Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel is just one person who has said the following: “The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference”. In other words, the opposite of love is not hate, as might have been expected. We’ve all heard this contention and been struck by it. Yes, we’ve thought, it is terrible to be ignored. (Pretty awful being hated too, of course.)
But I’m grateful to Dawn Eden for mentioning another powerful proposition.
Eden, promoting her book ‘The Thrill of the Chaste’, is currently visiting Canadian high schools.
The students seemed interested when I told them what Pope John Paul II called “the opposite of love.” It’s not hate, as some of them guessed when I asked them what they thought it would be, nor is it indifference. It’s use.
“People sometimes use people because they hate them,” I said. “But you don’t have to hate someone to use them. That’s why use is more dangerous than hate. You can use someone while fooling yourself into thinking you love them.”
On reading this I immediately thought of the life stories told at Lovefraud. This concept of love vs use seems to have much promise when it comes to making sense of life with a psychopath. For instance a minor change of the last sentence by Eden goes as follows: “You can use someone while fooling them into thinking you love them”.
aloha and OxD:
I didn’t explain that well. The “driving her nuts with forgiveness” was actually not allowing us to seethe quietly for days on end, to not go to bed angry.
I didn’t explain myself to her, but required both girls to state what they’re feeling and ways we could compromise. I called it “judges chambers” or something like that, where we were permitted to share with each other whatever the worst of the worst was we were feeling, get it out in the open. She actually appreciates it now, but felt annoyed with it then.
I’m an open book here in anonymity and was with him, years ago. This time NOT SO MUCH. But, yeah, I am stubborn and run by instincts, particularly empathy and nurturing instincts.
LOL about work and admitting mistakes. I do tend to do that, also, and also to solve them myself, usually first.
And don’t worry, it was a one-time break in NC. Won’t be happening again. I read my old journals again….I know which side of the fence I’m on for life.
LilOrphan
I broke the “there is a very good reason for no contact” rule back in Oct. He was in jail, I thought I was “safe” from my emotions since I had not seen him in 7 months and lets face it, he was in jail. I was wrong but I also learned-once again why no contact FOREVER is especially important. My caring feelings came right back and the whole sick thing was, he didn’t care & well, he just didn’t care and I knew he wouldn’t. He was very nice, very seductive, he was setting me up to use me ONCE again and asked me to bail him out of jail. Nope, I did not bail him out.
I went because I wanted to see some kind of remorse, I wanted him to acknowledge what he had done to me, I wanted him to say he was sorry, I wanted alot of things like closure, which I was never going to get. I wanted to once again explain my feelings to him, try to make him understand how much he hurt me and to make everything alright. Again, it wasn’t going to happen. Ever!
I also feel like I have to explain myself to EVEYRONE, to justify myself (which by the way, I don’t do very good). I too am working on being able to say no, without explaining myself or trying to justify myself. I am doing much better but have much more work to do. I also agree with Aloha. Take care
Aloha & OxD,
I so needed to read your comments to LilOrphan. I know he is a bad man, but I still cannot help myself with wanting closure from him, with wanting him to feel some emotions, some pain, some remorse. I know, I need to have NC, but I can’t help myself. I send him an email that has emotion involved and he completely ignores it, which causes me even more pain.
It’s almost like I’m asking for it, and I just cannot accept the fact that he is a BAD MAN, that he discarded me quite easily and that I will NEVER get any closure from him. It’s like someone needs to shake me and snap me out of trying to help this disordered man with his myriad of problems.
I can’t seem to help to continue to have hope that he will come around, that he will see the light. I have to stop this malignant hope. It really gets me nowhere.
Even though the divorce was final a week ago, I still feel as though I am completely stuck. I can’t seem to move forward right now. I thought I was, and then I have contact with him, and I’m thrown right back into being stuck. I know, NC is key, I need to take care of myself first, etc, but it’s so hard!
He is just plain evil. There is no goodness in him at all. It is the cold, hard truth. His cruelty is astounding. I am forced to see him because we have children. My daughter told me she wants him to move away. I wish he would.
I told someone today that yes, I still love him. What is wrong with me? How could I love someone that was so deceitful for years? Someone that emotionally abused me, and used me so horribly.
This is what he said when he told me he was leaving: “You get what you can out of someone and then it’s time to move on”. Word for word, that is what he said. This is truly the opposite of love: use.
So, please someone tell me why I could possibly care about this person at all!!
almost_free,
Most likely you loved him because what ever it was that he said during the phase of hooking you was EXACTLY what you had always wanted beyond your wildest dreams… or something like that.
There was some irresistable shiny hook that us deeply imbedded.
When I left the Bad Man, I did think that I still loved him but I don’t now nor do I think I ever truly loved him. You said something spo perfect: His cruelty is astounding.
Focus on the statement everything you start to go down the road that makes you believe you still love him. How would you feel about your BM if he was with your best friend and she told you of his cruelty? What would you say then? Chances are, your best friend has been trying to get through to you but you aren’t listening… switch places for a bit and pretend you are talking to her and trying to help her.
I didn’t mean to pick on LilOrphan… I have been described at an empathic person… very nurturing, “too nice.” I relate to the thing that Orphan is saying… I have been through all these things.
I knew there was something different about me but I didn’t know what it was… and I knew whatever it was… it wasn’t working for me. It was boundaries. I did not understand what boundaries were. And, I easily took on the pain of others… this even manifested in my body work when I was doing that. If my client had neck pain, I would end up with the same neck pain after working on them. If their body was in a lot of pain, I felt like I would throw up when I worked on them. This was boundaries again.. no separation between myself and others. If this sounds crazy, ask your Masage Therapist the next time you treat yourself to a day at the spa.
Anyway, I only want to help. I don’t want to upset anyone and I relate so much to LilOrphan because I have been there… and I feel lucky that I was able to put an ocean bectween myseld and BM. If I had not done that I am sure I would have wasted more time on him. A friend of mine called him an emotional black hole.. YES!
As far as closure and apologies… forget it ladies. They will not give this to us in any satisfactroy manner. We have to find a way to let this idea ago. They will not ever understand how much they hurt us but worse yet, THEY DO NOT CARE.. because life is all about them.
We must care for our own well being.
sorry about the typos.
I don’t feel “picked on” aloha. You’re not saying anything wrong or anything I haven’t told myself a million times — and not just regarding this situation!!
Being overly nice is as much a lifelong trait as any other. Did you hear it growing up, from people? From your parents, and were as sometimes, that you were too soft, too kind-hearted, going to get walked-on in life? Or, the classic: “You’re too sensitive!” from adults when we were little.
I developed this really hard shell, funny, snide and sarcastic. That’s part of who I am, too, but a lot of it was used to protect myself.
Look at you, even…telling me the stark reality that I need to toughen-up, create better boundaries…and then feeling bad and kind of apologizing for saying it!! That’s pretty much exactly what I’d do with someone, in that same order.
With everyone else but him I had boundaries, even though I do let my family override them sometimes. But nobody else.
We are works in progress, right? I’ve learned a lot from this whole experience, about where I need to really work on myself and realizing there’s so much room for growth and becoming a better person. Even about the ways I lied to myself along the way.
I appreciate your candor. My closest friends in real life are very different people from each other but they share one thing in common: they tell me the truth, without fail.
Telling the truth and then knowing you must act on it yourself can be one of the hardest lessons of all. We are all amazing people in this growth process and helping each other is what will make the difference for all of us.
Our biggest fear may be that we actually are as strong as we know we are.
We will survive and grow and be whom we are meant to be. Peace to you all.
Almost _free
Quote: “I can’t help myself”
YES YOU CAN! And believe it or not, you CAN control your thinking and your emotions….they don’t just come out of “no where” and “sweep uncontrollably over us”—Warrior is right, we ARE, REPEAT, ARE POWERFUL!
Start out simple. Like if you are irritated at a slow driver on the road and can’t get around it—feel the irritation in your stomach—NOW, you can CHOOSE to stay irritated, mad, upset, or you can say “There’s nothing I can do about the traffic, so I will just sit back and enjoy the day.” IT WORKS.
IT TAKES PRACTICE, but start small and work up to the “big stuff”
When you start feeling your gut telling you something–listen, but just like you “controlled” your gut by IGNORING THE RED FLAGS, you can CONTROL your gut when it is telling you that you “love the bad man”—
TALK to yourself in POSITIVE TERMS–preach to yourself if you need to, rant, rave, pound the pulpit! If you hear it enough, you will start to really believe it.
