figure.
Profound love combines the two accounts. Unlike in romantic ideology, lovers should be sensitive to reality and not wander in the wonder world. They should assign the appropriate weight to the beloved’s various characteristics, without distorting reality too much. Take, for example, someone whose partner is not particularly intelligent. This person can say that her partner’s kindness is much more important than his intelligence, and perhaps that he is not the least intelligent person she has ever met. At a certain point, she will become very familiar with the limits of his intelligence. However, she may think of him as “not brilliant,” rather than as “stupid.” It is not helpful to pretend that every frog will turn into a prince, but you can be generous in evaluating your partner’s positive traits.
The Comparative and Uniqueness Approaches
If you have an old habit of competing and comparing yourself with others, then you are still living your life like a sperm. GROW UP!!
SAURABH SHARMA
I love you more than coffee, but please don’t make me prove it.
ELIZABETH EVANS
The view that regards the beloved as the perfect person, in the sense of being without faults, has a strong comparative push; it considers the beloved’s main characteristics to be flawless, nonrelational (in the sense of standing on their own, regardless of the relation to the partner), and easily discoverable (by others as well). This comparative approach takes a static view of romantic love in which love is essentially fixed, while occasionally moving from one point of comparison to another.
The view that considers the beloved to be a perfect partner in the sense of being most suitable emphasizes the uniqueness of the relationship; it sees the beloved’s most important qualities as relational and sees confirmation of many of them during interactions. The uniqueness approach offers a dynamic kind of romantic love over time. Such love involves intrinsic development that includes bringing out the best in each other.
Both the comparative and uniqueness approaches describe important aspects of long-term robust love; it seems, however, that the odds of establishing such love are better in the second of these.
Landau distinguishes between two meaningful attitudes toward life: (1) aspiring to be the best and (2) aspiring to improve. He criticizes the first attitude, which is often associated with overcompetitiveness, involving an endless, unproductive search for “the best,” and praises the second, which is associated with meaningful development.15
This distinction is also captured by the difference between the comparative and uniqueness approaches to romantic love. Being romantically meaningful in the first sense depends on comparison with factors that are external to the connection between the two lovers. In the second sense, love depends mainly on the activities of the two lovers. Improving the connection between the two lovers, rather than finding the person with the best nonrelational properties, is the most meaningful task of romantic profundity. If romantic meaning mainly concerns achieving the best, lovers will always be restless, consumed with concern about missing the perfect person, or perhaps the younger, the richer, or the more beautiful one. If, however, romantic flourishing mainly involves improvement, achieving it lies much more in the hands of the couple.
Being married to someone who is not perfect but is still a caring and loving partner is not necessarily a compromise. In fact, that partner might be the optimal choice. We can have an (almost) perfect loving relationship with an imperfect lover. Many people even view their partners’ imperfections with compassion and amusement and consider these negligible compared to his or her profound virtues and their own flaws. This takes us back to the ambivalent nature of emotional complexity. The ability to notice and cope with both negative and positive aspects of the beloved expresses emotional complexity and is valuable for profound love.
For many people, the quest for the perfect person, instead of the perfect (in the sense of most suitable) partner, is a major obstacle to an enduring, profound, loving relationship. Since life is dynamic and people change their attitudes, priorities, and wishes over time, achieving such romantic compatibility is not a onetime accomplishment but an ongoing process. In a crucial and perhaps little-understood switch, perfect compatibility is not necessarily a precondition for love; it is love and time that create a couple’s compatibility.
To sum up, the distinction between two senses of “perfect”—flawless and most suitable—can help us understand the comparative and uniqueness approaches to the nature of the beloved. In the comparative approach, the perfect beloved is flawless, her most relevant traits are discovered, and her major cherished characteristics score very high in comparison to other people. In the uniqueness approach, the perfect beloved is the most suitable partner, and her most significant romantic traits are mainly relational and “bestowed.” Both approaches are common, and both contribute to the task of choosing a romantic partner.
The Replaceability of the Beloved
I have good-looking kids. Thank goodness my wife cheats on me.
RODNEY DANGERFIELD
Profound love is based on a strong romantic connection. And sometimes strong connections fracture. The most painful rupture occurs when the beloved is replaced by another person. This is closely connected to the issue of the lover’s commitment.
The Lover’s Commitment
A girl must marry for love, and keep on marrying until she finds it.
ZSA ZSA GABOR
Romantic commitment is not something that shatters without cause—there should be good reasons to breach a romantic commitment. Such commitment mainly stems from the relationship with our partner and not from comparing the partner to other people. Shared history is highly relevant to the issue of commitment, which is enhanced with time. Our commitment to someone we have been with for ten years is far greater than to the one we are with for merely ten minutes. This does not mean that lovers should be blind to other people or that comparison and replacement are immoral. It just emphasizes the obvious: shared history and commitment carry great weight when considering a partner replacement.
