A
male
age
51-59,
anonymous
writes:Why does cheating hurt our partners? Why is there no room for a free ride? Why do married people want to get out of their marriages? Why do single people want to get married? Why do we want to fulfil our fantasies? Why do we get punished for fulfilling our fantasies? Why do we feel guilty for having our fantasies? If the universe is an efficient place, why do we spend so much energy on relationships (building, breaking, maintaining)? I am tired. Reply to this Question
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male
reader, Tomas +, writes (20 February 2009):
Because we are born wanting to be loved totally and unconditionally, but we experience such love for others only briefly, and can only sustain it with people we do not know: new loves and newborns. Then we become disenchanted as we see the other has his own desires, and expects unconditional love from us. We want soulmates who know us without us having to know ourselves, who give us what we want without us having to take responsibility to ask for it.
We believe marriage is where unconditional love becomes official, and having achieved it, we think our work is done. Our partners think the same.
Unfulfilled, we seek unconditional love in children. We pour ourselves into them and neglect our partners, and resent our partners' demands. Children take our partners' attention, or they no longer need us, and we find ourselves alone.
We meet someone friendly who is generous to us, and we wonder whether we missed the wrong soulmate. Perhaps he really will understand you, perhaps with her it won't be so much work. She'll just be happy, he will listen.
We feel entitled to feeling loved without having to do the hard work of making someone else feel loved.
When we seek love elsewhere we tell our partners that they are not making us feel loved. That their hopes for unconditional love from us are a lie. We take away their sense that they are safe and loved. We make them feel like failures at loving someone, and (since we understand all this) like someone not worth the work that loving someone takes. We make them feel unlovable. And since we do actually still love them, we feel guilty for choosing our tiredness over their feelings.
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The world is efficient at bringing animals together to mate, to keep life going. Infants cling to parents to feel safe; adult cling to one another for the same reason (making more infants). Not to grasp at each other would require less energy, true. But given what complex animals we are, such energy (like that holding an atom together) may be what it takes for creatures like us to exist at all.
A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (20 February 2009): EGO... The mind can not be happy with what it has it wants what it can not have thus people complain about there situations and look outside themselves for happiness when really everything anyone wants is within themselves.
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A
male
reader, Fatherly Advice +, writes (20 February 2009):
 In order to be efficient, you only need to get a nearly equal return on your investment. It sounds like you have been making the wrong investments. Hedonism doesn't yield long term relationships. If you want to be happy you have to follow the path that leads to it. Make the right investments and you will get a good return. There is a lot of false advertising out there.
FA
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A
female
reader, Tisha-1 +, writes (20 February 2009):
 Good question, Star!
Okay, I'll bite.
Cheating hurts because it means that the value you place on sexual intimacy is very low. Also you could bring home a nasty disease, so it actually is very irresponsible. Cheating means that you think your pleasure is more important that your chosen partner's mental or physical well-being. Or it means that you're not getting any at home. Could go either way. It wouldn't be cheating if both partners agreed to it, now would it?
I'm not sure exactly what a free ride is. I do favors for people and they do favors for me. I don't expect or demand it, but I do appreciate it when it happens.
I think that some people marry the wrong people for them, also that people become lazy and don't put in the effort needed to keep the relationship strong. I also think that some people get married for the wrong reasons, and that perhaps if they were honest, they shouldn't get married at all, because they won't be able to handle the rough times. Maybe those people should marry other people who don't mind cheating or putting in less effort?
Single people get married because they think that the person they marry shares their vision/goals/plans for the future and hey, it's nice to have someone in your court along for the ride. (Hmmm. Is that the free ride? Hmmmm.)
Depends on the fantasy, maybe? And what is punishment?
Guilt is exterior pressure to conform internalized. It's also not a bad thing, if the populace tends toward murder, rape, robbery and other sorts of violence.
Who said the universe was an efficient place? I thought nature if left to itself, will go from order to disorder? Oh, right, those are closed systems. I dunno.
Oh no, I am energized. There are worse things than a broken heart and unrealized fantasies, I have learned.
I would go back to innocence but then the colors of life wouldn't be quite so vivid and interesting. And I like how much more of a wise-ass I am. I mean wiser, wiser, that's it!! Not the other word.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (20 February 2009): Because we're all alone and want to reach out to satisfy our own egos to their varying levels and degrees. If we're all born from a plant on the ground, away from other people, we would only know to satisfy ourselves through our relationship with our environment. Since most of us are not, we are constantly being pushed and pulled around in this sea of vast information. It's not just knowledge we all seek or choose not to bother, but actually, it's the sensations sparked by our surroundings, that make us seek more than ourselves. Having an interactive environment greatly boosts that.
The universe is simply a blank canvas. The only 'perfection' associated with it is that you are free to do what your complex mind allows you to do. The fallacy is not the universe nor what you paint, but in how you perceive it at the moment of perception.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (20 February 2009): It's been like that since time began. We were created to love one another. But we were also created with free will, and it usually causes us problems.
Most people think the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. we get bored with the mundane and want some excitement in our lives. That excitement can come with a hefty pricetag!
It's never going to change, so you might as well get used to it!
But by the way, some people do find true love, and are happy spending their entire lives together.
Life is full of ups and downs, it's how we deal with them that determines our degree of happiness/sadness!
What is the alternative??????
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (19 February 2009): why do you ask so many questions?
because they care and have pride.
because you dont gain anything if you don't pay for it
because married people getting more married would be pointless and if there were no new married people the old ones would die out.
because your fantasies involve you being punished for having a good time.
because the use of the neighbours cow was stupid and reckless
because we like shagging and its enormous fun.
me too now...
Star.x.
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