Love is math(s)… also. #1

So that’s it: you know it, you can feel it in your guts! This time, this is the ONE BIG THING: this person is so amazing, you just cannot help but thinking about him or her, you really, truly and fully love this person!

And after a delicate approach, a small “flirt” and several dates, this person is responding positively to you and you are eager, both of you, to build a strong relationship: either love or friendship – to me this is almost the same when you speak about feelings…

Ok. Fine. I am so happy for you. Really 🙂 Because the world desperately needs love and friendship. So you and your mate are the ambassadors of peace on earth. So nice, so “fairytale”!

But it is not enough. For you, it is time to think and make calculations. Mostly if YOU happen to be the most mature of your new couple. Mostly if you are a woman, because women are generally more mature in life and earlier in time, during their growth, than men…

Do not be afraid about that. I will tell you why you must be rational when you really love someone. Love is the strongest bond between people, but you have to do some mathematics in order to make it last: it is so easy to fall in love (or friendship) with someone, much harder is to keep love alive and strong.

I am always frustrated at the end of a movie or a fairytale when, after all this struggle and slain “monsters”, the happy couple moves towards the sunset and you know that they live happy ever after.

Yeah, so nice, so cute… But what the hell, how did they “perform” happiness?

Well, the truth is that the “struggle” never ends with the end of the film.

Just think about a house: a nice, bright, welcoming villa with a huge garden. See it? Well, this house is what you want your love or friendship to be in several years. In fact, you want it to be always welcoming and in a good shape “ever after”…

Well, maintaining a house is hard work: you want to enjoy barbecue parties, inviting your friends and protect it from natural disasters and so on. Maybe build an extension for children, a garage, and so on… Ok, you get it, you have the analogy, but this part of life is the nice part, the one you enjoy the most because it is purely emotional, spontaneous, so is love you say… But only in the beginning, or when you come back to your house after a long trip and when you see it from the distance… Because from time to time seeing it at a close range is a more sad experience… But let us say that your house is in good shape; what does it take?

So ok guys, you have to do calculations to have such a nice house:

1. Have a lot to build your house: be sure that the terrain is in order to support strong foundations. You have to make a choice: who will provide the “ground” to build? You? The other person? Someone has to make this first and crucial investment and “calculate” the odds ;
2. Make a plan together: do some hard brainstorming in order to make yourself clear what do you want of this relationship. Sad but truth be told, only one of the couple is really clear about it. (S)he has to make the first sketch alone and figure out what the house will be. But how vast will this house be? How will it “cost” at first” without any extensions? You must “calculate” somehow don’t you?
3. Invest all your guts in the initial construction: building strong foundations is hard. You can construct ANYTHING if you have strong foundations. So be always true, even if it hurts, even at the risk of not building any foundation at all: it is far better than constructing harsh foundations that will cause your “nice” villa to fall apart in a couple of years… Well: budget, assets, mortgage… Another bulk of “calculations”…
4. Ensure the day to day maintenance of your “house”: survey the surroundings, keep track of any leakage or problem and make sure you fix it. Put a new paint if the first one is fading or do not please you anymore: a house in something in “motion”, it cannot stay the same forever! It is only paint in the end… So if you take care to always save money and have a minimal budget for maintenance and repair, but are ready to reshape or even put down a part of your house in order to save the whole thing, your house will last! Another set of “Calculations” but this one is the most tricky to perform 🙂 Because you do not have to be afraid to put yourself (architect and builder) into question and CHANGE your hypothesis of calculations…
5. Be sure to “leave” your house from time to time: spending vacations together away from your house is the surest way to love your home when you come back. So make another set of “calculations” to plan and budget holidays together with your loved one or friend. This set of mathematics is the one I prefer 😉

Well, I hope I did not bother you too much with my long metaphor. But emotional and rational are the two sides of the same coin called “love” or “friendship”, as form and content are for almost any written text: you can hardly sell a good story if it is not well “marketed”…

Thank you for reading and, please, make calculations when you love someone: it is by far the safest way to make your feelings of love or friendship last and be happy “ever after” 🙂

Photo: “Love Calculator Pro for Mac OS X”