Addictive Love

 

I remember being in a relationship with a beautiful young lady name Yachica. We had no children together, but she had a child with someone before we met. Thus, there were occasions when she had to see and spend time with her child’s father. I was not insecure at all about her child’s father, for I could see when I looked in Yachica’ eyes how much she loved me. Her eyes told it all. Although she seemed to be under a spell concerning me, I still wondered what kind of feelings she held towards her child’s father. One day while eating lunch together, I asked her,

 

“How do you feel about your son’s father?”

 

She answered,

 

“I love him. I guess I always will.”

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Then, after a brief pause, she continued by saying,

 

“I only love him Howard. I am in love with you.”

 

I bring this story to the table to state; there is a huge difference between loving someone and being in love with someone. Being in love, (something I like to term, “Internal Love”) gives reference to an addiction.

 

THE LOVE DRUG

When a person is under the influence of a drug like, let’s say cocaine; an organic chemical called “dopamine” is produced in the person’s Ventral Tegmental Region of the brain. The Ventral Tegmental Region of the brain is termed by psychologists as the “Reward Center” of the brain. This part of the brain is associated with our wants, focus, motivations, and cravings.

Surprisingly, when a person is in love, the same dopamine is produced in the Ventral Tegmental Region or Reward Center of the brain. Thus, Internal Love (i.e. being in love) is considered by some as an invisible narcotic because; it acts on the same principle as drugs.

 

BEING IN LOVE AND BEING ON DRUGS

In the same way a junkie’s focus is drugs; the person that is in love focus is on who they are in love with. And just as the junky obsessively thinks about the drug they are addicted too, the one in love obsessively thinks about the person they are in love with (i.e. addicted too.)

Another similarity that can be drawn from being in love and being on drugs is this: when we see the drug ruining the junkie’s life and confronts him/her about what’s being seen; the junky enters a mind state of denial: distorting reality in an attempt to convince their self the drug is not the culprit.

In like manner, how many times have you seen the one in love get taken advantage of and even ruined by their lover as the victim distorts their own reality, making excuses for the one they are in love with?

The one in love craves the object of their eye as the junky craves the drug. The addicted is willing to take enormous risk they would never take if they were not under the influence of drugs/love.

And just as with the junky, the one in love needs more and more, or face withdraws that can lead to anger, depression, suicide and even murder.

Drug experts say, once an addict always an addict because; an ex-junky is always subject to relapse through association memorization.

The one in love that has walked away from their love addiction can also relapse. When the one in love is finally over that person they were addicted too, they may begin to function as a normal human being again. But they are subject to relapse at any given moment, even through the hearing of a certain song.

Strong is the love drug. And the obsession usually gets worse when you have been rejected after falling in it.

Being in love is absolutely wonderful when things are going well and absolutely horrible when things are going poorly. When you have been hurt by love; the one thing you would like to do is forget about that person and go on with your life. But instead you just love them harder. It is an addiction like no other.

Some would say, Internal Love is the strongest drug on earth because; unlike cocaine or heroin, drugs that have to enter the bloodstream to work; with the love drug, all you have to do is think about the stimulus and you are off to the races.

 

INTERNAL LOVE IS LIKE CHOCOLATES

We all have fallen in love and have had those “googoo-gaagaa” feelings when we were young. You know, those feelings we enjoy when that special someone is around, the butterflies we get in our stomachs from knowing they are on their way. As I stated earlier, this sort of love I term Internal Love.

Most of us interpret Internal Love (or being in love) as the real thing. To most people, it is all they know concerning love. But I do not recommend Internal Love as being the meal the couple in a love relationship eat and grow from. Like chocolates, this form of love does not possess the nutrients needed for a relationship to grow healthy and strong. Like an energy drink or a candy bar; Internal Love (i.e. being in love) gives a big burst of energy at first, and then it is all over.

Am I insinuating that Internal Love is something negative to indulge in? Certainly not! Although, all we need is Love Stew to keep our relationship nourished, strong and growing, a little chocolate now and then does not hurt. There is nothing wrong with eating chocolate. The idea to be drawn here is to never become addicted to the chocolate. We should base our love relationships on what I term External Love (i.e. agape love,) and not Internal Love. In opposition to chocolates; Love Stew should be the only meal we consider regularly.

