Addiction is Love’s dark reflection
People come to me for psychotherapy. Before they sit down to talk, I already know what is wrong and what is lacking. I already know that all symptoms point to the desire for love and the fear of love.
A man pursues freedom, his wife pursues romance, and they fight over it continually.
They are going to divorce because she demands something and he protects something else. She says she is starving for attention; he says that he is not going to lose his freedom to be himself. She imagines that love is absent; he imagines that love is suffocating. She imagines that she is alone; he imagines that he is bound. They each have a half truth that they will divorce for and even die for. Each has the missing half that the other needs.
We shall call this wholeness Love Power. She does not have love power, she has love deprivation, love weakness, love absence, love need. He does not have Love Power, he has love fear, love dread, love restriction, love constriction, love evasion. She believes that she could lose love; he believes that he could lose love power and love freedom. She thinks that if she had freedom, it would kill her. He believes that if he gave in to love, it would kill him. It would only kill their life strategies, not their self.
Love, freedom and power cannot be separated from our creativity. At every moment we are creating images of love and of love’s power. Since love’s individuality and love’s unification are at the heart of love power, we are in an endless search for love’s meaning and wholeness. Since this search is largely unconscious, we develop a whole language of evasion and denial. We develop a whole clinical casebook of symptoms which attempt to replace love’s centrality. These symptoms carry many messages which indirectly say that something is wrong or missing.
Why are we so reluctant to admit a need for love? Is it because we imagine that we could be rejected and even worse off than now? We imagine that love is a co-dependency situation in which we could feel even more the pain of isolation, loneliness and fragmentation. IF we have ever fallen in love with anything or anyone, and lost, we begin to fabricate a story that the universe is treacherous and undependable.
We spin out a story that subtly substitutes power for love. Love becomes a battle for control. Love is not about control. Love is about that unity which precedes control and makes control issues obsolete. Love is the ultimate dependency, the ultimate oneness, the ultimate vulnerability. That is why people are always embarrassed to speak about love, and feel uneasy about it. That is why people prefer the sense of security and control if they can reduce love to money, to sex, to power, to being right, to knowledge, to hundreds of little habits and addictions.
Addiction is a substitute for absolute love. If I don’t have love for the entire universe, at least I can love my cigarettes. If I don’ t experience unconditional love for each lover I meet, at least I can be unified with my love for food. I am not separated, I am not alone, I am not divided…I love my sport totally. I love my cocaine totally. I love my pornography totally. I am safe. I am in control. Nothing can hurt me. My stash is always available. My connection is not subject to human whim. No one can take my security away. My habit is dependable. My obsession is guaranteed. Something is dependable in a chaotic universe. Love is not necessary. Love is not needed. I can survive well without it, thank you. I never could depend on love anyway. Love is for the stupid and the foolish. I got over that childish thing in my teens. Look at the lovers around you. They are not really lovers, they are just out for what they can take from others. They don’t really care. They just want something. Yes, I am a cynic. But I am the realist here. Love is not realistic. Love is a come on, love is a deceit, love is a scam, love is a manipulation. Love is a farce. Love is a pretense. I had rather be safe than sorry. I had rather be safe than foolish. I had rather be powerful than vulnerable. Who can live with an open heart in a world of wolves.
And so, we have the desire for love and the fear of love. That is what all of our symptoms are about. That is what all of our medical and psychological problems are about. We build a fortress of safety to protect us against the dangers of love, and then we wonder why we suffer numerous diseases and numerous health problems. We get addicted to our safety mechanisms and strategies and then we wonder why life doesn’t flow and sing. We distrust flowing and singing. We resist flowing and singing. The cat purrs and we complain. The birds sing and we whine. The river gurgles and we burp and belch.
We prefer war to love. In war at least we are battling for our rights and our power and our security. We get to yell about national security. We get to fight and die for our liberty.
We get to kill those who try to take away our freedom and our power. Our history is studded with wars and memories of wars. Our young men die for our protection. The lonely Nazarene says to love unconditionally. But look at him. He was nailed to a tree and shut up. He loved everything and everyone and look what it got him. Do you think I am going to get myself crucified! And besides, he was not even human. If he had been human, he would have seen the truth of the situation. How can you defeat armies without a bigger army. Love may be a nice thing to talk about in the back of a car on lover’s lane, but not on Wall Street and not in Harlam or in Iraq. I want an automatic weapon in my bedroom. I have constitutional rights. If love means giving up power, forget it. Any realist would tell you that love is not the rule in society. Armies, police, guns and laws are where the real power is. Just try going to court and you will find out that love has nothing to say about judges and jury decisions. You can go to jail. And what rules the prisons? Certainly not love or anything that even sounds remotely like love. Lawyers rule courts and prisons. The double-talking power of legalese is what is in control. And you had better put your money in an overseas account or it can be taken by the IRS.
Paranoia rules the streets, the courts, the Pentagon, and Congress, does it not? Do 1000 points of light hold any power? Do “inclusion and compassion” mean anything?
Are those just shibboleths to hoodwink the public for all sorts of crooked politics in smoke filled rooms? Paranoia is the underlying ego problem which we all have to face and work through, is it not? How do we survive in a power hungry world which is denying the relevance of love.
Has love succumbed to power? Has power become loveless? Has the patriarchy destroyed femininity? Have money, armies and walls won? Has rape, lust, and intimacy-less sex won?
Do addictions have the last word? Can medication control the recurrent damage being caused by powerless love and loveless power? That is your decision. This little love poem is not just for idealists and romantics, is it?
Love cannot be tamed and put in a jar of peanut butter. Love cannot be tamed and confined to a zoo. Love cannot be tamed and sold at Victoria’s Secret. Love cannot be packaged and sold in beer, pizzas and Viagra. Yet I would not be one to say that love is not the essence of peanut butter, tigers at the zoo, Victoria’s panties, beer, pizza, and Viagra. Love is the essence of all things. At the heart of every thing and everyone, there is only love.
A man pursues freedom, his wife pursues romance, and they fight over it continually.
They are going to divorce because she demands something and he protects something else. She says she is starving for attention; he says that he is not going to lose his freedom to be himself. She imagines that love is absent; he imagines that love is suffocating. She imagines that she is alone; he imagines that he is bound. They each have a half truth that they will divorce for and even die for. Each has the missing half that the other needs.
We shall call this wholeness Love Power. She does not have love power, she has love deprivation, love weakness, love absence, love need. He does not have Love Power, he has love fear, love dread, love restriction, love constriction, love evasion. She believes that she could lose love; he believes that he could lose love power and love freedom. She thinks that if she had freedom, it would kill her. He believes that if he gave in to love, it would kill him. It would only kill their life strategies, not their self.
Love, freedom and power cannot be separated from our creativity. At every moment we are creating images of love and of love’s power. Since love’s individuality and love’s unification are at the heart of love power, we are in an endless search for love’s meaning and wholeness. Since this search is largely unconscious, we develop a whole language of evasion and denial. We develop a whole clinical casebook of symptoms which attempt to replace love’s centrality. These symptoms carry many messages which indirectly say that something is wrong or missing.
Why are we so reluctant to admit a need for love? