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Addicted to love?


Claire.

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Just now, tcgram said:

So if I am understanding correctly, you are saying that we are all hard-wired to want some sort of reward for our actions and emotions, correct?   So the feeling you get from helping others with no outward reward is still our chemicals causing us to feel good in helping another person?  

I think I've mentioned this to you before (?), "I do good because it makes me feel good." People who like helping others do so because of either the praise they receive, how it makes them feel, or both.

Similar to how getting a "thank you" card from someone, like one of your kids gives you that little slice of pride. You feel happy. A little magical placebo effect that is.

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We may have had this discussion before, but I didn't remember for sure.  Thank you for the clarification.   :)    

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If we really think about it, our whole lives are about positive and negative emotional reinforcement. We become addicted to the feels, whatever it is becomes habit. 

Just now, tcgram said:

We may have had this discussion before, but I didn't remember for sure.  Thank you for the clarification.   :)    

We did. It was in my magical placebo thread and I think a few PM's.:tu:

Easy way to test this is to think about having a nice slice of warm apple pie with a bit of whip cream and a dash of cinnamon on top, mmmmmm. 

How many times has all those cat picture we post made you laugh???? You gotta have a trigger and it kicks in. 

 

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Just now, XenoFish said:

If we really think about it, our whole lives are about positive and negative emotional reinforcement. We become addicted to the feels, whatever it is becomes habit. 

We did. It was in my magical placebo thread and I think a few PM's.:tu:

Easy way to test this is to think about having a nice slice of warm apple pie with a bit of whip cream and a dash of cinnamon on top, mmmmmm. 

How many times has all those cat picture we post made you laugh???? You gotta have a trigger and it kicks in. 

 

You're right!!   I thought I had heard it before but had a brain belch and wasn't sure exactly where or who.....I guess I have an quick trigger as I'm easily amused.   

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Just now, tcgram said:

You're right!!   I thought I had heard it before but had a brain belch and wasn't sure exactly where or who.....I guess I have an quick trigger as I'm easily amused.   

I supposed to be the cold hearted cynical one who never laughs or is ever happy, quite the opposite. I wouldn't post any of those cat pic if they didn't make me laugh. Hell I even bust out laughing that the thought of a few of them. I just know how the game is played, took it apart broke half the pieces, it still works though.

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2 minutes ago, XenoFish said:

I supposed to be the cold hearted cynical one who never laughs or is ever happy, quite the opposite. I wouldn't post any of those cat pic if they didn't make me laugh. Hell I even bust out laughing that the thought of a few of them. I just know how the game is played, took it apart broke half the pieces, it still works though.

I tend not to be cold hearted unless someone hurts me very deeply.   

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Just now, tcgram said:

I tend not to be cold hearted unless someone hurts me very deeply.   

Life tends to generate various levels of hate, bitterness, and regret in all of us from time to time. I just hope no ones felt my level and I'm glad that I haven't felt others. It makes us cautious. We keep walls up to keep people out, so the pain doesn't come back. It is not that we don't care, it's that the scars run deep and the pain is ever present. 

Love can be assigned may meanings and each one will be different between all of us. I just don't see love as this white light happy fluffy rainbow space bunny that farts sparkles of joy. 

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1 minute ago, XenoFish said:

Life tends to generate various levels of hate, bitterness, and regret in all of us from time to time. I just hope no ones felt my level and I'm glad that I haven't felt others. It makes us cautious. We keep walls up to keep people out, so the pain doesn't come back. It is not that we don't care, it's that the scars run deep and the pain is ever present. 

Love can be assigned may meanings and each one will be different between all of us. I just don't see love as this white light happy fluffy rainbow space bunny that farts sparkles of joy. 

I've been through a lot but I tend to be a "Pollyanna" about things because I know they can always be worse.   :)  

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1 minute ago, tcgram said:

I've been through a lot but I tend to be a "Pollyanna" about things because I know they can always be worse.   :)  

That's the reason I'm a pessimist. Hope for the best, expect the worst or as I've learned prepare for the worst. 

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Just now, XenoFish said:

That's the reason I'm a pessimist. Hope for the best, expect the worst or as I've learned prepare for the worst. 

I've been down to the bottom, but I know I am capable of pulling myself back up again.  So I choose to look forward.   

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2 minutes ago, XenoFish said:

If other people were as easy as you to converse with I'd never get warnings.:tu:

If everyone were easy to converse with then we would probably not have any good debates.  

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3 minutes ago, tcgram said:

If everyone were easy to converse with then we would probably not have any good debates.  

I doubt that. It probably would be better and more constructive. 