To learn how to love completely, one must learn how to balance Internal Love with External Love.  We will discuss in grave detail exactly what External Love is later.

But for now, I want you to understand that anyone who is in love independent of External Love has not yet captured what true love really is. Trying to live on an Internal Love diet is like trying to survive on chocolates. Eventually you will want and need a real home cooked meal. For more discussion on Love Stew, see chapter 3 of this book under "Relationships are Like Stew. For more discussion on External Love, see chapter 2 of this book under "How to Love".

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In Love with Self

 

What most of us fail to realize is, when we claim to be in love with the apple of our eye; we are not really in love with the apple of our eye. We are really in love with the anticipations of the great emotions we experience through interaction with the apple of our eye. And we could easily become addicted to those fuzzy feelings we hold inside. The feel good emotions are what we are really in love with. We believe it is the apple of our eye we are in love with because of their association to the feel good sensations going on within. This is why the same person who is in love today can fall out of love the very next week if the apple of their eye does not comply (i.e. keep on making them feel good.)

Being in love (Internal Love) in a nutshell is this: It is a loving of one’s own self. That is to say,

 

“I am in love with the feel good sensation that my body exerts when you are around: l love the high.”

 

Another way to look at it is like this: I love chocolate because of the way it melts in my mouth and collides with my taste-buds sending off a sensation like no other. Am I really in love with chocolate? No! I am in love with that feel good (taste - sensation) that chocolate gives me. I could really care less for the chocolate itself. It is what the chocolate does for me that I am in love with. Actually, you can take away the chocolate, for any substitute will do as long as it does those same breathtaking things in my bodily members.

A cocaine addict loves the feel good sensation cocaine brings. But anything giving that same euphoria will satisfy the addict. It is the same with the person in love. The person in love is in love with their own self. They only want the object of their eye because of the euphoria going on within them through interactions with the apple of their eye. Thus, anyone coming along transmitting the same euphoria will due.

Heroin addicts are weaned off of heroin with a heroin substitute called “methadone.” The drug methadone gives the heroin addict the same sensation that heroin does. Thus, being in love is like saying,

 

“I love the sensations I feel within from interacting with you. But, any guy will do, as long as they bring about the same eruption within me.”

 

Poet, writer and social activist Thomas Mertin once stated:

 

“The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not twist them to fit our own image, [i.e. the image of the ideal person in our head.] Otherwise, we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.”

“Love, Themselves, Reflection” – Thomas Mertin: Brainy Quotes

 

EMOTIONS ARE GOOD

Someone would ask the question:

 

“Is the dopamine releasing, i.e. the psychological and biological rushes we experience as emotions when in love, a bad thing?”

 

Again I say No! But on the contrary, emotions are good because they are a part of our human makeup. It is our addiction to the emotions that are the problem.

My definition for addiction is very simple. An addiction is

 

“Something that you can’t stop!”

 

The major problem addiction brings is an addict will always need a little more in order to get that rush or high they are craving. If you cannot control your emotional state, it is because you are addicted to those emotions.

I mention the Pleasure Principle in the introduction of this book. As I stated in the introduction, the Pleasure Principle is the psychoanalytic concept describing people seeking pleasure in order to satisfy their biological and psychological needs. Internal Love (i.e. being in love) operates on this principle. Internal Love in a nutshell is a self-serving love. It incorporates a combination of hormones being released as feel good sensations that we can very easily become addicted to without being aware of the addiction.

 

MY TWO GOOD FRIENDS

I have a couple of good friends: Renarta and Eric Spencer. They came to me one day with their marriage for counseling. They both did not deny that they were totally in love with one another. I know the two very well and would be a witness; they are very much in love. But like I mentioned earlier, there is a difference between loving someone and being in love with someone.

The problem they brought to my table was their frequent arguments over what would seem to most people as small potatoes. They asked me, as one standing and looking from the outside of their marriage, is there anything I could see that might be pulling them down this road of feuding with one another.

