6. the lovers

06loversTrue love exists, I believe, but it is not—cannot be—passion that lasts forever. True love, the love that undergirds strong marriages, is simply strong companionate love, with some added passion, between two people who are firmly committed to each other.

Companionate love looks weak in the graph above because it can never attain the intensity of passionate love.

But if we change the time scale from six months to sixty years, as in
the next figure, it is passionate love that seems trivial—a flash in the pan—
while companionate love can last a lifetime.

When we admire a couple still in love on their fiftieth anniversary, it is this blend of loves—mostly companionate—that we are admiring.”

ref “Happiness Hypothesis”  Jonathan Haidt