The Evolution of Modern Relationships
I recently came across this article by Ankush Bahuguna, on mensxp.com, titled “Why Modern Relationships Are Falling Apart So Easily Today”, one of the points Bahuguna makes is that "We believe we’re not meant for relationships. We don’t want to settle down. Even the thought of it is scary. We cannot imagine being with one person for the rest of our lives.[...] We like to believe we’re ‘different’ than the rest. We like to believe we don’t conform to social norms." To this I pose these questions:
What if we *are* different?
What if the social norm of finding 'one true love' that you will be with 'forever and ever' is not something we want or strive for or ever really believed in the first place?
What if you want to share your love with more than one person?
What if we are evolving, and the idea that we can care about more than one person is spreading, because that's how we were designed; meanwhile, modern religion has tried to make us conform to their 'acceptable' social norms for more than two thousand years!
Maybe we are learning that people change, especially as we progress from our early twenties to our early thirties! Look back at who you were 10 years ago. Do you think you could spend a lifetime with that person? How could you possibly expect your partner and yourself to evolve as people over years or decades and still be compatible? I'm not staying this is impossible; it's just rare, and certainly not to be taken for granted! This is one thing I do think the author got right: “We’re not prepared. We’re not prepared for the sacrifices, for the compromises [...] We’re not ready to invest all that it takes to make a relationship work.” Whether we’re not prepared or just naïve doesn't really matter. We think monogamy is going to be this Disney movie fairy tale, and it is not. It can be beautiful, but it requires compromise and hard work.
Another thing the author touched on was the impression that millennials sleep with more people than past generations. This might be due to the common Tinder 'I'm just not looking for anything serious right now', and the casual sex that comes along with it; however, Jean Twenge, who is a professor of psychology at San Diego State University, analyzed data from a survey of more than 33,000 adults in the U.S. to measure the country's shifting sexual landscape. The Washington Post produced this chart and I think it speaks volumes;
Knowing this tells me that perhaps we are not struggling with making relationships last, perhaps we are just struggling with deciding to settle. Casual sex doesn't have to mean it is meaningless, it's just fun and exciting and something to do until we figure out what it is we want.
We are learning that we don't have to settle and struggle under the weight of the "social norm.” We can have what makes us happy, and there is no reason to feel ashamed. If we accept that it takes a concerted effort to make any kind of relationship successful, why not put that effort into achieving what you truly desire? Challenge the social norms, explore, experiment, and then, if you decide the social norm is what you want, congratulations! You are going to have a much easier time explaining yourself at family dinners. But as long as we are safe and focused on mutual consent and happiness, we can design our own relationships as complexly as we see fit.
