PhronesisRomantic idealization — the chronic attachment to an idealized partner image that systematically distorts perception of real partners, generating a disillusionment loop — is here formally reconceptualized as a wrong attractor W_RI in the landscape of mature love. The healthy ground state S^0 is defined as mature love: the capacity to love a real, particular person with genuine knowledge of their limitations, choosing them not despite imperfection but through it.
W_RI is distinguished from healthy early-stage romantic idealization, which is normal and typically resolves through partner-knowledge accumulation, and from limerence by its updateability criterion. Two structural variants are characterized: the serial idealizer, who cycle-repeats across relationships seeking the perfect partner and never arrives at mature love, and the fantasy prisoner, who maintains idealization of an absent or inaccessible person rather than engaging real available partners.
Nine formal propositions characterize the perfect partner projection mechanism, the disillusionment loop, basin deepening through early attachment disruption and romantic media culture, the updateability criterion distinguishing W_RI from healthy idealization, and return paths through disillusionment tolerance, partner-knowledge cultivation, and attachment work.