(Is love a flame or longing for happiness?)
The last drop that made me write this article was watching French movie “Quelques Mots D'amour”, the title of which in Russian translation literally sounds like “Body in Love”. Her Majesty Love comes into the main characters’ life: they fall head over heels in love with each other. Emergence of this wonderful feeling instantly changes the way main heroes see themselves, others, responsibilities and immerses them in a state of trance. The eyewitness of everything is a friend, who collects illustrative material for her thesis “Neurobiology of love”. Emilie gives advice to the main character to stop thinking, obey her feelings and to walk out on her groom. Emilie, a woman of science, authoritatively states that what is happening with her is Love! “Yes, we are similar to dogs: you like the smell – you love”, “yes, hormones are more important than freedom of choice”…
Excuse me, more important than what? More important than what makes us people? Is it for real that love turns us into some kind of a Headless Horseman? Does a man really, by definition, become a mere “body” (as it is in the Russian title)?
I do agree. Of course, love changes a lot there, inside of us. For sure it changes. But…not always for better.
“Things base and vile, folding no quantity,
Love can transpose to form and dignity”
This is how Paul Popenoe describes, what most of people think on this topic: “Love is a mysterious visitation which comes out of nowhere and takes control of you —just like the measles…. It is recognized intuitively…. If it’s the real thing, you won’t have to be told. You will know without asking. Love is so important that you must give up everything else for it. A man is justified in giving up his wife for it, a woman is justified in abandoning her home and children for it, a king is justified in giving up his throne for it. It may go as unexpectedly as it came, and there is nothing you can do about that either. It is not, in any way, subject to human control.”
Love. “Her Majesty Goddess”… Who’d dare to disagree? There was someone, who said: “…don’t wonder about anything too much, for deities are ruling people. That’s what they are for”… He also said that the art of love and the art of war are gods’ arts.
War smells of corpses. “War – is an insanity, that calls into a question reasonableness of a man”, - this is what Leo Tolstoy told. Out of question, – further on we talk about love only, – it’s better make it than war…
I’m confident: most likely, you didn’t know that the term “love” is the most widespread homonym in the world. Homonyms – are words spelling and sounding of which is similar, but they have different sense. “Love” is like an Austro-Hungarian empire, where under one “roof” a lot of cognitively, emotionally and behaviorally hardly compatible phenomena are brought together. It contains everything: from love for ice-cream to love for symphony, from liking to the deepest feeling of affinity. People feel that they love, if they are passionately “fond of” somebody. They call love their addiction, their ownership, their desire to escape loneliness.
“The Loneliness not once will snare us,
And naïve, as we are, we’ll let ourselves be fooled again,
And take for love the languor of the flesh” (A.S. Pushkin)
The spectrum is wide: it’s when you’re sick at heart because of somebody, it’s a pleasant lightheadedness, bright hopes, it’s when you wish all the best to man and to mankind. It’s when you don’t care about what others think, it’s when one second apart is like death, it’s when the world around is dull and irritating. Because of it some people live, others take someone’s life, others kill themselves. Yes, this is how homonyms work… Now let’s proceed.
One of the first things that people refer to as “love” is sexual attraction. This is what Russian writer M.O. Men’shykov wrote about it back in 1899: “Infatuation has been for centuries almost the only topic of belles-lettres. Under conditions of high interest in love stories, the deception that belles-lettres introduces into collective consciousness has been formed. Thousands of poets praise love quite exaggeratedly – as a divine feeling, heavenly bliss that has life-transforming power; it is put above reason, above consciousness and all the sacred things.”
Here are some more absolutely different views of love:
- The highest value on this Earth is Love. (A. Blok)
- What drives me crazy the most about love is that you can’t do without a mate. (Ch. Bodler)
- Love is the imagination’s triumph over reason. (H. L. Mencken)
- There is hardly any activity, any enterprise, which is started out with such tremendous hopes and expectations, and yet which fails so regularly, as love. (E. Fromm)
- Is love a natural feeling? Is it natural for a man to love? Love is a disease, and disease obeys no laws. (I. Turgenev)
- Love is the lamp that lights the universe: without that light ...the Earth is a barren promontory and man - the quintessence of dust. (M. Braddon)
- They call with the same word spiritual love, which is love to God and to neighbor, and fleshly love of a man to a woman or of a woman to a man. It is a huge mistake. There is nothing similar between these two feelings. The first one, spiritual love to God and neighbor, – is the voice of God, second one – sexual love between man and woman – voice of an animal. (L. Tolstoy)
Now it comes to that, if we put together the semantic pictures that form the semantic field of the term “love”, we get the chimera, where high morality is in close contact with lust, spiritual commitment – with mental disorders. And we haven’t even got to the love for the kittens and for fried potatoes yet.:)
“Define the meanings of the words and you’ll liberate the mankind from half of its misapprehensions.” (R. Dekart)
Here follow pairs of sayings of outstanding and famous people, which are seemingly about love, but each saying in a pair contradicts another:
- To love deeply means to forget yourself. (J-J. Rousseau)
- The true essence of love is…having and possessing oneself for the first time. (G. Hegel)
- When we love, we lose our sight. (Lope de Vega)
- For a mature person love is not blind. (N. Shelgunov)
- Love is the most interesting and pardonable of human weaknesses. (Ch. Dickens)
- Which wedge or hummer can be compared in strength to love? Nothing can withstand it. (H. Thoreau)
- Love often takes reason from the one, who has it. (D. Diderot)
- Great love is inseparable from deep reason. (A. Goncharov)
It’s obvious that even the best representatives of the human race are quite confused. It’s not without a reason. Love is full of antinomies: it’s ambivalent – contains a moment of hatred to a partner; together with pleasure it brings suffering; it is a result of a free choice of the object and extreme dependence on it…
Unfortunately, love, which is praised in the literature sources and is an example to follow, very often presents … samples of love addiction. Not only don’t they have anything in common with love, but, moreover, they are considered to be psychological and mental disorders – love addictions according to International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10), and are included in section F63, “Habit and impulse disorders” – classification of nonchemical forms of addictive behavior. It happened only in the last third of XX century. Did you know that?
Stories of Romeo and Juliet, Petrarca and Laura, Jose and Carmen, Anna Karenina and Vronskiy and other beautiful descriptions of relationships of this kind show people what the real love should look like. Full of suffering and anxiety, obstacles and humiliation, it’s fleeting and not likely to have any prospects. Vast majority of love songs are actually dedicated to addictive behavior.
What soap operas – where heroes overcome all the possible obstacles, suffer from bullying and cheating, and finally get what they wanted – most often praise is just love addiction.
If we started to analyze on the subject of love/pseudo love huge heaps of love literature, that have been written during the whole history of mankind, we would have to perform a modern psychological and psychiatric examination. Such masterpieces as Sheakspear’s “Romeo and Juliet”, “Othello”; Karamzin’s “Poor Liza”, Goethe’s “Werther”, Tolstoy’s “Anna Karenina”, and also real people with their feelings, experiences and works: Dante, Petrarca, Mayakovskiy, Blok would have failed it, for they would have been diagnosed with “Habit and impulse disorders” - nonchemical forms of addictive behavior – love addictions.
