“Love comes along when you least expect it.” It might be one of the most infuriating pseudo-affirmations a single person can hear – more often than not given by a prying relative at a wedding – but it’s an almost universally accepted theory. “The single person wants to shave her legs to make sure she’s ready. And then she wants not to shave her legs, to tempt fate into letting love arrive when she’s looking the other way, all hairy and unprepared,” writes Sophie Heawood in her memoir The Hungover Games. Or, as Shakespeare put it in Twelfth Night, “Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.”

Witness the traditional hierarchy of love: at its most romantic, it originates by chance. Fairytales and films have cemented this thought in the collective consciousness, from cinematic ‘meet cutes’ in department stores to glass slippers serendipitously lost at royal balls. Even the language that surrounds ‘falling’ in love implies something unexpected, rapid, all-consuming and, yes, dangerous. But is this a fallacy? Can we successfully adopt a mindful approach and be more intentional about finding love, rather than passively waiting for it to happen?