Although we think of love as an emotion, it is really more like a drive. Emotions come and go, whereas drives, like love, tend to persist. All emotions are associated with distinct facial expressions, whereas love is not. Love (like all of the basic drives I have discussed in this blog) is difficult to control. Furthermore, the most recent scientific research indicates that all drives, including love, are associated with activation of the brain pathway called the mesolimbic dopamine pathway.
Attraction: the first stage of love
Love, like other drives, is associated with wanting to get something. That something we are talking about here is a partner. The first stage of love, then, involves seeking out a partner. Scientists have called this the attraction phase. It is important for each person to understand how the attraction phase works within himself/herself. There are both conscious and unconscious parts to attraction.
The attraction phase involves the senses, primarily sight and smell. There may be chemicals that activate the brain through smell that we are not consciously aware of. Similarly, we may like the way someone looks and not be sure why. Our conscious mind and unconscious mind may be looking for different things in a partner. The unconscious mind plays a big role in our partner selection process.
It is important to realize that we can be taken over and captivated by attraction. Some of the symptoms of attraction or falling in love are “butterflies in the stomach,” clammy hands and racing heart. These symptoms are direct evidence of the physical nature of the love drive.
There is pleasure associated with getting the objects of our drives. In the brain, this pleasure involves many important chemicals like dopamine and the endorphins. Contact with the lover is also pleasurable because it releases oxytocin. This chemical produces reward by calming us down. (It doesn’t matter that it is the lover’s fault that we need calming.) Oxytocin is a powerful, natural anti-anxiety chemical.
The attraction phase usually lasts no more than 18 months. The reason for this is that it is too consuming. People have to be able to function, and when our energies are over focused on a lover, we aren’t as productive in other areas. Furthermore, the attraction phase has only one purpose. That is to get us hooked. When the pleasure chemicals and anxiety relieving chemicals are released in the brain, a compulsion is formed. That compulsion is to be with the lover. So the love that starts out as pleasure in the company of the lover becomes a compulsion. When the compulsion phase sets in, we feel compelled to stay with our lover no matter what. That is when we know “bonding” has taken place.
So the stages of love basically involve attraction, followed by great pleasure, followed by bonding. I would add a fourth stage, caretaking. Normal people feel an urge to take care of others toward whom they feel bonded.
Sociopaths and love
Ability to love, then, involves attraction, pleasure, bonding and caretaking. How is the sociopath’s experience of love different from what I have described? First, I never met a sociopath who did not do exactly what he/she wanted. I have to conclude from this that the attraction phase operates relatively normally in the sociopath. In fact, many sociopaths hang around only as long as the attraction phase lasts. There is evidence that emotional arousal is abnormal in sociopaths. So I would also assume they experience the pleasures of attraction without the “butterflies.”
It is blatantly obvious that sociopaths do not bond in the usual sense. Their love drive is thus stuck in the attraction gear and they can go no further than attraction. But don’t stop there! As the sociopath experienced the pleasures of his/her latest object of attraction, his/her drive for conquest was also activated.
The sociopath simultaneously experiences pleasure in attraction and pleasure in conquest or power. In other words, although the sociopath cannot form a love bond, he/she can acquire a possession which he/she strongly believes belongs to him/her.
If I enjoy something and I work very hard to get that thing, it is mine! I feel entitled to something I enjoy and work for. That thing also should keep giving me pleasure and satisfaction in order to stay wanted. If a possession is no longer pleasant and appealing to me, I throw it in the garbage. Now, if someone breaks in and tries to steal my possessions, I am angry and feel violated. Does any of this sound familiar?
Unlike the caretaking of the true love bond, the caretaking behavior of sociopaths is only self serving. I take care of my stuff because I have to. If I want people to envy me, I make the outside of my house look good and wax my car. Then people driving by see the great looking house with the new car in the driveway and think I really have it made. My stuff gives me status. If I don’t take care of my stuff, my status goes down.
So again we see that although sociopaths have a rudimentary love drive, in the end their drives are all about power and status. Don’t be fooled by the occasional care taking behavior, it is not motivated by empathy or a true love bond.
BigDude: That’s what happens when choosing if you should take the righteous path or unrighteous path when faced with a fork in the road of life.
Those of us who chose the righteous paths, did the work, learned how to do the work (wisdom gained), and reaped the rewards at the end (thinking it was just the paycheck, prize, prestige what ever the reaping item was at that point in time in our lives … it was more than what we thought, as we got older we realized we were strengthening our Ethical and Moral fiber, building a firm foundation, instilling competency, assuring satisfaction that we now know how to do said job … and so much more ).
Those that refused to take a righteous path, chose to take the unrighteous path. They never did the work, but reaped the reward in the end (the man made reward, not any of the Godly rewards).
