In the last post I mused on how life is like a river, and how it is important to navigate it rather than just drift where the current takes you.
That raises the question of where you should steer. What should you aim towards? Where do you want your life to go?
That is not a trivial question to answer, especially once you realise that there are an almost limitless number of possibilities for how you can productively use your time. Should you be an astronaut? Or a writer? A parent? A missionary, soldier, shepherd, games developer, counsellor, magistrate, entrepreneur, foster carer, artist, athlete, candlestick maker, journalist, politician, doctor, twitter warrior, or hermit?
One of the true blessings of a free society is that those of us fortunate enough to live in them are able to choose from a wide range of occupations. We can decide where to focus our energies. We can succeed if we can find an undertaking that matches our skills.
OK, most of us will never play in the NBA or conduct the London Symphony orchestra, but we can build a stable and happy life with people who love us – as dentists, carpenters, builders, receptionists, wedding planners, photographers, parents, aunts and uncles.
Given this embarrassment of riches, it can feel like something of a personal failure if we struggle to find meaning. Given all the opportunities, surely we can find something that we care about? How can so many people be living lives of quiet desperation when they have the freedom to choose how to spend their time and energy?
I suspect that this question is answered by the philosophical ramblings in the last post: most of us drift into adulthood without really taking the time to think about the choices we are making. And once you come to the realisation that your life could be different if you make a purposeful decision to change it, where do you start?
Most people like lots of things. Most people are competent at lots of things, but don’t obviously excel at anything. How can you find purpose when given too much choice? Well, despite the wide landscape of opportunity, and the rich diversity of people, there are some core elements that determine life satisfaction for almost everyone. The philosophers and psychologists are pretty united on this. So, that seems a promising starting point to begin the search for purpose.
The three key areas of life
- Physical and mental health
- Meaningful relationships
- A fulfilling occupation
If you neglect any of those areas, your life is likely to deteriorate. If you work on improving any of them, your life will get better. If you want to be more purposeful, focusing your attention on one of these areas is the surest way to find direction.
As ever, there are complexities. These areas of life are interconnected in important ways, which means that if you improve any one area, all the others improve too. If you improve your health, you will have more energy and confidence to expend on the other two. If your relationships improve, you will feel more optimistic and more motivated. There are positive feedback loops that reinforce.
The second complexity is that we are most of us constrained. Our occupation needs to generate enough money to pay our bills and meet the essential needs of life. We don’t choose many of our most important relationships (family of origin, especially), and they can sometimes be difficult. Many health problems are outside of our control.
The purposeful response to these complexities is simple: do the best you can with each strand within the constraints you have.
Where to start?
The surefire way to make a rapid improvement in quality of life is to identify which of the three strands is currently holding you back, or causing the most stress. Then, make some plans, and take some first small steps to improving things.
Physical and mental health:
We all know what needs to be done to boost our health: eat well and take regular exercise (both weight bearing and cardio). I won’t give advice here – God knows there are a million and one resources online – but the best concise summary I’ve come across is Michael Pollan’s famous dictum:
Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.
Aim modestly. Your goal is to maximise your chance of success by making tweaks not grand gestures. Swap candy for fruit. Buy a smaller plate, so that your portion size is automatically reduced. Go for a swim once a week. Try a meditation app. Join a yoga class.
The important point is that any step taken to improve mental or physical health is a step forward.
Meaningful relationships:
There are three major relationships that shape our lives: family, friends and romantic partners. You can’t choose family, but you can try and improve your relationship with them. Some parents or siblings are totally toxic, but others are just thoughtless and self-centred, rather than actively malicious. There are things you can try to improve your interactions with them.
Pick up a book on communication skills, and work to improve yours (listening is the critical skill). Try to be honest and patient with yourself and others. Steel yourself to having difficult conversations that have been put off too long.
If you need more friends or a romantic partner, you need to engage with the world. Join a club. Work on your small talk skills. Seek out communities online that have real life meet ups.
Occupation:
All work requires sacrifice. People generally pay you to do something because it requires labour that they don’t want to do. It also comes with opportunity costs – if you are doing one thing you cannot do another. When it comes to occupation, the limited, irredeemable resource is time. It is the one way in which we are truly equal. You cannot buy it, and everyone has the same amount each day, so you need to use it wisely.
The sweet spot for life satisfaction is to spend most of your time doing something that is lucrative enough to sustain the lifestyle you prefer, while getting fulfilment from the labour itself. Both of those elements are important.
Artists can live financially impoverished lives, but don’t care too much if they are consumed by their creative work. Senior partners of financial firms jet around the world and live lavish lifestyles, because they thrive on the status and workaholic competition.
Most of us find a middle ground – working to earn enough for our families needs, and finding creative outlets in our spare time. The trap is when we drift into an occupation that becomes drudgery, expand our lifestyle to meet the limits of our income, and then realise that a decade has passed without us having achieved much to feel proud of.
The small steps to improve occupation depend on your current situation. If you have responsibilities and commitments, then it will need some finesse. Look to alternative careers. Research your options. Could you set up in private practice? Could you set up a side hustle that could give a financial boost or become a new career? Could you work on your mindset and try to rediscover the fulfilling elements of your current job?
If you are younger and freer, the best advice I have come across for how to choose an occupation is from Mel Robbins. Don’t choose something you are passionate about, choose something that you find energising. Try to focus on an occupation where the labour involved is satisfying in itself.
Some people get completely absorbed in spreadsheets and calculations. Some people love researching a new topic, and synthesising their discoveries into a short report. Some people lose hours happily creating a beautiful garden. Some people enjoy imposing order on a chaotic environment.
Working with your temperament is the key to a satisfying job.
Next, actually do it
OK. So, those are the three areas that are likely to have the biggest impact on life, and the best starting point for finding purpose. There is a bit of a problem, though, and that’s the fact that most of this is… kind of obvious. Many of these ideas are self evident.
Yeah, wow, eat less junk food. Thanks Dr L! That literally never occurred to me before.
Imaginary cynical reader
Many people will dismiss them as trite and simpleminded, and find some useful rationalisations as to why they don’t apply to themselves for some reason.
If that is your impulse, see it as an opportunity to spot your own mental constraints. Is it really the case that you have properly tried these tactics and they failed, or is it more that you half-heartedly tried them from a starting position of scepticism and then when the plan inevitably failed, you at least felt the self-satisfaction of being right all along?
Most of us actually know what we should be doing to make our lives better. We know it deep down. It’s revealed by the uncomfortable pang of shame about our inability to do what needs to be done. We sense that really trying and failing would be devastating, and so we avoid that risk. It is formidably hard to confront the fears and insecurities that keep us where we are.
There are two good ways to respond to this emotional paralysis: first, as outlined above, take small steps. Don’t go straight for the spectacular gesture, go for the incremental improvement. Second, work on developing more strength of character.
