Monday, 20 May 2013
Women Detectives - Born or Made?: The Love Quest: the science of love and the receiv...
Women Detectives - Born or Made?: The Love Quest: the science of love and the receiv...: So we are all looking for love. Even the cynics, the resigned, the disappointed, whatever we may be, we are all looking for love. 1 to 1, ex...
The Love Quest: the science of love and the received wisdom
So we are all looking for love. Even the cynics, the resigned, the disappointed, whatever we may be, we are all looking for love. 1 to 1, exclusive, personal, intimate love.
All of us in the same big boat, on a quest to find and keep love.
For the past few years I have been following the work of Dr Helen Fisher, the cultural anthropologist of romantic love. I am definitely a Fisher fan and she really makes 'romantic love' sound great and I am seduced by this new-old quest: to understand love. Fisher's research is fascinating, she collected thousands upon thousands of data surveys, she even scans lovers' brains. She says that 'love' is the most powerful brain system on earth and romantic love keeps the world turning. Sure she's not the first to make such a claim. Lots of nods from the gallery. Look at Freud's libido, Jung's animus and anima, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
So let's get some received wisdom (RW) out, on love - everything in between science and folk tale.
First I trust some of my good and beautiful friends who assure me that love NEVER happens when you're waiting for it.
Oh, ok! Thanks. That explains it.
Nope. Not here. It's like watching a kettle.
When you stop wanting love you get a brief relief from the longing and the hoping. This you must enjoy because it's restful and there aren't that many stops coming up. Then out of nowhere, love arrives in one's heart. Never goes for any fingers or toes, 'bulls' eye'!
Alas, the loving, the hoping, wishing and praying are back! No restful, serene, shady places now... Loving somebody takes energy.
No wonder so many of us on the journey get such tired hearts.
Second RW fact about love is that you must 'decide to love'. Yep, it's a decision which sort of goes well with an economic view of the personality and the cost-benefit calculations self-interested individuals are suppose to be making - consciously or not - when making decisions. But I like this step - 'decide to love' - because it shows that you have to be willing and you have to be open. It sounds like Khalil Gibran, but it's actually my 7 year old who told me this and he'd heard it on Cbeebies. Oh, so you decide to love but you can't decide who will love you back. Is that why love is blind?
Fisher says it takes seconds to make that decision though. She says we know, we are walking billboards advertising everything there is to know about ourselves, we always know what we want and who has it.
So what do we have so far?
You have to wait but stop waiting, with your open heart, with your defences down, in the way of the arrows. Imagine it, you're naked, at peace, restful, defenceless, sleeping in a forest like some nymph or satyr. One eye open though, so that you can decide.
I definitely think we're making some progress here...
All of us in the same big boat, on a quest to find and keep love.
For the past few years I have been following the work of Dr Helen Fisher, the cultural anthropologist of romantic love. I am definitely a Fisher fan and she really makes 'romantic love' sound great and I am seduced by this new-old quest: to understand love. Fisher's research is fascinating, she collected thousands upon thousands of data surveys, she even scans lovers' brains. She says that 'love' is the most powerful brain system on earth and romantic love keeps the world turning. Sure she's not the first to make such a claim. Lots of nods from the gallery. Look at Freud's libido, Jung's animus and anima, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
So let's get some received wisdom (RW) out, on love - everything in between science and folk tale.
First I trust some of my good and beautiful friends who assure me that love NEVER happens when you're waiting for it.
Oh, ok! Thanks. That explains it.
Nope. Not here. It's like watching a kettle.
When you stop wanting love you get a brief relief from the longing and the hoping. This you must enjoy because it's restful and there aren't that many stops coming up. Then out of nowhere, love arrives in one's heart. Never goes for any fingers or toes, 'bulls' eye'!
Alas, the loving, the hoping, wishing and praying are back! No restful, serene, shady places now... Loving somebody takes energy.
No wonder so many of us on the journey get such tired hearts.
