This phase lasts, on average, 12 to 18 months. After that, the chemicals level out.

Here is the liberation: Stop looking for the epilogue.

But here is the secret that Hallmark movies won't tell you: Boredom is the soil in which deep love grows.

It is not "They lived happily ever after." It is "They argued ferociously, repaired the rupture, and chose each other again anyway." Stage Three: Boredom is Not Betrayal Perhaps the scariest monster in the modern dating jungle is boredom .