We’ll cover that next week.
I am enjoying these posts on purposeful living. And this is just my experience, but I would not ever put the words “fulfilling” and “occupation” in the same sentence. I went to graduate school years ago to redirect myself into another field, and I enjoyed graduate school, but there was a stark difference between school and doing my major for a living. It was a very deadline-driven job, and every day my boss’ question was, “What you got for today?” Four years of this. And part of me wanted to say, “I got nothing. I want to sit on my butt and look at the internet.” 🙂 Having to be somewhere every day, being told what to do, folding my interests into that of an organization … something I enjoyed became something I had to do. I had a friend who used to say, “It’s called work. If it was play, they’d call it play.”
Yeah, that is most people’s experience for sure, Marcia. It is hard to find a job that is such a good match that you do enjoy the labour (though they do exist for some people). Another point is that even otherwise good jobs will always have some drudgery work that is soul sapping. As you say, if it was all good it would be play.
But, I suspect many people don’t even consider the fact that they could choose to do something different with the lives. Sunk cost fallacy probably plays a role, along with the general expectation that jobs are awful by their nature. It does take an act of will to start considering radical new options…
“It does take an act of will to start considering radical new options…”
It’s possible but difficult to try to enter a completely new field. It sometimes means starting at the very bottom in an entry-level job. Once you have a few jobs on the resume in a certain field, it does cement expectations in some ways. HR people are not the most imaginative when it comes to relevant skills. They want to hire someone who’s done the exact same job already. Going back to school wipes the slate clean, but that can be expensive, and, depending on your age, difficult to pay back.
I accidentally posted this to the “Loneliness of Limernece” so maybe DrL can delete that one.
Song of the Day #2: “Watching the Wheels” – John Lennon (1980)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RU—2beeoU
If you want to read two interesting books about managing your life, check out “The Drunkard’s Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives” by Leonard Mlodinow and “Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Market” by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
The basic premise in both is that most people don’t really have a clue as to how things work and models may be imprecise.
When I think of my life in terms of randomness, I may owe my current situation to some nameless Naval officer in BUPERS who matched my profile to a certain submarine that because of the SALT I treaty and the Navy having a brand new submarine base with no submarines to put there at the time, was reassigned to a port outside Seattle. He didn’t know me from Adam. His job was to put officers where submarines needed them at the time. They needed a Sonar Officer and I had an Electrical Engineering degree. Seattle was my second or third choice of home ports. Close enough.
On that boat, was a certain officer who because of a mutual interest suggested I contact Service Corps of Retired Executives, a US Government Small Business Administration program that provided free mentorship to aspiring investors and entrepreneurs. Some random person there assigned me a mentor who turned out to be a con man and scammed me and others, including LO #2’s parents, out of a lot of money. He was later convicted and sent to prison for bilking $3 Million from his fellow church parishioners. (True) The US Government had delivered me into the hands of a con man.
As if this couldn’t be any weirder, he introduced me to LO #2 who was the daughter of another one of his marks. (Seriously) Even weirder, when LO #2 got married and returned to Seattle, her husband and the con man worked together. I don’t know if he was involved in anything shady. The con man’s wife seemed to genuinely feel sorry for me and introduced me to at least 3 women.
There’s more to the story of how my jacket got to the detailer when it did but the point is that one guy who never met me started an almost unbelievable chain of events.
But, it’s all true.
“THOUGH I HAVE SOME RESERVATIONS ABOUT WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF WE COLLECTED A GROUP OF SINGLE, PRIMED LIMERENTS TOGETHER”
Nothing as not enough uncertainty! 🙂
I get a lot of satisfaction from, and am very motivated by my occupation currently… I wonder if my LO being my boss is something to do with it 🙂
Seriously though, I do think mental attitude plays a huge role in how purposeful or satisfying you find relationships/work/life/etc… grass is always greener and all that. Plus limerence has that tendency to make everything else seem a tad unsatisfying by comparison.
Except work for me at least.
“I get a lot of satisfaction from, and am very motivated by my occupation currently… I wonder if my LO being my boss is something to do with it 🙂”
Allie,
LOL! You could be writing my story! And if the LO boss is your biggest cheerleader… and hence you work harder… and hence that becomes more of a life purpose… leading to even more LE involvement… GAH! Such a tangled web 🙂
Blue Ivy,
For me, the same. I have met several LOs at work. I wonder if it’s some elaborate defense mechanism to make a boring job interesting. All of a sudden, I want to go to work! And I’m getting all fixed up — hair done, make up on, slightly tighter shirt :). Stuff I cared far less about before the LO was on the scene.
I’m restating this but before I knew about limerence, I knew my thoughts were not healthy.
I was mid-life, mid-divorce and, I believed, strangely in love with a man unworthy who lived far away.
I decided to search for a new job across the country, thinking this challenge would throw me into a new state of mind.
It didn’t. I could not stop thinking of LO. I would be mid-day at new job and tear up. I’d date someone new and not care. I’d explore this new city or spend time with loved ones and underneath everything all the time were thoughts of LO. When I woke up, when I went to sleep.
As long as he replied to texts or called/answered mine, the connection continued. I was limiting contact then.
I went NC finally after a year and my misery continued for months.
I kept doing things to find purpose and will continue to do so.
It’s the quiet and lack of distractions that do me in.
Beth,
“I kept doing things to find purpose and will continue to do so.”
I am doing the same thing. I worked on my side hustle artistic project yesterday. Today I am going to a meetup group. So I am trying to work on some of these areas mentioned in this post … but nothing I have tried so far has compared to whatever limerence provided (at least in the beginning). It feels like being offered a vegan, gluten free cookie after having my meals prepared by a Michelen chef. Intellectually, I know that limerence is unhealthy and that I was wasting my time with that particular LO. But there’s still this sense of loss hat nothing else has replaced. Maybe it’s impossible to fill that loss because limerence is largely a fantasy, and any real-life attempts will fall short (particularly when I’m dealing with people as I have found the only strategy is dial my expectations way down 🙂 ).
Marcia,
“It feels like being offered a vegan, gluten free cookie after having my meals prepared by a Michelen chef.”
That’s the most difficult part. Hard to find a replacement for it. You’ve talked about your side hustle and I’ve often thought about trying to find something.
I moved nearly two years ago, about 6 months into this LE, and can’t believe how little it affected rumination. Thought for sure it would shake me up.
I traveled this past weekend, attended a wedding, had a great time…LO was there but definitely faded.
I know it’s all in my head. Some unmet need or desire. Knowing that doesn’t always help.
Beth,
“I traveled this past weekend, attended a wedding, had a great time…LO was there but definitely faded.”
Same here. I actually had a great time at the meetup. The organizer has a theme and we have a discussion. Small talk is discouraged, so it’s right up my alley. Some really smart, articulate, emotive people, particularly the guys (all millennials), which I’m not used to because the men in my family are very inexpressive.
