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relationships can be tricky many spend their days dreaming about finally meeting that so-and-so who will justify their existence and fill that hole in their heart most of our media is characterized by the romantic pursuit portraying love as a battleground of risk hope and making someone your everything and much of our free time is filled up with swiping on dating apps going out to bars and clubs and talking about our romantic interests all in the openly cynical and yet privately hopeful possibility of finding love and then once you're in it at least fifty percent of the time it becomes an uneven affair of hurt feelings and missed expectations you engage in the desperate mental gymnastics of someone trying in their earnest to find a reason to stay to somehow turn a blind eye to the possibility that this just isn't working out [Music] the famous existentialist author wrote extensively about the asymmetrical expectations that characterize many relationships she believed love to be an inherent component to the human condition we wish to be with another to be heard to be affirmed in who we are and yet time and time again this very desire leads us astray into relationships that scar us and make us forget who we truly are for bouvois this common occurrence only further justifies the necessity of a sort of ethics of love a project that she would pursue throughout her life today's video is sponsored by blinkist sometimes i need to pour over quite a few books before i can decide on a topic for a video research can also be quite difficult since i need the time to read through so many pages of info for a while i relied on my mediocre speed reading abilities to do this that is until i found blinkist which condenses entire books and more importantly powerful ideas into just 15 minutes of the most important highlights blinkist lets you save time money and helps you discover and understand the world around you faster than ever blinkist has over 3 000 non-fiction books 14 million active users and lets you access all of your titles well offline now there's also shortcasts that condense popular podcasts to the heart of each episode i enjoy blinkist when i go for walks right now i'm listening to sigmund freud's the interpretation of dreams a famous book that details freud's own theory of the unconscious and reveals what would later become his idea of the oedipus complex i found the book to be an interesting summary of freud's most popular ideas and would highly recommend it to anyone interested in the history of psychology click on the link below and the first 100 people will get unlimited access for one week to try it out this is a seven day trial that is completely free and that you can cancel at any time you'll also get 25 off if you want the full membership [Music] bouvois saw the very ambiguity of love as a gateway to exploitation this is apparent in the gender differences that define love boys generally speaking were encouraged to have projects for their lives to see love as part of life not all of it and to believe that success was possible in more than one part at once girls by contrast were encouraged to see love as life itself and to believe that to succeed at other things might make them less lovable whereas men see freedom as their true calling whatever that calling may be women are taught to see love as their key to freedom this naturally leads to some level of asymmetry in romantic expectations men have been generally taught to seek their romantic interest as somebody who will vitalize them and challenge them unlocking their true potential but nonetheless submitting to the man's power they appear to provide almost mystical help to the man reminiscent of the popular stock character of the manic pixie dream girl who acts as a quirky attractive and spontaneous woman who encourages the male protagonist through their resistant and yet yielding validation of the man's true essence we can see this trope in breakfast at tiffany's and a deconstruction of this trope in 500 days of summer bouvoir quite poignantly defines this issue early on the average western male's ideal is a woman who freely submits to his domination who does not accept his ideas without some discussion but who yields to his reasoning who intelligently resists but yields in the end this of course isn't limited to one gender or the other but is rather the norm as presented in media the manic pixie dream boy is also a common trope for both genders bouvois as well as a list of many other thinkers discourages us from viewing love and relationships as the key to salvation we should not rely on another to make us feel whole like money material goods social approval and countless other culturally constructed ideas that promise us freedom or happiness treating love as a means to an end will more often than not lead to an unsatisfactory relationship this argument is brought forth in becker's the denial of death who sees the age of secularism as becoming increasingly reliant on romantic relationships as fulfilling our two ontological motives of feeling special and unique and also belonging to something larger whereas god used to give us the assurance that we are valuable and good we now seek such fulfillment in another human the only issue is that they too are human with their own quirks and existential anxieties such relationships often end in resentment or boredom serving only to distract individuals from facing their fear of meaninglessness and death head-on what might these unhealthy relationships look like uva presents us with two forms of failed love narcissism and devotion the relationship of narcissism quite plainly is loving oneself and loving in the other the love they have for you this is apparent in the manic pixie dream girl fantasy of the man who likes the idea of their partner and enjoys the encouragement and validation that comes with being with them this fulfills the ontological motive of feeling unique and special however their lover is still nothing more than a small character in their life story they neglect the fact that there is another in the relationship with their own potential and good waiting to be encouraged and cultivated simply put the narcissistic relationship is self-serving and dehumanizing it often ends in the other feeling neglected and unwanted on the other hand is devotion if narcissism is making your partner into a side character in your life journey devotion is letting your partner write that story for you this is apparent in the love is everything fantasy socialized in girls where the other is to be treated with the utmost devotion and given total autonomy the devoted is there to serve the other entirely and acts as a gift to the lover this fulfills the ontological motive of belonging to something larger how special is it that this person has chosen you you may even believe that it's meant to be slowly forgetting yourself in the attempt to maintain a relationship that is anything but destined instead you continually make compromises allowing your true love to slowly define who you are thus making it ever the more difficult to leave you have made them your everything each side both narcissism and devotion is present in any relationship to like someone a bit too much or to also want some space isn't unnatural but bouvois is addressing the issue when these turn pathological neither is true love but rather reflections of individuals who do not know themselves quite enough neither may be acting maliciously but the damage can be nonetheless tremendous ethical love then is an equilibrium a balance between absolute self-interest and absolute selflessness as bouvois notes it is to simply walk side by side mutually helping each other a little we give ourselves but without losing ourselves we share each other's lives all the while respecting the fact that the good you see in the other cannot be restricted but should rather be free to grow unencumbered by your own idealistic expectations you love them for who they are this can of course be corrupted when one sees the other as inferior or superior and so a healthy relationship is one that is based upon and driven by a sense of equality and a shared sense of support despite her concerns with hetero relationships i don't feel like the essence of simon dubova's project of ethical love is exclusive to the love between a man and a woman instead i believe that to strive for something she sees as both rare and yet possible of a love in which both partners are equal is a project relevant in any space where human connection is yearning to flourish [Music] you ...
