With a savory flush of sensual, dewy-skinned
lust, a scantily clad brunette ambles onto the stage. She exhales audibly,
brushes one caramel leg across the other, and locks the audience’s eyes in a
visual embrace. A hush blankets the theater. Every spectator’s breath comes
more quickly than the last. Hearts pump with growing vigor. Faces flush and
every body suddenly becomes desperately aware of the body next to it.
In her usual carnal timbre, Cher purrs, “The
trouble with some women is that they get all excited about nothing . . . and
then marry him.” The audience lets out a collective chortle, but not without
feeling the residual biological effects of the scene that had just played out
in front of them—as well as the places to which each individual mind had
wandered. Men wanted what they had seen. Women wanted to feel the way she
looked.
Although said in jest, all jokes contain an
element of truth. The truth here is that the road to genuine romantic love is exciting, but it is also fraught with pitfalls and
hazards—lusty let-downs like the one experienced by the audience after Cher’s
punch line, but on a much larger scale. One wrong turn and a woman just might
find her chassis hitched to the very thing Cher warned about: nothing. Maybe that’s why on February 16, 2010, the New York Times reported that nearly one in three people are
using the Internet to surf for love. Now factor in that some report that
one-third of the world’s population in now on the Internet
and that’s presumably a lot of people
looking for love . . . billions in fact.
With so many people searching for Mr. or Ms.
Right, why aren’t more successful love matches taking place? Why isn’t the
Census reporting an abundance of newly married, happy couples? Aside from the
fact that the government doesn’t concern itself with intangible things like
love, the answer is that most people simply don’t realize that their efforts in
finding a truly loving relationship are being sabotaged. That’s right, I said
it: sabotaged.
This saboteur is not some evil six-horned corporate
dating service trying to keep its customers chained to the matchmaking
websites, where they click on profile after profile, hoping that the next image
will send them into a love-at-first-screen froth. No, this scoundrel is much
closer than one might think; in fact, we take it with us wherever we go. This
insidious relationship scallywag is the human brain.
For the past several years, award-winning author,
coach, and biology professor Dawn Maslar has successfully worked with women of
all ages who have become frustrated in their search for love. Thanks to her
diverse background, Maslar has come to learn that many of the problems singles
face today are rooted in basic biology. Daters are caught in an evolutionary
quandary: Although romantic love generally begins with sexual desire, not all
sexual desire evolves into real love. Oftentimes, basing a relationship solely
on the pituitary gland’s loin-boiling abilities will only lead to shards of
hearts left lying between sets of heavily worn sheets. So, the question becomes
this: How can a woman traverse the path to real love while avoiding the potential
biohazards? Fortunately, an understanding of science—or more specifically,
biology—can illuminate the road ahead by shedding a bright light into the
potholes and pitfalls of both lust and love.
Won’t you join me on this fascinating journey of discovery
as we explore the science of love?
