Is falling in love with someone only possible in romantic love? By reflecting on the relationship with my best friend I try to understand where love begins and if our societal description of it actually fits reality.
Is falling in love with someone only possible in romantic love? By reflecting on the relationship with my best friend I try to understand where love begins and if our societal description of it actually fits reality.
Photo by Vadim Martschenko
Photo by Vadim Martschenko
I was around six years old when I first noticed you. You were in the same class as I was and like most children with working parents we both attended daycare after school. In the beginning of school most children are very insecure. You were shy and so was I. Never in my life would I have had the guts to approach someone. But on one magical afternoon I saw you playing a rope skipping game with a few other kids. They sang a song while you were setting a new record on who can jump the longest. You made it up to 100. This just made you the coolest person ever. I don’t know if it was this groundbreaking record or just the long and lonely hours of daycare which forced me to overcome my insecurity and actually approach you, but a few months later we were inseparable.
Flash forward to this day and this girl is still my best friend. We grew up together, not only sharing a life but also our deepest secrets and hardships with each other. She was my rock, the first person I would turn to and the last person I would want to give up on. But shouldn’t that be a romantic partner? Society emphasises the importance of romantic relationships and falling in love. Finding that one person that truly understands you, with whom you want to grow old with and who you would do anything for. For me all of this was my best friend. That confused me. Is there platonic love and am I platonically in love with my best friend?
“You don't fear letting the other one close to you and might even feel more at ease with creating an emotional interdependence.”
My confusion might arise from the similarity between romantic love and platonic love. As seen in Sternberg’s triangle of love (Sternberg, 1986) both foster emotional intimacy between two people. Intimacy is a key component of happy relationships, since having a deep understanding of the other person’s feelings and emotions makes it much easier to connect with them (APA, 2015). You don’t fear letting the other one close to you and might even feel more at ease with creating an emotional interdependence. The life of the other person inevitably becomes yours, morphing not only the views and values but also fears and feelings of two persons into one. Aristotle even said that the loved one becomes another self; a reflection of yourself (Biss, 2011). It doesn’t always have to be that extreme but an intuitive understanding of our closest relationships and an increased amount of empathy towards that person is explained by this phenomenon. This happens often in our closest relationships, regardless of them being between lovers or friends. By sharing this emotional interdependence, a second factor of both romantic and platonic love arises: unity. You create a bond with the other person based on security and trust. Interests and feelings are shared and give you the perception of not being alone in this world (Smith, Mackie & Claypool, 2014). Having my best friend next to me when attending a new and unfamiliar situation always gave me comfort. For instance, on her 11th birthday when we first went on a free-fall tower and I was about to puke because I was so scared. But I managed, thanks to her. This ties in with benefiting from each other, another important component of our closest relationships (Davis & Todd, 1982). The neurotransmitter oxytocin – also called the “love hormone” – is strongly associated with both romantic love and friendship (Brent et al., 2014). It’s no wonder that almost 70% of romantic relationships start off as friendships (Stinson, Cameron & Hoplock, 2022). Although all these aspects create a fine line between romantic and platonic love which might seem easy to cross, there is an important factor which separates the two: sexual desire. Romantic love primarily cooccurs with (sexual) attraction towards another person whereas platonic love remains non-sexual (APA, 2015). This is why not all friends become lovers, they are missing the key element of passionate love: desire.
Before we know if we actually can platonically fall in love with someone, we must consider the distinction between falling in love and loving someone. In my personal opinion, loving someone is a broad feeling which can occur across multiple people. I strongly associate it with a feeling of comfort, warmth, and a deep form of trust. Falling in love on the other hand is much more passionate (Jeske, 2019). You get this unique tingling sensation in your stomach when you see a specific person. It might remind someone of the feeling right before competing in a sports tournament. Anticipation, nervousness but especially excitement. You want to immerse yourself in this feeling and experience it to the fullest. I believe, on a different level it is rather exceptional and much more intense than platonic love. Some people might never experience it. So best friends might love each other platonically but falling in love will, at least for me, always be reserved for romantic relationships.
In 2019 we went to a party of one of our classmates together. Afterwards, like I often did, I slept over at your place. We listened to some music, while we laid on your bed and looked back on the evening we just shared, sobering up. It was a very common but still wholesome moment. Eventually we both became tired and shut our eyes. Right before I fell asleep a question came up in my mind: “If you knew that you will fall asleep now and won’t wake up tomorrow, what would you tell me right now?” I asked in the dark. I expected you to answer something about your family since they are the most important people in your life, but to my surprise you answered: “That I love you.” The funny thing was, I would have said the exact same thing.
Dear Laetitia, thank you for being there for me and showing me how true (platonic) love looks like. You are and always will be my best friend, forever. <<
References
– American Psychological Association. (2015). Romantic Love. In APA Dictionary of Psychology (2nd ed.). Retrieved October 1st, 2022, from https://dictionary.apa.org/romantic-love
– American Psychological Association. (2015). Platonic Love. In APA Dictionary of Psychology (2nd ed.). Retrieved October 1st, 2022, from https://dictionary.apa.org/platonic-love
– American Psychological Association. (2015). Intimacy. In APA Dictionary of Psychology (2nd ed.). Retrieved October 1st, 2022, from https://dictionary.apa.org/intimacy
– Biss, M. (2011). Aristotle on friendship and self-knowledge: The friend beyond the mirror. History of Philosophy Quarterly, 28(2), 125-140.
