Love at first sight

Skeptics will tell you that it doesn't exist. But as psychologists and sexologists writes love at first sight can strike any time, any place.

There you are, sitting quietly at your favourite coffee shop, slowly sipping hot chocolate and allowing the spring sun to caress your face. Suddenly you're interrupted by a burst of laughter. You lift your eyes away from your magazine and there he is. Pow! Your pulse quickens, your stomach tightens and you feel shivers passing through your body. You had never believed in love at first sight, but there he is, only three tables away: the man of your dreams.

Knowing that it's now or never, your eyes light up with excitement as you quickly map out a plan that will begin by drawing him into an innocent conversation—and end with the two of you falling madly in love and spending every minute of your lives in each other's arms.

But first things first. You casually throw your gaze in his direction. For a fleeting moment your eyes lock and you dive into each other's being. It's as if you've known each other all your lives. Once again, chills race down your spine and you start to feel weak. You look away.

As soon as you regain the strength and courage to look up again, miracle of miracles, he's looking right at you, flashing a brilliant smile. But how should you go about talking to him? Where do you start a conversation? You're trying hard not to panic, racking your brain for a good opening line, when he gets up to leave. What if he takes off and you never see him again? Thankfully, he briefly sits back down, pretending to be busy finishing up some last minute business with the cheque. You realize it's your final opportunity.

Talking the talk

After much hesitation, you cautiously approach his table, your heart thumping in your chest. "I feel a bit uncomfortable approaching you like this," you mumble, "but I'd really like to get to know you." Joy of joys, he returns the smile and extends his hand to you, inviting you to sit down and talk.

You've already been talking for a few minutes when it dawns on you that you have no idea what you're talking about. Words have been exchanged—of that much you're sure—but you've been too busy absorbing his being to bother paying attention to the details of language. Fortunately, you realize that he's in a similar state of rapture.

Within a matter of minutes an intimate cocoon seems to have formed around the two of you, making it seem perfectly natural when he takes your hand and starts caressing it gently. You've only just met, but already you feel very close. Ideally, you'd like to hold him in your arms and tell him everything—but you hold back so as not to frighten him away.

Two hours of talking and looking into each other's eyes later, you suddenly remember: the chicken that you put in the oven a little earlier in the evening is probably burnt to a crisp! This might normally bother you—and you'd probably run home to see if you accidentally set your whole building on fire with your burnt chicken—but nothing seems to matter now. You're not hungry anymore and losing your apartment doesn't seem like quite such a tragic prospect anymore.

For the next two days you have to physically restrain yourself from calling him—you don't want to seem like he's all that you've got, after all. But these are long hours and you have a tough time sitting still. What if he doesn't like you as much as he makes out? What if he doesn't call? Or what if the magic between you seems to disappear with a second meeting? What if it's only an illusion? You'd be forced to kiss your dream life with your dream man goodbye.

Fortunately, when you invite him over for dinner you have another wonderful night. You laugh, you eat, you drink, you open up to each other, you dance and you exchange a magical first kiss.

From lust to love

Naturally, you arrange to see each other again and you discover a whole range of common interests. You've even started talking on the phone for hours and hours. Finally, you make love and you fall in love, head over heels. Life, you think, is beautiful: you start making plans for the future. You've never met a man who is so considerate, communicative, sensitive and self-confident... All that's left to do is live out the rest of this fairy tale relationship.

Among other things, instances of love at first sight can teach us about the first five steps in the process of seduction and about the primary components of what most of us refer to as "romantic feelings."

To seduce, we must first attract the attention of the desired party; any means is justified in meeting this end. Women usually draw attention to their "feminine assets" (usually beauty and sex appeal, as these qualities have been emphasized by society as being definitive of our culture's notion of femininity). Similarly, men will typically try to show off their own signifiers of socially constructed notions of "masculinity": wealth and power.

In both cases, the message is the same: "I'm not just anyone, you can trust me!" The first intense stares make up the second phase of the ritual of seduction, as they seem to communicate interest in furthering the relationship by saying, "yes, you interest me, come join me."

The conversation is the next crucial step because the voice represents the person. However, what matters isn't so much what is said, but the way is it said: the tone, the diction, the warmth of the voice and the physical gestures used to accompany speech say much more than the actual content of the words.

First contact

Psychologists have noted the first instance of physical contact is initiated by the woman three times out of four, usually in the most subtle possible manner. A slight brush of the arm or the shoulder, for example, is usually enough to tell her man that it's his turn to take some physical initiative—and that his advances won't be turned down!

The best way to know whether or not you've been successful in seducing your prospective mate is to observe his reactions to your physical movements. If he crosses his legs in response to you crossing your legs, he's probably unconsciously expressing his pleasure at being in your company. This is what psychologists call body synchronism and it happens when people dance and make love together in harmony. When this happens, there's a good chance that an invitation to dinner—or maybe even more—would be appreciated.

At first, love can only rely on physical attraction since this is what we first see of the person: it's his or her body that attracts or repulses us, whether we want it or not. However, this attraction can only move beyond sexual desire if admiration develops as we get to know the other. Finally, love survives the ravages of time and routine only if we maintain a degree of shared interests and activities.

Symptoms of passion

You know you've fallen for him when...

Your mind starts spinning out of control and you can't stop thinking about your new love.

You tend to overlook your loved one's faults and weakness, secretly hoping that your love will be enough to fix them all.

The fact that your emotions seem to be attached to a roller coaster that takes them up and down; you're happy when he's there, you're terribly depressed when he's gone.

Communication

According to psychologists, communication is composed of 55% non-verbal expression and only 45% of verbal; verbal expression is further subdivided into literal word meanings (8%) and tones in which words are said (38%). A warm and enveloping "I love you," with the body leaning towards the loved one, eyes focused on eyes, means much more than a quick "I love you" over the phone.