“I know it’s all in my head. Some unmet need or desire. Knowing that doesn’t always help.”
I’m right there with you. Intellectually, I know it’s something in me, but I don’t know what to do about it.
“I know it’s all in my head. Some unmet need or desire. Knowing that doesn’t always help…I’m right there with you. Intellectually, I know it’s something in me, but I don’t know what to do about it.”
Find out what it is and fix it.
It may not be easy. Finding the right therapist to help is hard. The therapist has to know what they’re doing and a lot of them don’t.
Confronting unpleasant truths can be really painful. It has the potential to radically alter your life and change life-long relationships.
But, as Bowlby said in his video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAAmSqv2GV8), “If it’s true, it’s true.” The context may not apply but the sentiment does.
Sometimes, a change of scene helps. Most of the time, the only thing that changed is the location.
Have you ever heard the expression, “Wherever you go, there you are.”? Check out https://galadarling.com/article/wherever-you-go-there-you-are/. It’s pretty simplistic but there’s a lot of material out there that talks about that if you don’t deal with your baggage, it follows you forever.
The baggage I took into my relationship with LO #2 followed me right into my marriage. I may not have come out of my relationship with LO #2 with any more baggage than I went in with but I sure as hell didn’t come out of it with any less.
You can banish your demons, you can try to run from your demons, or you can learn to live with your demons.
LE,
Nah, I’m “therapied -out.” I’ve been in and out of therapy for at least 5 years and basically asking the same question: What do you fill your life with if you don’t want to structure it around the same things everybody else does? And I’ve never gotten an answer. The fact is, there is no answer.
I will agree with you that you always take you with you. But I do think having a purpose is key. More important than even having people in your life because if those people bail, you still have your purpose.
Marcia,
Maybe you need to ask a different question.
“What do you fill your life with if you don’t want to structure it around the same things everybody else does? And I’ve never gotten an answer. The fact is, there is no answer.”
Maybe the question can be reframed differently. Maybe the answer doesn’t lie in a “what” question. Maybe the answer lies in a “why” question. In my experience, it’s easier to change something when I know the reason I was doing it the way I was and understand why what I was doing wasn’t working.
LE,
I should have been clearer. I am ambivalent about long-term relationships, I don’t want children and I’m not close with my family of origin. Those are your options as a middle-aged person in the U.S. That is what everyone else prioritizes and structures their lives around. So there is no answer to my question.
Marcia,
I don’t know what to say.
Some people seem to be destined to go through life as unhappy people. I don’t understand it but it seems to be true. Between happy and unhappy, happy seems better.
I think LO #2 was one of those people. It was like the woman had a pathological aversion to happiness. The closer she got to it the more it scared the living sh-t out of her. I actually told her that if she didn’t figure some things out, she had the potential to go through life as a very unhappy person.
Five years later, at our last meeting, in an Italian restaurant in Seattle, the last thing I remember LO #2 ever saying to me is, “You told me that you thought I had the potential to go through life as a very unhappy person. I hate you for that.”
If I ever do talk to LO #2 again, I’m going to ask her if she did.
LE,
Never mind. We are talking past each other. Almost 2 different languages.
Marcia – have you ever tried religion? I say that slightly tongue in cheek as I am a non-religious atheist but it does seem to give many people purpose. If you are an atheist like me, Buddhism is god-free and can be pretty secular. Also teaches you how to find happiness from within.
Allie,
Yes, I have been a Buddhist for about 2 years. I just don’t like middle age. I graduated late from college, so at 25 … I was getting up at 9:30, going to class, discussing Jane Austen books, going back to my room, writing a paper, taking a nap, meeting up with friends (where there’s a sense you’re all in it together), hitting the school disco, maybe picking somebody up if I got really lucky because almost every one was available and it was the best I was ever going to look, and calling the friends the next day to give all the excruciating details. 🙂 It sure beats working every day and meeting up with friends for a lunch every blue moon to talk about home renovations. 🙂 I’ll stop talking. I hung out with younger people this weekend and wanted to yell, “Whatever you are going to do, do it NOW! You won’t have a chance to do it later!” 🙂
Marcia,
You have purpose.
You’re Wendy.
Your purpose is to find a Peter Pan LO who’ll whisk you off to Neverland where your life will be all fun and adventure and you never have to grow up. You can skip the Lost Boys part, it’s your fantasy.
But, Barrie did call it Neverland for a reason.
All you need to do is define what a contemporary Neverland looks like to you. Then you can find the LO to take you there. How hard can that be?
Problem solved.
@Marcia
Ah yes university….the best years of my life I think! And agree about middle age – if your life’s purpose isn’t kids, gardening , charity work, home renovations etc, it can be a bit challenging. And I have kids and a spouse! If we were on the same continent I’d suggest meeting up for a night out… of the completely let your hair down variety!
Allie,
That’s sweet. Thank you. I had 2 friends call me yesterday, and I enjoyed chatting with them, but I call them storytelling friendships — I tell them my stories, they tell me theirs. Maybe we’ll get together for coffee a month from now, but we’re not really in each others’ lives and experiencing adventures together. We’re on the periphery, and the friendships don’t feel like all that much, like they used to. I guess it’s inevitable.
I find it is a real sense of day to day invested-in-each other community that is missing. Thousands of years has shrunk networks of large vibrant interrelated tribes & villages down to just the nuclear family. Which isn’t enough. My kids are older and I now feel so ready to live some of my thirties all over again. Except many of my best friends are busy going to the garden centre or painting their spare bedroom. It is so much fun fun when we do get together but it is not often enough for me.
Allie,
“I find it is a real sense of day to day invested-in-each other community that is missing. ”
That is exactly what I miss. When a former crush reappeared in my life a few months ago, I called 2 friends who were supportive and listened, but neither has asked me about it after the initial conversation (probably because we don’t talk enough for them to even remember). And I had to go through the whole backstory with them. I miss having a friend who I could just call up and say, “You aren’t going to believe what that guy did,” and they’d know immediately who “that guy” is and the history. And we’d laugh about it and talk about what a weasel his is. 🙂
“Except many of my best friends are busy going to the garden centre or painting their spare bedroom. ”
And I fail to see why those things would be more interesting than a few shots and a male strip club 🙂 or even a nice dinner and conversation with someone who knows and understands you.
Ha ha ha! Sounds fun 🙂
DrL,
With all due respect, Allie 1 took an excerpt from my post NOT about her and made it so.
I was referring to posts that speak in a glowing way about limerence.
Allie 1, I’m aware of the neurochemical changes caused by limerence but I’m not required to agree with your point of view.
An addiction by its nature is not a healthy or positive thing. I received some fantastic things from limerence for many months…I even wrote a short story connected to LO. But like any addiction, the long term effects are not what anyone would desire.