For this reason above mentioned pathologies and nonspecific mental and physical conditions cannot be referred to as “love”. If now frequency dictionaries of modern languages witness that “love” – is one of the most frequently used words both in literature and in pop-culture, then after psychological and linguistic analysis only a little shelf of books about love would be left.
“For the last two hundred years it has been told a lot about love stories, yet so little about love.”(Jose Ortega y Gasset)
The time has come to tell you a blasphemous thing. All that is told about uniqueness of the partner, about impossibility to live without him – in most of the cases it’s just a matter of time and hormones.
If Romeo and Juliet had got married, Juliet, most probably, soon would have become an ordinary, maybe not too smart, quarreling wife, would have been stuffing herself with sweets, caviling at her maids and gossiping with neighbors (recall Russian comedy “What Men Talk About”). And Romeo could have decided that he had mistaken enamourment for love; that they didn’t forge a bond with each other; he would have been gone for carousals, for hunt and in the evenings he would have been loitering under some other balconies. Does anyone want to disagree? It’s not so easy to disagree when such metamorphoses are constantly happening on our eyes, is it?
Does it mean that “union of two souls”, “marriages are made in heaven” and other unearthly things – are nothing more than a peacock’s feather, gaudy plumage that, caused by feelings and sexual attraction, insanity dresses up in?!
If the answer is “yes”, then whose fault is it? – This is the first question.
“Love is a flame”
By the felicitous remark of O. Sin’ko the “matrix” of love is to be blamed.
In my understanding, it is the creation of our Inner Gods, some kind of "force field" that compels us to do their bidding.
“Inner Gods? What Inner Gods are you talking about?” - you might ask. I will give the answer a bit later, and now let’s talk about chemistry of love.
In fact, there are three kinds of love. Each has its own features and scientific explanation.
First one is sexual attraction, - something that we often call passionate infatuation. If we are driven by sex hormones testosterone and estrogen, a strong desire appears to constantly see the object of our worship; sleep and appetite disappear. At the sight of the beloved your palms start sweating and your breath is taken away.
Sappho described the “flame of feelings”:
…Then in my bosom my heart wildly flutters,
And, when on thee I gaze never so little,
Bereft am I of all power of utterance,
My tongue is useless.
There rushes at once through my flesh tingling fire,
My eyes are deprived of all power of vision…
Hormones provoke our brain to produce chemical substances: serotonin, noradrenaline, which cause agitation; and dopamine, that evokes feeling of happiness. Influence of these substances is, actually, what we call “love”. Some people become love addicts. Once in a period of time they need a new doze of “love”. Life becomes a TV series that is made up of fleeting relations. Each series is a firework sparkler. Every new partner brings new emission of “love drugs” and feeling of lasting euphoria. The blame is on dopamine hormone - one of the main bliss chemicals in organism. When a person sees the one he/she adores, the human organism starts to produce substances that make you experience pleasure. “Love flush” stimulates several different parts of brain and makes them produce the substances which brain usually produces after getting a dose of cocaine.
In order not to get stuck on this stage of “addictive love”, it is good to remember: sexually infatuated person feels attractiveness of the physical characteristics of the elect (appearance), and also is fond of those treats of character, which are “trendy”. But… In such case it’s not the person, who is loved, but what this person “has”: seductive appearance, attractive temperament. Sometimes social status is of importance as well, “stuffing”… (“It’s interesting, what were men loved for in times when money didn’t exist?”J)
But you have to be attractive as well, and to achieve that, you should know what type of personality meets a ready “love romances” market. Becoming attractive consists in learning “fancy” manners, being able to maintain an interesting conversation and to look “trendy”. A lot of schemes that help to evoke love are the same schemes that are widely used to achieve success in business talks, to get useful friends and influential connections. Apparently, for most of the people in our culture ability to evoke love is, in fact, a combination of “prettiness” and outward sexual attractiveness (E. Fromm described it more detailed).
People find what they look for…The aim is achieved – the flame burns again!
“All these intoxicating drinks and energizing alcohol are just a pale representation of the unique, not yet discovered toxin, which love inebriation produces” (Z. Freud)
Freud was wrong. He knew was cocaine was, but, for some reasons, didn’t recognize it. Or had he never happened to taste “love inebriation”? Who knows…
Today we know the following: the so called caudate nucleus in our brain is responsible for passion and mental anguish, it is densely filled with cells that produce and absorb dopamine. It is this nucleus that is activated, when we start to passionately lust after somebody.
Meanwhile, Helen Fisher, anthropologist from Rutgers University, thinks passionate love, supported by dopamine, is not enough to keep a couple together for a long time. Here helps the chemical brother of dopamine, noradrenaline. Together with dopamine he is to be blamed for insomnia and loss of appetite, which are so common for those who are in love. Noradrenaline improves memory work – that’s why people remember the smallest details of romantic moments even over decades.
State of all-absorbing passion can really be considered a narcotic intoxication. No wonder that serotonin level (serotonin helps to maintain calm and untroubled attitude towards life) decreases rather that increases when someone is in love. Normally serotonin deficiency can cause depression, obsessive fears and obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (kind of disorder, when a person, for example, constantly washes his/her hands). But lovers are intoxicated with dopamine, so serotonin deficiency results not in constant hand washing, but in a compulsive desire to call twenty times a day to the object of passion.
All-absorbing romantic love – is an obsession, anancasm, some mania; people lose themselves in love, lose identity. Such person can’t stop thinking about the object of love: “Someone has nested in my head”.
It’s interesting that some people, who were prescribed antidepressants, couldn’t feel firework of emotions: they felt “flat” all the time. The thing is that antidepressants artificially maintain high level of serotonin. It prevents dopamine from doing its work and intoxicating the person.
Monogamous love – is it the final aim?
Another kind of love – is a feeling of deep affiliation, soul connection. Two different hormones control this kind of love – oxytocin and vasopressin.
Oxytocin makes connection between lovers firmer, cements it. It is also one of the substances that are responsible for birth pangs and for orgasm. Some time ago it was thought that it only stimulates childbirth and secretion of mother’s milk. It turned out that it is produced in both men and women. Oxytocin is secreted when having sex. Precisely for this reason the more you have it, “the more you want it” – the more sex couple has, the stronger their bond will be. Scientists suppose that it is this hormone that gives rise to the feeling of attachment. By the way, for this reason Dr. Fisher warns her students not to play with fire, making sex with people they wouldn’t like to fall in love with.
When a man hugs a woman, oxytocin rapidly intensifies feeling of trust. In this state a person doesn’t take words critically, doesn’t notice inconsistencies. Significant are the results of an experiment that was conducted by Swedish scientists: potential investors, who were sprayed in their noses with an oxytocin containing liquid, were ready to invest twice as much money into the project as before the experiment.
