Someone asked about jealousy on Twitter and I offered my two-cents. Here is a detailed dive into the subject in the current age.

Few things are as inseparable as love and jealousy. God Himself, who loved the world so much that He gave His only Son, is also described as a jealous God. Whether you believe in Christian dogma or not, you have to admit it is peculiar that not even a supreme being can escape the trappings of jealousy in love.

Jealousy, first, is not an evil feeling. It is a very natural feeling. Herein, we shall demystify jealousy in love, and understand why something that feels so utterly crushing is as inescapable in love as breathing is for life.

First, though, what is love?

Depends on who you ask, I'll say. To the Christian, God is love, and when humans love each other, they express their godliness to each other. Makes sense. God is good, so we are good to those we love. God creates, so we also create with those we love. He is forgiving so we forgive them, and so on. To the scientist, love is a rush of electrochemical signals that, ultimately, compels humans to breed (Sanchez, Rick., 2017). Also makes sense. We get attracted to each other, get familiar, get emotionally attached and eventually have sex and get pregnant (sometimes). To the layman, love is just an intensely good feeling that arises when someone you desire consistently fulfils that desire. Also simple enough. A two way traffic. I desire you and you fulfil my desires. You desire me and I fulfil your desires.

A few things are becoming clear. God does not place a limit on the number of people we can love. We should love them all as we love ourselves. Your nervous system will almost always be triggered by many people, and some of them will be as attracted to you as you are to them. And any normal person knows it is only natural to desire more than one person. No matter how you look at it, love will always have room for more people. It is both the beauty and the curse, and it brings me to the second part.

Jealousy

Knowing that your partner could be giving (or getting) the same kind of emotional/physical/relational fulfillment that should be exclusive to the two of you creates this crushing feeling of being left out. Naturally, we expect that our partners will be entirely faithful, where in fact this is not a reasonable expectation. It is rational to expect that your partner will be faithful, but rational is not always reasonable. Rationality does not take in contextual circumstances and is strict to the logic.

Jealousy is fueled by a rational expectation, not a reasonable one. We have seen that by all means, it is inevitable that our minds, bodies and spirit will react differently to different people, often positively. We are bound to fall for different people, even when we already love others. Each moment a new love is created, a new jealousy is born. It is unreasonable to expect that your partner will not be attracted to other people. I do not advocate for cheating here. I am just describing how easily jealousy always seems to rear its head wherever there is love. Dealing with it, in my experience, calls for two things.

Trust and Boundaries

The first is the more commonly suggested solution, but is trickier than you think. For trust to work, you need to either: 1. Accept what you do not know about your partner. Accept it all and whole heartedly, and make sure it remains unknown. Or 2. Accept the truth about your partner, whatever that may be. I personally prefer the second, but I'm sure others would prefer the first. The problem is also that absolute honesty is a very dangerous way of living, and nobody is ever 100% honest anyway. There is still room for error. The problem with the first option is that in this age of information, it is very difficult to remain oblivious of someone's actions. Ignorance is bliss, but lately ignorance has been getting too expensive. You cannot afford to be in the dark because one day you will definitely know it all, and it will hurt worse then than it does now. You would have to know all about your partner before they are your partner, because that information will always get to you, and if you realise it is bad after making them your partner, it will hurt very bad to try and reconcile the matter.

The second is on boundaries. These are the easiest, and because of that, they are often overlooked as obvious. However, not establishing where the line lies between being a puppet to biology and breaking your partner's trust can be catastrophic; take it from me. Both of you need to be clear about what constitutes cheating and what is just passing attraction. This, right here, is the key to avoiding hurting your partner; to avoiding jealousy. Boundaries reinforce trust which improves the relationship which then allows partners to know each other better, allowing them to set better boundaries.

Of course, all other conditions (like communication, care, optimism etc.) held constant.