The Vagabond

The concept of romantic love is flawed. The notion of Romantic love as shown in Bollywood and Hollywood movies has ruined many a lives.

I was recently watching Shahrukh khan starrer “Harry met Sejal.” What got me thinking was how can a well educated girl lawyer by profession, born in a rich family choose a guide to marry. Will she be able to leave the riches she is used to and get away peacefully living a hardworking life.

Romance is good as long as it is confined to the carefree days of college or if you are bachelor and living alone. That’s the time when you have all the time in the world and you can go and watch movies, go for dinners.

Once the married life with kids set in, it is more important to earn so that you can pay school fees, pay for your annual vacation and so on. It will be more important that you make your child sleep in time, wake him/ her in time and have a restful good night sleep. A late night movie or a romantic dinner would be the last thing on mind.

Romantic love brings with it the feeling that a long term marriage will have all the excitement of a love affair. However, we all know this is seldom true. Once married, you have responsibilities which are to be catered to. Both the partners will have extended families who will have to be taken care of. So as per romantic love, spending time with only one as if none existed is not possible. This notion sooner or later brings in feelings of inadequacy in either of the partners leading to them straying outside marriage.

Love and sex are inseparable as per romantic love. So, one cannot love a person if they do not have great sex and vice versa. This concept has doomed many a great marriages.

As per romantic love, you are compatible only if you like each other in eternity. While in reality, no one is perfect. All of us, will like some aspects about others, while there will be equally irritating features with either.

We need to replace this Bollywood type of love with mature love where we need to understand that in order to succeed in love and marriage, practicality should be considered.

There is nothing wrong in not opting someone who you feel won’t match in status or money. That there is nothing wrong, if a couple does not have sex frequently. Also, a person does not stop loving someone, if he/ she had a temporary lust for someone yet they are able to act within the moral and societal norms.

To be continued..