# Love is blind



## grahamg (Mar 22, 2020)

Love they say is blind, and here is some evidence supporting that theory:

"Whether individual or collective, willful blindness doesn’t have a single driver, but many. It is a human phenomenon to which we all succumb in matters little and large. We can’t notice and know everything: the cognitive limits of our brain simply won’t let us. That means we have to filter or edit what we take in. So what we choose to let through and to leave out is crucial. We mostly admit the information that makes us feel great about ourselves, while conveniently filtering whatever unsettles our fragile egos and most vital beliefs. It’s a truism that love is blind; what’s less obvious is just how much evidence it can ignore. Ideology powerfully masks what, to the uncaptivated mind, is obvious, dangerous, or absurd and there’s much about how, and even where, we live that leaves us in the dark. Fear of conflict, fear of change keeps us that way. An unconscious (and much denied) impulse to obey and conform shields us from confrontation and crowds provide friendly alibis for our inertia. And money has the power to blind us, even to our better selves."

Break

"When we love someone, we see them as smarter, wittier, prettier, stronger than anyone else sees them. To us, a beloved parent, partner, or child has endlessly more talent, potential, and virtue than mere strangers can ever discern. Being loved, when we are born, keeps us alive; without love for her child, how could any new mother manage or any child survive? And if we grow up surrounded by love, we feel secure in the knowledge that others believe in us, will champion and defend us. That confidence — that we are loved and therefore lovable — is an essential building block of our identity and self-confidence. We believe in ourselves, at least in part, because others believe in us and we depend mightily on their belief. As human beings, we are highly driven to find and to protect the relationships that make us feel good about ourselves and that make us feel safe.. Those mirrors confirms our sense of self-worth. Love does the same thing … and that seems to be just as true even if our love is based on illusion. Indeed, there seems to be some evidence not only that all love is based on illusion — but that love positively requires illusion in order to endure. "

https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/08/27/willful-blindness-margaret-heffernan/


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## grahamg (Mar 23, 2020)

Here is a video by Dr. Margaret Heffernan on her theory about "Willful Blindness":


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## Judycat (Mar 24, 2020)

As usual, I see things differently. There are some who have never had the pleasure of being willfully blind. They have been forced to see the reality of the world and how it operates mainly because their survival depended upon it. Their self-worth doesn't depend upon anyone else because in reality others have failed them.  It literally only comes down to who they are and the strength they possess within. Sorry.


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## win231 (Mar 24, 2020)

A famous person said, "Keep your eyes wide open before marriage; half shut after marriage."
(I just remembered that quote was from Benjamin Franklin)


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## grahamg (Mar 24, 2020)

Judycat said:


> As usual, I see things differently. There are some who have never had the pleasure of being willfully blind. They have been forced to see the reality of the world and how it operates mainly because their survival depended upon it. Their self-worth doesn't depend upon anyone else because in reality others have failed them.  It literally only comes down to who they are and the strength they possess within. Sorry.



I can see nothing wrong with your post, so no need to be sorry in my opinion.   .


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## grahamg (Mar 24, 2020)

win231 said:


> A famous person said, "Keep your eyes wide open before marriage; half open after marriage."



Another good post.   .

My dad used to say getting married was like "going into a boxing ring", (not physically mind you, but psychologically).


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## Llynn (Mar 24, 2020)

“When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions, they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal, and exhausting condition continuously until death do them part.”  
  ―      George Bernard Shaw,  On Getting Married


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## grahamg (Mar 24, 2020)

Llynn said:


> “When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions, they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal, and exhausting condition continuously until death do them part.”
> ―      George Bernard Shaw,  On Getting Married



My dad referred to him as a "dry b**ger" (- too rude to repeat here but maybe you will get my gist  ).

Here is another quote attributed to him: "Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same." [George Bernard Shaw]"

There are those who achieve the miracle of a happy marriage though dont they, my parents being fairy good examples, and many of my aunts and uncles, but all from a different generation, with many fundamental beliefs, and attitudes that have since become unfashionable.


