There's a saying that the unit of measurement for the capacity of a Weibo server is "celebrity cheating". ---That is to say, if the server can withstand the traffic impact of several celebrities' cheating at the same time, there is nothing to worry about.
The love lives of celebrities are inevitably scrutinised under a magnifying glass. Cheating incidents, in particular, are like serial dramas that keep crowds busy searching for evidence, berating the unfaithful side and feeling heartbroken for the betrayed side. Even the protagonists of past cheating dramas are mentioned again and discussed.
Whether it's for a public figure's reputation or for a relationship, cheating is extremely destructive.
Have you ever wondered why people hate cheating so much but can't avoid it? In an intimate relationship, there are many behaviours that both parties may do to hurt each other. Why is cheating, alone, so powerful that the moment it happens, it virtually sentences a relationship to death?
Is sex the only thing that counts?
No, a message is enough.
What do we think of when we talk about cheating?
Is it a flirtation? A true love story? A sneaky little porno? Paid sex? Or "texting flirtatiously" on a dating app?
Perhaps cheating is seen by 1,000 people in 1,000 different ways.
According to a survey in the US, 87 per cent of respondents regarded "having a one-night stand with someone else" as evidence of cheating. This may be taken for granted. But 50 per cent of people think that "going out to dinner with someone who is attractive to you" is cheating, and 24 per cent of people even think that following an ex on social networks is cheating.
The definition of infidelity has been expanding since we enter the internet age. And because of the lack of a universally accepted definition of what constitutes cheating, estimates of the percentage of people who cheat fluctuate widely: from 26% to 75%.
But no matter how cheating is defined, no matter how the numbers fluctuate, the fact remains that it has been a common occurrence all over the world from ancient times to now. And how do we deal with a behaviour that is so common, yet so universally resisted and revolted against?
There are thousands of ways to hurt your partner.
Why is cheating especially unforgivable?
Cheating (adultery) is a big taboo in marriage. Hurting the other person in a relationship can take many forms, contempt, cold violence, neglect ...... But only a simple boundary crossing act like cheating can easily take away the stability of a relationship between partners and the happiness they have been holding on to. What special damage does it actually cause?
Firstly, what cheating crushes is a person's grandiose beliefs about love.
Each of us has a fantasy about our ideal partner: there is a person who can satisfy our endless needs in every way and who is my best mate, a caring friend, a competent parent, a reliable confidant, an emotional companion and a mental match.
I, on the other hand, was the other person's Mr. Right; I was the chosen one, indispensable and irreplaceable. But the fact of cheating tells me that I am not.
Secondly, a partner's cheating can threaten a person's self-perception.
"I thought I knew my life, I thought I knew you and our relationship as a couple, and I knew myself. But now I'm questioning everything." So said a visitor to his counselor over his partner's cheating.
We begin by choosing to trust someone and by choosing to enter into a stable intimate relationship with him or her. We trust each other's loyalty with unprecedented fervour, and while mutually exposing our vulnerable sides, we also give each other the right to hurt us. And infidelity leads to a collapse of trust and a crisis of identity.
It leaves people wondering, "Can I continue to trust you? Can I trust anyone else?" These doubts can hover in mind, haunting people who have been hurt by a cheating partner.
Cheating
only has a difference between 0 and 10,000 times?
Some people assert that "once a cheater, always a cheater" and use this as an argument to persuade others to break up. In times past, divorce was a stigma for people. Nowadays, choosing to bear humiliation, holding on to the broken, and "choosing to forgive" when you can divorce is the shame of the new era.
Whether it is entertainment news, or people around, as long as the cheating incident arises, public opinion will basically fall on the side of the "victim", "Why don't you break up right away?"
So when a person has experienced a partner cheating incident, he or she simply can not talk to friends. He or she afraid that when he or she told others so, people will think he or she still love the other person. Because no matter who he or she talks to, he or she'll just get the same advice: leave him! Leave him to his doom! He deserves it.
The normal logic is that if you can get everything you want at home, there is no need to seek fulfilment elsewhere. But this can't explain why people who seem to be happy and fulfilled have to cheat.
The truth is that for cheating it is more about desire, about autonomy, about a sense of freedom and freshness, than about sex; behind it expresses a longing to be recognised, to feel extraordinary, to use it to compensate for gaps and losses in oneself, to bring life back to living that is sinking as dead ashes.
It's a disappointing fact that you can't keep fresh towards your partner in your mind all the time. And it's that imperfection, its uncertainty, its ambiguity, contained in the core nature of cheating that will keep a person longing for what they can't have. In other words, cheating itself is a self-rotating machine of desire.
But human
is not just a desire machine
In fact, most partners who experience infidelity do not separate, but choose to remain together. But some of them just subsist. But there are other partners who turn a crisis into an opportunity, and turn it into a feeder experience.
For those partners who still want to stay together, how should they go about reconciling themselves after being involved in a cheating incident?
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Regaining a Sense of Self-esteem
The effects of cheating are traumatic. The anger, hatred, grief and feeling humiliated that arises after betrayal are all normal emotions and must be dealt with.
The key at this stage is to focus on yourself, deal with your torn life and sense of shame, and rebuild your self and confidence, rather than turning all your fire on the other person first.
Be in a loving environment rather than shutting yourself off, spend time with friends, get involved in activities that allow you to feel alive, regain your joy, and find meaning and self-identity in your life.
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Control Your Curiosity about Unpleasant Details
Don't dwell on the question "Where did you go? Where did you cheat, and how does he or she compare to me?" Don't try to make the details of the affair vividly visible to you; these specific questions will only cause more pain.
Replace the curiosity of those who want to delve into the details with questions about motivation and intent:
What does this affair mean to you?
What are the things you would do with him or her that you wouldn't do with me?
How do you see our relationship?
Every adultery redefines a relationship. The outcome of every adultery is also up to both partners.
Cheating has been around since the ancient times and will not be eliminated afterwards, but the dilemmas of love and desire that arise from it will never be defused by simple answers like black and white, good and evil, victim and betrayer.
Esther Perel, a marriage therapist, has made many public presentations about her field of study: cheating and how to integrate people's perceptions of cheating. So many people have asked her, "You always say, "Cheating may have good outcomes," and by whitewashing cheating, are you supporting it, or even recommending it to us?
She said, "Let's put it this way. I'm recommending cheating to everyone as I would recommend having cancer to everyone."
"We often hear people with cancer, talking about their disease, say 'cancer gave them a whole new perspective.' Before that, we might have looked at cheating through only one perspective: hurt and betrayal, but that's only one side of it. The other side of it is growth and self-discovery."
We may not have a choice in "what we let happen in our lives," but what we can choose and change is to rewrite the meaning of life's events and give them new perspectives.
As Esther puts it:
"Now in the West, most of us have two or three relationships or marriages in our lives, and some of us have multiple marriages with the same person. Now that your first marriage is over, would you like to start a second one together?"