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On 29/04/2017 at 10:52 PM, XenoFish said:

I always feel like somebody's watching me.

We are :) 

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On 30/04/2017 at 9:06 AM, XenoFish said:

love-addiction-6-638.jpg?cb=1422626120

HappFFy-Chemicals.png

Dopamine + Serotonin + Oxytocin = Love

Nothing more than electricity and chemistry.

Or you can marry them and get cured :) 

Seriously though, it is a sad commentary on modern society that love might be seen as a negative or addiction 

I would offer a difernt cycle of addiction to love 

Attraction 

Some stress and anxiety

Announcement/declaration  

Acceptance

Joy

Fulfilment

An addiction to love is not necessarily bad, if you can maintain a constant supply which meets your needs, and it does not cost too much for you to afford. 

What you describe above  (Dopamine + Serotonin + Oxytocin = Love)  is lust or physical attraction.

It is NOT love as humans can experience love, and if that  is all a human has experienced, then  they haven't felt one tenth of the power of true love  It is what makes a farm boy reply, "As you wish. " to any request from his princess.  This love does not even have to contain an element of physical attraction or lust,  and does not require proximity to, or physical contact with the object of love. 

It can be a love for a poem, or a painting, or an animal, or any aspect of the natural world,  yet it can ALSO be the larger part of the nature of love/attraction to a person you love, from a parent, to a sibling, to a mate, to a partner.  Sexual attraction is just one minor, additional, component added to this wider form of human love.

It is a shame that our world is becoming so materialistic and reductionist that many people really don't understand that love for humans is far more complex and mostly an intellectual ideal rather than just a biological response to chemical attractions.People from my parents and grandparents generations would never have made that mistake, nor suffered from that confusion.  

 Perhaps, for them, romantic love and idealism came from much wider reading of the classics of literature and an understanding of the reality of romantic love,  but it also came from living a life based on the knowledge that love was a concpet or construct, like duty or honour, which took time, effort, and discipline, to maintain and grow.  They also lacked the selfishness and cynicism of the modern era .

Convince yourself that love is merely a biological or chemical impulse and first, you remove any obligation or responsibility to, and for, your feelings of love,( Ie they are outside your control)  and second, you may see love as temporary, and thus any relationship as only based on a temporary chemical attraction  That is destructive to families, and thus to societies.

When the chemical attraction ceases, or a new one is found, if you believe that is all there is to love, then  you have no duty to remain with your partner, or  the children from that first love. If you think love is just that brief chemical attraction, then NO relationship will last  for you,  because you will think you have fallen out of love, when the chemical attraction ceases.    BUT if you have constructed a deeper conceptual and intellectual construct of love for your partner, which includes other concepts like; duty and loyalty, partnership and compassion,   as PART of that love,  then you can remain together happily, and in love, for life  all things being equal.  Eventually sexual attraction or desire  might not even form part of a loving lifelong relationship, but friendship compatibility and love, always will 

Edited by Mr Walker
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On 30/04/2017 at 9:37 AM, XenoFish said:

You like the rest of us are nothing more than a series of chemical and electrical reactions. Every emotion you have is based on a stimuli. Love is just a chemical that compels animals to breed, to nurture, and to protect. It's all chemically driven. Even laughter. When you stripe all of it away, we are driven by the same primordial instinct that the first life on earth had, survive. Now we dress us this compulsion and call it love and an excess of the love chemical can cause a lot of harm to the target of one's obsession.

This is factually untrue

Humans are basically self aware cognitive beings, and so  our emotions are NOT simply biochemical.  They are constructs of the mind, often subconscious but also accessible consciously   While we are driven by the same basic biological drivers as other primates, our awareness of this combines with the power of self aware intelligence to give us choices. This means that humans are MORE than simple biological entities.

A  human being has a choice about mating for 30 minutes (on a good night ) :) or for life. We have the ability to see and understand the consequences of  different  behaviours and   (for example) the need for relationships to endure to protect individuals, property, and children.  Some might chose NOT to exercise that responsibility, but we all have it, and an awareness of consequences of different types of behaviour .

Pretending to be like other animals, driven by biological conditioning is a modern cop out from the responsibility of being a human being  

Yes, you have drivers known as biological imperatives, but you also  have the conscious awareness and the mental skills, ( including the self discipline required to delay gratification of desire,)  to act beyond, or in opposition to, those drivers, to construct a better/ healthier/ more compassionate world than that of other primates.  

Edited by Mr Walker
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On 30/04/2017 at 11:13 PM, XenoFish said:

Selfless love is still driven by selfish desires. The reward of approval.

