Marry, And You Will Regret It...

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Says Søren Kierkegaard

Yes, there are differences between the notions of lasting love and lasting relationships. Public relationships 'work' without passionate love, but pasionate love really does not without a private relationship.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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So yes, a love can last, and so can a relationship. But as water freezes into ice or evaporates into a mist, a love and/or a relationship may transition from one phase to another over time as well.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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Let's not mistake love for mere sexual interest. Even though love is erotic as it includes sexuality at its core, love is much more than carnality. One cannot be much in love with another if not delighting in just being with him or her.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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When people agree to an arranged marriage, that is, a provisioned relationship, it is hoped that love will come about when the two begin to mingle with each other. Love, it is said, will surely grow on them overnight.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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When people 'fall in love' with each other, it is so that people are smitten by each other into a burgeoning relationship, that is, a mysterious bond of love that is hoped to last forever.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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Many intimate relationships nowadays start as something in between the provisioned and the smitten case. People are freer than ever to chart their own intimate destiny and to choose a mate by deliberately evaluating romantic and other social considerations.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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Does that mesmerizing, smitten kind of love so popularized by romantic literature and Hollywood really matter all that much? How about a kind of love, that perhaps of liking, respect, and cooperation, of acting in concert with mutually-held beliefs and interests?

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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Suppose that love matters when it happens - it could not have been otherwise for Romeo and Juliet. And for John and Jane Doe? Can they not cut out a good life with each other otherwise, that is, in spite of not being lost in love?

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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It is no good to belittle anyone's noble hopes, beliefs, expectations, or intentions. Not those who accept arranged marriages or those who seek for that One far and away. If the love between two folks is or will be good enough for them, it is a good thing.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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But intimate relationships that hold together only by accepted obligations, by little more than sympathies, by notorious familiarity may not last. Both types of bonds, the one of arranged marriage and the one of being in love can end up as bonds of little love.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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In arranged marriages, the love that was supposed to grow on the couple may never come to flourish. In romantic marriages, the love that smote the lovers initially will sooner or later peter out for sure.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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In arranged marriages, the no-show of even good-enough love will be a disaster that few marriage counselors can fix. In romantic marriages, the fading infatuation with each other can deliberately be transitioned into a more mature incarnation of love.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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In any case, there are risks involved in an arranged marriage, as there are risks involved in a romantic marriage. What is it that one wishes to hold one's intimate relationship together over the long run?

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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An intimate relationship can certainly last while powered at its core by either passionate love, or cordial friendship, or shared beliefs and values, or a mix of said conditions. At times, the quest for happiness might favor the delights of erotic love over constraining obligations implicit in shared beliefs and values.

Marry, And You Will Regret It

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As Existentialist philosopher Søren Kierkegaard suggested: "Marry, and you will regret it; don’t marry, you will also regret it; marry or don’t marry, you will regret it either way."

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Marry, And You Will Regret It

(c) soulmate.singles