What Is Love

            What is love, why does it sometimes grow, and why does it sometimes die; these are questions often asked by humans today. In the Psychology of Romantic Love, a book written by psychiatrist Nathaniel Branden, these questions are answered in full detail. There were many topics in this book that interested me. What romantic love is not, the need and the desire to be loved, self-esteem and love, sex as an expression of love, and finally the longing for permanence and inevitability are topics that I researched. I chose these topics because these are the topics that I can relate to the most.
             Do you really know what love is? Most human being do not. There are, for example, men and women who characterize a strong sexual attraction for each other as love. Somehow they have come to the conclusion that even though they have few interest and values in common. Incompatible personalities and temperaments is the only thing that these people share. "They are not representative of romantic love, and it amounts to setting up a straw man to treat them as they were." (Nathaniel Branden).
             To love a human being is to know and love his or her person. It is commonly argued that romantic lovers manifest a strong tendency to idealize or glamorize their partners, to misperceive them. Of course this sometimes occurs. But it is not inherent the true nature of love that it must occur. "To argue that love is blind is to maintain that no real and deep affinities of a kind that inspire love can exist between persons."(Nathaniel Brandon) This argument runs counter to the experience of men and women who do see the partner's weaknesses as well as strengths and who do love passionately. .
             Most couples do in fact suffer feelings of disenchantment shortly after marriage; the experience of romantic love must be a delusion in this case. Yet many people experience this somewhere along the line in their careers. Others experience in their children.