Allie 1, you chose to make personal observations (that I must feel threatened) and then take things personally (you don’t feel welcome). It’s unclear why you feel the need for me to validate your views.
I appreciate this board and the opportunity/support it gives, but I will not be admonished by another poster into agreeing when I don’t.
Peace and best wishes to all.
@ Beth
Certainly no admonishment was intended and of course you do not need to agree with me, wouldn’t be much of a debate of you did :-). I am just expressing what I think and how I feel, as are you.
The you being threatened comment was an impression I developed over time, clearly a wrong one, and an unhelpful comment to make.
From my perspective, I would just request that you do not keep dismissing my experience as “not being limerence”. You do not know me so cannot make that call. I have read posts from many here with a similar experience to me. And I have often acknowledged the negative side to my addiction so of course agree with you in this.
I have been pondering your “unhelpful” comment. I realise that I was also a bit dismissive – please accept my apology for that (though not for my perspective).
I used to be a smoker – the type that chain smoked 30+ per day and could not go more than 45 minutes without a fix. I occasionally met “occasional smokers” that claimed they could “take or leave” smoking, and only smoked “a couple a day”, maybe only socially. I was always perplexed at how they could be an occasional addict, and not have to increase their dose over time like I had to. I tried to quit many times. My failures always came down to convincing myself that I could also be that occasional smoker. I could just have 1 or 2 when out at weekends, that wouldn’t harm me too much would it? It never worked of course, I always slid back to my 30+ a day.
What I subsequently realised is that occasional smokers spend all day, every day thinking about, craving for and waiting for that occasional cigarette. It is the highlight of their life, yet in the end, it tends to spoil most of the time they are not smoking. That is limerence for me. Maybe I seem like that “occasional smoker” to you? Unintentionally promising limerents the best of all worlds, yet when you scratch the surface, the reality does not live up the implicit promise?
Extending this analogy, I guess I see my happy life/good SO/good reciprocating LO/mindfulness skills as my using a vape instead of cigarettes. I am still just as addicted, just as craven, and become utterly miserable if I don’t get a regular fix, but I have removed 90% of the potential (mental) health damage.
Wishing you well.
Allie,
I have the same problem with Diet Coke that you do with cigarettes. I’m not addicted to the caffeine; it’s the aspartame. When I stop drinking it and switch to iced tea, I feel like I have the flu. And I think I can just drink one a week, but then I am white knuckling it until 12: 01 a.m. on the day I can drink it. And one turns into 8 or 10 very quickly. But I feel the same way about limerence. Just knowing my LO was at work and I may run into him was enough to keep me on alert. My entire workplace became associated with him in my mind. I had to get out of there. It’s hard, though, because w/o the Diet Cokes and my recent attempt to cut out most sugar and …no limerence anymore … sigh … feels like solitary confinement at Alcatraz 🙂
Marcia,
There’s something about Aspartame. It seems to have some kind of addictive properties. Maybe DrL could elaborate.
I had a college buddy who hated Diet Coke. He drank Tab when he could find it because it used saccharin.
My MIL used two drink 1 – 2 super Big Gulps (64oz – 128oz) of Diet Coke per day. My FIL might drive 5 miles one way to get her one. But, he may have just been trying to get away from her for awhile. My MIL didn’t like canned soda. She likes fountain drinks.
I had a professor in grad school who said he drank a case of Diet Coke (24 – 12oz cans)/day. If he was awake 16 hours/day, he went through them at the rate of 1.5 cans/hour. At the time, a case of Diet Coke cost about $5 so he was dropping at least $35/week. I don’t know why he brought it up but he did. He told us of reports that Aspartame had some nasty side effects and they appeared to be irreversible. I didn’t do any research so I can’t opine on its credibility. The current reports on Aspartame are interesting but I don’t know how you’d verify their validity.
But, my prof didn’t have any obvious effects and the reports didn’t stop him. My MIL did have some serious health issues but nothing she could positively attribute to Aspartame. I don’t know if my prof ever dropped it but my MIL cut way back, if she didn’t drop it completely. I never asked her why but maybe she just aged out of it.
Things affect people differently.
Forgot to add…
“It’s unclear why you feel the need for me to validate your views.”
When my feelings are publicly invalidated, I feel hurt. It is unclear to me why this is so too. Hardwired human behavior maybe.
I watched a food myth type show on TV – they looked into the effect of sweeteners. It showed they had a similar effect on our body chemistry (insulin levels, etc) as sugar, but without the fattening calories. They also found that just swilling your mouth with a sugary drink and not actually swallowing it also had a similar effect. So our body is primed by our taste buds before we even swallow. I guess sweeteners just mimic sugar on the tongue.
LE,
“There’s something about Aspartame. It seems to have some kind of addictive properties. ”
My father’s side of the family are all alcoholics. I thought I had escaped their issues — and didn’t really want their genes! — but I haven’t.
“My MIL did have some serious health issues but nothing she could positively attribute to Aspartame.”
I actually do. I have stomach pain and the minute I cut out the DC, it goes away. The doctor told me to also cut out all caffeine, chocolate, tomatoes, anything citrus, alcohol or spicy food. Anything overly acidic. What’s left?
Allie,
I read something similar. With fake sweeteners, which are much sweeter than sugar, your body is waiting for a sugar load that never arrives because fake sweeteners have no calories. So you get sugar cravings and they wreck havoc on your hormones.
Marcia,
Your words resonate deeply with me. I think the only things that compare would have an element of risk, challenge and exhiliration. And interaction with people.
Starting a new organization or business, speaking in a high visibility conference, traveling to work in a new part of the world as a member of Peacecorp… just pulling these out of imagination trying to articulate what I’m trying to say.
Still… does it compare to Limerance? Maybe not. But would for sure distract.
Ivy,
During the worst time for me, I considered the peace corps. I was anxious, missing LO…I went on a trip with my daughter. I broke down in tears and gave her just a brief sketch of my inability to get past this.
At that time I was on Facebook and connected to him. My daughter advised me to block him and avoid him on social media.
As I’ve said and posted before, he knew that I was struggling to get past things and I unfriended him. I told him why. He mentioned it later and I couldn’t tell if he was frustrated about it or didn’t care.
I appreciate everyone here but am unnerved by posts from people who almost revel in limerence.
For me, it was the closest I’ve ever been to a nervous breakdown. I’ve lived through extreme poverty, rough times, sexual abuse.
Limerence is up there with any of those.
Blue Ivy,
“I think the only things that compare would have an element of risk, challenge and exhilaration. And interaction with people.”
I know exactly what you are saying. You are speaking my language. I was reading the other day that soul-churning levels of attraction to someone always carry with them an element of danger and uncertainty. So I guess the key is to find those things … without the emotional pain of limerence.
“Starting a new organization or business, speaking in a high visibility conference, traveling to work in a new part of the world as a member of Peacecorp.”