They didn’t learn how to do the job. They didn’t feel satisfaction for completing a job. They didn’t feel fulfilled for accomplishing the task. They of course, didn’t build any Ethical or Moral fibers. They didn’t feel confident for learning how to do the job.
And everyone wonders why they are so messed up?
There is more to this theory, just deduct all the ramifications that happened throughout our lives as we learned lessons of God’s virtues along the way.
Peace.
Guys and gals,
It takes time to go down the “healing road” and there are pot holes along the way, sometimes we lose our shoes and have to walk on rocks and thorns or broken glass, and sometimes the road is up hill and we have to crawl and climb, sometimes the road is in sunshine and other times cold and sleet, but what we have to do is continue on.
That is what LF does for us is to give us a companion to call to us out of the darkness, “Come on, keep going, don’t look down” and encourage us to keep going. Because we are on this “road” “together” we are able to help each other and we know we are not alone.
Think about how it would be locked in a dark room, no light at all. You dont’ know where you are, how long you will be there, or what you omight encounter and you are so scared and afraid and then you hear a voice out of the darkness that is comforting and feel a hand reach out to you, and you know you are NOT ALONE. How comforting would that be?
hiya star:
i don’t want to change my phone number. he’s not ”winnng” again! i know when he calls, and i don’t answer (he only called last friday; prior to that, NC for three months.)
so, i don’t answer the phone if it’s a number i don’t know. next time, i just have to remember NOT TO LISTEN TO THE MESSAGE! but i have such a curious nature, it was impossible not to hear what he had to say.
it did set me back a bit, but i’m good now. stupid s.o.b., actually started the message with, ”i need a favor…” now that’s freakin’ insanity!
he’s scratchin’ his head right about now, in total disbelief that his ‘rah-di-dah chick’ isn’t calling him back!
HA-HA!
TOWANDA!!!!!
Hi LIG: Oh that famous line, “I need a favor.” It always started that way with my ex. Did anyone ever hear them say, “I would like to do you a favor…” Nope. It’s all about them and what they need. I say “up yours” to all of them.
I just had a wonderful healing conversation with the ex’s ex-wife..the one before me. She’s so nice. She sufferred his abuse too. Same controlling, verbally abusive AH. Only, he was very physically abusive to her. Thank God he only got physical with me once..but think about it. Once may be all it would take to finish the job. I was lucky to get out. We also compared notes as to the time line when he started getting with me. She had walked out on him by then so we don’t have hard feelings toward eachother. The guy was cheating on me like 8 months before my back before I found out about her. That sucked for me. It was a slow torturous death. The more he went out to see the OW, the more fights and abuse I took. I always ask myself why I put up with that so long but it was so hard to cut him loose. I kept hoping things would turn back around. I have a lot of regrets for not getting out sooner.
At least I’m not hurting anymore. NC is great.
I dont know, I had a really bad spell the past few days, I thought I would share with you what I wrote in my blog. And when I say a bad spell, I mean a BAD SPELL.. Oh yes, Indigo? You really are great, and thaks to all the others on here for their help and support.
My Daily Battle:
This what I struggle and battle with every day, every single day.
The sense of loss: This is so difficult for me, I am not sure why but it is. I find myself crying at night, asking “where are you”? I don’t know where the woman I loved has gone, why she was taken from me and killed so efficiently in front of me. I will spend the rest of my life never knowing. I keep hoping that there is some part of her left inside whoever resides in her body now, I keep trying, looking for a glimmer of humanity, a sign that my S is still alive somewhere in her. I keep wondering if the phone will ring and I will hear her voice saying “Its okay Jamie, I am still here”, just as I did with her once, but I know that it will never happen. God, I’m crying as I write this. I keep wanting to be wrong about her, to find out that it was some sort of huge mistake, to take her in my arms and hold her and make her feel better, to apologize to her for failing her somehow. A forlorn hope. My S is gone from me forever. I have buried what I could of her, tried to erase the memories with hypnosis so I could handle the pain, but that can only work so far. Every time the phone rings my heart jumps, half of me afraid it is her, half of me hoping it is her, to have her tell me it has all been a bad dream. But whenever the phone rings I also know that it will never be her, the woman I loved.
The pain: I cannot begin to describe the level and type of pain that I feel. I have never had to deal with anything on this level before. It is part of what drove me to try to take my own life, and it is what makes me believe that life without the woman I loved is not worth living, it is a life emptied of what it once contained. But, I made my choice to live and so I will live, as best as I am able. I will try to treat myself the way that I would have treated S were she still here with us. I will live well in a way, but in many ways it will remain forever an empty life. The pain is also what prevents me from truly enjoying the company of my friends. I have some wonderful friends, and I love them dearly, but I always have to hold back the tears from them, the unremitting agony of what is left inside. I have holes in me now, huge gaping rents through my heart and soul, and they will never heal.
