Prelationship

​The term "prelationship" describes something complementary to the idea of "relationship", for which I can find no adequate extant English word. While "relationship" summarizes the meaningful interactions between two people during the time that they know one another, "prelationship" summarizes the interactions that one acquires before entering into a "relationship" with someone else. Prelationship is a usually-unintentional period where people integrate their separately-ongoing love-experiences into individualized narrative about what kinds of "relationships" they want or deserve. "Prelationship" is to "Relationship" as Foreplay is to Sex. 

A "relationship" can last one entire moment, night, year, or life; it begins at introductions and ends when one of the partners dies to the other. In contrast, a prelationship occurs in the evolutionary, embryological, and psychological interval between the Big Bang and introductions. Thus Prelationship must die when Relationship is born. The vibrancy of an individual's self-prelationship is what allows for a loving, consensual, and resonating relationship with someone else. 

With whom are you prelating right now? 

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