Great suggestions.
“but am unnerved by posts from people who almost revel in limerence”
Given how painful your LE has been for you Beth, I can understand why you would feel that way. I think the vast majority of limerents (myself included) would choose to have never been limerent in the first place, just because it is so intrusive, life dominating and heart-breaking at times. But their are as many flavours of LEs as there are different personalities and LOs. Limerence isn’t always constantly painful, it can be comforting, exciting or pleasurable at times, and can prompt you re-evaluate your life in a positive way. If you enter your LE from a period of contentment with life, your LO is genuinely good and it is barriers rather than uncertainty that fuel the obsession, it does not always make sense to choose the prolonged pain and grief of NC over the ongoing feeling of being cared for by someone you deeply admire or love (but cannot have and unhealthily obsess over). There are many mental techniques to re-focus and address the negative mind chatter and thus minimise the LE pain and loss of life purpose.
Allie 1,
“Limerence isn’t always constantly painful, it can be comforting, exciting or pleasurable at times, and can prompt you re-evaluate your life in a positive way”
Obviously, it started out that way. Truly wonderful and I believed LO might be my future.
But if limerence were generally harmless, there wouldn’t be a support site.
Obsessing about someone you can’t be with may fade over time and cause no lasting harm.
However, if you’re in a period of contentment, as you say, you’re unlikely to fall into limerence to begin with. I’ve certainly had work crushes, friend crushes; fantasies. That’s typical. Those happened during “contentment” and caused no issues.
From my perspective, there’s no limerence lite. If you want to indulge yourself, that’s your call. I was there myself for a long time.
@Beth
I did not say limerence is generally harmless, just that there are a multitude of different LE experiences, and therefore a multitude of “best approaches” in how to deal with it.
“if you’re in a period of contentment, as you say, you’re unlikely to fall into limerence to begin with.”
I strongly disagree. You really believe people can only fall in love if they are unhappy or missing something in their lives? Limerence is just a form of being in-love where the desired relationship is thwarted by circumstance, you become addicted to the “in-love” neurochemicals thus cannot let go or stop thinking about them. The pain of this is highly exacerbated by vulnerability or bad LOs but still happens without either. Regardless of our current situation, sometimes we just meet someone lovely, get to know them platonically and our feelings grow without us even realising it. By the time we do realise, it is too late to apply the brakes – it is already way out of control.
“I’ve certainly had work crushes, friend crushes; fantasies. That’s typical. Those happened during “contentment” and caused no issues.”” This really invalidates the overpowering feelings I have been battling with for the last 1.5 years. I understand the difference between a crush and limerence – I am a lifelong limerent so (unfortunately) have plenty of experience of dealing with it.
I almost get the impression you find my version/experience of limerence threatening in some way. Maybe there is some value for you in understanding why.
Wishing you well.
“I almost get the impression you find my version/experience of limerence threatening in some way.”
Haha! No. I just don’t think it’s limerence.
From what you’ve posted, you’re cherry-picking the best parts of limerence and posting about them in a positive way.
Limerence is, for most, unhealthy and, for me, dangerously so.
Your posts about its benefits are unhelpful.
Again, your response makes me feel like my experience is invalid in some way, which is quite upsetting. Is trying to have a positive mindset a bad thing? Your words make me feel like I am not welcome here. This is a support site for all people requiring support isn’t it, regardless of their mindset or approach?
I see our problem as the same Beth. We are both addicts at the end of the day. We have become completely addicted to the neurochemicals that exposure to our LO triggered in us. We own that, not our LO. We may both have completely different narratives surrounding that addiction but addiction is what this boils down to. I truly wish I wasn’t addicted as I understand its harmful potential. But I am carefully managing my addiction and the mental narratives around it in a way that I feel suits me best, for now at least. Sorry that you find that offensive or unhelpful in some way.
I’d agree with this, Beth and Allie 1. Let’s try and keep it focused on the ideas (rather than the person putting forth the ideas).
From a spectator’s perspective, your different perspectives have been very useful – illuminating the problem from different sides, as it were.
All perspectives are valid and useful for finding the truth, and all helpful for someone out there.
Except the bad faith perspectives, I suppose…
There’s always an exception 🙂
Very true Beth. I’m feeling all of that. I’m NC w my LO for almost 3 mos and it’s just starting to get better…. I’m learning what keeps me fixated on her. Drinking – even just a glass or two. Songs lead to day dreaming. Aloneness ….it’s a fight to control my mind. My mind got me into this and it’s what is going to get me out 👍🏼
Bob,
Keep going 🙂 All you can do.
I’m at 4 months now.
I’ve dated throughout my NC attempts (I’ve had many!) and it’s never worked.
I’m not dating anyone right now. I can’t summon the energy or interest. Not sure whether it’s better or worse.
Even when I’m busy and focused, something will pop up at work to throw me. His birthday will pop up when I check the time at school. I’m not looking for it. In fact, I actively avoid anything that might remind me. Songs, movies.
Stay strong. Keep busy.
Bob, you can get there.
Thank you Beth. Just knowing there’s someone out there who is supportive is huge. Combine that w knowing u are in the Limerent Club makes it even more meaningful. When in hell, don’t stop. Just keep going!! I got used to LE but it was like a friend you over that causes discord and disharmony. Unwinding and withdrawing from that – in secret – is so hard!! I’m pulling and praying for you too, Beth
Clip of the Day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DS1YYtQ_LLY – “Play It Again, Sam” (1972)
Where to find purpose?
You can always try art galleries…
My LO (or the imaginary version of my LO) actually helped me find things I like doing and develop my personality in a very meaningful way… And I’ve been doing these new activities at first just to please him and show him how awesome I am, and then I delved deeper into it while gradually losing contact with the LO. But we are bound to meet in a few months or a year, and even though I had no contact (no texts, even!) with my LO for around 3 years I know I still care a lot about what he will think when he sees me.
See, I had my first LE when I was in the early teens (around 13-14 years old), I’d say that was my first love also. There was no chance for that to grow into anything whatsoever (he was an older guy; we were just friends, texting periodically), but I let my fantasies stay and they shaped me and my taste in men a whole lot. I had been actively limerent (that means daily check of his public accounts and attempts to find more!) for this person for some 2 years, then I got to know other people (= painfully limerent for another guy for about a year; we even started dating, but then he broke up with me out of the blue, I never recovered even though I tried and still try) and almost forgot about the first LO. But now I don’t really have anyone to obsess over, and my mind always goes back to the first LO. The scary thing is, I haven’t seen that person in 5 years, and we met only once or twice (embarrassing, I think he knew I was obsessed with him in a cringey, inappropriate way), but now the feelings are stronger than ever. And I got a lot better at cyberstalking people over the years I wasn’t limerent for him, and I’ve been doing this obsessively for a few weeks now, building up a dossier, and I admit I hacked a few of his accounts, they were empty and useless, but what bothers me is that I can’t control myself at all with this (some time ago I set a rule that I may stalk people, but never hack them or interact from fake accounts)
I know there’s no hope for that relationship nor there will ever be, but I still can’t stop doing this. It’s sort of my comfort zone to have someone to fantasize about and “do Internet research on”. And I keep thinking about how impressed he would be with my smarts and hacking/cracking skills (he sort-of worked in the field).
