Should I marry the one I love or the one who loves me?

Hi Benjamin,

I'm 26, and I feel a little lost. As a woman, should I go for someone I love, or should I go for someone who loves me? Most of the time, the ones I love are not into me. But those I don't feel anything for are the ones after me. I want to get married by 30. Will this situation change?

Hi,

None of the above. You should go for someone who loves you as much as you love them. Do not seek someone who loves you more than you love him, as some people advise, because it will tire you. When someone loves you more than you love them, you'll find them extra and excessive. You'll find them to be too much. Too concerned. Too close. Too present. Suffocating.

Why? When the chemistry is low, everything, including genuine love gestures becomes burdensome and mechanical. The man will sense your ambivalence and will be challenged to try harder. He will go all out and up his game. He will render more acts of service and invest more in pleasing you. In return, you will resent his efforts because you'll feel obligated to reciprocate, which you find uninteresting. You will ask him to tone down and take things slowly, but he will wonder where he's supposed to pour his love.

He will think you're playing hard to get and then go on a charm offensive. The truth is that you're not playing, but such a truth is too ugly and unimaginable to him.

Once upon a time, women married for survival and lifestyle, and they were therefore expected to submit to the man and forget about their feelings. There may still be women who marry for those reasons today, which forces them to forget their hearts and just comply with the man who can give them the lifestyle they want.

But if you marry for true love and genuine connection, you will want someone you like. When you're not into someone, serving them becomes laborious and dry. If you can afford your existence, you want to marry for true love.

What if women around you are telling you that you're unrealistic and misguided?  In the past, women were denied the chance to develop themselves and get jobs. This way, they would need a man to sustain them, and so they had to suppress their need for love in favour of survival. Others were even amputated to stop them from enjoying sex and just become entertainment for the man and a bearer of babies. Those days, women were also married off when they were very young, lest they should develop and get a mind of their own.

Your mother or grandmother may be coming from this generation, and their advice may be full of subdued notions. In their era, women had no say in their own lives. Understand them in this context and leave them alone.

Does love grow? Will you learn to love the man over time? No, it won't. The chemistry between two people evolves as soon as they get to know each other. We all know the people we can potentially love because we sense the attraction. When that attraction is not there, nothing can change it.

If a man keeps trying and you never reciprocate the love, he will go through three phases: obsession with trying to win you, depression for thinking he's insufficient and unlovable, then emotional separation where he gives up trying and you begin to live parallel lives.

Obsession may start during dating, and this person's intense pursuit may impress those around you. They will tell you that you'll never find another love like it if you don't marry the person. What they don't realise is that your lack of interest makes this person more attached because of that sense of mystery and the way you seem unknowable.

If you marry him, the second stage will commence, where he gets tired of always being the one excited and initiating things. He'll think he has a problem and get discouraged. Eventually, he'll reach the final stage of quitting internally.

If he doesn't initiate divorce, a false peace will set in where you won't be fighting, but you won't be together in anything either. You'll just be parallel housemates. Your home will become a logistics centre for raising children and running family businesses, and that's all. Everyone will divert their needs to other things, whether affairs, jobs or friends.

What about the people you like but they don't like you? Should you shoot your shot? No. When you initiate love, you upset the leadership dynamic, and the man will eventually chicken out for feeling trapped or become the feminine one. You'll be forced to wear the pants and take the lead. All you should do is be available to him through other interactions and let him take up proposing love between you if he's interested. Otherwise, you should keep searching until you find someone with whom you're crazily in love with each other.