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I think it's less about accomplishment and more about emotional health and unresolved issues for the OP. OW in my case was attractive, intelligent and reasonably successful. But emotionally fragile..


T 13 M 7
Me 48 H 46
SS 15
BD 7.14 PA
D final 5.16 (H filed)

We receive & we lose, and must try to achieve gratitude & embrace with whole hearts whatever of life that remains after the losses - Dubus
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I think it's different for everyone in every case. My ex's OW is a lawyer (although we make the same money, I am a nurse) she is very physically unattractive, has no shared interests, is a mess (he is a neat freak and she is a hoarder) but they have been together for 9 years, married 6. She tolerates his abuse where I just couldn't take it anymore and I began to stand up for myself.

Whatever they got apparently works for them. But it didn't work for us.

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Originally Posted By: DDJ
So I just read an article that said that love is a choice...Imagine if love is actually not a choice. Imagine it is an emotion?


I read this earlier today, and Ive been thinking on it for some time to try to get my thoughts a little bit straighter before responding. Im not sure Im there yet, but I will say that Im trying to imagine love as a fleeting emotion, as something that we, as humans, have no control over, and Ive come to the conclusion that I reject that concept.

Fundamentally, I cant come around to the idea that I have no control over who I love. I dont think falling in or out of love is an accident, I think it is a conscious decision that a person makes. I dont think there is such a thing as accidentally falling in or out of love; instead it grows or shrinks based on actions, words, decisions that the people in the relationship make.

You speak above about love and hate, but I dont think they are opposites as you seem to. I believe that you can love and hate someone at the same time. They are both strong ends of a spectrum. As Vapo wrote, I believe indifference or apathy are better choices as the opposite of love. How can you possible love someone and feel indifferent about them? How can you hate someone and feel indifferent about them?

I went through my entire marriage thinking that love was a given. That my love and my ex's love would be present for each other, just because. I dont believe that it just 'goes away' as you are suggesting, but more that it isnt self-sustaining; love needs to be nurtured and making the choice to love is what allows it to thrive.

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Originally Posted By: Kaizen

I read this earlier today, and Ive been thinking on it for some time to try to get my thoughts a little bit straighter before responding. Im not sure Im there yet, but I will say that Im trying to imagine love as a fleeting emotion, as something that we, as humans, have no control over, and Ive come to the conclusion that I reject that concept.


Thank you for the input guys and girls. @Kaizen, I have come to learn that there is no such thing as coincidence in life. Everything is in its right place at the right time. The good and the so-called bad.

I'm sitting in my bed, on my laptop, divorced. Now, i could not be anywhere else but here, in this moment. So love, the love that my XWW had for me, was always going to end. I was always going to be single (now). To think that we have control over anything is the greatest fallacy that human beings can ever believe.

As for making a choice to love, if it's not self-sustaining, then it is an emotion. One can choose to be angry at a family member for decades, the same as one can choose to love someone who is no good for you. That's why we must love in the moment, love does not have to be nurtured, it must just be. And when it's gone, we must let it go...


Just cos things are going right, doesn't mean that they were always wrong.
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No, no and no. It is not true that we do not have control over anything. We have almost perfect control over ourselves and our actions. We have choices in life that we can and should make. There is an old saying that if we choose not to choose than we have chosen.

And yes, love has to be nurtured, or let me clarify, there are 2 kinds of love, an unconditional one and a conditional one. An unconditional love is the love that we feel for our children and also the one that most of us feel for our parents. The conditional kind is a peculiar beast. Sometimes we love people that are no good for us. A dangerous kind of love is the one that is formed from need. When we are needy, we compromise ourselves just to have someone in our lives who "loves" us and to whome we can give our love to. Sometimes we feel (an intuition) that something is wrong but we choose not to listen to our intuition and dive in head-on, only to pay the price later. Sometimes when we subconsciously feel that something is wrong with the relationship we act in a manner that sabotages the relationship. Everything is clear in hindsight...

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Hmmmm...... I think love is how we personally perceive it. I believe love is a feeling and an action. Love is an emotion. The love emotion is generated by how someone treats you and acts towards you. You FEEL it I believe. Then the partner wants to act on that love emotion by choosing to actively love that other person. By showing loving gestures that generate that emotion of love.

Someone actively does something to hurt you, you FEEL hurt. When someone behaves in a way to actively love you, you FEEL love.

Then love becomes somewhat unconditional at times when you are in a long term romantic partnership. Your partner may not be showing you love all the time, but you know that they love you when they apologize, or try to work on the situation that may have brought feelings of hurt.

Do we have control of our emotions? Popular opinion says "yes" I say no. We are humans, not robots and there is brain chemistry that produces emotions and we often have no control over those emotions and chemical reactions. We do chose how to react to those emotions though.

Love evolves.

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I'm hungry and I'd love a burrito right now.

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Originally Posted By: doodler

I'm hungry and I'd love a burrito right now.



Well if this isn't true love, then I don't know what it... laugh

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I feel that kind of love for bacon. Bacon has never let me down.

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Bacon on a burrito, that's love above love!

Seriously tho, a bacon burrito would be heavenly.

But seriously, seriously, I think that love is beautiful. It is painful as hell, but can taste like a bacon burrito too. I guess everything has to come to an end, whether we like it or not... like this reply.


Just cos things are going right, doesn't mean that they were always wrong.
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