“The idea that love is something magical, almost supernatural, in your heart, that has nothing to do with the day-to-day encounters with a real person–that understanding of love has probably created more unhappiness and ruined more marriages than just about anything.
“Love is what happens between people living their lives together, becoming close through contact and actual partnership, and it’s what survives through difficulties and imperfections. An idealized, imagined, faraway person in your heart–that’s not love. That’s a daydream. People often mistake that daydream for love, so either they’re disappointed when love doesn’t measure up to that daydream, or they try to protect that daydream from being sullied by real life.”
–Misha Glouberman (with Sheila Heti), “A Mind Is Not a Terrible Thing to Measure,” from The Chairs Are Where the People Go