– Brent, L. J., Chang, S. W., Gariépy, J. F., & Platt, M. L. (2014). The neuroethology of friendship. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1316(1), 1-17.
– Davis, K. E., & Todd, M. J. (1982). Friendship and love relationships. Advances in Descriptive Psychology.
– Jeske, D. (2019). Love and friendship. In The Routledge handbook of love in philosophy (pp. 13-22). Routledge.
– Smith, E.R., Mackie, D.M., & Claypool, H.M. (2014). Social Psychology (4th ed.). Psychology Press. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203833698
– Sternberg, R. J. (1986). A triangular theory of love. Psychological review, 93(2), 119.
– Stinson, D. A., Cameron, J. J., & Hoplock, L. B. (2022). The friends-to-lovers pathway to romance: Prevalent, preferred, and overlooked by science. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 13(2), 562-571.
I was around six years old when I first noticed you. You were in the same class as I was and like most children with working parents we both attended daycare after school. In the beginning of school most children are very insecure. You were shy and so was I. Never in my life would I have had the guts to approach someone. But on one magical afternoon I saw you playing a rope skipping game with a few other kids. They sang a song while you were setting a new record on who can jump the longest. You made it up to 100. This just made you the coolest person ever. I don’t know if it was this groundbreaking record or just the long and lonely hours of daycare which forced me to overcome my insecurity and actually approach you, but a few months later we were inseparable.
Flash forward to this day and this girl is still my best friend. We grew up together, not only sharing a life but also our deepest secrets and hardships with each other. She was my rock, the first person I would turn to and the last person I would want to give up on. But shouldn’t that be a romantic partner? Society emphasises the importance of romantic relationships and falling in love. Finding that one person that truly understands you, with whom you want to grow old with and who you would do anything for. For me all of this was my best friend. That confused me. Is there platonic love and am I platonically in love with my best friend?
“You don't fear letting the other one close to you and might even feel more at ease with creating an emotional interdependence.”
My confusion might arise from the similarity between romantic love and platonic love. As seen in Sternberg’s triangle of love (Sternberg, 1986) both foster emotional intimacy between two people. Intimacy is a key component of happy relationships, since having a deep understanding of the other person’s feelings and emotions makes it much easier to connect with them (APA, 2015). You don’t fear letting the other one close to you and might even feel more at ease with creating an emotional interdependence. The life of the other person inevitably becomes yours, morphing not only the views and values but also fears and feelings of two persons into one. Aristotle even said that the loved one becomes another self; a reflection of yourself (Biss, 2011). It doesn’t always have to be that extreme but an intuitive understanding of our closest relationships and an increased amount of empathy towards that person is explained by this phenomenon. This happens often in our closest relationships, regardless of them being between lovers or friends. By sharing this emotional interdependence, a second factor of both romantic and platonic love arises: unity. You create a bond with the other person based on security and trust. Interests and feelings are shared and give you the perception of not being alone in this world (Smith, Mackie & Claypool, 2014). Having my best friend next to me when attending a new and unfamiliar situation always gave me comfort. For instance, on her 11th birthday when we first went on a free-fall tower and I was about to puke because I was so scared. But I managed, thanks to her. This ties in with benefiting from each other, another important component of our closest relationships (Davis & Todd, 1982). The neurotransmitter oxytocin – also called the “love hormone” – is strongly associated with both romantic love and friendship (Brent et al., 2014). It’s no wonder that almost 70% of romantic relationships start off as friendships (Stinson, Cameron & Hoplock, 2022). Although all these aspects create a fine line between romantic and platonic love which might seem easy to cross, there is an important factor which separates the two: sexual desire. Romantic love primarily cooccurs with (sexual) attraction towards another person whereas platonic love remains non-sexual (APA, 2015). This is why not all friends become lovers, they are missing the key element of passionate love: desire.
Before we know if we actually can platonically fall in love with someone, we must consider the distinction between falling in love and loving someone. In my personal opinion, loving someone is a broad feeling which can occur across multiple people. I strongly associate it with a feeling of comfort, warmth, and a deep form of trust. Falling in love on the other hand is much more passionate (Jeske, 2019). You get this unique tingling sensation in your stomach when you see a specific person. It might remind someone of the feeling right before competing in a sports tournament. Anticipation, nervousness but especially excitement. You want to immerse yourself in this feeling and experience it to the fullest. I believe, on a different level it is rather exceptional and much more intense than platonic love. Some people might never experience it. So best friends might love each other platonically but falling in love will, at least for me, always be reserved for romantic relationships.
In 2019 we went to a party of one of our classmates together. Afterwards, like I often did, I slept over at your place. We listened to some music, while we laid on your bed and looked back on the evening we just shared, sobering up. It was a very common but still wholesome moment. Eventually we both became tired and shut our eyes. Right before I fell asleep a question came up in my mind: “If you knew that you will fall asleep now and won’t wake up tomorrow, what would you tell me right now?” I asked in the dark. I expected you to answer something about your family since they are the most important people in your life, but to my surprise you answered: “That I love you.” The funny thing was, I would have said the exact same thing.
Dear Laetitia, thank you for being there for me and showing me how true (platonic) love looks like. You are and always will be my best friend, forever. <<
