My column, at times, survives on the over-analyzation of this behavior. A prime example: is monogamy attainable on a college campus? From time-to-time, however, something comes up that is strictly science in its purest, simplelistform. These questions demonstrate that there can be an actual formula to falling in love and, most importantly, we have control over whom we fall for.
In a controlled lab environment, psychologist Arthur Aron had a heterosexual man and a heterosexual woman enter the room through separate doors and sit down face-to-face. They then asked each other 36 intimate questions, alternating posing each. The questions are arranged in three sets and get more intimate with each set.
Also, ask your partner to reflect back to you how you seem to be feeling about the problem you have chosen. This part appears to be where the connection transforms to love. After all, not only did the participants in the study end up married, but 20 years later, Mandy Len Catron from the New York Times decided to reenact the study with her best guy friend and they too ended up falling in love. What she ended up realizing is that love is more malleable than we may expect. The 36 questions almost compiles things that would end up being discovered on multiple dates, while the eye contact exercise forces a kind of intimacy not broken by something physical or verbal.
If it really is a scientific code, where this superficial side of romance melts away, you are left with love and humanness in its most vulnerable forms. I think about how wonderful it would be to do this exercise with a male best friend like Catron did and being able to have both a lover and a friend in the same person.
Love can be created and then thrive because two people made the choice. If you want love, you can become its master artist. Cancel reply. Your email address will not be published. If you wish for your response to an article to be submitted as a letter to the editor, please email [email protected].