After years of matrimonial life oxytocin works against dopamine and replaces the flight of passion with home comfy, while vasopressin controls monogamy. Having appeared and gained its power oxytocin also makes us more attentive to our loved ones and helps us to interpret adequately even the slightest signals, like light disapproval or partner’s wish to get home from party as soon as possible. At the same time oxytocin makes us blind (not in the direct meaning, of course). For certain, each one of us has a special person - most important in the whole Universe, without whom life is not life and joy is not joy. And it’s absolutely not important who he/she is in reality. No matter what we are told about them we always find some excuse: “It was just a joke” or “he’s not rude, he’s just straightforward”. It seems like we are simply not capable of seeing who this person really is.
The thing is that there is a certain area in a human brain that is responsible for processing judgments. Normally this area becomes instantly activated when we encounter an unusual situation that requires immediate evaluation – for instance, when we meet somebody for the first time.
Nevertheless, when we are fond of somebody, this area of brain seems to be sleeping or “turned off”. That’s right – when hormones come on the scene, our analytics, our wisdom can do nothing but “nervously smoke in the corner”.
We really become physically unable to find faults in the one we love. One more phenomenon is connected with “love blindness”, its name is “halo effect”: hormones pick out one or two positive qualities of the loved one and automatically opposes them to other qualities, not always pleasant ones. In this way we willingly put on some magic glasses. “Oh, she’s special”, “Here he is, the champion of my heart!”
When your boyfriend or girlfriend laughs at an impolite or awful joke and, all of a sudden, you start to laugh also without understanding why you’re doing it, you don’t pretend actually, - your brain commands: ”This person possesses wonderful qualities, for this reason every trifle that he does will be further viewed as magic. Repeat it!”
“Love is not to be made by magnifying glasses” (Thomas Browne)
What’s the result? Under the influence of chemistry of the hormones we don’t love him (her), but we love our fantasy about him (her). And this fantasy has so little in common with what this person is in reality. Otherwise where all this comes from: “What an idiot I was!”, “What was I thinking about?”, “Where were my eyes?”, “He’s (she’s) absolutely not the person I married!!” You can go on with your own phrases)).
Most vividly the force of Infatuation Queen can be seen in sexual passion. Erotic desire is able to draw together as one undivided whole even absolutely different people. But it’s only temporary. Then the magic fades, flame goes out, only dust and ashes are left.
In the autumn of 1923 Sergei Yesenin, drawing conclusions to his relationships with Isadora Duncan, bitterly wrote in his diary: “It was a passion, a great passion. For the whole year it has been continuing. And then it went away and nothing is left, nothing. When there was passion, I saw nothing. But now! Oh God, how blind I was! Where were my eyes? This is, perhaps, how they go blind.”
“Don"t you look at her wrist and the blooming
Silky shawl hanging down her head.
I was looking for joy in this woman
But I found perdition instead.”
The Queen of “love slaves”
The queen runs the show on the planet: dances of passion and infatuation. First, amorousness is not an act of free will or conscious choice. It doesn’t matter how much we’d like to fall in love, we cannot provoke it. On the other hand, we don’t even have in mind falling in love, but suddenly it happens. Sometimes we fall in love with wrong people in wrong time. Do you agree?
Second, amorousness is not a real love, because it takes no efforts. No matter what we do when we are enamoured,- the process usually runs without any self-control or conscious decisions…”I’m amped”, - exclaims in excitement the main hero of the movie “Quelques Mots D'amour”.
Our endless expensive phone talks, money that we spend for trips to each other, presents that we give, work that provides for our lives, - this all seems to loose significance for us. It’s similar to how instinct makes a bird nest, instinct, which is awakened by infatuation, makes us do senseless things that are not characteristic of us.
We have already talked about how the second type of love appears – affection. No doubts that monogamous devotion is essential for building long lasting, trustworthy, warm relationship. Otherwise we’ll follow the path of the heroes of Soviet movie “Formula of Love”: “-Do you want big, empyrean love? – Who doesn’t want it? – Then come…when it gets dark…to the hayloft”
The Queen enjoys its power not only in its inebriant sexual amorousness. In attachment her power is seen as well…
The borderline between love and love addiction is where the borderline between joy, quiet piece and suffering, torment is. Love becomes a problem, when you cause (or let cause) pain to yourself with the feeling “I will die without him”.
Formula of love addiction is “my happiness is in your hands”.
When I completely give up waiting for you,
Loving you, hoping and believing,
Then I’ll keep firmly closed my doors and windows
And lie down begging death to come and take me. (M. Tsvetaeva)
The most vulnerable are the people, who believe, or are even convinced, that happiness, - as an object, personality, event or substance, - can be situated somewhere outside of them; that it will appear the very moment starving one gets the desired on the silver platter. “Happiness” can be anything: thesis, conquered woman, friend’s wife, flat in the downtown. Quater-litre bottle of vodka or the “bing” are in the same row. Because a new flat and another person’s wife are situated outside of me, and oh-my-god how bad I feel without them, my inside is empty. Thus, any addiction can occur, if I feel, that happiness is subjectified and is somewhere outside of me. The same scenario works for love addiction. It occurs, when I’m confident that there is somebody somewhere who is an embodiment of my happiness.
Dopamine stimulates the nucleus accumbens and body gets prepared to snatch the desired object or to set off in pursuit of it, while amygdala determines the value of the object and triggers the feeling of conscious excitation; prefrontal cortex and septum concentrate our attention on the aim. All these reactions together create elation. But they do not produce feeling of long lasting satisfaction, and, in case dopamine system works without the agency of other neuromediators, after the release of dopamine usually arises need in one more such release, after that – one more. This mechanism is the basis for psychological habituation.
Of course, if I love SO MUCH, I want this person to “really” love me, to be “mine” and only mine, to assure me that he (she) will be with me forever, always, - otherwise “…I lie down begging death to come and take me”. Such “love” reminds a lot the desire to place someone inside of you, - “I’ll eat you up – I love you so!”. But…
If you don’t feel good with yourself, you won’t get better with someone else. If you look for another person just to escape loneliness…you will not find Harmony. If you look for a “soulmate” to fill the emptiness… you will still feel that there is not enough Love.
That is why the person in love seems to be living not inside of (him)herself, but inside of another, like a child, who was the one with the mother in her womb.
Thus, such desire of the one in love to devour the loved one (not so often occurs a dream to melt into the loved one), - is a consequence of some kind of enchantment. How does this need arise? Is it possible that this enchantment – is a “reminder of the past”?
“How little we need to be happy -
The comfort to be in the soul,
The carelessness, like in the childhood,
And confidence we’re not alone”
Amorousness…is it an infant desire to find somebody, who will take you back to a “land of milk and honey”? It looks like it is. Amorousness has power to enchant you with those indistinct recollections of the times when somebody loved you…and you loved somebody… and this somebody-outside-of-you was very kind, - he gave you everything, always.