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## Catlady (Mar 24, 2020)

grahamg said:


> *There are those who achieve the miracle of a happy marriage* though dont they, my parents being fairy good examples, and many of my aunts and uncles, but* all from a different generation, with many fundamental beliefs*, and attitudes that have since become unfashionable.



The only reason those marriages from ''a different generation'' lasted until death was because the spouses were willing to put up with a miserable marriage for the sake of ''family honor''.   Length of marriages is not proof that the marriage was happy.  I have known MANY of those marriages.  I myself cut the cord on my miserable marriage after only 4 1/2 years and wondered why I lasted that long.  I guess it was a matter of  ''The straw that broke the camel's back".  One day I finally said ''That is enough".


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## Capt Lightning (Mar 24, 2020)

“When you like someone, you like them in spite of their faults. When you love someone, you love them with their faults.”   Hermann Hesse.


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## grahamg (Mar 24, 2020)

Capt Lightning said:


> “When you like someone, you like them in spite of their faults. When you love someone, you love them with their faults.”   Hermann Hesse.



I think you may be in tune with Dr. Margaret Heffernan's thinking.

Here are some more of her views:

"One of the subtlest yet most pervasive manifestations of our willful blindness is our choice of mates. Data from 25 million online dating site questionnaires reveal that “we mostly marry and live with people very like ourselves” — a finding that Heffernan points out always annoys people:

We all want to feel that we have made our own choices, that they weren’t predictable, that we aren’t so vain as to choose ourselves, and that we are freer spirits, with a broader, more eclectic range of taste than the data imply. We don’t like to feel that we’re blind to the allure of those who are not like us; we don’t like to see how trapped we are inside our own identity.

We like ourselves, not least because we are known and familiar to ourselves. So we like people similar to us — or that we just imagine might have some attributes in common with us. They feel familiar too, and safe. And those feelings of familiarity and security make us like ourselves more because we aren’t anxious. We belong. Our self-esteem rises. We feel happy. Human beings want to feel good about themselves and to feel safe, and being surrounded by familiarity and similarity satisfies those needs very efficiently.

And yet, she notes, our minds work much like the dating site algorithms — we scan life for matches and, when we find one, we relish the feel-good affirmation. It’s just one manifestation of our soft spot for “filter bubbles,” exploited by everything from Amazon’s book recommendation engines to the elaborate audience-tailoring of modern media. (Heffernan touches on the big-picture disservice in the media’s insidious practice of narrowing our horizons for profit, rather than expanding them in the public interest: _“[Media companies] know that when we buy a newspaper or a magazine, we aren’t looking for a fight… The search for what is familiar and comfortable underlies our media consumption habits in just the same way as it makes us yearn for Mom’s mac ’n’ cheese.”_) She captures the dark side:

The problem with this is that everything outside that warm, safe circle is our blind spot.

Remarkably, these blind spots turn out to have a physical foundation in the brain. Heffernan quotes neurologist Robert Burton, who studies the biological basis of bias and why our brains tend to reject information that broadens our outlook:


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## grahamg (Mar 28, 2020)

Catlady said:


> The only reason those marriages from ''a different generation'' lasted until death was because the spouses were willing to put up with a miserable marriage for the sake of ''family honor''.   Length of marriages is not proof that the marriage was happy.  I have known MANY of those marriages.  I myself cut the cord on my miserable marriage after only 4 1/2 years and wondered why I lasted that long.  I guess it was a matter of  ''The straw that broke the camel's back".  One day I finally said ''That is enough".



I came across this US minister today (link below on the meaning of love). I wondered where to post his views, and they are here as they have some bearing on your post, (not that I believe I can live up to the standards he sets you understand, just that I can see where he is coming from I believe):

http://markambrose.org/how-to-identify-true-love/

Quote:
".....everyone wants to feel loved and receive love from others, but if this is the only condition for extending love, it won’t last. This is why we see couples making lifetime marital commitments and then getting a divorce a few years later. They have misunderstood the concept of “for better or for worse” to mean as long as I feel loved (see my blog post, _The Secret to Avoiding a Divorce_). True love goes beyond how you feel and remains faithful to the very end even when it gets hard.* True love is humbling but when it is expressed and received, it is the greatest blessing you will ever experience in life.* "


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