Love at First Sight Is a Total Myth

Todd Baratz is a certified sex therapist, the author of How to Love Someone Without Losing Your Mind, and the creator of @YourDiagnonsense on Instagram, where he breaks down myths and taboos surrounding modern relationships and intimacy. In the first of an exclusive new series of columns for Men’s Health on the subject of attraction, Baratz tackles one of the most popular myths of all: love at first sight.

LOVE AT FIRST sight is an idea that is straight out of a rom-com—magical, instantaneous, and perfect. I’m talking full-frontal fantasy. Orgasmic bliss in an instant. And it sounds like everything most of us want when it comes to the scary stuff, like dating, love, and relationships. Despite the skepticism many claim to have about love at first sight, there’s often a small part of us that secretly hopes it’s real. Who wouldn’t want to lock eyes with a stranger across a crowded room, feel an electric spark, and know right then and there that they’re The One?

The problem with this fantasy is that it doesn’t hold up under scrutiny.

When people talk about love at first sight, what they’re usually referring to is an immediate surge of attraction or chemistry. Fireworks, butterflies, a symphony playing in our pants. And while this rush can feel euphoric and captivating, it’s not love. What’s really happening in these moments usually says more about us than the other person.

First, let’s break down what we’re actually feeling. The person standing in front of us is a literal stranger—we don’t know anything significant about them to justify the depth of feelings we think we have. What we’re really responding to is twofold: physical attraction, and a psychological phenomenon called projection.

Physical attraction is the part that’s easiest to understand. We see someone who’s physically appealing—maybe it’s their style, their confidence, the way they move—and we get excited. That excitement can be sexual, emotional, or even intellectual, depending on how we process attraction. But this initial spark is 100 percent surface-level. It’s about how they look or present themselves, and while that’s important, it’s far from what love is really about. It has nothing to do with knowing who the other person is. Which—newsflash—we need to know if we are to love. Love is about a much deeper understanding.

The more complicated part is projection. Projection is when we unconsciously place our own desires, fantasies, and expectations onto the other person. It’s like taking a blank canvas and painting it with all our hopes and dreams—then mistaking it for reality. Oopsies. We’re not really seeing them for who they are; instead, we’re seeing a version of them that aligns with what we want. In this sense, “love at first sight” is more about us than the person we’re projecting onto. We create an idealized version of them that fits our fantasy, and we fall for that—rather than the actual, complex person standing in front of us.

This process is why relationships that start with a huge bang of chemistry and instant attraction often tend to fizzle once reality sets in. No one can live up to the image we’ve created. By contrast, real love grows through understanding, trust, shared experiences, and vulnerability, none of which can happen in a chance meeting or single glance.

Certainly, the idea of love at first sight is romantic and alluring, but, sorry to disappoint, it’s ultimately a myth. What we experience in those moments is intense attraction and a surge of emotional energy that has way more to do with who we are and what we’re going through than with the other person—let alone love.

Real love takes time, patience, and the willingness to see another person for who they truly are, not as a reflection of our own desires and fantasies.

And if I’m starting to make love sound a lot like work? Well, now you’re on to something.