The trust: I know now that I will not be able to let a woman that close to me ever again. The level of trust that I placed in S was greater than I have ever been able to show to anyone, I trusted her with my heart, my soul, and even my life. I am unable to ever trust anybody I don’t know that much ever again. And I don’t allow people I don’t know that close to me and I never will be able to. Trust was huge issue for me, having been betrayed in the past by people I trusted, people who I should have been able to trust but they weren’t deserving of it.
The devaluing: Of all of them this hurts the most in a way. To have had all the years we were together tossed aside for the sake of an online fling that lasted (apparently) for two months. To realize that everything that I thought we had, everything that we had done and shared, all the troubles we had fought through together as a couple meant that little. I thought I was handling this one better, but the past few days have taken the wind out of me. I thought that what we had was magical, I even fell in love with her all over again in Rome, totally, smitten by this woman. I tried to give her whatever she desired, for one simple reason. I loved her. It made her happy. That’s all, just to know that I had made her day or month or life better, even in the smallest way meant everything to me. One warm genuine smile from her was like sunshine. And now I am left sitting here, my life torn apart, my psyche and my soul scarred forever, a total wreck of what I once was. Why? Because I loved. Everything that I thought had value is now gone from my life. I wasn’t left with any self-respect, any dignity, I had been devalued and everything that I thought we had together has now totally lost any meaning or value it might have had. My self worth? I have none really, I am taking small steps to try to find some but it is a hard lonely road. And a long one.
This is what I struggle with every day, and no matter how intensive the therapy, no matter how deeply I am hypnotized, this is what greets me upon waking, and it will be there for the rest of my life. Every time that damn phone rings my heart will jump, every time I see someone with hair like hers I will start to cry. Every day is a living hell, but I smile, I pretend I am doing okay, I pretend that I will be fine. But I am not fine, and I never will be. This truly was my last chance and the woman I shared it with has been snatched away. I will grieve for her for the rest of my life. I will always hope that somewhere my S is still inside that stranger, I will always hope that one day she might reach out and tell me “Its okay Jamie, I AM still here”. But I will always know that that will never happen, whoever this person is now won’t allow it. Ever. She will never allow that simple act of humanity.
This is what they do to us. They take everything. All that we had is gone or lays in ruins around our feet, and every day we struggle to find meaning in it all. And we never do find it. So, I will take what is left of my S and carry her inside me to Paris. I will take that part of her at least. I promised her I would take her there and I never break a promise.
Every day is a struggle, every day a battle. So far I have managed to crawl this far, but it takes its toll. And the only person that could have helped is gone forever.
Dear Bigdude,
Your thoughts and your feelings are I think universal to those of us who are grieving…that sense of loss, of bargaining (what can I do to make it all a big mistake, a bad dream, to put it right?) That loss of trust, not only in others but in our own ability to see the true from the false. How could we have missed such a fake?
The QUOTE “I never will be fine” is also a natural, normal part of the grief process, Bigdude.
Yes, it is a long road, and a lonely one, because the only one you want to comfort you in this horrible pain is the one who is GONE.
When my husband died in a plane crash here at our small airport and farm, I was there. Through the grace of God, one thing after another squelched my plans to take my terminally ill step father for a drive through the country, and finally, a broken finger made me decide to stay home that morning. The morning of the crash.
I heard the take off run, then the crash, and then the “whoosh” of the flames and though the trees blocked my view, I knew what had happened as I raced through the house to get to my truck. The man I loved, the man I idolized lay there stark naked except for one shoe and his belt, and I couldn’t see my son, or the two friends, but only the fifty feet of flames shooting up from the plane into the top of a pine tree. As a medical professional I knew from the first glance that though my husband was alive, he would not live long, but the thought that my beloved son, and two friends were still inside that inferno was more than I could even imagine. They stood only a few feet away, but in my shock I literally could not see their faces.
My whole life went up with that airplane I thought. I thought there was no way I could survive, but I put one foot in front of the other, and I managed to come to acceptance of that horrible crash, that horrible loss of the man I loved.
Not quite a year later, feeling old, undesirable, and alone, I “hooked up with” a P who seemed to offer a new relationship, a new happiness, and before another year had gone buy, he had devalued me, and I knew he was only using me. Some how, I’m not sure how, I had the strength to kick his miserable butt to the curb, though it broke my heart to give up the dreams he had brought to me of another happy life. I felt even older, even less desirable, used and abused, and trashed.
Then the Year of Chaos with my P-son and his partners trying to get rid of me so he could get access to the family assets. While I was down, as low as you could get, he attacked me while my back was turned. Talk about “crazy making”—I was at the limit of my sanity, and then my entire family, with the exception of one adopted son devalued and discarded me like used toilet paper. I had to flee my home to save my life. I had nothing, everything was gone, all my security, all my self worth, and I was alone except for that one son who was also devalued and discarded “because he isn’t blood.”