I AM POWERFUL
I WILL NOT LET THE P RUIN MY LIFE
THE P DOES NOT LOVE ME
THE P WILL NEVER ADMIT THEY ARE EVIL
I DO NOT DESERVE TO BE TREATED LIKE TRASH
THE P TREATED ME LIKE TRASH
Etc etc.
Today is my “stand up or shut up” day—I have to go and enforce a boundary–and when I made the boundary, I was all wishy washy, and teary eyed, afraid I would “offend”—but the boundary is REASONABLE, and has now been violated and I have to go and ENFORCE it–and you know, I am NOT teary eyed, and I quite frankly don’t give a rat’s behind if I offend. I HAVE BEEN OFFENDED, it is OKAY FOR ME TO stand up for myself, and ENFORCE A REASONABLE BOUNDARY. If the person who has made this “enforcement” necessary is OFFENDED and is no longer my “friend” WHAT HAVE I LOST? NOTHING but my perception of their friendship.
It is MY WAY OR THE HIGHWAY in this instance, because it is a situation that I cannot tolerate or ignore.
I’m going to put on my “big girl panties” and act like an adult. WHOOOIE!
You go, OxDrover! You’ve got a posse behind you if you need it!
Thank you Warrior—believe me, I felt the presence of my posse behind me!
Well, I just got back from my “enforcement” round, and I am really proud of myself (that sound you hear is me patting myself on the back!)
The situation is that my late husband’s closest friend, has a dog that is a pit bull dog and kills cats and other small animals just for sport, the man keeps him on a chain most of the time, but the dogs (there are two of them) get off on a regular basis and show up at my door as I am letting my small dog (who thinks he is 10 ft. tall and bullet proof) out to go to the bathroom, or sometimes I leave him tethered for for a while.
My friend’s dog is very prescious to him and he dotes on the dog. The dog however is dangerous to MY dog’s life and I think that MY dog should be able to go out into HIS OWN yard to pee witout being in mortal danger. I have spoken to Owner of said dog on 4 occasions recently when the dogs showed up at my door.
Today, I went again for the “final” confrontation before taking further action.
I confronted my friend “nicely” but firmly and the response was “well, I’m doing the best I can” (he keeps his dogs chained but they get off about once a week, and last night at 4:30 a.m. I went to let my dog out and there was Fido out there with slavering jaws just daring my dog to come out. Fortunately, I was able to restrain my dog. I called the owner to come get him, but he didn’t answer his phone so I had my son take the dog home and chain him up.
This morning Owner called me watning to know why I called him at 4:30 a.m. and I told him. He said, “well I heard the phone but decided not to answer it.” I said “well, sometimes when you get a call at 4:30 in the morning it is because there is some sort of emergency that you need to take care of.”
Anyway, Owner said to me when I told him he MUST keep his dog up, “I’m doing the best I can.” I replied (keeping my cool) “well, apparently the best is not working, and I cannot tolerate the results, so let’s think of another solution. How about a pen.? Do you think that is an unreasonable alternative?” He replied “No” and so then assured me that he would buy a pen.
I was nice, but did firmly set the consequences of his dog attacking MY dog on MY front porch, and that was death for his dog (in this area there is no leash law, or animal control, but if an animal is attacking you, your dog or your livestock, you have a perfect right to kill it on the spot. I have exercised that right several times after warning the owners that their dogs were being a problem and they refused to keep them up. I have had baby calves chewed to pieces by multiple packs of dogs, both ferrel and pet dogs.
Anyway, I am proud of myself, not only for SETTING the boundary, and ENFORCING it, but for not being anxious and guilty feeling that I have to allow someone else’s unreasonable and irresponsible behavior to risk MY dog’s life
in MY front yard.
It’s certainally not the dog’s fault that he is bred for killing, and not his fault that his owner is not taking adequate precautions to keep him confined in his own yard, but I have set the boundary for Owner of said dog, and I think I’m being more than reasonable. Pity is, if the Owner doesn’t follow up, then the dog gets the consequences. I just don’t intend for it to be MY dog that gets the consequences for someone else’s irresponsible behavior.