No matter if it is this way or not exactly, but you feel this amorousness-enchantment like a sturdy leash, which you don’t see, but it takes control of your personality. Is it as sturdy as umbilical cord? Who knows…but there is definitely something childish in this enchantment. The word “enchantment” is so worn-out, but nevertheless it describes this dependency of the one in love on the one who is loved better than any other word…
“Enchanted, bewitched” (words of one Russian song by Mikhail Zvezdinskiy) we are by amorousness…
The way the butterflies are attracted to the light
I was attracted to enchanted country – Love
There I’d find someone who would say “you’re mine”
There every day is like no other one
There I would have to be afraid of nothing
This country – Love, wonderful country – Love,
The only place, where happiness can be encountered.
Dr. Helen Fisher explains, that it is actually romantic, that warms up passion for the partner – ecstacy from having your “happiness” beside – so strong, that Ministry of Healthcare should warn about it.
But very little time passes (year, half a year, three years maximum), - the person can’t be eaten up, and you didn’t get the expected, - you start to feel pang pretty quickly:
“I was looking for joy in this woman,
But I found perdition instead”
…THAT IS IT, the dopamine flame has died away…
New times have some
You aren’t here, you lie without wincing
I’ve come to understand that Love -
Is place where everything’s about pretending;
It’s my disaster, rather than my fault, that I’m so naïve.
The deceitful country - Love, deceitful country,
And every citizen there’s born to be an actor.
Why do I cry in front of you, my smile is so improper?
Love – is a country of unfaithful kind
And every person there is born to be betrayer.
Obsession of “enchantment” becomes only stronger, when we are rejected. Magnetic resonance imaging of the people, who had been dropped just before it, showed three brain areas that got activated when their misfortune was mentioned.
First to be activated is the same center that activates when a person is in love. It seems obvious that, if you are dropped, there is nothing better you can do than to forget it and continue living – it happens. But no, we can’t do that. Moreover, it looks like instead of extinguishing this flame we start to love the one who rejected us even stronger. We strive to see the object of our love more and more often, to never let him (her) go, amalgamate in ecstasy. In vain we try to get back this “paradise lost”.
Typical narcotic withdrawal is observed:
- Leaving the one you love. First – denial. Disbelief in that everything is really happenning. Signs of amalgamation can be observed. The person doesn’t see any prospects for future without the loved one, doesn’t want to accept reality without him (her).
- Soreness. This feeling can be directed at others, as well as towards yourself. This stage is a signal that people are being torn apart, and that the anxiety escalates.
- Agression. It is important to understand here, that negative energy is a sign of stepping out of the situation “I hate you! But I can’t do without you…”
- Despair that passes into sadness. Person feels that emptiness appeared, recognizes the irreversible.
You’re gone – no eating:
Bread is tasteless.
Things are chalk
I try to reach for.
…You were my bread,
You were my snow.
Now snow’s not white
And bread’s unloved. (M. Tsvetaeva)
- And it’s only now that new image of the world is formed
…The depth of a personality depends on what has been lived through and what has been realized, not on how many birthdays have been celebrated.
“Now I think that if I hadn’t got burnt so much back then, I wouldn’t have become anyone. I think it’s good that you didn’t marry me.” (Soviet movie “Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears”)
People don’t get into our lives accidentally. Some of them bring happiness, others bring experience. The best teacher in life is experience. Of course, you have to pay a lot, but it makes things clear…To avoid mistakes in future you need to gain experience; to gain experience you need to make mistakes. Do you want to break the circle? Then don’t ask yourself “why?”, ask “what for?”…
For a distant observer the person in love – is a mentally sick person, who suffers from maniac addiction to the one-and-only on the whole earth. If everything is good in the relationships with this person, then life is beautiful. But if not, especially when they break up, - then it’s over! The world is ruined, the life is dull. Thus there are two opposite states, like in manic depressive disorder (MDD is a mental illness, when the state of happiness and excitement passes into the state of deep depression without any obvious reason), the only difference is that when you break up there is a reason for change in the mood – the image of your loved one, that influences you through your hormones! These hormones act in a way that they cause “narcotic” addiction to another person, with the feeling of “withdrawal” during the split. It’s not the person that you cry over, when splitting, it’s your lost “rush”. Just think about it, it’s not you, who has control over yourself now, it’s your hormones; they make you laugh and cry. Try to look at yourself from the side.
Beyond dispute, it’s much easier to advise it than to find resources to do it…
“The sun will rise above the woods, but not for me, for now without my princess I cannot live” (Soviet movie “The Bremen Town Musicians”)
- Don’t be afraid to lose somebody. People who are destined for you don’t get lost. Those who do are needed for experience. (Osho)
- The hardest thing in life – is to understand, which bridge you should cross, and which one has to be burnt. (E.M. Remarque)
- The time will come, when you decide it’s all over. That will be the beginning! (Louis Lamour)
- When one door of happiness closes, another one opens; but often we look for so long at the closed door that we do not see the one, which has been opened for us.” (H. Keller)
- Never regret anything: sometimes troubles occur for the better, and dreams do not come true for the good cause. (O. Roy)
God has three main answers:
- Yes!
- Yes, but later!
- I have something better for you!
The one who is absorbed by the past and is afraid of the future gets stuck in despair, depression, rage, jealousy.
Who doesn’t grow up having experienced emotional pain, will have to experience it again. And there is one more thing worth remembering, - no matter what you do, -with your actions you create yourself.
"True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have seen." - Francois de La Rochefoucauld
(The third type of love - the reason I’m on the computer now:)
Human being is the highest creature on Earth among the biological species. The fundamental distinctive feature is presence of consciousness and intellect that is incomparable to the intellect of any of the smartest animals on the planet. Human being is the only creature, who has freedom of choice, yet uses it so easily to the detriment of his own.
Have a look at the animals. Reproduction and finding food is everything that their life is about. Nothing more than “to survive” and “to breed” is expected from them. Life of an animal is ruled exclusively by instincts, reflexes. In contrast to animals, man, having got instincts and reflexes, is capable of creating his own reality. For example, he can choose the aim of life himself, control his health on his own, influence his character, create his inner world. They say that if you want to be happy, be. “If you want to be loved, love.” (Seneca)
(Warning! “If in the first act there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the last one it absolutely must go off”, - was once said by a classicist…So. The rifle has been hanging from the moment you read the first phrases: “Is it for real that love turns us into some Headless Horseman? Do I really become a mere “body in love”? Remember? And now, please, read slowly.)
“Experiencing love, - says Dr. Fisher, is connected with activation of such brain areas as ventral tegmental area, caudate nucleus and frontal lobe of the cerebral cortex. First one is the main part of the brain system which is responsible for moving towards aim and for desire to get reward. Second one forms preferences when choosing the love object, motivation to achieving the desired, and pushes to action. Both first and second are part of the limbic system, and also of the reptile brain.”