No. Selfless love is driven by selfless love. Ie  to care for, to protect,  to support,  comfort, be there for the other person.  NOT to get anything back for yourself, but to benefit THEM, because you love them and care about their well being.  This is an idea and a practice which it seems must be taught to humans or they just do not get it  IMO it is NOT being taught to the young as part of basic parental instruction life, as it used to be Or again, perhaps young peole simply are not reading the classic romantic literature which explains this, OR we are just getting more selfish and cynical as a society.  This is what I mean about humans being able to go above and beyond the behaviour of other primates who behave in conditioned or biological ways   A human can create an abstract /intellectual  concpet or ideal like love, honour, duty, compassion empathy etc., and then chose to shape their; life, beliefs, and behaviours, around that ideal and others like it   The aim might not be approval of others but the abilty to live by an inner code or ethical system, as the BEST/ most productive, way to live as an individual, and as a member of a wider society.  

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On 30/04/2017 at 11:23 PM, XenoFish said:

All love is selfish. Even mature love.

You can ONLY judge this form your own experience it is NOT the actual experience of all human beings . 

I was brought up with a selfless love from many adults  and shown that true lasting love has to be selfless to endure.  Loving in a selfish way is the surest way to ensure the love cannot last. 

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On 01/05/2017 at 1:36 AM, Lilly said:

When I was young a little girl I that lived in my town was almost struck by a moving car. She was pushed out of the way by a man who was then struck by the car himself (he was hurt quite badly). The man wanted nothing in return and requested to remain anonymous. An equally anonymous benefactor paid for the man's medical bills as he was not a very wealthy person (keep in mind this is way back before medical insurance was common). Many, many years later I found out the anonymous benefactor was actually 2 people...my father and my uncle.

Years later when my mother was dying of Alzheimer's disease our local Hospice would send ladies who would just sit with and comfort my mother. These women were not paid and wanted nothing in return.

A neighbor of mine's son was badly burned when he was just 12 years old. The boy was in their cellar when the furnace sparked an explosion of a gas can. He was sent to Shriner's Hospital in Boston. His parents had to travel up to Boston and lost work hours for literally months. Someone (actually a group of 'someones') anonymously paid their real estate taxes for 6 months.

Once there was a woman who found a mud covered dog on the side of the road. It had been struck by a car. She took it to a Vet and paid for the treatment. Eventually the owners showed up and it turned out the dog had panicked and run off due to a thunderstorm. The young couple had been searching for the dog for hours in the pouring rain. The Vet told the woman that the young couple had very little money and might not be able to pay her back. The woman didn't care and asked not to be identified to the couple.  

Make no mistake, love exists. It's just not what most people think it is.

These are beautiful stories and just a few of the billions going on daily around the world  Yet  a cynic would argue (because this is what they believe in their own heart) that all these people only act from  some form of self interest or approval.  Or are acting form powerful social conditioning. 

I live with people who act like this all the time and many of these stories are mirrored in the life of myself my wife and our family/friends  ( for example we have done the same with a couple of dogs involved in road accidents  We have had people give generously with out expectation of acknowledgement or repayment when we were in need, and have done the same for others.  It is how we were raised but also how the books i read as a child and a young person showed that humans acted towards each other. 

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On 01/05/2017 at 1:57 AM, quiXilver said:

when we like/lust a flower (or anything) we pick it and bring it home to watch and seek to possess it.

 

when we love a flower, we nurture it and tend it, with our loving presence and with water so that it may thrive for generations...

 

Love this but would add if we are doing this to benefit the FLOWER, rather than to gain from the beauty of the flower,  then this is true love. 

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On 01/05/2017 at 5:42 AM, XenoFish said:

Its that dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin reward system.

And when it is not, but a response to an intellectual construct like love, honor, duty,  or a practical outcomes- based assessment that certain behaviours are more constructive and productive than others? 

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I've been through two pages of posts sequentially  Perhaps i should have read them all, before responding to any

 In brief I do not accept that humans are primarily driven by what makes us feel good, but by what we KNOW will be the consequences of our actions ie striving to attain certain ideas principles or abstract concepts, often embodied in  laws and rules.

 I know this is not how all humans act, but if we are to survive in a modern world it is how the majority will have to learn to act . Not from  emotional biological drivers, as other primates do,  but from conscious realisations about which behaviours provide the safest and best outcomes for the most people.

.Ie we  need to be driven by what is right and most constructive, not by what feels good.   Most humans actually manage this, most of the time. 

Edited by Mr Walker
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Eros, storge, philia, and agape.

Edited by I hide behind words
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7 hours ago, I hide behind words said:

Eros, storge, philia, and agape.

Dont forget ludus, pragma, and the 96 sanskrit words for different types of love. :) 

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