The Typical Cycle

Intimate Relationships:
The Typical Cycle

Is "Love" All It's Cracked Up To Be?

"My papa told me . . .

Boy, don't put your faith in love . . . "

- The Lemon Tree Song

Article by LiveReal Agent Grace

"Is
he
the
one?"

"Bow.
Wow.
Bowwow.
Woof."

Your dedicated LiveReal Agents, exploring the treacherous terrain of modern relationships, while trying, with every sinew in our sleek, svelte, caffeine-powered bodies, to keep our sanity intact . . .

Maybe we're seeing things, but it seems that with all the hype, fuss and bother about romance and relationships...

- well, when we honestly examine the way many romantic relationships in the real world turn out . . .

- maybe they aren't all they're cracked up to be . . .

How it seems to work:

Around the time we turn, say, 11 to 15, we begin to experience a rush of strange and powerful interest in certain other members of the human race. This rush, to one degree or another, typically continues throughout the rest of our lives.

To our surprise, we suddenly find our hearts pounding, our voices quivering, our breath short, we think of "him" or "her" aaaall the time . . . they transform into the doorway to happiness, holding our trembling heart in their hands, ripe with the promise of ever-lasting bliss . . .

- or maybe . . .

this just launches us on a predictable chain of events. . .

The Typical Cycle

Step One: "The Catch"
Going through life. Someone catches your eye. Thought: "They can make me happy!" "This is what I've been waiting for all of my life." Promise of fulfillment. The future is bright, and bursting with potential.

"Love is what happens to a man and a woman
who don't know each other."
- W. Somerset Maugham

Step Two: "Courtship"
You display your best features, hide the bad ones. At this point, either get painfully rejected several times and return to Step One, or if the courtship is successful, fall in "love."

"When two people are under the influence of the most violent,
most insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions,
they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited,
abnormal and exhausting condition until death do them part."
- George Bernard Shaw

(Editor's Note: Marriage may occur at this step, or after any any of the following steps.)

Step Three: "Romance"
Time moves on. Swell of passion begins to fade. He/she is still perfect . . . mostly, well except maybe for this one little thing . . .

"The duration of passion is proportionate
with the original resistance of the woman."
- Honore de Balzac

Step Four: "The Honeymoon Has Ended."
A wide assortment of minor problems emerge, usually each party blaming the other, either loudly or secretly.

"Men are April when they woo,
December when they wed;
maids are May when they are maids,
but the sky changes when they are wives."
- William Shakespeare (As You Like It, Act 4, Scene 1)

Step Five: "Rude Awakening"
Problems, issues, and troubles.Infatuation fully fades away. You realize that this other person is just another normal, flawed, breathing, scratching, coughing, fearful, complicated human being, just like yourself, more or less. They find out the same about you. Guys begin to think "Why is she like that?" Girls begin to think, "He'll never change." Often this is accompanied by feelings of betrayal, of having been wronged, let down, disappointed, or hurt.

"Love is something that hangs up behind the bathroom door
and smells of Lysol."
- Ernest Hemingway

Step Six: "This isn't what I expected."
"I realize that what I thought was the real solution, IT, the Answer, the end of loneliness, boredom, unhappiness . . . wasn't. Now I'm right back where I started, lonely and in pain. You go to bed soulmates, wake up cellmates."

"Marriage is like paying an endless visit
in your worst clothes."
- J. B. Priestley

Step Seven: "Crossroads"
This step consists of how one copes with the previous step. Here, one is at the following crossroads: Either
Step Eight: "Rest a bit."
Ponder on what went wrong, and try to come up with theories and/or explanations of what happened. The quality and accuracy of answers vary, depending on how in touch with reality one is, one's honesty, and often the quality of relationship books one is reading. Typically, the solution is to conclude that it was the other person's fault, and the way to not make the same mistake again is to find a "better" person. (Note: this step can, and often is, skipped by those who move immediately to a new partner, thus returning again to the cycle at Step One.)

"There are very few people who are not ashamed of having been in love
when they no longer love each other."
- Duc de la Rochefoucauld

Step Nine: "Start looking for a new catch."
Return to Step 1.

"Love is only a dirty trick played on us
to achieve the continuation of the species."
- W. Somerset Maugham

And this
is The Typical Cycle
of romance and passion!

"Love is the word used to label the sexual excitement of the young,
the habituation of the middle-aged, and the mutual dependence of the old."
- John Ciardi

U N L E S S

you

"get off"

"The Typical Cycle."

. . . and how, exactly, do you do that??

"If Romeo and Juliet would have stayed around,
then they would have soon been bickering over the dishes
and who was going to hang the curtains."
- Unknown

. . . well, by breaking the cycle at some point.

And just how, exactly, do you do that??

This sounds
like a job
for LiveReal.

So, stay tuned . . .

Here's a PREVIEW

Appendix I

Check this out:
"love" relationships
typically turn into "love-hate" relationships.
Why?

Appendix II

We often think, going into a relationship,
that this will be "IT".

But all too often, as described above,
we find out sooner or later that the relationship in itself,
as it turns out, was not "IT". And understandably, we're disappointed.

So then . . . what IS "IT"?

- and that, dear reader, is exactly what us LiveReal Agents
(and many other folks . . . and maybe even you, too . . . ) - are working on.

- so stay tuned . . .