The Real Reasons Why You’re Attracted to Someone Isn’t Why You Think

Person meets person and something intangible goes “click” and that’s it. Love.

Inexplicable riddle, beautiful enigma or even pain in the ass, take your pick; it is something that has given us heartbreak, heartache, happiness, poetry, song, film, book and sometimes an excuse to be alive.

It is the boulder we all push. At some point in life.

Our concepts of love are formed when we are children. We form the notions as a composite mixture of what our primary caregivers or parents were like. Depending on how much we were loved or not, we form preferences.

“They fuck you up, your mum and dad. / They may not mean to, but they do. / They fill you with the faults they had/ And add some extra, just for you” wrote the celebrated Phillip Larkin.

Childhood experiences and their consequences thereof form an essential part of all romantic experiences. In fact the whole process of romance can be arranged as parallels to childhood experiences.

Stage 1: The Trial and Error

This is the first stage of the experiment. At this stage you are pampered, like the only child of the family; a wunderkind of sorts. It is a very hormonal time too since the self, attaches itself to anyone who can give a semblance of healing the wounds that were inflicted in our childhood. It is a hormonal high if one has to put it simply. This is what laymen and smut writers online term as the honeymoon phase. It is nigh impossible to get out of a bond at this stage because it is always sweet no matter how incompatible you are.

Stage 2: The bombs are falling

This is what you call the phase of war. The relationship becomes a bit old and a bit monotonous. This is when the true colours of the other person come out, things they had hid from you before. This is also the phase when most relationships end. This is because once it becomes boring and in some cases harmful and toxic, it is not worth staying in. This is hence the stage where you either break-up or have a relationship epiphany.

Stage 3: Everlasting love

This is in case the previous stage ends with a relationship breakthrough. This is if you two find a path that leads to a common ground amidst the struggles and care. This is when you realise the childhood scars are well healable if you have each other. If you aren’t alone, if you have someone to lean on when you hit rock bottom, someone who helps you wrestle your demons, everything is possible. From a happy relationship to a happy existence, everything is possible and within grasp.

You aren’t your parents; you aren’t what ruined your childhood; you aren’t just your scars; heartache isn’t the norm; there is a light at the end of the tunnel too.

If someone makes you feel that way, you’re home.