Disposable Relationships


In an age of fast foods, instant online services, lightning-speed
telecommunications, and disposable "everything", a relationship is
increasingly being seen as another throwaway item.


In an impatient society which demands instant gratification, couples are
becoming less and less compelled to maintain and develop a romantic
bond.


As long as the going is easy and rewarding for both parties, it's all
peachy. But as soon as discord, differences, and other difficulties
begin
straining the relationship, the temptation to dump and pick up another
becomes dangerously strong.


Gone are the times of our parents and the generations before them when a
romantic bond was like boiling a good pot of herbal soup ? the longer
and
more often you brew it, the better tasting and more beneficial it
becomes.


Relationships these days are more like instant soup mixes. We want all
the
taste but none of the effort. As soon as the sweet turns bitter, we spit
the relationship out and consume another. We thus become ill-equipped to
deal with adversity in a relationship. Our relationships become stunted,
unable to mature and bear fruit.


A relationship can only be enriched and fortified through the weathering
of
hardship. Falling in love is effortless. Staying in love is infinitely
harder. Couples who go through bad times together are more likely to
stay
together and benefit more from the relationship.


Throw out Hollywood notions of eternal love borne of a few days on a
doomed
ship. Love doesn't "touch you one time and last for a lifetime". It
needs
hard work all the time.


Fruitful relationships don't have to be preordained, they have to be
maintained.


WRITTEN BY EUGENE LOH