6 ways to tell you’re truly in love
By: Abstract Magazine
Tags: Love, Sex, Life

Our totally legit love guru Sweta Rana has been inspired by the relationship advice found in women’s magazines. But how can you really tell that you’ve found the one?

If there are no flowers and chocolates, it’s probably not true love. Photo: Shenghung Lin/Flickr

Hello, ladies! Got yourself a man, but not sure whether it’s the real thing? Here’s how to tell…

1. He’s constantly on your mind

If you’re thinking about him all the time, it’s a sure sign of real commitment. Think about him at home, and at work, and in between? It’s clear this guy’s gotten into your head, and your heart! In fact, if there is a single split-second during your life when you’re not thinking about him, for example if you’re asleep or concussed or distracted by a ravaging, deathly disease, then it means you’re not in love, you never will be and you should definitely break up with him right away so you can go rot alone in a cave somewhere.

2. You have the same star sign

Specialised research has shown that if you share the same star sign, you are cosmically destined to fall in love and have several babies. In a professional study*, a whopping 20% were found to have the same star sign as their significant other. If your stars are aligned, he must be on your mind!

*survey of 5 participants

3. You’re not quite sure what his name is

Are you unsure as to what this guy is actually called? Hello, wedding bells! Your connection is so deep, trivial things like his name, birthday and personality are secondary to your passionate love. After all, a name’s just some nonsensical squiggles on a birth certificate, right ladies? If you’re distracted by silly things like what he’s called or where he works, you might want to take a long hard look at your priorities. Love first — boring facts and statistics later!

4. You fake your orgasms to end sex faster

Pretending to reach orgasm just so he’ll hurry up and finish is one of the kindest, most loving gestures you can make. You care so much about his beauty sleep that you’re willing to end sex as early as possible so he can get a good night’s rest. If you’ve ever faked an orgasm with your man, even just once, then congratulations — you two are on the crossroads between Love Boulevard and Commitment Lane! Next stop, Forever City!

5. You’ve cooked him a meal

After your Manly Man returns home from work, where he probably does Manly things like chop wood and punch strangers, he flops down on the sofa still wearing his Manly suit, watches some Manly sport and thinks about making a Manly dinner. If you’ve ever provided this meal for him — bless you, going all Nigella for your fella! Research has proved that literally no woman ever cooks unless it’s for a man, and we are biologically designed to not actually know what cooking is until we fall in love with one. Tip: the best technique is to present a live baby deer before him, tied up and terrified, so he can have the Manly pleasure of killing his own food.

6. You don’t believe you love him

Scientists have shown that stage one of any process in the entire world, whether it be grief, love, photosynthesis or global warming, is always denial. It’s human nature: you just don’t want to believe what’s happening to you. So, do you look at this guy and feel nothing? Do you imagine your future with him and begin compulsively vomiting in fearful disgust? Have you considered hiring an ancient army of ninjas to dispense with him altogether? Official research has proved that all of these feelings are 99% likely to be your subconscious denial of true love, and the other 1% was just like a typo or something anyway. Not loving someone is the crucial first step to loving them.

Why do so many women’s magazines do this? Why do they take the overwhelming, terrifying, beautiful complexities of life and reduce them into simplistic patronisations? Why do they assume that everyone’s sexual needs are the same, that love and sex are only understood heteronormatively, that being single is temporary at best and pseudo-supernatural at worst? These features always seem to encourage a woman to adapt themselves to a man, in ways based on ancient stereotype. It’s utterly disheartening.

But it’s also stupid. Terrifically, terrifically stupid. The nonsense above isn’t hugely different from what you’ll discover in Cosmo or Bustle. It’s so exaggerative it barely holds together. It’s so utterly absurd you just have to laugh at it.

So while these things are still floating around, join me in mocking them mercilessly. They are condescending, assumptive gibberish. We are better than this — but we might as well have some fun while we dismiss it.