According to a study, 68% of couples started out as friends

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Love sometimes arises when you least expect it in the person you are closest to: in that friend you see every day… Has it happened to you?

Love finds us in many ways. Sometimes, instantly, at first sight, at first conversation and in that flirtation in which mutual fascination and passion unites us in a relationship from minute one. This, as we well know, happens. However, According to a study, a good part of couples started out as friends.

That is to say, The most common thing is that this love emerges over a slow fire and in that day to day in which complicity, support, laughter and good harmony lead, sooner or later, to an emotional bond. Many people will feel identified. In fact, there is something that the research published in the Social Psychological and Personality Science, which we will now talk about. In general, That person who ultimately becomes our partner did not attract us at first.

When meeting that classmate, co-worker or that person who is a friend of another friend, it is common not to feel a special attraction for him or her. However, over time, no one seems more perfect and charming to us. Almost, without knowing how, that figure becomes someone essential in our lives and we can no longer be without her.

The love that appears between friendships becomes evident after a year or two, according to a recent study.

This is how love arises: 68% of couples started as friends

The lead author of this research paper is Danu Anthony Stinson from the University of Victoria in Canada. It is true that, in some way, many of us intuited this information. In this way, and despite the fact that we are in the era of Tinder and all those applications that allow us to find a partner – or a relationship for one night -, people continue to fall in love at a slow pace and on a daily basis.

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Now, this does not mean in any way that relationships arising from a friendship are better than those arising from an almost instantaneous attraction. However, the way they are constructed perhaps makes them much more interesting. Starting a relationship after a good friendship allows us to enter that bond with greater security, knowledge and complicity.

On the other hand, something that the research highlights is that From the moment we meet and friendship begins until love appears, an average of 22 months passes. Almost two years in which the magic of trust, the chemistry of attraction, the alliance of intimacy, admiration and that hidden desire that emerges slowly, but evidently, is gradually built.

From friendship, moving to platonic love to the consolidation of a couple

Film and television often show us fabulous stories that start from love at first sight. There is a crush and, from there, various adventures arise that end in that idyllic union. However, if they started from what happens to two-thirds of people in relational matters, this production would be excessively long.

Many of the couples who started out as friends went through various stages. It should also be noted that this experience happens both in heterosexual people and in the LGBTQ + community. Generally, friendship begins and after months platonic love appears. One begins to fantasize about that co-worker or classmate, about that friend with whom we get along so well and who is our daily support.

It should be noted, however, that in platonic love sexual desire does not always exist openly. What there is is emotional and intellectual attraction, added to idealization. Physical attraction and desire arise ultimately, in that phase that, on average, precedes the consolidation or not of the couple.

Genuine, nurturing friendship is often accompanied by an intellectual attraction similar to sapiosexuality. They are people who tune in to countless details and aspects that, little by little, lead to a relationship.

Couples who started out as friends, the favorite option

The author of this work, Danu Anthony Stinson, also tells us something interesting. Many of the people surveyed in this research indicated that they prefer to start a relationship starting from a friendship. In some way, we almost take for granted that nothing is as decisive in an emotional bond as that complicity of someone who, before being a lover, knows how to be a life partner.

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Those who started out as friends have that advantage, they know that they will have someone to lean on, a figure with whom, previously, many things have already been shared. However, we insist, This does not mean that these types of ties are richer and happier than those that begin with mutual attraction. and rapid consolidation of the relationship.

Everyone finds love in their own way and there are no better or worse paths. Because the most decisive thing is what happens afterwards, just when that emotional bond and coexistence begins.. This stage is always new for everyone and demands multiple efforts and delicate psycho-emotional crafts from us.

However, we will never be able to remove the variable of friendship from the equation that is love. Without it, only passion and desire remain, fleeting dimensions that, although intense, do not always last or fuel commitment.