I arose and went into my den where I keep my books. I grabbed the Bible and brought it to them. Turning to the New Testament’ book of James, I showed them Chapter four, verse one where it states;

 

“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?”

The Bible’ (NT) book of James 4:1 NIV

 

I then began to talk to them about Internal and External Love, showing them the difference in the two loves. I concluded by telling them,

 

“You two are in love with one another. It’s written all over your faces. But what this means is, your love is based on feeling good, (i.e. the good emotional feelings you draw from one another.) Therefore, your problem is this: although you are in love with one another, you are in love with yourselves (your addictions) even more so. You are in love with the biological and psychological sensations you draw from one another more so than the actual person you are in the relationship with.”

 

After letting me know they did not fully comprehend what I was saying, I told them to listen very carefully, then said,

 

“When that chemical rush you draw from one another is for some reason or another interrupted, and the feel good that caused you to fall in love is put on hold, or cut off; the true you surfaces.

A heroin addict is at peace as long as the drug is flowing through his veins. But once the high wears off, watch what that addict becomes. If the addict is not allowed to receive another fix of feel good, the craving will begin to become stronger and stronger. It is the same with a person who is in love and has become addicted to the feel good transmitted from their lover. Once the feel good is slowed down, or is cut off, the arguments of hostility begins:

 

• ‘You used to give me flowers’

• ‘You used to make me feel like a king’

• ‘You’re not that same person I met’

• ‘You’re not the same person I fell in love with’"

 

I concluded by explaining to the couple,

 

“What I am seeing in your relationship (the fighting and bickering) are all symptoms of withdraw. If your partner doesn’t comply with doing the things that caused you to fall in love; you being in love face withdraw – mood swings, sadness, anger, etc.

Withdraws making a person sad or angry is determined by that person's character. In a nutshell, your arguing is due to Internal Love withdraw.”

 

When a person begins to pull back, no longer complying, a Love Jones could occur on their lover’s behalf. Not complying would be like taking the syringe out of a junkie’s arm.

 

SEARCHING FOR LOVE

Internal love is not the stuff one should base relationships and marriage upon because; it is totally internal. Think about it: the one who yearns to be in love, especially without knowledge of External Love, possesses an irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired, and to have all of their mental notes of the ideal lover checked off. They with wide eye search eagerly for those desires they hold to be met. But in all their searching, they fail to realize that you do not find true love, true love finds you.

 

INTERNAL LOVE CAN TURN BAD QUICK

Internal Love without External Love is a love based on self-interest (one’s own welfare). The addict in love wants their pusher near to avoid love jones' (i.e. withdraws.) Love jones' have in some cases led to suicide and even murder. If that person that is in love does not receive their high, (i.e. the feeling that has them exuberant ;) all the opposite effects of being in love suddenly becomes their reality.

In the next chapter we will discuss External Love, what it is and why it is needed in a relationship to balance out Internal Love. But before we close out this chapter, I would like to leave you with a few examples of Internal Love and its disastrous effects.

Take the woman that killed the man who no longer wanted to be with her. All she really wanted was for things to go back to the way things were when she was getting her regular dosage of feel good.

Take the woman, who goes to her pastor and says,

 

“I don’t know what to do. I want to leave this man, but he’s telling me he loves me and if I leave him he will kill himself”

 

The pastor replied,

 

“That man doesn’t love you. He loves himself and wants you”.

 

Take the little girl who plays with her little pet bird every day after school. She loves this little bird; and as the little bird strut’s its stuff around her bedroom making funny jesters, the little girl is tickled pink.

One day the little girl reads in her animal encyclopedia that the bird she has does not survive long when living in a cage or within closed doors, but rather, has a great necessity to be free to fly in the open skies for longevity. The girl’s love for her bird being internal or external will be determined by her keeping the bird or setting it free.

True love is

 

“When the other person’s happiness is more important than our owns”

“Love, Happiness, Important” – H. Jackson Brown, Jr.: Brainy Quotes

 

“Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up.”

“Love, War, End” – James A. Baldwin: Brainy Quotes