That’s it! Frontal lobe hasn’t been even mentioned yet! The “main executive” of the brain, it controls emotions, cooperating with the limbic system to achieve that. The function of the frontal lobe in relation to emotional center – is restraining.
The third type of love can only be possible if the frontal lobe is involved. (To faster understand, why we need the reptile brain, limbic system, frontal lobe – see my article “Don’t Wake the Beast in Me”)
“Its function is warning. Of course, it cannot turn off emotions or stop actions. When frontal lobe functions are disordered, impulses of desires hinder well-weight actions. Any sin is rooted in impulse control decrease, and person acts adrift, without thinking of the consequences. Frontal lobe “helps” us think before saying or doing something. It is also involved in the moments, when, drawing on previous life experience, a person makes choice between alternative actions in personal, social, and spiritual situations. When the frontal lobe doesn’t function well, probability that you say or do something that you will regret about afterwards is higher.” (Amen Daniel, Doctor of Medicine, neurobiologist)
Frontal lobe has not only to be a strong “executive”, but also a skilled “shepherd”, as it constantly deals with the perversity and unpredictability of “brothers our smaller”: “By the way, when examining how the enamored brain works, scientists perform experiments not on humans, but on animals – they too have “love zones” in their brains. For example caudate nucleus, which activity increases in the period of amorousness, is found not only in mammals, but in creepers as well. From this you can conclude that some of love emotions…lead us directly to mammals and creepers.” (Yurii Panchul) It turns out that the box opens by itself!
“Here’s the key of the kingdom,
It opens the kingdom of Love”
"Do not be sad, - said Alice. - Sooner or later, everything will become clear, everything falls into place and line up in a single scheme beautiful as lace. It becomes clear why it was necessary, because everything is correct.." (Lewis Carroll "Alice in Wonderland")
Apart from the Inner Creeper (in the very depth of the brain) and Inner Mammals (that are situated higher, above the reptile complex), there has to be someone restraining/controlling the power of our Mammals, - the power of “lost emotions, and vehement gaze” (S.Yesenin). And the reptile energy is absolutely ruining: “…when a person gets overwhelmed with passion, he craves that there is no God”. And, apparently, this authority should stand high, as it deserves.
… They come to work in limousines with smoked glasses. They ascend in personal elevators to the top floors of corporate headquarters. They are the main corporative executives…Somewhere in a philharmonic the bandleader rehearses with a big symphonic orchestra …And on the stage of a theatre a stage director tries to get his interpretation of a famous play across to the actors…Seems like the bandleader and the stage director have little in common with the corporative executive, but they perform similar functions. At first sight, the chief executive doesn’t produce product of the company, same as bandleader doesn’t produce music, and stage director doesn’t perform on stage. But all of them direct actions of those, who make product, perform music, and act in play. Without them there would be no product, no concert, no performance… It’s all about it – the frontal lobe. It plays pivotal role in higher order rational behavior – setting goal, designing aim, creating plan for its achievement, organization of resources, with help of which such plans can be realized, observation and evaluation of the consequences, so that to see, that everything works the way it is supposed to. Without it “the lights are on, but nobody's home”…Frontal lobe is connected to the speech areas. Do we not say to ourselves: “You shouldn’t do that!” The word is the power, which helps us become conscious of and direct our behavior. Yes, without doubt, that’s how it should be. But in reality things look different: upside down. Very often we are ruled by what is beneath, under water, below the belt – our animal nature…
Our ancestors felt that that everything was wrong side up.
Let’s talk a bit about the phenomenon of man in the context of ancient religions. Let’s recall the deities of Egypt: human beings with heads of animals, figures of dualistic human-animal nature. Prayers were offered up to them, for they were gods. Depictions of gods with zoomorphic or anthropomorphic features – animal heads and human bodies – can be found in different cultures. “In religions and religious art of almost all continents there are cases of veneration of gods in animal guise or attributing animal features to deities. Ancient inhabitants of Babylon relocated their gods to the heaven as signs of zodiac: Aries, Taurus, Cancer, Leo, Scorpio, Pisces etc. Egyptians depicted Hathor goddess as a woman with a cow head, Amon god as a man with a ram head, and Thoth god as a human with an ibis head, or as a baboon. Ganesha, Indian god of luck, has a human body and an elephant head, Vishnu is depicted as a boar, and Hanuman as a monkey, and so on.”
(FIRST GODS – PROSVETLENIE.org)
Very tellingly, don’t you think so? Human-animal gods have been ruling…and are still ruling us! Don’t you agree? Look around…Everything is like in animal world – satiation, breeding, self-protection, domination. Is it supposed to be this way among human beings? The worshipers of science will give answer to us: “Being a part of animal world, man cannot exist without instincts. But it’s his obligation to suppress in himself, as much as possible, rude manifestations of many of the instincts. “Yes, of course, a man is not a candle fish, and not even a horse (or a monkey), for whom the desire – is practically an action (or an intent of an action at least), - V. Protopopov writes. – What the brain cortex, especially the frontal lobe, exist for, is control and selection of desires, so that not all of them would become actions in the end.” “Amorousness, - writes psychoanalyst V. Albisetti, - belongs to animal nature of the human being, love – to its maturity. To fall for someone you don’t need courage: you just need to go with the flow and let your hair down”.
There’s something else.
“Amorousness in its nature is in tune with psychology of a child, who, in its infant aspiration to be “all mighty”, wants to get everything at once; and love – is a lot of mature personalities, who are not afraid of time, but, on the contrary, take it into consideration.”
And more.
“Amorousness reigns over people, who experience it; the one, who follows the path of love control their love, but are not controlled by it. Amorousness is superficial and is content with appearance; love takes its strength from the depths of a partner’s personality. Love is never superficial. Amorousness consists mostly of impressions; love, alongside with them, contains will.”
Love that goes hand in hand with will, courage, control over emotions, matureness?? Is it possible?
“To love is to decide to get old with another person” (Albert Camus)
The moment of “deciding” sooner or later comes in any love relationships. We are not puppies, indeed; and not Headless Horsemen. No doubt, it’s not hormones, smells or fantasies that have to drag us, but a decision made. In the end, man should tack up a horse (and not to be a horse with a human head, or a human with a horse head, - who can only be “amped” or “hyped”).
Example of a conscious decision:
In one research (S. Ortega with coauthors) test people were shown photos of unknown, mentally disabled people, and were asked to feel (to implant in themselves) love for those people. First one to be activated was frontal lobe. It was found out, that such attempts in the course of time lead to stimulation of the same brain areas that are activated when a mother loves her child. Emotional centers were activated as well, including the insula, caudate nucleus and front part of the cingulate gyrus. Researches of maternal love and compassionate/unconditional love to mentally disabled people showed similar activations of dopamine reward system, but in this case the PAG nucleus in brain stem was also activated. This nucleus is actively involved in anesthesia (during childbirth, for example) and also contains big amount of vasopressin receptors. This neuromodulator along with oxytocin is used by brain to form stable, strong attachments even in those cases when pleasure is not necessary (for example as in case of a petulant child, invalid child or a spouse of whom you are well tired).
