Apparently, All It Takes To Fall In Love Are These 36 Questions

It's a love experiment.

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by MANDY VELEZ

Last week, The New York Times published a piece to their
 Modern Love column called "To Fall In Love With Anyone, Do This."
In it, writer Mandy Len Catron details how she used research on love
to make herself fall in love — and it worked.

About two decades ago, Social psychologist Arthur Aron came up
with 36 questions so deep that he believed they would lead people to
 falling in love. 

Catron writes the basic rules and regulations of the study:

A heterosexual man and woman enter the lab through separate doors

They sit face to face and answer a

series of increasingly personal questions.

Then they stare silently into each other’s eyes for four minutes.

The most tantalizing detail:

Six months later, two participants were married.

They invited the entire lab to the ceremony.

She decided to try out the experiment herself with a male university
acquaintance. They went to a bar and asked
each other the questions
one by one until they ventured outside to look into each other's eyes
for four minutes, like the research says.

According to her, it worked.

"You’re probably wondering if he and I fell in love. Well, we did,"
she wrote. "Although it’s hard to credit the study entirely
(it may have happened anyway), the study did give us a way into a
relationship that feels deliberate. We spent weeks in the intimate space
 we created that night, waiting to see what it could become."

Catron goes on to say that love is a choice, not so much something
that happens to us like we're all led to believe. Art Markman, Ph.D,
a professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, told
Yahoo how this could be possible.

“With this research, it’s almost like hypnosis in a way,” says Markman. “
If you think about falling in love, it’s really a willingness to lower barriers
 that normally inhibit us from getting to know each other.”

Whether or not the experiment itself led to the author and her partner
falling in love or just led her in the right direction, her outlook on
connecting to another person is something we can take away no
matter how we fall in love:

I’ve begun to think love is a more pliable thing than we make it out to be.

         Arthur Aron’s study taught me that it’s possible — simple, even —
          to generate trust and intimacy, the feelings love needs to thrive.

Now go grab someone and get the ball rolling:

1. Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a
dinner guest?

2. Would you like to be famous? In what way?

3. Before making a phone call, do you ever rehearse what you’re going
to say? Why?

4. What would constitute a perfect day for you?

5. When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?

6. If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either
the mind or body of a 30-year old for the last 60 years of your life,
which would you choose?

7. Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?

8. Name three things you and your partner appear to have in common.

9. For what in your life do you feel most grateful?

10. If you could change anything about the way you were raised,
what would it be?

11. Take four minutes and tell your partner your life story in as much
detail as possible.

12. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained one quality or ability,
what would it be?

13. If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life,
 the future or anything else, what would you want to know?

14. Is there something that you’ve dreamt of doing for a long time?
Why haven’t you done it?

15. What is the greatest accomplishment of your life?

16. What do you value most in a friendship?

17. What is your most treasured memory?

18. What is your most terrible memory?

19. If you knew that in one year you would die suddenly,
would you change anything about the way you are now living? Why?

20. What does friendship mean to you?

21. What roles do love and affection play in your life?

22. Alternate sharing something you consider a positive
characteristic of your partner. Share a total of five items.

23. How close and warm is your family? Do you feel your
 childhood was happier than most other people’s?

24. How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?

25. Make three true “we” statements each. For instance,
“we are both in this room feeling…”

26. Complete this sentence “I wish I had someone with
 whom I could share…”

27. If you were going to become a close friend with your partner
, please share what would be important for him or her to know.

28. Tell your partner what you like about them:
 Be honest this time, saying things that you might not say to
someone you’ve just met.

29. Share with your partner an embarrassing moment in your life.

30. When did you last cry in front of another person? By yourself?

31. Tell your partner something that you like about them already.

32. What, if anything, is too serious to be joked about?

33. If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to
 communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told
someone? Why haven’t you told them yet?

34. Your house, containing everything you own, catches fire.
After saving your loved ones and pets, you have time to safely
 make a final dash to save any one item. What would it be? Why?

35. Of all the people in your family, whose death would you
 find most disturbing? Why?

36. Share a personal problem and ask your partner’s advice
on how he or she might handle it. Also, ask your partner to
reflect back to you how you seem to be feeling about the
problem you have chosen.