Falling in Love: When Inner Strength and Social Rituals Converge
The formation of a person's experience of falling in love depends on a number of internal and external influences, related both to individual qualities and to social circumstances. For example, one source emphasizes that the ability to exercise self-control and for reason to prevail over instinct play a key role—only such a person is capable of experiencing the "freedom of love." Equally important are upbringing, moral guidance, and the spiritual interests and needs that develop within the school community, reflecting society’s highest value: the human being. This suggests that a person’s inner world and moral education directly affect the purity and nobility of falling in love:"This great human happiness is available only to the one who is able to keep themselves in check, who has the power of reason over instinct. It is only under these conditions that one can speak of the freedom of love. Without the freedom of noble, elevated feelings—rational, beautiful, disciplined, and intolerant of debauchery—the flourishing of human dignity is inconceivable, and equally inconceivable is the youth’s intolerance of base feelings that debase a person. The purity and sublimity of youthful infatuation depend, of course, on guidance, advice, and wise words, but even more so on how young people live, what their spiritual interests, aspirations, and needs are, and on how the most important moral idea of our society—the greatest value being the human—is developed within the school community. Before a teenager comes to love the woman in his friend, he must first love the person in her, being moved by a sense of admiration and wonder at what he has discovered or is discovering in her." (source: link txt)Social factors and the experience of first love relationships are also significant. The age and circumstances of one’s first sexual encounter, for instance, influence the emotional depth and moral content of a relationship. Early engagement in intimate relations can be driven by social symbols and expectations, which in turn affects the authenticity of falling in love:"The lower the age at which young people engage in their first sexual encounter, the less morally motivated that relationship becomes and the less love it contains. Alongside genuine infatuations in the relationships between young men and women, there is a lot of invented behavior. Courting, exchanging notes, the first date, and the first kiss are important not so much as expressions of a high schooler’s inner need as they are certain social symbols—signs of coming of age. If this event is delayed (and there are no strict chronological norms here), he becomes nervous, sometimes attempting to replace genuine infatuation with something fabricated, etc. Hence, there is a constant monitoring of peers’ opinions, imitation, and boasting of real, or more often, imaginary "victories," and so on." (source: link txt)There is also the view that falling in love often arises not from a conscious decision or effort, but rather as a sudden and unpredictable emotion triggered by natural instincts. Researchers note that this state is experienced as an effortless way of being, where all actions seem to flow with extraordinary ease, and it can astonish with its spontaneity:"Some researchers, including psychiatrist Scott Peck and psychologist Dorothy Tennov, argue that what is commonly called falling in love cannot really be called 'love.' Dr. Peck asserts that falling in love is not true love for three reasons. First, falling in love is not an act of will, not a conscious choice. No matter how much we long to fall in love, it does not always work out. On the other hand, falling in love can overtake us when we least expect it. Often we fall in love at the wrong time or with the wrong person. Second, falling in love is not true love because it does not require conscious effort from us. Whatever we do—once in love, everything comes easily. We engage in long conversations over the phone, are ready to overcome any distance just to see each other, give expensive gifts, and make plans—and it costs us nothing. Just as instinct compels a bird to build a nest, it pushes lovers toward strange and unusual actions." (source: link txt)Finally, individual qualities such as intellect, beauty, or nobility are often regarded as objects of admiration that facilitate the emergence of falling in love—people choose a friend in the guise of a beloved based on these traits. However, falling in love can sometimes become a form of self-expression, an attempt to evoke sympathy or pity from others:"Falling in love is when a person ends up loving more for themselves—loving for something: for intellect, beauty, or nobility. To learn how to love without a specific reason, just for the sake of love, one must have truly shared life’s burdens with someone. In depriving themselves of life because of love, the lover wishes to show everyone: 'Look how miserable I am'; he seeks to provoke pity in those around him. Falling in love is a wonderful period—one feels as if they are flying on wings, constantly thinking about their beloved, always wanting to be near them. This fervor of emotion has been celebrated by the romantic writers in their works." (source: link txt)Thus, personal qualities (self-control, reason, upbringing, moral values), social circumstances (the experience of first love, peer influence, symbolic rites of passage), and instinctive reactions all play significant roles in the formation of falling in love.