In another research, conducted by Indian scholars, paradoxical fact was discovered: spouses, who had got married for love, after five years of cohabitation started to feel much lees romantic love, while spouses, who had an “arranged” marriage, but had been showing attention and care for each other, in the course of time started to love each other stronger and stronger (Gupta, Singh, 1982).
The true love sprouts also from reason and choice, not exclusively from instinct. Karl Menninger, psychiatrist, expressed this thought with the following words: “One does not fall in love; one grows into love, and love grows in him.” The same thing says Ray Short, Sociology Professor at Wisconsin University in Patterville : “Love exists when your strong tender feelings for someone are balanced with reason and deep respect.”
The true love in its nature must be something very emotional, but it will not become an obsession. So there is a grain of truth in R. Short’s judgment that there is no “love from the first sight”.
“We have children inside of us. Divine children…”
To have an extensive view of a problem I suggest recollecting that pretty often the way different authors describe amorousness goes with something childish in actions of a grown up person. It turns out that limbic system has not only Mammals, but also Children in it. (You can see the articles “I Hear My Mother’s Voice Through Ages…” and “Who Wears the Pants in the House” to find out more about Inner Children)
The Inner Child. It lives inside of every grown up. It exists in memory and in subconsciousness, since every one of us has sharp memories of his past that form adult relationships, self-perception, perception of others, motivation, thrill for the future, etc.
Our Inner Child – is not a mere metaphor. It is a concrete, physical reality. In E. Berne’s theory of personality both Inner Child and Inner Parent – are infant, immature parts of personality, or, more precisely, - temporary states of our Self. Z. Freud had it as It and Super-Ego, R. Dilts – as Dreamer and Critic, V. Shoutz – as Affiliation and Control. C. Jung called it Divine Child, and E. Fox – Miracle Child.
The Child – is a role in which adult lives when he’s guided by instant desires and emotional state. This role can be very well described by the verb “want”.
The Child exists because we acquired certain peculiarities of emotional response and, accordingly, quite rigid behavior patterns (conditioned and elaborated reflexive schemes of emotional reactions – example of Albert and Peter from the article “Don’t Wake the Beast in Me” on my webpage: http://olex.pp.ua/).
Negative situations that had been lived through, emotional traumas (we have oh-my-god-how-many of them), are “grown into” our “flesh and blood”. Inside of everyone there are a lot of wounded Children. From the point of view of psychology, it is possible to understand the vulnerability of child’s boundaries and his sensibility to false beliefs about him. In other words, until certain age child believes everything he hears about himself (both concealed and explicit) thinking that it is truth, and takes it very personally. For instance, when parents quarrel, child thinks, that he is to be blamed for the conflict, and if he’s sick – most probably it’s because he’s bad (it’s a reflection of childish egocentrism). He is forced to use different forms of defensive behavior. Some children seek for affiliation – they literally need to hold on somebody to feel their “self”. Other children try to please others as often as possible to get at least a little acceptance and good attitude. Others become timid, cautious or obtrusive to protect their “self” in the world where they feel weak and helpless. Others choose the role of unobedient “devil” or manipulator, etc.
Problems of children are directly connected with the attitude of parents, - with a deficit or abundance of love, - “everything is poison and antipoison – depends on a dose”. It is known that deficit of parental love has negative impact on a child, even if mother and father care for all the other needs of their child.
But is it possible that parental love can be harmful for son or daughter, and even spoil them? This statement seems to be right, of course, but… Love to a child, that prevents him from psychological growth, and fosters dependence on parent, lowers self-confidence and self-esteem, - is harmful, it creates neurotic problems. Unconscious temptation (kissing lips, for example, or bathing child of an opposite sex etc.) – traumatizes son’s or daugter’s psyche even more…
And although those are childhood “outdated” programs, - all of them are still working and make you feel, react according to the written scheme. You can’t deny they’re godlike.
Actually, it is childhood “body memory” together with various childhood ways of reacting that is kept in our brain. From this viewpoint any strong emotion of ours is a trance and is nothing but “awakening” of our traumatized-wounded or naughty-playful-unobedient Inner Child, who plays with our feelings.
When Adult part of us, under the watchful eye of who they should be, is turn off, - is when our Children break free… and become our Inner Gods and Goddesses. Influence of Inner Child is often noticed by us easier than influence of an Animal side, but, nevertheless, very often we are not able to control even such schemes, programs, or algorithms of our behavior!
Thus you can say that the article is devoted to them – different in their nature in each man and woman – inherent or obtained schemes of behavior and reactions that are deeply rooted in psyche and form us, adults, from the inside. These Gods (of animal or childish nature) represent unseen dispositions (sometimes these are invisible and unrelenting “viral” programs) that influence adult’s character and relationships with others.
These gods determine emotional openness or reserve; inclination to passion or romantics, dependence or selfish love, i.e. to everything above mentioned…“Enchanted, bewitched”…
Did you happen to watch The Matrix? So…here it is again, the Matrix!
Have you fallen for someone? Do emotions full up the cup? Is your body and consciousness filled with bliss and ecstasy? Do you want that it lasts forever? What can be more wonderful than first experience of infatuation or new sexual feelings?!...Calm down: you are being brainwashed! You are being brainwashed by your own Inner Gods in the most ancient fail-safe way. By rigid biochemical methods you are being subjugated to their will and to a rigid program. “The Matrix has you!” Your biochemical “ports” and brain structures are being connected to the tubes through which they dope you with an elusive reality that definitely doesn’t work for you. And no one will give you red or blue pill – from this Matrix Morpheus will not free you. The thing is that this Matrix is not outside. It exists almost from the moment people appeared on earth and it has been mastering them for thousands of years. It lives inside of us. Its architect is Drive/Appetence. The name of the Matrix is Genes. Its agents are Hormones and Neuromediators. Their weapon is Endorphins. And their mask is Infatuation, Passion and also Aggression (from mainstream “fanciness” to a literal war)…Did you know that? Have you even felt there’s something wrong with this world?
Well, there is a way out! It’s a loving ennoblement of animal-instinctive-reflexive and childish-selfish nature of our “selves”. Yes, there is a way out, but it’s only twinkling over there, somewhere high above; the path is tight; conditions of freedom are strictly set up – self work. It’s not an easy one, by the way. Self-denial – is a moral attribute, sense of freedom of a human consciousness from restricting influence of the lower, selfish nature so that the headship of the higher, spiritual being would be established (sounds posh, but this is how it is, after all).
