Following on from the post on libido, here’s an interesting article in Psychology today about long term romantic love. It is possible to sustain the romantic/erotic connection for many years. It suffers slightly from the common current obsession with fMRI (blob-ology), but is fascinating nonetheless.
The key take away is that many of the same neurophysiological processes are active in short-term and long-term romantic love, with additional gains for long-term love related to regulation of anxiety. The key question is: are the long-term romantics blessed with a physiology to sustain romantic behaviour, or do they cultivate the behaviours that sustain the physiology?
Only one is within our control…
“The key question is: are the long term romantics blessed with physiology to sustain romantic behavior, or do they cultivate the behaviors that sustain the physiology?
The million dollar question.
I believe everyone is blessed with a physiology system to sustain romantic behaviors, as long as they are physically and mentally healthy, first. Second, if the partners wait till they’re mature enough to make the right choice of a partner. That is, young couples are not mature enough, have had not enough experience, have not been established economically yet, therefore they cannot offer the safe and secure environment needed for a long-term romantic relationship to survive and be at ease, peace. That’s why, I believe, they go through the mid-life crisis… In other words, men should marry at their 35 years and over , and women at late 30s. That is: When the men are more or less done with chasing women, are established economically, and at peace with themselves and accomplishments; and women are finished with her studies and dream career, enjoyed their youth as a single person and now is ready for nesting… With this in mind, now they’re ready to cultivate the behaviors that will keep the fire going and the peace that allows them to enjoy one another. My two cents.
Correction: women should marry at her late 20s.
A Chief Petty Officer at my NROTC unit in college told me that any man who married before age 30 was an idiot.
I was 27 when I married. Funny thing is that I knew I was an idiot then.
Now I’m 52 and not much has changed.
Hi MJ, at 27 you were a baby…. I’m a female, and no way I would get married at that age. I was enjoying my youth and work. I was in a deep exclusive romantic relationship then, but I wasn’t ready to settle down. (He didn’t have the qualifications …he’s the love of my life and
my LO now….) Marriage brings children and children bring obligations and one gets tied up too soon. I’ve seen my sisters and friends struggle with marriage and children and I didn’t find it too amusing… I married at 31 and my SO was ten years older. But he was mature, had “daddy material “, and was financially solvent. Now , I was ready to settle down consciously. My thinking: if I were to have children I wanted to stay home and bring them up myself, I needed a secure and save environment for that. Mission accomplished!