Love and relationships are both fascinating subjects, while at the same time, confounding.  There are lots of notions and views about such issues among humans.  Each individual seems to have his or her own understanding of love and different manners in expressing it.

Why do you think people stay briefly or longer in a relationship?  Whatever type of relationship, romantic love relationship or business relationship, people tend to hang on to them because of the varied benefits that go with it.  Well, this may sound too cold and callous, and perhaps you will argue and ask about love.  Isn’t it the main reason why people get involve and stay in relationships?  The romantic side in you will certainly assert this kind of reasoning, that it is indeed love that binds two people in a relationship.  It may be true for some, but generally, when you look at it philosophically, a person may do “love” someone because he or she realized that lot of things will be gained from “loving” that particular person, or as what the Minimax Theory of Love implies.

According to this theory of love, a person exercises a kind of “benefits-cost” analysis before making a decision to enter and stay in a relationship.  If he or she sees that the benefits and rewards are plenty for him or her to reap, the likelihood of sustaining the relationship is great.  The guiding principle when it comes to relationships states that people desire to keep relationships that bestow the maximum gains and minimum losses or costs.  Thus, the Minimax Theory of Love came to exist.

Actually, this theory makes a lot of sense albeit it strips off the romanticized concept of love and falling for it, reducing it to a business-like proposition.  In reality, people have needs and everyone possesses that particular something others may be in need of.  Hence, love relationships offer the opportunity for a person to find another being that will ultimately give him or her most of what he or she aspires and needs that requires only the least cost for the needs to be met.  Such cost and benefits may pertain to various aspects such as physical or abstract, like emotional, material or sex.

From such outlook, love and to love someone is more on being a decision rather than feeling.  And for this, when you hear people say they had broken up with their lover, they could mean that they did not feel the satisfaction of their needs or that it somehow became too costly or no longer worthy of the benefits they acquired from it.  That is why, phrases like “the relationship becomes a high maintenance” can be heard at times.

Given that many of today’s marriages eventually ended up in divorce, this theory of love offers a clearer view and better understanding where most of the serious marital issues came from.  It is in fact true to say that falling in love, at the same time, falling out from it is much easier than staying in love, for the reason that people tend to unconsciously and consciously make the effort of evaluating the benefit-cost of their relationship every day.  The challenge to it all is finding a lot more reasons as to why a person should stay, enhance and strengthen the relationship he or she is involve with at the moment, or making the reasons happen should he or she finds wanting for more.

However you view love, whether you do believe in the certainty of its intangible being or you define it based on some theory of love, stick to it, as long as it keeps you happy and strengthens your relationship with a special someone.  With all these opinionated insights on love and relationships, two things remain to be certain: love is real and it is reason enough to live.