The true love is a path of reason that has a trusting and warm mutual understanding with emotions, the path of self-discipline and love. To love in the outside is possible only if the inside is in harmony. Where infatuation meets reason the space appears in which all things desirable for a human being can become reality. All you need – is just a loving reason. Reason alone becomes a cold intellect. Frontal lobe can turn both unmerciful, retributory tyrant and “saint” acting only by the book, like Pharisees. Infatuation alone turns into a frenzy of wild passion that is a law unto itself. But loving reason can never become neither the first, nor the second. It will give you a new sort of integrity, new personality in which intellect of a human being interweaves with pure emotions of a happy, joyful Child and also with mightiness, power and instinctive wisdom of ennobled Animals.
Inner Gods and Inner Children of ours – is an enormous potential for growth, - to Personality, to Logos. Denial of natural-unbridled in a human being leads to draining and drying of life springs. When consciousness represses and supersedes unconscious-unbridled, something inevitably breaks inside of us (the lion’s share of neuroses is a result of suppressed desires).
There is another extreme – appeasing gods’ desires, so that, when they get strong and start to “rule”, we behave correspondingly. But when the Ego (I) at all withdraws, this potential becomes a path to self-destruction: victory of Subconscious leads to Chaos (psychosis). So what are we supposed to do? As it was told above – love! We are supposed to learn to love them. Ultimately all these gods-programs mean well to us (or, rather, they mean what they consider to be well). They need help to be reprogrammed, transformed. Then, in their turn, they will help us in a new, more correct way. What should our help be? Should it be enforcement? Training roots in violence: to tame a wild animal man should cow it into submission, to prove his superiority, which is only possible by suppressing the will of an animal (from fr. “dresser” – tame). We need another path.
Depth psychology can help you.
The right path is intelligent contact with our desires and emotions. Nonviolence is not passivity – it’s a skill of “ironing out” difficulties. Culture of Light in relations with the inner world, kindness and respect subconsciously form soft contact.
Of course, parenting is not possible from a position of weakness – it takes strength, which creates energy field of influence. Feel this line between field of influence and field of violence.
In doing good be consistent. Don’t doubt – Light and Kindness come back to the one who shares them, for such exchange is a foundation of life in the Universe: “overcome evil with good…Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”
Below are the fragments of the movie “How to Train Your Dragon”. Look at how the loving kindness is able to turn even a reptile into a loyal friend)
To be able to help the ones who are inside, you need to train yourself. We will talk about it in the end.
The pain of a human being born.
An animal doesn’t choose: it is driven by desires. A human has to take a position towards the “want”. Human possesses appetences, but appetences do not possess him. Or, rather, appetences do not wear him thin. Human being – is a creature that can always say “no” to his appetences and doesn’t have to always say “yes” or “amen” to them. This freedom includes also possibility to become either a nonhuman, or a Man; the Black Whole (that can only swallow) or a Sun (that gives in the outside). Everything depends on who (unconditional, inborn or acquired, consciously formed and suffered reflexes) will hear from you: “We’re of the same blood”…That’s why the most formative lessons are learnt, as a rule, through pain, through suffering, - through denial of the desirable, through estrangement from the “rush” of The Matrix…And it has a really hypnotic power. In the latter case withdrawals are to be expected. But for the sake of what? The possibility is given to go beyond your limits, to leave the Body (“I want”), - and to be born from the Spirit (“must”). That is when the transformation happens; through pain of refusal. This will be the pain of Personality being born and pain of its growth. The Light of the Above will appear. It will make you a Man. Now you can also give. You can bring the Light, first – to the inside of you…in your darkness…for them…
“I see a great edifice. In front a portal opens wide. Beyond the portal I see a gloomy haze. Before the high threshold stands a girl . . . a Russian girl. Freezing winds blow from out of that impenetrable gloom and from the depths of the edifice comes a slow hollow voice:
- Oh, you, who wish to cross this threshold, do you know what awaits you?
- I know, - the girl replies.
- Cold, hunger, hatred, mockery, scorn, injury, sickness, even death.
- I know.
- Alienation, complete isolation.
- I know. I am ready. I shall bear all the sufferings, all the blows.
- Not only from enemies, but even from relatives, friends?
- Yes – even from them.
- Good. Are you ready for sacrifice?
- Yes.
- For anonymous sacrifice? You will die, and no one will even know how to honor your memory.
- I need neither thanks nor pity. I need no name.
- Do you know, - the voice went on saying, - that you may dissuade yourself of what you now believe, that you may come to understand that you have deceived yourself and have given your young life in vain?
- I know that too. I still want to enter.
- Enter!
The girl crossed the threshold and a heavy curtain fell over the entrance.
- Fool! - said someone from behind it.
- Saint! - came the answer from somewhere.” (I.S. Turgenev “The Threshold”)
But where does such a sacrificial power come from? And where to take the Light from?
“Not by body alone, not by sex alone”
People in all times suspected, that the task to reproduce – is not the only aim of love. Those, who, from different reasons (age, injury, disease, etc.), cannot have offspring, fall in love as well…The same conclusion, - that love and reproduction, though being interdependent, are not the same, - is reached by scholars. Harvard University Professor of Aesthetics Elaine Scarry in her tract on beauty considers love as a special case of human admiration of beauty, of any beautiful objects – flowers, birds, music. The primary desire of a human being, claims Scarry, is to follow beauty and to try to reproduce this beauty and then to create it. Beauty – is something that doesn’t need verbal description. It evokes feelings and emotions, resonates with the heart. It attracts you. And you understand that this beauty – is a part of you, your essence, you have recognized it in yourself.
So, you say that sense of love is in reaching beauty and multiplying it? Perfect. But how to define “beauty”, if everything that we can percept is in the material world, in which every admiration ends with disappointment and life ends with death?
Let’s recall – we, according to the Holy Scriptures, are created in the image of God. So, divine criteria for beauty, harmony, truth are present in us, we often feel them, but…Yes, they are present, but they are deafened, suppressed by the Serpent that whispered once: “you can decide yourselves what is good for you and what is desirable for you…take, and you will be like God”.
These words still echo in us, in the reptile complex of our brain. We don’t want to bother, look for something, struggle, we choose what is closer and simpler, something that doesn’t require efforts and work. For, “there's nothing so useless, as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all” (or Sine magistris vitia descuntur – To do evil the one doesn’t need to be taught).
