What is the relationship between love and desire? How do they relate, and how do they conflict? ... Therein lies the mystery of eroticism.

What is the relationship between love and desire? How do they relate, and how do they conflict? ... Therein lies the mystery of eroticism.

Our consumer economy peddles the notions "romantic consumerism" of finding "the one," of being the one. It's the narcissistic enhancement of, "I'm the one you stopped your nomadic life for." It's one thing when you have sex for the first time when you marry, but it's another thing altogether when you stop having sex with others when you marry. So the marital commitment becomes, "I must be really special. With me, you no longer think you can find better next door." Romantic consumerism is thinking you can't find better, younger or newer.

Today, monogamy is one person at a time.

There is no neediness in desire ... there is no caretaking in desire. Caretaking is mightily loving, [but] it's a powerful anti-aphrodisiac.

In my community there were two groups of people, There were the ones who did not die and the ones who came back to life.

Modern infidelity is different than traditional infidelity and sits on top of the romantic ideal that you find "the one" and that if you have everything that you need at home, you have no reason to go looking elsewhere. And if you have an affair, it's a symptom of a flawed relationship. If you don't apply the deficiency model to the relationship, then you apply it to the person. The person who strays is selfish, immature, addicted suffers from insecure attachment. And the person who doesn't stray is the committed partner: mature, stable, and non-selfish.