The Corrupted Marketing of Love

Have you ever considered what would happen to you if you never found the romantic relationship that would last for the rest of your life? Some of us would be perfectly okay, but many of us cannot bare the thought.

In fact, based on how people think about, talk about and experience romantic/sexual relationships, it is clear that their happiness is dependent on satisfying their desire for love.

This explains why they have multiple dating apps, buy tons of stuff to be physically and psychologically appealing and try to find the answer to how to make a relationship work.

Love is extremely important, and yet, love manifests itself in so many different areas of life. One can experience love in family, friendship, one’s occupation as well as in a sexual relationship. You could even experience love from a stranger.

And as you are probably aware, the reason love can occur in almost any context is because human beings are programmed to love and are rewarded whenever we do it.

We feel great, we form connections which encourage social cohesion and we neutralize negative emotions. We are love, and while we may have access to other states of being, love is one in which we find comfort.

However, there is a fallacy that pervades society at large and is one of the best kept secrets of love.

I’m sorry if that sounds conspiratorial. I don’t mean to be. This isn’t really a secret. It’s just that the people who know this simple fact never think to share it because believing the opposite is a surefire way to drown in suffering.

The “secret” is that romantic or sexual love is no more important than familial love, love of friendship, love from one’s fans or supporters, love from strangers or any other type of love. Love is love; it can show itself in various relationships and contexts, but it is still love.

Now, you may agree with that sentiment. You may have already known this to be true. The question is, are you living this truth? Because whenever one chases romantic love, it is because they believe they cannot live without it. Conversely, those who are too afraid to put themselves out there are afraid because they’ve over-prioritized romantic/sexual love.

And what was the solution? To continue to chase? To hide under the bed? If you chase, you’ll keep chasing. If you hide, you’ll continue to hide. The problem is how you think about love in terms of romance and sexual attraction.

As painful as this is, this is the marketing of romantic love at work. Romantic love is seen as a common commodity that many of us rarely get to experience. That illusion infuriates us into action or depression. We mustn’t be the odd one out. My person is out there somewhere! I just have to work on myself to get them. But somehow, “you find love once you stop looking for it.”

And that dichotomy only serves to infuriate people even more.

Fatal Attraction

Here’s the funniest part. People have noted that when it comes to sex and romance, logic goes out the door. You can’t see red flags because your own body betrays you as it dumps neurotransmitters into your bloodstream.

Essentially, you’re wearing a red blindfold looking for red flags. This also helps to explain why this type of relationship feels more important than the others. It also explains why we rush to call it love and to diminish any other time we experience love.

The love we experience here is far more dramatic. The love we experience elsewhere is calm.

But why do our bodies do this? Well, other than the fact that the body is doing its best to ensure procreation, our psyche is often attracted to people who mirror things we have rejected about ourselves. Unfortunately, we’re not conscious of this at all.

This does not bode well for anyone who believes that romantic or sexual love is the most important way to be loved, because you are prevented from seeing someone for who they really are and you are likely to be with someone who has a trait that you despise.

Love doesn’t just turn to hate because we selfishly want people to do what we want. It also happens because they embody the things we resent. We’re just blocked from seeing it.

The solution to this specific problem is to take this knowledge, find someone who also knows this or is at least open to it and then working together to accept one another. By doing so, we learn to accept the thing we didn’t like about ourselves.

This experience is a beautiful thing because you get to see just how similar you are to your partner. Whenever I’ve experienced this I’m compelled to apologize for ever judging them and then I apologize to myself because that’s really where the problem began in the first place.

I thought I was different from them. Turns out I was more similar than I thought. It’s humbling but it strengthens the bond.

So although sexual love can be extremely tricky (especially because most people are unconsciously attracted to each other one moment and then attacking each other the next), the potential for a happy relationship is still very much present.

Love Transcends Contexts

It is vital that one understands that sexual or romantic love is not more important than the love you get anywhere else in life. That’s just a lie pushed by the media and socialization (and our bodies). We believed the lie and then we reinforced that falsehood by how we lived our lives.

I’ll be honest. I don’t know if people knowingly pushed the lie. After all, how can you know that you’re pushing a lie and then fall for your own lie? I think this mistaken notion dates back from centuries ago. I wrote about it here.

Love is about accepting the other person as they are and taking them as a part of you. A loving relationship is when both parties are doing this for one another.

This kind of relationship is possible in so many different contexts in life. To think that love in the context of sex or romance is more important is a pretty good way to remain trapped in the frustrations of trying to make these relationships work while you continue to take for granted the love you already have.

So I guess the final question would be, if you don’t have any love at all in any area of life, what do you do?

The solution is that you have to give love. Remember, you are love already. All it takes is for you to show that you accept someone.

It can be done in a positive comment on someone’s work that you enjoyed, saying good morning to a stranger, a gratitude journal, donating to those less fortunate or to someone who is making something you consider to be cool. You have an abundance of options.

And it doesn’t hurt to take your attention off of yourself and self-gratification. That’s a pretty important part too. But when you do this and feel the glow of love within, you will realize that you had love all along. There was never a need to seek it.

So when it comes to relationships, you would’ve figured out that love is within you and you will then rendezvous with those who also understand and live that truth, whether that be sexually or not.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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