Love is a divine affair in which mortals try to take part. To love is to touch the most important mystery of the genesis. But to touch doesn’t mean to solve. We try, but it doesn’t work somehow. Maybe it’s because we try to catch happiness of love by intuition? Or by the method of shooting in the dark…or by “let the heart decide” method…or by “listen to yourself” one? If we act only by intuition, it means our frontal lobe is “out of the play”. So what influences us? To get the answer we need to recall all the above mentioned…
If we look inside of ourselves, into our depths, the first ones to be seen will be our Children with divine power, then – mighty human-animal gods. And deeper is sitting enthroned even mightier, imperious reptile-god (snake or a crocodile). The God of enchanting coituses and passionate desires:
“Studies of the brain of infatuated ones showed where the “center of love” is situated in a brain”. It’s a tiny area in middle-lower part of brain, which is called VTE (ventral tegmental area) and is involved in dopamine production. This is a part of reward system. This part of brain is much deeper than our system of perception and consciousness; it’s even lower than our emotional centers. It is connected to what is called reptilian core – the most primitive part of brain. It is responsible for desires, motivation, for ability to crave for something and to concentrate on the object of your desire.” (S. Senenko, Chaskor.ru)
Reptile-god…God that forces you to crave…It is told that crocodile-god Sobek, patron of pharaohs, “takes women from their men any time he wants, - according to his desire”. But he also makes grass of the river shores and valleys green, i.e. from the ancient times he has been responsible for reproduction and plant abundance.” (piramidavorever.ru/religija)
Indifference to the consequences of actions towards other people is peculiar to him. If to put it into modern language, - “the winner takes it all”, “success is never blamed”, “who has the gold, makes the rules”… Function of the reptile brain, no doubt, is useful and needed to fulfill an order “go forth and multiply”. But if the search of pleasures becomes the main thing, we are trapped. Remember: with the help of mass media influence they want to shut us in reptile brain…Everything that “gods” want from us – is any sensual “I want” energy. And the energy of passion – is in front of the line. No wonder that somebody once told:
“…when a person gets overwhelmed with passion, he craves that there is no God”
Doesn’t seem to be quite the thing, right?
But you shouldn’t forget that there is a complementarity to the opposite direction: there, higher, first goes our conscience (powerful controller of our behavior) plus “ideal self” concept (what a person thinks he can or should be).
Higher – is the Teacher, Christ (Teacher, Ideal, Example) – of whom it is told “Here is the man”.
Jesus, God’s Word, came to teach us another kind of love.
(Logos – from gr. “λόγος” – “Word”)
(Let’s notice that only man has the second signal system, in which the conditioned stimulus is word. If a person accepts important for him words, impulse appears, which is processed by forebrain cortex, frontal lobe. New reflexes are formed. On these new reflexive paths the character building is based, as well as production of new values of moral consciousness, pursuit of the perfect etc. For that to be achieved the word not only has to be read and heard, but taken by frontal lobe as very important information, i.e. first the word has to cause neural excitation in primary cortex areas and then in secondary ones and in overlapping regions. It means that in its development second signal system relies on the first signal system. On the language of psychology it means, that highest manifestations of psyche (moral consciousness, virtue) are only possible if based on senses, perceptions, emotions, i.e. based on sensual experiences of the lowest brain structures: Animal and Child)
He is Logos, the Word about self-denying love (which is unnatural for the way we are now, unnatural for appetences of our Ego). Are you surprised? Revise the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5, 6, 7)
He teaches us how to retrain our frontal lobe.
The highest – is the One.
His name is: “He causes to become”.
It is told of him: “God is Love”. “For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light.”
God dwells in unapproachable light, but still reveals himself into the outside. God makes connection with his creation through His Word.
It was he, to whom Jesus prayed:
“I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.”
A man feels there is something above him, for what he “sublimates”, in the name of what he acts and offers up sacrifices, in the name of what he can even sacrifice himself, his “self”. Love, which is always a passion in the depths of you, becomes the true love to the degree to which it is transformed by the act of will of frontal lobe. To the degree to which from a passionate love it becomes love spiritual, Divine. Such transformation can be described by the term “sublimation of passion”: passions (they are sensuous in nature) convert into being spiritual by that they obey the will. Will shouldn’t extinguish them; it should only sublime them by teaching how to be in harmony with the higher aims of frontal lobe (this is what is called “self-denial”). To the degree we manage to perform such transformation, our passions become trained and…give us spiritual power!
In our genesis love – is an ability to accept presence of the Divine, that “causes to become”, to become a Man.
If you want to have something you’ve never had, you will have to do something you’ve never done.
This is no joke. Power of the Serpent and also mightiness of Inner Animals and Inner Children in the process of selection have to be transformed into formative energy of Man, energy that is merged with triumph of the powers of Logos. The path of realization of personality lies from unconscious through conscious to superconscious. (It has come to my mind: “The most exhausting work – is self-work, but the sweetest victory – is victory over yourself”)
Exit from average-normal state is possible. All highest achievements of man; geniality, meditativeness and creativity are connected with it. This is why only a human can be called a creature that overcomes itself. This exit from an average-normal state (which is created by our consumer society) is what forms a personality, before whom the prospective of whole eternity has always to be opened, eternity and love.
Love begins when with all my essence I can perceive the deepest entity of another person. Any beauty (external) can be deformed, spoiled. Love’s business – is to look at a person and at the same time to see his inherent beauty and to sorrow at what life “has done” to him. Love – is at the same time pain for imperfectness of a person, and celebration of his beauty. To love is to give someone opportunity to absolutely open himself. The one should love not for virtues, but despite imperfections, love just for being a human, God’s creation…(we are talking about the third type of love)
Love – is a chance. Chance – in battling yourself, in battling your “natural” – to come out of yourself (from a sphere of free nature), - towards the One who loved you: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3)
“To tell someone "I love you" is tantamount to telling him or her, "you shall never die" (G. Marcel)
They say that time and love pass, but time says that those pass, who don’t love.
When you overcome the “I want”, you find out you’re absolutely different. Exit from the lowest deity enables you to feel the highest one. And it turns out that this is what has always been in you, what you have always felt inside, - image of God.
What is intended for us by God is way more than what we can imagine: “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that[h] the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.” (Romans 8)
This is incomprehensible – “the freedom and glory of the children of God”! Indeed we are a mystery to ourselves. For the mystery is what we carry inside – image of God!...
Not for the reason, Lord, you are so mighty and ungraspable
Before my consciousness that is in lurch,
That in most starry day your Seraphim
Lit up huge sphere above the world of yours…
The reason you‘re so mighty and ungraspable is rather that myself I am
So powerless and momentary
But still, in chest of mine I carry, like that Seraph,
The flame that’s stronger and far brighter than whole Universe.
- Fet
In reality no one can give you love. And no one can get love from you. We can only, by knowing better the Father, “come to know/feel” His love in ourselves and we can “come to know/feel” the same kind of love in others. And when the “coming to know” happens, there are no more “others”, for in others you “come to know” yourself, i.e. God, i.e. His image.
Etymologically Russian word for “happiness” (schastie) has the meaning of “sharing” in itself.
(I’ve just tried to give a short answer to the question about what I mean by my definition of love in the interview “Love Crisis in Modern Society” http://olex.pp.ua/content/kriza-lyubovi)
And then everybody, who “came to know” God, “came to know” themselves, “came to know” others, will join into one system. Sharing… Maybe this is what Jesus meant, when in his prayer to God asked: “may all be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us…” (John 17)
And that will be the Personality (not just a body) in Love.
(the information is taken from different open sources)