Sorry this got long. Just venting
Hopeless,
I’m pretty confident he would be angry, not impressed, that you hacked his accounts.
Could you use your IT skills in a positive way that interests you? If might also lead you to meet others with the same interests.
Beth,
How much Bitcoin do you have so she knows how much ransom to ask for when she takes over your account? 🙂
LE,
Maybe she’ll post some spicier stories?
Mine have been a drag since they’re all-limerence-all-the-time.
Y’all are not getting the best of me here.
I was watching the movie “American Beauty” last night, and all I could think was how much the movie is about limerence. The Kevin Spacey character says, “I feel like I have been in a coma for 20 years and I am finally waking up” when he becomes infatuated with his daughter’s friend. And then at the end he actually sees her as a whole, three-dimensional person.
Marcia,
I can’t help but think he must have loved his wife early on. People fall into their day-to-day and it’s easy to forget the early feelings that drew you to one another.
I think the movie is more about him finding himself. But I love the way he quits his job, telling management he spends most of the day masking the contempt he has for them and retiring to the men’s room to jerk off. HA I would love to quit a job like that. He is tired of not existing.
Love that movie! Agree, his limerence woke him to re-evaluating his life. He starting to live life with purpose in his own way after that.
I love it, too. I agree. The limerence wakes him up, not so much to get the LO to but to become a different person. And when he finally has the opportunity to be with the LO, he sees her for who she really is. And not in a bad or disappointing way, but he realizes he shouldn’t take advantage of the situation. It’s a really lovely moment.
That moment is a good lesson to all of us too isn’t it. Just like him, many of us mentally turn our LOs into exactly the person we need to fill our void, when that isn’t who they are in reality. I have found actually getting to know some previous LOs or crushes quite jarring and unsettling – not what I expected at all.
Difficult trying to find purpose when I’m agoraphobic and have few friends. Though it’s probably about time to face the fear. LO3 is someone I only met online for a few meetings. I’m still confused how this can lead to limerence, but it has! The previous 2 were real people. I stayed in contact with them for too long, thought I would be ok with this one – but a few months later I’m still infatuated and it’s making me really miserable! My brain keeps telling me to go out and find him in person, but I don’t go far from home and he lives 100 miles away! I think he’s married anyway. Basically it’s not going to happen. My brain seems to take that in, then forgets and starts planning our future together, then gets upset when it has a reality check! Anyone else had online limerences? Obviously a modern world thing. Wouldn’t have happened 15 years ago!
Jane,
It has not happened to me but it has to friends.
You know this already but going live is different!
You’ve developed an image from texts, pics, talk ,even video.
The smells, nuances and everything in person can strengthen or dispel that attraction.
Best wishes.
Jane,
I could be the poster child for an entirely virtual LE.
I never actually met my last LO. In fact, we never even spoke directly to each other. We did everything via email or PM on her website. It was all very 19th century.
I don’t think my LE/EA was powerful enough to destroy my marriage but nothing about was going to make it any better.
@Aliie1 and Beth.
I really appreciate both your perspectives in this thread, as your good-hearted “clash of views” illuminates the sometimes paradoxical nature of limerence itself, as DR.L points out. I think it’s been a helpful exploration. It’s helped me, as a bystander, gather my thoughts on the subject. 😛
On the one hand, limerence feels amazing in the early stages. I don’t think anyone would disagree with that. It’s probably the highest high anyone could ever experience, and it’s understandable why people would want to return again and again to that feeling, even if they’ve been “burnt” by one or more LOs.
If anyone wants to revel in limerence, unnerving as that revelling might seem, I think they’d revel in the euphoria of the beginning. Or, at least, the memory of the euphoria, the hope, the promise of new love.
Even when limerence descends into the “pure, unrelenting anguish/help-me-I’m-trapped-in-mental-hell” stage, it’s not all bad, because it makes the sufferer feel alive – more alive than they’ve ever felt before. More alive than they may ever feel again. Pleasure can make us feel alive. So can pain – even intense, constant pain.
I agree, though, limerence can be very, very disturbing, when one looks at it from a more emotionally-detached perspective, through the lens of life goals, etc. E.g. do I really desire someone who belongs to someone else? Do I really want to spend ten years, or whatever, pining after someone unavailable? Am I being fair to myself? Am I being fair to others? But it feels so darn good! Why can’t I stop?
Beth, you’re absolutely right to emphasise the destructive side of limerence. Maybe not enough has been said about the destructive, unhealthy, dangerous side. However, I think it wasn’t fair of you to imply that Allie isn’t experiencing limerence because her experience (or her “drug trip”) hasn’t been uniformly bad from her point of view…
I think I would feel invalidated if someone suggested my own experience of limerence wasn’t limerence, because I rather enjoyed or “got off” on some aspects of limerence. But I understand why you feel invalidated yourself by posters (not necessarily Allie) seemingly glossing over the pain/negative aspects of limerence in their reports, pain which has been central and in some ways definitive of your powerful experience. You feel not threatened, no, by maybe a tiny bit alienated, by overly-rosy accounts of limerence? Accounts that gloss over darker aspects of obsession? Would that be a fair assessment? 😛
I guess the real question that comes out of this “clash of views” is the million-dollar question: “How does one know suspected limerence really is limerence?” E.g. if I, or another reader, is sitting around at home, wondering whether I’m experiencing limerence or not, should that be taken as a sign it’s most likely not limerence, but a mere crush? With true limerence, one surely “just knows” that something uncanny and extraordinary is happening. There’s no ambiguity…
Sorry for weighing in. Perhaps it’s not my place to comment, and I don’t want to offend, or speak out of turn. But I feel like you both had something incredibly valuable to offer here. So I’m glad you’ve have a “clash” of opinions. Although, of course, clashing with someone in a public setting can be embarrassing for us non-confrontational, peace-loving, introvert types and for people already feeling a bit defensive about their LEs in general…
I think limerence, being a minority emotional experience. can leave us all feeling a little bit invalidated at times, and we rush in to defend our own experience of reality, because, you know, so few people “out there”, in the world, seem to get it. Because, you know, so few people “out there”, in the world, take us seriously. 🙂
Thank you both for sharing your thoughts and feelings so generously! 🙂
Sammy,
Read the early blogs and their comments. There are numerous examples of the destructive side of limerence both on the limerent and his/her SO. I can’t recall any stories of the limerent wreaking havoc on their LO but there might be one.
