Only marry who loves you, not who you love.
Are you, or have you been married?
My psychology teacher repeatedly told us not to marry for love, and to instead marry for like. He said that love is an emotion and as an emotion it fades fades after a couple years, and the relationship ends up consisting of two people who’s only cohesive element, love, is gone. The breakup becomes inevitable.
He said that it’s best if people marry those whom they like (and love, if you’re lucky enough to find the combo) since “like” is a longer lasting cohesive element than love.
I agree with him in that likability is a much better quality in a partner than love, provided one is looking for longevity in a relationship, but still think that it’s unnecessary to take a perfectly good relatioship and transform it into another form–a form so loaded with expected roles for each member–ie call the relationship a marriage. As I see it, if you want to be with someone, then be with them; and if you want to leave, then leave. There’s just no need to transform a perfectly good relationship into a marriage, in my opinion.
Marry whoever you want and divorce whenever you want … or as soon as the layers recommend. 
I was once nearly married to a young female lawyer, 10 years younger than me. 
She was attractive, fantastic in the bed (multiple orgasmic nympho), sensitive and intelligent.
But her specialty was the divorce mediation.
Interesting. This makes a lot of sense actually. 
I never believed in the idea of simple relationships although they are still necessary. I like how you have put this, Erlir. It gives me new insight on the matter.
I actually never quite believed in this. I believe divorce is something quite avoidable if you do not marry due to the moment. Erlir is correct in saying that love lasts only ‘so long.’ However this person should be your only one. Even if the most beautiful lady on the planet asks to be with you, your lover should be the only one who comes to mind. That is not only love, but, what I believe to be, a bond that is unbreakable.
But what bothers me is, how do you know what your partner is thinking? And if you do not trust them even a little bit, isn’t something wrong? 
Haha. 
My parents have been together for 23 years now. Why are they still together? I understood why a month ago when my dad was offered a new job. He calls me up and asks for my opinion on the matter. Should he go for it, should he leave the job he’s in right now, etc. I didn’t know what to tell him, other than doing what he thought was best for him. Then he asked me where mom was and why she wasn’t answering her phone. He told me he wanted to hear her opinion on this matter right away, because he was in a position where he had to make a decision within the half-hour. Then it struck me. From this I understood why my mother and father will be together for the rest of their lives.
What I’m about to say is not a very romantic thing, and in fact it would probably make single people think twice about marriage. The reason why my parents stay together is because over the years they’ve been together they’ve created a dynamic relationship between eachother. Before the relationship each person was capable of living independently, but now, after all the years they’ve spent together, they cannot live without the other. I mean that literally. They are neither psychologically nor physically able to survive without the other. My father can not make up his mind without my mother’s opinion. This is why he called me. He’s never called me for advice before, but because he could not get mom on the phone, he had to somehow fill that void. And my mother, well, she’s psychologically the same, but also physically unable to survive in society. She doesn’t know how to pay the bills, or fix her car, etc. This has become a symbiotic relationship. Each person has “sacrificed,” in a matter of speaking, some ability they had to survive alone, which is then complimented by the other partner for the sake of living together. This is, I think, the secret to a long-lasting relationship, and this is why, in many first-world countries people get divorced.
In these first world countries both guys and gals get out of the parents house at 18 and learn to live on their own. Think about it, why would a perfectly capable person who can live on his or her own continue living with another person for a length of time–after love has faded? The other person’s opinion is irritating when you can make up your own mind. The other’s services are redundant, and even a burden, if you can service your own self (no pun intended, and yes, I did read the new maddox article, but still find it necessary to say sometimes ). Ultimately, the relationship crumbles when the individualist in the relationship decides to get rid of the irritation and burden and go on living on their own as they are capably able of doing.
The point is, if you want to be in a life-long relationship, then you have to sacrifice some capacity you have which your partner compliments, so that necessity becomes the element that keeps the couple together. Now, just because the cohesive element is not love does not mean that the relationship can’t have love. I’m not saying that. I’m only saying that love cannot be the cohesive element–necessity has to be that. Love must play a different role.