My grief was overpowering profound, and I felt there was no hope. I survived but what was there to look forward to in my “declining” years, everything I valued was gone, up in smoke either physical or emotional. GONE.
But time passed, and I began to see that as long as you are alive, your value, your validation must be from within yourself not from without. Not from someone else, no matter how prescious they are to you, or how much you love them. What we are is inside ourselves.
I turned back to God, and started to trust him, renewed my relationship with Him, and renewed my relationship with myself, started to validate myself, and not depend on anyone else to validate that I am worthwhile, that I have value. Even if the ONLY person on earth that values me is me, that’s enough.
I read a book called “Man’s Search for Meaning” by Dr. Viktor Frankl. Dr. Frankl was in the Nazi camps for years, and lost everything except his body and his mind, and yet, this brave and good man still found meaning in life—meaning separate from things and separate from other people. His only “possession” that he had left was is body. All else was gone. His writings, his home, his wife, his family, his friends, ALL GONE. Yet this man found meaning in his suffering, and in learning from that suffering. He found meaning in becoming a more thoughtful person, a better person, because of his sufferings, rather than using his sufferings as an excuse to lose hope, to lose his humility, to lose his joy.
I came to see that what I had suffered was nothing compared with Dr Frankl’s losses and suffering. Something he said though in his book tht to me was very profound.
He said that pain and suffering is like a gas. It totally fills any container it is put into, regardless if it is a small amount of gas or a large amount of gas, it expands to fill the ENTIRE volume of the container.
So your pain, my pain, is no less able to fill us than his pain was to fill him. We are all totally filled with our own pain at the losses we have suffered. To some people a paper cut or a broken finger nail is enough to fill them with pain, and with others, it takes a “big” loss to fill them with pain, but whatever the pain is, it FILLS us, but it doesn’t have to last forever.
Find meaning in your pain Bigdude, don’t let that pain suck the joy out of the rest of your life, it doesn’t have to.
She isn’t the “only person that could have helped” — the only person who CAN help is inside your skin, and that is YOU. You have value, you are not alone (we are here) and you can make it, you can pass through this fire and come out refined.
“The finest china has been through the hottest fire.”
Like Dr. Frankl, I think that our suffering refines us, burns out the impurities (if we will let it) and brings us out of the furnaces of the pain, better, and stronger, and with more of everything that matters. I hear your pain, Bigdude, but I also know that you can pass through this pain, and come out the other side. Hang in there and God bless, Bigdude. (((hugs)))
OxDrover,
Thanks for your kind words and help. I am failiar with Frankl’s work, and I just went online and ordered a copy of it. I am lookingforward to reading it. I will cope, I know that, but some days it is so hard.
OH Bigdude – What can anyone say too you that will help you make it through the nite? All the wisdom and advice you get here is helpful – but you are still left feeling like you will never be the same again – I still feel the thing’s you described – but they are so much less intense than they were. Time is the best healer in the world. And I was like you – I thought I will never love like this again – this was my last chance – well I don’t want to love like that again – it wasn’t real. Why did I do it? Why do I miss it? Because I am left here with myself -again – I have spent most of my adult life alone – yes I have family but I know how it hurts to have someone in your life one nite and gone the next. And I don’t know what tomorrow will bring and you dont either – so – don’t think your life is over – just the WAY we loved them is over – and we have to learn from it Dude – I dont know the specifics of your story – but I just want to tell you – walk through the pain – learn from it – that intense love we still feel for them ain’t love – it is misbelief – we are bewildered – and our self esteem has been crushed – but look at who crushed it!!! you deserve better Dude – your life isnt over – it has just gone through a big change – and you will adjust and you will not feel like you feel tonite for ever – give yourself sometime – just think of it this way – she didnt love you she pretended too love you – she lied – that hurts – try your best to keep going – I have seen your picture dude – you got lots of livin too do –
dude i have a stack of books – but the one I recommend is (Meaning from Madness) by richard skerritt
Henry You are my Hero
BIG DUDE YOU ARE MY HERO!
Give you both a simple remedy! Let Go! Give It all to the one who created everything stop trying to figure it out it is not Important that you understand all things! You are worthy of so much more ,that I can only begin to IMAGIN what you both are capable of now that you have Passed this Test!
Wini said this and I thought how good it was !
He is not going to let you progress untill you get this lesson right! So Ya got it! HURRAY for the both of yas! I know it was TOUGH I know exactly what each of you have felt! I was there ! I dwelled on it it consumed me and my Life stood Still the Whole 7 years ! But Now We are FREE Rejoice ! Dance and Party and Laugh and sing and play and cry tears of Joy because YOU deserve to You both have been through HELL! They tryed to ruion You but it did not happen! I told you so ! LOVE JJ