Jollimore discusses the role of the connection in love. He claims that there is something in the romantic connection that is nonuniversalizable and nonassessable in which both parties play crucial, irreducible roles in the relation. Such roles, which are largely responsible for the uniqueness of the interactions, underlie any personal commitment. It is evident that lovers have some commitment toward their beloveds and that this makes the transfer of love from one person to another very hard.16 This does not mean that partner replacement is never justified. There are extreme circumstances, the obvious being that of domestic violence, where such replacement is highly justified. There are opposite extreme cases, such as those where profound love is replaced by short-term superficial excitements, in which the replacement is usually unjust. The hardest cases are those that fall in between. Commitment should be respected, but not at any price; excitement, development, diversity, and complexity should also be appreciated—but again, not at any price.
The lover’s actual attitude toward the beloved falls along a behavioral continuum reflecting the actualization of the lover’s attitude. Three major types of such actualization are (1) a mere wish, which cannot, or is not intended to be, translated into actual behavior; (2) a want or desire, which is not manifested in actual be
havior because of external constraints; and (3) a full-fledged desire, which is also expressed in actual behavior. Love, for example, typically includes full-fledged desires expressed in characteristic activities: caring, yearning, caressing, cuddling, fulfilling the needs and wishes of the beloved, and so on. Not all of these have to be manifest at all times. However, the total absence of such behavior might suggest that love is absent as well.17
A mere wish is one that actually cannot be fulfilled in the present circumstances, such as “Fly me to the moon, let me play among the stars.” A mere wish can also be one that in principle can be fulfilled, but you really do not want to actualize it even if you could—for example, killing the partner of your beloved. A want, such as the desire to run away with your lover, can, in principle, be fulfilled, but you do not do it because you do not want to get divorced. A full-fledged loving attitude includes various actual joint romantic, sexual, and caring activities. You do what a loving relationship is all about—having many joint activities and experiences.
These kinds of connections between a loving attitude and its behavioral implementation are indications of the lover’s commitment. The least degree of a commitment breach is feeling the temptation as a mere wish that is not intended to be implemented in actual behavior. A greater “sin” is to consider implementing the temptation, but not doing so because of external concerns related, for example, to the personal cost it involves or the harm to the primary partner. The greatest violation of one’s commitment, in this regard, is acting on the temptation.
The Mate-Switching Phenomenon
Why have you left the one you left me for?
CRYSTAL GAYLE
Despite all good intentions, lovers separate and replace each other. Love is risky, as lovers are vulnerable to profound frustrations, unexpected misfortune, or dishonest behavior. These risky circumstances often generate the stressful situation of having to switch mates.
David Buss and colleagues argue that the romantic fantasy of long-lasting, committed mating rarely materializes in reality. The prevailing circumstances include a gradual inattentiveness to each other’s needs, a steady decline in sexual satisfaction, the exciting lure of infidelity, and the wonder about whether the humdrum grayness of married existence is really all life has to offer. They further claim that in the context of the struggles against this situation, the major strategy is that of long-term, committed pair-bonding. However, as nothing in mating remains static, and since “evolution did not design humans for lifelong matrimonial bliss,” people should prepare themselves for the possible situation of marriage dissolution. This issue is of particular concern in women’s mate-switching behavior, as the risk women face in switching mates seems to be higher and their gain less apparent.18
People try to take precautions aimed at easing the painful nature of this switch. Three such major strategies are (1) positive coping by enhancing the quality and the commitment of the current relationship; (2) giving up romance by initiating a breakup, living alone, or at least being in a nonpassionate, committed relationship; and (3) fighting under the shadow of a possible switch. The first strategy is the focus of the current book; this strategy’s success would somewhat reduce romantic loneliness. The second strategy, of giving up on romantic love and focusing on life or other types of love (such as friendship or parental love), is of some value in certain circumstances, especially those in which the search for romantic love is proving more harmful than a nurturing life of living without such love. The third strategy can be acted on in various ways that mainly involve having multiple relationships simultaneously. Two major subtypes of this strategy are (1) having extramarital affairs and (2) cultivating backup mates. I will discuss the issue of affairs later in the book; at this point, I focus on the backup strategy.
The Backup Strategy
Save a boyfriend for a rainy day—and another, in case it doesn’t rain.