Well said, Erlir. That got me thinking.
Man & women are stronger together in life-long unions. It’s quite aesthetic.
I don’t know if divorce is “avoidable”, in general.
And I don’t see divorce as something you should avoid, either.
Marriage? Divorce? Go ahead and taste it, if you want.
I don’t have much belief that marriage/divorce is good/bad. Do what you want. 
Polygamy, monogamy, whatever.
Hmmm … First of all, you don’t know if your partner is thinking at all. Some people don’t think much.
Then, you don’t know how they “think”. There are different way of “thinking” and many people simply use what I call “associative thinking” and it’s not really organized logical way of thinking.
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=163870&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&#p1986946
Thus you can’t expect organized logical opinion from them.
And you don’t know if they are consistent or not. Some of us change the mind pretty easily and also often. Even if you knew how they think, you don’t know what they will be thinking in a while.
Then, there are those who say opposite of what they think/feel …
In short, you never really know.
We are not even fully conscious about ourselves.
I think many people are actually having certain “expectations” when they think they “trust” in someone/something.
It seems they are nearly preparing for the possibility someone/something would let them down.
Then, in their mind, they can think that they have the right to blame someone/something because they’ve “trusted” and someone/something wasn’t keeping up with the expected level of performance.
And I don’t think often about “right/wrong”. “Wrong” for what/who in what kind of way?
I don’t really care about “common sense”/ “gros bon sens”.
Well put, Nah. Thank you for that bit.
Your psychology teacher sounds bitter. Wass he in his second marriage by any chance?
Though I agree you must like the person I think your psychology has a very clinical view of love. Love is one of those words in psychology that has not been acurately and fully defined, at least in an agreed sense. My experience of love is that it does not come when you first meet someone or the thing that hangs around for a year or so untill the arguments begin. Its the stuff that holds you together in the bad times. The times when you realy dont “like” the person at all. Likeability is fical and can change from day to day. Love stays around through the good and the bad.
Marry for likability? that sounds like a failed relationship to me.
As for the happy go lucky view on relationships, sure that works when you are young, but not when you want a family, wether its human nature or the nature of society, Kids grow up happier if their parents have a stable relationship on average. And for the parents having someone to depend on makes the stress of having children easier. Thinking that they could up and leave at any moment just because your falling on hard times doesnt work in a real adult relationship.
“And if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with.”
This has brought some light to the entire topic, my friend.
…isn’t that just settling for second best?
I’d rather be alone than settle, but I know most people need to be in a relationship with hardly any gaps inbetween - I just want to know how they find these people to date one after the other??? 
I actually agree with this idea a lot, Magsj. I have never been dated. To me, it is simply a way of using time unwisely. It’s a waste rather. The whole process is bull. When you are married you will hardly ever find satisfaction with your spouse for you will always find an aspect that he/she does not contain that a previous relationship contained.
There’s nobody that’s ever even going to be remotely similar to me. Period. This marriage thing is not going to cut it. I’m just going to mate protected the rest of my life with random people until the day I die. I don’t believe in the whole “best friends forever” jargon. Divorce is a given, and people who stay married are weak. They obviously compromise way too easily and hold no grudges. That’s supposed to be admirable? No thanks.
And ironically, if I ever were to find someone like myself, they wouldn’t want to get married either so it would all work out.
Well that sounds like it satisfies you well enough, Echo. 
Good for you. Hehe.
A part of me has to agree though. It’s a fact of life. There’s no other like me. And truth be told, I’m not going to try and find anyone like me.
Anyone wants to hang out with me for a lifetime, their welcome to go through the shit they have to to live with me. I live the way I want to. I refuse to adjust to other people so that it changes my very identity.
And that is the number one reason for divorces.
Change for someone who hardly gives a damn.
The empire thanks you for producing more mind-slaves. However, FYI, your boys will be castrated at birth.