There’s no set timeline for falling in love, but premature love can come with unique risks and challenges. Imagine a delicate flower, budding with potential, blooming prematurely amid the Winter. Think of this scenario as foreshadowing for awakening love before its time. When addressing the Shulammite, the author of Song of Solomon urges her “…not to awaken love until the time is right.” Why could this be?
Premature love, in my experience, can leave one vulnerable and exposed. Like a bud that opens too soon and is hit with the dry days and cold nights of a South African Winter. When love is awakened too soon, it may not have a strong base or enough time to develop and flourish naturally. Leaving room for unrealistic expectations and a lack of compatibility, leading to tension and possible heartbreak. This brings to mind even the emotional maturity or readiness we might overlook when taken over by the allure of passion and companionship when we aren’t yet ready.
Read: The challenges of romantic relationships
Cue the impact of what we consume and how it affects our POV regarding what love and romance should look like. According to Julia Lippman, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan, “the media may be teaching us what sorts of beliefs we should have about romantic relationships,” The study unpacks how the types of media messaging often correlate with how people idealise romance. The findings appear in Psychology of Popular Media Culture: http://bit.ly/1lFKuWY
Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Shrek and Fiona are fictional works of literature that create romanticised ideals in minds from as young as six – the minimum age rating set for Cinderella. How much of what you believe about love has been influenced by what you consume? How much of this has steered you towards stoking the fire of love when the time wasn’t right?
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Written by Kabelo Milton.
The views expressed herein are those of the writer and not I Am Youth.
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