All about love, dating and romance issues.
A young woman named Marie lives with her boyfriend, Paul, who refuses to have sex with her. She searches for intimacy beyond the bounds of traditional sexual limitations. She has a sexual relationship with Paolo, whom she meets in a bar. Her frustration also drives her to a series of relationships, until she engages in sadomasochism with an older man. She ultimately gets raped in a stairwell.
There are quite different understandings of the nature of loving. Monastics throughout the world, for example, have held that the most fundamental experience of love comes not from relations with other people but from an inward experience of Being itself. Such an experience has been described as bliss, enlightenment, mystery, or light. Within Christianity the term agape is used to denote the love of God for human beings. It is a Christian contention that we are obligated to love others—indeed, that we can be commanded to love others because we have been loved by God.
Love seems to be the logical starting point. Though not synonymous, love and marriage are nevertheless very much interrelated and are generally thought of together. Marriage is the natural consummation of love interests. Love is the magnet that brings people together and the cement that holds them together; it is the most essential element in pair unity.
The term “friends” in the U. S. does not ordinarily mean great intimacy of relationship. When we speak of our circle of friends we do not necessarily imply that our “closest friend” is in that circle. We ordinarily mean that most of our visiting and our social engagements take place in that group. In some contexts and in some situations, there may be no real “group” of friends.