DrL recently reissued some of the original blogs and some examples might be buried in those.
Most of those posters are no longer posting on LwL. But, there are some good stories and cautionary tales.
Sammy, what a very diplomatic response. You are gifted in the de-escalating department.
I swing back on forth on the experience of limerence, the long term consequences to ones psyche, the deep wounds (and perhaps scars!) it causes and the slow healing that ensues (when conditions allow for healing), and yet…some of the most vivid experiences of my life were the results of limerent adventures. If I could turn back time would I really want to erase the extraordinary chapters or even pages in my life that were a clear result of limerent involvement? My LO’s were actually very interesting sorts of fellows, a bit ‘larger than life’, and now that I can review my LE’s with a detached and objective eye, I really had fascinating and wild rides that I am not sure (now that the excruciating pain has subsided) that I completely regret. Oh the fun! Concerts and travels and meals and exposure to different cultures, unique to anything I had ever experienced before.
If those years had been filled with healthy reciprocal relationships would they have been so intense and interesting? And left me enhanced instead of damaged and distraught?
I do know that I have no interest in risking future limerent adventure, no matter how kaleidoscopically intriguing, and I certainly don’t recommend it.
But the experiences of limerence have contributed to who I am today and I am not bitter. I hope to distill some beauty from it all, even if it in being able to be truly compassionate to other limerents, avoiding generating limerence in others, and being able to glance back from time to time at the limerent adventures I have had, and smile.
Great comment Sammy! I am living proof that limerence can be gut-wrenching and bleak or really not all that bad depending on the limerent’s relationship with the LO. Obviously, the individual limerent makes a difference too, but limerence was so very different for me in two different scenarios less than a year apart.
My first LO (well, my first LO in 20 years anyway) was a stranger I met in a bar. I had no validation or reciprocation from her other than the fact that she treated me with basic human decency and kindness. I didn’t even know if I would ever see her again, never mind if I could ever have a chance with a relationship with her (especially since I’m married but unhappily so). The pain at times was awful and palpable. I never want to go back to the bleakness I was feeling a year-and-a-half ago when I was pining away for LO #1. I still like her a whole lot and think very highly of LO #1, but the limerence is gone. I can live without her and even the less rational parts of my brain are getting the message that it won’t be the end of the world if I never see her again (I thought I caught a glimpse of her three or four times since that fateful night but I’m not sure it was even her).
But then I met her – LO #2. At first, there was no spark at all. I thought she was fun and reasonably attractive, but she didn’t really do anything for me the first few times I met her after joining a new crowd of friends (people I had sought out at least partially to get over LO #1). The problem was she started flirting with me – nothing too over the top, but she definitely started to do and say things that got me to notice her. As someone in this community once mentioned, nothing makes you more attracted to someone than the knowledge that they might fancy you. After only a few weeks, I started to realize I was falling for this woman and I began to feel an intense emotional and physical attraction towards her. Still, I thought it was only a crush and I referred to her as my “glimmery friend” for the longest time. I didn’t think it was full-blown limerence, but once I had actually cried over this woman a couple of times I realized that was a telltale sign that I had become limerent for her. Several commenters on the discussion forum also got me thinking I might have been fooling myself in thinking it wasn’t limerence. Eventually, the transference was complete and she became my LO. There was no denying it any longer.
But then things changed with her. She stopped flirting with me, and she made very pointed comments about her type being essentially the total opposite of me. She even began to tell me about her experiences with dating and casual sex, and she actually started to brag about her sexual conquests. LO #2 even made it sound like she wanted me to be her wing man to go out with her while she tried to meet other guys. On the other hand, we were becoming quite good friends, and she gave me some really good advice about my failing marriage. I think I offended her a bit when I made some little digs at her, and she has been a little standoffish with me since. I think my limerence is gradually subsiding for her at this point, but I had thought that in the past and it turned out not to be the case.
Sure, limerence for LO #2 has brought me some pain, but nothing like the bleak, hopeless, gut-wrenching heartache I felt with LO #1. I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. At first I thought the difference was because I wasn’t truly limerent for LO #2, but I tend to think the difference was because LO #2 is in my life. She is my friend, we spend time together and she definitely did give me at least some validation. If I had to guess, I would say she isn’t really into me, but she at least found enough of an attraction at one point to flirt with me (I don’t think she would do that if she found me repulsive, but I now understand that women often do flirt with men they don’t find THAT attractive). So, I believe that whether one experiences the depths of despair associated with the most negative aspects of limerence will depend very much on the situation. This second LE has been disruptive, but not nearly as disruptive as it was with LO #1. At this point, my biggest distractions are my marital and family problems, not limerence.
Vicarious,
” As someone in this community once mentioned, nothing makes you more attracted to someone than the knowledge that they might fancy you. ”
I guess when I read comments like this (and I admit to this being my own personal stuff), it makes me worried about marriage. I’m assuming married people go through life (I’m not talking about you specifically) and are in multiple situations where other people show interest. Unless this person specially pushed the married person’s buttons and the married person became limerent (which is rare), I’d imagine these other low-level orbiters who express interest don’t make much of a dent. It’s something to enjoy and then .. well, then it’s time to get lunch.
Absolutely. Attraction and even mild crushes are fine. I am a fan of the maxim, “I’m married, not dead.” However, limerence is a totally different ballgame. In my case, my marriage was already on the rocks when I became limerent for LO #1. I hadn’t been limerent for maybe 20 years before that, so I was able to keep it in check as long as my marriage was relatively healthy. Others have different experiences though, and there are some people who have totally happy and healthy marriages who nevertheless become limerent for someone else.
Vicarious,
“Others have different experiences though, and there are some people who have totally happy and healthy marriages who nevertheless become limerent for someone else.”
I’m thinking that someone can be happily married and still become limerent. I used to work with a lot of married men, and I can still not believe where the line is for some of them. One of my female co-workers told me one guy was trying to have a graphic conversation with her about what he liked to do sexually. (This was several years ago, before the MeToo movement, so I’m assuming less of this is happening now.) I guess he thought he wasn’t cheating because he wasn’t physically doing anything, but to me there wasn’t much of a distinction. Now, maybe he had some kind of agreement with his wife about what was ok, but I highly doubt that. I knew his wife. She was extremely controlling, which was probably why he was doing what he was doing. But I’d bet every penny I have in the bank she had no idea what he did when she wasn’t around. And unpleasant as she was, that still was not fair to her.
It is important to remember one thing, Marcia: Limerence is relatively rare. Supposedly only about 5% of the population are limerents. So, I don’t think limerence should deter you from marriage, unless you are worried about yourself as opposed to a potential spouse or partner. From what I’ve heard, many people would rather their spouses be unfaithful physically than if they developed a strong emotional and romantic connection with someone else. I can understand that sentiment, but I have heard the stories of many people who are in happy, healthy, stable relationships and they are able to overcome limerence and recognize that their LO doesn’t measure up to their SO. I wouldn’t let limerence deter you from finding love. There is a possibility you would never experience it again if you were in a healthy and happy long-term relationship.