MAE WEST
One major strategy for preparing to switch mates is to lay the groundwork for a kind of preemptive strike by cultivating backup mates—that is, potential replacements for the current mate, should the relationship implode. Buss and colleagues show that people of both sexes report having an average of three potential backup mates. People also indicate that they would be upset if their backup mates became seriously involved romantically with someone else. Women are more likely than men to report that they would be upset if their backup person entered a long-term relationship or fell in love with someone else.19 Despite such difficulties, some people prefer being vicarious partners to their married lovers to not being together at all.
The backup strategy is present in both dating and committed relationships. This is most evident on romantic dating sites, which offer a dazzling display of prospective partners. People have a long backup list, sometimes consisting of a few dozen candidates, and if one date is not going well, they turn to the next person on the list. Such an abundance of replacements decreases a person’s incentive to focus on a worthwhile partner and invest in deepening their connection. The backup list creates problems associated with “more is less” and “too much of a good thing” and reduces the likelihood of establishing a committed, profound romantic relationship.
The backup strategy, which is a kind of insurance policy against getting hurt, dumped, or bored with current love, is often harmful within a committed relationship, as it damages the individual’s commitment to the current relationship, thereby making the strategy a self-fulfilling prophecy. While having a backup list of romantic partners might well reduce the cost of separation, it often increases the likelihood of such separation. The negative impact of such a strategy is particularly evident in low- and medium-satisfied relationships, where the existing commitment is already not high.
Romantic backup activities are like window-shopping. You do not intend to purchase anything now, but if you find something attractive, you might purchase it at a more convenient time. Like window-shopping, romantic backup activities can be pleasant, involving intrinsically valuable activities such as enjoyable flirting. Many people would assume that there is nothing wrong with such romantic window-shopping, as long as it does not become an alternative about which the shopper ruminates and which she actually considers acquiring.
The backup strategy is wasteful in terms of resources. Nowadays, we do not lack romantic options: we have too many of them. The problem today is not finding love but maintaining and enhancing love over time. So, investing effort and resources in cultivating further options seems to be unwise. It might have been of some benefit for our ancestors, who did not enjoy as many romantic options as we do, but these days, it is unnecessary, unwise, and wasteful.
It can be argued that while one does not need any backups in brief sexual encounters, backups are useful in longer relationships, which require time to develop. This claim makes some sense, and indeed people in longer relationships tend to nurture a few backup alternatives. Nevertheless, the lack of ongoing profound interactions with such backup people reduces the ability to fully examine and nurture the relationship with them. This reduces the value of the backup strategy, especially in light of the high cost it inflicts on the current relationship. Like positive illusions, backup behavior can lead to self-fulfilling prophecies. However, while in the case of backup behavior a self-fulfilling prophecy often destroys the possibility of profound love, positive illusions tend to maintain and enhance such love.
At first glance, it might seem that the romantic backup strategy is more important than positive illusions, as it is more sensitive to objective reality. But is this really the case? In my opinion, it is not. Sometimes, it can be advantageous to disregard the unpleasant aspects of reality, as it increases our chances of fulfilling our positive attitudes. The promise of everlasting love prompts lovers to believe in the possibility of such love. Positive illusions also lead to higher motivation, greater persistence in tasks, more effective performance, and ultimately greater success. Thus, a positive view of the self typically lead
s a person to work harder and longer on tasks. The same goes for optimism, including unrealistic optimism, which can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. However, the unrealistic nature of positive illusions can also be harmful in that it impedes our ability to cope with the real problems that arise in intimate relationships.
Romantic connections do not come with a guarantee. When you let love lead the way, a concern for security takes something of a back seat. Although backup plans can be helpful, their value is doubtful in the case of profound romantic love, mainly because the potential cost far exceeds its future benefits. Using this strategy is likely to prevent you from establishing profound love. Not only can no lover promise you a rose garden; certain activities can poison the whole garden.
Why Try to Change Me Now?
You know I’ll love you, Till the moon is upside down. Don’t you remember, I was always your clown. Why try to change me now?
FRANK SINATRA, BOB DYLAN, FIONA APPLE, and many others
Partner replacement is strongly connected to another aspect of romantic relationships—the desire to change the partner’s negative traits. Although in trying to regulate our partner’s behavior we are often attempting to improve the relationship, this plan usually fails. This is because such attempts are likely to increase awareness of the gap between the idealized lover and the partner, and they are also likely to communicate a lack of acceptance of the partner. Attempts to change the partner are powerful signals that he or she is failing to meet expectations. Thus, the greater the amount of attempted regulation to which people are subjected, the less they feel they match their partner’s ideal standards. Accordingly, regulatory efforts tend to backfire, and both people become even unhappier with their relationship. Moreover, any changes in the partner would be minor and would not make her much closer to your ideal lover.
The Arc of Love Page 13