Modern dating has become a performance. There are rules now, carefully whispered through group chats, podcasts, and Instagram reels: Don’t text back too quickly. Don’t appear too eager. Wait until at least the third or fourth date before sex. Pretend you’re busy even if you’re not.
Follow the script.

We’ve turned romance into theatre, where timing and tactics matter more than authenticity. A friend once described today’s dating market as “sparse and untidy.” Another scoffed, “No — it’s worse. What’s left is sewage.” It was crude, but I understood. For every beautiful story of modern love, there are dozens more of heartbreak, deception, or disappointment.

And yet, the irony is this: even when you follow the script to the letter, the outcome is still unpredictable.

Take two couples I know.
The first met online.
Their chemistry was instant — electric. They broke all the rules.
Within days, they were in bed together, laughing at the idea that they were moving too fast. Six months later, they were married. Years on, they’re still happy. Their love story reads like a fairy tale, proof that sometimes breaking the script leads you straight to the truth.

The second couple did the exact opposite.
They waited.
They nurtured a friendship into romance, slowly, carefully, respectfully. They didn’t rush intimacy. They ticked every box the script demands — and yes, they got married. But within a year, it was over. Their story ended in bitter divorce, a reminder that sometimes the “rules” are nothing more than illusions of control.

And there are countless variations in between.
Some couples swear by patience and boundaries.
Others fall quickly, burn brightly, and last forever.
Still others crumble, no matter how carefully they followed the path society laid out for them.
So what do we do with this paradox? Does love in the time of scripts actually work?
I wonder if the real issue is that we cling to scripts because we fear the chaos of chance. To believe in love as a lottery feels terrifying. Scripts give us the illusion of order — like if we wait three hours to text back, or refuse intimacy before date five, we can control whether someone will truly love us.

It’s comforting, but it’s not always true.
Because human beings are not predictable algorithms. We are messy, emotional, contradictory creatures. What makes one couple thrive might destroy another. What feels desperate to one person feels refreshing to someone else. What looks like rushing in might, in truth, be simply recognising destiny when it shows up.

And yet, dismissing the scripts entirely feels reckless. Boundaries, after all, exist for a reason. We know that relationships rushed purely by lust often collapse under the weight of reality. We know that caution can save us from pain. But boundaries alone are not guarantees of love — they are scaffolding.

Without the substance of compatibility, respect, and shared vision, the building falls anyway.

Maybe the real untold truth is this: love has never been about perfect scripts. It has always been about imperfect people taking risks. Every relationship is a gamble of time and chance. You can nurture a seed for years, and it still may not grow. Or you can scatter one wildly, and it may bloom instantly.

In the end, maybe it comes down to something larger than us — the special grace of God, if you believe in that. Because how else do you explain why some couples, against all odds, make it work, while others, with every resource and every rule in their favour, fall apart?

Perhaps the scripts are not the problem. Perhaps our obsession with them is. We want guarantees where there are none. We want rules where there is only risk. We want certainty in a game that has always been defined by mystery.

So is love in the time of scripts possible? Yes, sometimes. But it’s equally true that love beyond the scripts can be just as real. The real question is not whether you followed the rules — it’s whether you found someone whose chaos matches yours.

And maybe, just maybe, the most #Unshakable truth is this: love has never belonged to scripts. It belongs to chance, to choice, and to the courage of two people willing to keep showing up, rules or no rules.

‘See’ you next week.

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IG Handle: @unshakable.is.a.state.of.mind