Second RW fact about love is that you must 'decide to love'. Yep, it's a decision which sort of goes well with an economic view of the personality and the cost-benefit calculations self-interested individuals are suppose to be making - consciously or not - when making decisions. But I like this step - 'decide to love' - because it shows that you have to be willing and you have to be open. It sounds like Khalil Gibran, but it's actually my 7 year old who told me this and he'd heard it on Cbeebies. Oh, so you decide to love but you can't decide who will love you back. Is that why love is blind?
Fisher says it takes seconds to make that decision though. She says we know, we are walking billboards advertising everything there is to know about ourselves, we always know what we want and who has it.
So what do we have so far?
You have to wait but stop waiting, with your open heart, with your defences down, in the way of the arrows. Imagine it, you're naked, at peace, restful, defenceless, sleeping in a forest like some nymph or satyr. One eye open though, so that you can decide.
I definitely think we're making some progress here...
Women Detectives - Born or Made?: Ordering the world on the train
Women Detectives - Born or Made?: Ordering the world on the train: Three days after Christmas and I am traveling to Kent with my five year old son for an overnight visit. We are going to see an old universit...
Ordering the world on the train
Three days after Christmas and I am traveling to Kent with my five year old son for an overnight visit. We are going to see an old university friend who has recently become a mother. Although in recent times I haven't been enjoying train journeys as much as I used to, I feel lucky to have found seats and a table across from a nice young lady who doesn't seem to mind being chatted up by my son. In fact he draws her in so much that she soon abandons her Simone de Bevoire tomme altogether and we launch in a four hour relaxed session of talking about feminists, Philosophy, christmas and family - punctuated by play, drawing and practicing cursive writing.
We mostly debate the tesis of my young friend's book: are we born women or do we become women? My new friend, who has just started gender studies at university and has a specific interest in 'motherhood', is mostly of the oppinion that gender roles are learned rather than innate. I used to like this tesis when I was younger. But now I have a couple of objections to it. I don't have to look too far.... First my son, like most five year old boys I know, is going through his 'no girls, no pink' phase, and he'll be happy to combatively defend it even to the most well intentioned, pacifist aunt who may try to explain gender neutrality to him. Second why should social roles be distinct or dicotomised from 'natural' plain order? Isn't that the old red herring of where does nature start and culture begins?
Anyhow it is soon time to say goodbye to Briana, it was a pleasure to meet her, and we keep on the trucks for two more hours. Just before getting our last connection I pick up the December issiue of the New Scientists (2010) and read a short article on some amazing new research that shows that some chimps play with dolls! Not exactly dolls but sticks that are used like dolls: the chimps put them to bed, make little nests for them, in short practice motherhood. Of course not all chimps do it. Only young female chimps who have not yet had babies.
One thing I noticed is that synchronicity is especially on the loose when one travels. When I travel I pay attention to ways in which colours, sounds and words congregate together. I like following my trail of crums as I put the world in order. To understand. I am sure I do it more as a woman...
We mostly debate the tesis of my young friend's book: are we born women or do we become women? My new friend, who has just started gender studies at university and has a specific interest in 'motherhood', is mostly of the oppinion that gender roles are learned rather than innate. I used to like this tesis when I was younger. But now I have a couple of objections to it. I don't have to look too far.... First my son, like most five year old boys I know, is going through his 'no girls, no pink' phase, and he'll be happy to combatively defend it even to the most well intentioned, pacifist aunt who may try to explain gender neutrality to him. Second why should social roles be distinct or dicotomised from 'natural' plain order? Isn't that the old red herring of where does nature start and culture begins?
Anyhow it is soon time to say goodbye to Briana, it was a pleasure to meet her, and we keep on the trucks for two more hours. Just before getting our last connection I pick up the December issiue of the New Scientists (2010) and read a short article on some amazing new research that shows that some chimps play with dolls! Not exactly dolls but sticks that are used like dolls: the chimps put them to bed, make little nests for them, in short practice motherhood. Of course not all chimps do it. Only young female chimps who have not yet had babies.
One thing I noticed is that synchronicity is especially on the loose when one travels. When I travel I pay attention to ways in which colours, sounds and words congregate together. I like following my trail of crums as I put the world in order. To understand. I am sure I do it more as a woman...
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