Love, Relationships & Infidelity!

They say it is the physical intimacy that stamps a man’s complete involvement in the event called love, and it is the emotional connect that binds a woman to a relationship in totality. Whereas a relationship fuels an intricate equilibrium between the excitement of physical desire and the idealization of emotional association, so where and how does one try to find a balance between the two?

When you are attracted to someone, feel invested emotionally, and desire a physical connection, what do you do? You even let your passion take the leap of that vulnerability and confess your love. But what when your feelings are not being reciprocated the way your longing heart pleas? Do you then steer your feelings and find respite in the closeness of someone else willing to offer comfort in their embrace? Would it not be then considered infidelity to your own emotions, or would it merely quench your desire for completeness that your love had originally envisioned? Being with someone else only as an alternative to suppress and compensate for your compelling passion for the person you want to be close with, is it justifiable to your own heart’s craving?

If physical intimacy is vital for the viability of a flourishing relationship, so will this togetherness with another, ultimately sprout the passion that drives the emotional longing to carry forward an alliance? Is one attribute of the affinity bound to lead to another? Or it would simply be termed as infidelity in a relationship?

This aspect then also compels us to contemplate another grave concern that of-whether emotional cheating can be considered infidelity. Betraying your partner in a non-physical sense and lingering on to the moments spent with someone else, rejoicing in the tiny bits of intimate acts, and developing a mutual unrequited feeling with that someone.

A sustained secretive closeness to that someone which over time starts to affect the intimacy of your relationship with your partner. Although there is no physical closeness the mind strays to an intimate feeling towards that someone, an irresistible attraction towards that person with or without an acknowledgment! Tiptoeing around a fair risk of that enduring emotional connection waiting to be converted to a full-blown affair. An affair drew out of mere fantasy and an idealized persona between the two people.

Or is it only the physical intimacy with someone else outside the liaison, which can be considered an imminent threat in an existing relationship and a more consequential type of infidelity? To indulge in an instant act of togetherness and the instantaneous dive into the lust and passion of a moment’s indiscretion, which then carries a tremendous potential to spiral into a complete and full-fledged affair later. The strong sense of disregarding the moral obligation of your relationship and finding happiness in the intimacy of someone else.

A violation of the unspoken rule of exclusivity of either physical closeness or emotional bonding with anyone outside the intimate vicinity of the two people involved in a relationship can equally be categorized as an act of infidelity. How do the couples in a relationship move forward from either kind of infidelity? To take the leap beyond the betrayal and try to heal the damaged relationship, is there going to be a painless escape?

While there are fair chances that most couples survive, sustain, and emerge from the painful experience, and may even be successful in restoring their connection and developing a stronger and more committed bond. However, there are equally reasonable shots then they drift apart and end up their relationship, unable to endure the pain and hurt generated from the unfaithfulness.

Or would it only be simpler to accept that there can be a varied definition of affair and divergent set of boundaries for each individual and in every existing relationship? Boundaries that may not set an icicle in the heart, but bring the warmth of friendship, trust, love, and happiness. One that can travel beyond the tapestry of suffocating a relationship and allow room for the evolvement of a changing process. Where the relationship flourishes in full bloom steering clear of the menaces of either an emotional affair or physical infidelity.

Beyond all this pandemonium, on the other hand, there has also always been a kind of love and longing that prevails over any physical binding. However, what is now more concerning is whether the generations are heading to such a fast-paced lifestyle where the virtue of patience is lost somewhere in the line of consummating a relationship as quickly as possible. And in this haste of living a relationship, is there still a guarantee that a physical closeness binds the heart and emotions eternally?

So, we circle back to the enigma of how to find a balance between the desire and romance aspects of an alliance. Or would it be pertinent to just rejoice in the euphoria driven by the prospect of being together with someone and not being engulfed by the sense of raptures by actual unification with the person? And to simply immerse in the fantasized euphoria of love!

About the Columnist-

An author of three books, Jyoti Jha is a Former HR Professional, a Literary Critic, a Columnist, and a Globetrotter. An esteemed winner of ‘TOI Write India Season 3’, she is a proud panelist and Guest Speaker in Talk Shows at prestigious institutions like IIM Lucknow, IIT Delhi, IIT Jammu, and Christ College, she has been an honorable Jury Member at the Literary Club, IIT BHU for Storytelling.