Reality of “Happily Ever After”
Finding True Love in the Real World: Beyond Disney Dreams “Happily Ever After”
# From Storybook Romance to Real-Life Joy: Unveiling the Truth Behind Lasting Love
Thanks to COVID, I had a long date with my current wife for 6 years. Now this is 1st year since we got married, and I can’t be happier in my life. This was the best decision I ever made in my life: meeting with my beloved wife. To my surprise, when I looked around, not many people were as happy as me, so it made me reflect on factors that prevent them from being happy.
To start, I found below quite humorous to read. Try and see if you get the joke!
<Before Marriage>
- Men: Oh, this is so joyful. This is all I have been waiting for.
- Women: What will you do if I ever leave you?
- Men: Don’t even dream about it!
- Women: Do you love me?
- Men: Of course, until death do us part!
- Women: Are you going to cheat on me?
- Men: What? Why do you even ask that kind of question?
- Women: Are you going to kiss me every day?
- Men: Of course, even now I feel like doing it!
- Women: Will you ever hit me?
- Men: Are you crazy? I am not like that.
- Women: Can I trust you?
- Men: Yes!
- Women: Hey Honey
<After Marriage — Read from the bottom up now! ☝️>
Living in Disney Fantasy
As a Disney generation, since young, many of us have dreamed of happily ever after; You believe that once you find the right person (Your prince, or princess) you will live with them happily ever after.
In Disney, girls often look for knights/princes with shining armor and white horses, living in a castle and many of the girls are young cute, and pretty with good and caring mindsets, often young and pure/innocent. I guess in today’s context, a guy’s requirement can be translated into his job (knight or prince), shining armor (clothes), white horse (his car), castle (house), etc.
Men are genetically attracted to younger women for one simple reason: They want to increase their chances of having healthier babies. Also, they want to have as much sexual intercourse as possible to spread their offspring (I don’t support cheating, just saying that it’s genetically programmed just like animals. But remember, we are not animals, and we shouldn’t let dick to dictate our brain as a man) For women, they are attracted to men who is capable/strong and able to take care of them and protect their baby. Without realizing it, both men/women want strong genetics to be passed down so that their baby’s chance of survival in the world is higher.
Criteria for Men/Women for Date & Marriage
However, the chance of you meeting the perfect guy/girl is quite rare, and the more conditions you impose, the higher the chance you will not be able to meet such a person.
For example, for a girl looking for decent men following can be the criteria:
1) Height should be a little above average cause I am a little tall (Okay this is reasonable).
2) He should have a decent job (The right thing to look for).
3) He should look decent at least average (Okay, half a man’s gone from her candidate now).
4) His parent should be financially stable. At least won’t be asking us for money after marriage. (Okay reasonable request once again.)
5) He should not be looking at any other beautiful/cute ladies (Okay, this can be a little challenging as men are genetically attracted to other women, but he can try his best to fix his eyes on you, pretending he never looked).
6) He should be caring in personality and vocal about how much he cares/loves you. (Right call)
7) He is neither a sociopath nor a narcissist (Definitely the quality you should look for).
8) He should not gamble and should not have much of debts than his assets (Of course you should check this out!)
I have highlighted some approaches you can take to examine whether a person is genuine in this link.
Do you find any of the requirement seems absurdly high standard? It sounds all rational and seems to be the bare minimum requirement, right? But when you go for the dating market, you will soon realize that the chance of meeting those guys is quite slim due to the probability matrix.
Imagine the chance of men meeting criteria 1 is like 50% (since it’s above average), 2 is (40%), 3 is (50%), 4 is (50%), and 5 is (30%, I am giving a little bit higher rate than I think it actually is), 6 is 50% (not many men are vocal about their emotions, to be frank), 7 maybe 80%, 8 can be another 50%.
So out of 1000 men:
= 1000 x 50% x 40% x 50% x 50% x 30% x 50% x 80% x 50% = 3.2
Only 3.2 men will meet those criteria and left for you to choose!
Oh, sorry I forgot to mention one important factor. All the men who seem to be decent and nice are either already married or drive the car on the other side (if you know what I mean).
So that’s requirement number 8. Should not be gay or married already (50%).
You will be having only 1.6 men (50% of 3.2 men) from 1000 men around you. No wonder women always complain that there are no good men around them to get married with, right?
The same goes for men looking for women but men are much simpler.
1) Is she pretty? (This goes on even when he reaches the age of 80. He will keep asking the same questions.)
2) Is she young?
And that’s it most of the time. The funny thing is that men won’t even bother doing the background check on girls’ careers, parents, how much money she has gathered, etc.
Let us say that you‘ve fallen in love with your soulmate “Luckily”. Many believe that once they are married, they will live happily ever after, like what the prince and princess were told to be when the end of each Disney movie.
Once you get into actual marriage, you soon will realize that it’s not the end. It’s just a start and the first step towards a happy life, which both you and your spouse have to put on a lot of effort to make a successful and joyful experience.
Also, if you have fallen into “Conditional” love due to some conditions/possession of his/her, your love may be challenged. Both men and women will get older, and they will lose their looks once they have.
Also, studies from Harvard suggest that the extreme emotional and physical reactions characteristic of romantic love, which are often due to hormones such as oxytocin or dopamine, cool down within 2 years¹. These changes cause less stress-related levels of cortisol and serotonin. The intense feelings stay, but the obsessive parts of love that come with it decline. It’s a steadier and more sustainable kind of attachment this way.
That’s why I love this phrase:
“True love of men is revealed when he has everything, whereas woman’s true love is revealed when he has nothing.”
If you look for men’s wealth, that may not last your entire life and women’s youth and beauty also fade. When this happens, if you are not loving for who they were, you will turn your eyes around and your marriage will be challenged, both thinking that “He/she has changed”.
So, what should we do about it? We should respect and love our spouses just as how we would like to be treated. Therefore in marriage, you ought to love each other for who the two of you really are. Don’t just like how he or she dresses, it does not matter whether they have a lotta money and such things! Real love is about caring deeply for each other and understanding one another. You know, marriage isn’t like in the fairy tales we see. But it’s a relationship where you do together what needs doing, and both help each other; one shoulder life with the other.
Wrapping it up
People change with time, and what drew you to each other back then might have shifted. The thing is to change and find something each day to say Thank you. It takes effort, open talking, empathy, and respect for each other’s true selves to make a good marriage.
But remember: true love doesn’t rely on conditions; it should get stronger when you go through difficulties together. It’s a matter of letting each other be human and helping one another learn to live.
So what are we to do? Without reservation, we should treat our spouse with love and respect just as one would hope to treat oneself. In that way we’ve got relationships for life, going from feeling in love to being lifelong partners. We experience together the good things and bad in this world of living figures. Remember that love is always a work in progress. Real love isn’t holding out for that thing, so much as cherishing a person just being who they are. And love is the real magic of a lifelong union. If you can enjoy your true selves and grow together with each other, then there’s nothing to worry about.
“The true beauty of love, then, is not in finding the perfect person but rather it’s loving an imperfect person perfectly.”
Reference
[1]: Scott Edwards (2015) |Love and the Brain | Harvard Medical School
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