Various,
“Supposedly only about 5% of the population are limerence. ”
I wasn’t necessarily talking about limerence but Shady Shaderton. You were talking about attention. I used to be very flirtatious, and things can go from friendly/jokey to “Can I have a hug,” strong, sexual innuendo, heavy flirting with a lot of married men pretty quickly. What I’m saying is that they didn’t need to be limerent for me to soak up that attention. Were all of them going to cheat? Idk. I did get propositioned by some, yes. Many of my single girlfriends have been proportioned by married men. I look at all of this very differently now. I’m not sure why I didn’t see it before, but it’s pretty hollow attention and, frankly, kind of a waste of time.
“From what I’ve heard, many people would rather their spouses be unfaithful physically than if they developed a strong emotional and romantic connection with someone else.”
Idk. I think the first question a lot of women would ask their husbands if they found out he had an affair is, “Are you in love with her?” Now, that’s if they actually had the affair, but I think the feelings part of it is much more threatening to a women in that they are aware how meaningless some sex can be.
Marcia,
“Idk. I think the first question a lot of women would ask their husbands if they found out he had an affair is, “Are you in love with her?” Now, that’s if they actually had the affair, but I think the feelings part of it is much more threatening to a women in that they are aware how meaningless some sex can be.”
When I decided to disclose my LE/EA to my wife 3.5 years after LO #4 and I said goodbye, it might not have been the first question my wife asked, but it was no more than second or third. That was one of the most uncomfortable conversations I’ve ever had with my wife in our entire marriage.
At the time, my wife suspected LO #4 and I might have had more going than simple online acquaintance over a mutual interest. I thought I’d been keeping myself together pretty well but I was leaking enough for my wife to know something was up. She asked, “Is LO #4 after you?” Thank God, she didn’t ask it the other way around. I was able to honestly say, “I don’t think so.” It was true, I can’t speak for LO #4 and she never offered me a thing. But, it helped me realize how much danger I was in. Things were really close to collapsing and that would have happened spectacularly.
When I met with the EAP counselor after LO #4 told me her relationship collapsed, one of the questions that she asked was if my wife knew about it. I told the EAP counselor that my wife knew about the online acquaintance but not its depth. The EAP counselor said, “So, you’re hiding this relationship from your wife?” I fell back on, “We’ve never met and we’ve never even spoken directly. We’re not in a relationship.” The EAP counselor smiled and replied, “Oh, yes, you are.” LO #4 brought up hiding our correspondence from my wife in her goodbye.
Apparently, my strategy wasn’t as solid as I’d hoped. But, it was the best one I had.
When my wife asked the question, I once again fell back on my standard defense. I told her I don’t think I could love someone I never met. Bill Clinton would have admired my waffling. My wife has lived with me long enough to know the difference between a response and an answer and she wanted an answer so she asked again, “But, did you love her?”
I couldn’t muster a direct “No.” The best I could do was, “I don’t think so.”
LE,
Women, as a general rule, are more concerned with emotional cheating; men, as a general rule, are more concerned with physical cheating. I’m kind of baffled by that, given that, as third general rule (and I’m making sweeping statements here) men are better at separating sex and emotion. So they know how meaningless some sex can be. Some of it is as memorable as a take-out pizza. (I read that somewhere. I thought it was pretty accurate.) Much more threatening, imo, is if someone has parked him or herself in your partner’s psyche. Who care is they’ve so much as touched hands. The meaningless sex is something you get over in a week. But limerence or even an intense infatuation/crush is something different altogether.
Thanks Sammy, enjoy your posts as always.
It is interesting – for me the euphoric phase of my LE was the one where I felt the most mentally disordered. I am usually highly focussed and rational so losing that entirely to a drugged out, over-aroused, never ending fantasy state was very uncomfortable to me, I did not feel like myself at all. Hence I sought support very early in my LE. While my early intervention has not changed the addiction, maybe it has moderated the harmful effects of my LE?
The definition of limerence is Person Addiction”. Addictions OFTEN harm, but don’t always (caffeine addicted anyone?). They always cause suffering but the amount will vary a lot from person to person. I am a big fan of Buddhist philosophy, so much of which adresses a theme of how to minimise suffering and craving. I particularly like The Parable of the Second Arrow:
The Buddha once asked a student, “If a person is struck by an arrow, is it painful?” The student replied , “It is.” The Buddha then asked, “If the person is struck by a second arrow, is that even more painful?” The student replied again, “It is.” The Buddha then explained, “In life, we cannot always control the first arrow. However the second arrow is our reaction to the first. And with this second arrow comes the possibility of choice.
Very profound. Maybe LO #2 is my second arrow? I discussed the difference between LO #1 and LO #2 above, but part of the difference might be that I was better equipped to handle limerence once it hit a second time within a year. Sorry to make this about me, but I think your analogy fits perfectly to my situation as well as yours.
I like your interpretation VL 🙂
I think the closer interpretation would be the first arrow might be LO2 talking about her exploits with other men. Which hurts because you really like her. The second arrow is the subsequent ruminating about every detail from every angle, thinking this means she doesn’t like you, feeling like you are not good enough in some way, maybe also castigating yourself for having all these thoughts and feelings i.e. the downward thought spiral that often follows the first arrow.
It is possible to learn to nip that downward thought spiral in the bud by seeing it immediately and consciously changing your inner dialogue to be kind, supportive and realistic / more optimistic.
It all sounds easy doesn’t it, but it takes the average Buddhist months or years of daily practice, regular reading, pod casts etc to develop that skill. You can’t just read a book and do it sadly.
I’m finding not thinking about my LO more difficult than not seeing him! The Buddhist monk thing is good. No point beating ourselves up about it. Mindfulness is good!
My problem with finding purpose is that I have high anxiety and moderate depression. I look after my physical health, but relationships and work suffer. Therefore I don’t have much of a defence against limerences. I hadn’t had one for many years, but I’ve got a bad one now! I only met the man 3 times, then went no contact – but am still obsessing about him 3 months later. I’m avoiding him in prison and online, but can’t stop thinking about him!
Lol, that was meant to say avoiding him in person, not prison!
Thank you so so much for this site Dr L, which I only found this week. Impossible to believe I’ve only just discovered there’s a name for this madness after 50 years of numerous LE’s and LO’s.
Now I know why it happens, how it happens and learning to find purpose. Great article. And to know that other people get this and see yourself in so many stories.
Somewhere on the site I read about personality types so went off to discover my own and that has amazed me too.
Just shows there’s always hope for a better future even in my sixties.
This site is a truly wonderful gift for people like us and I will never be able to thank you enough.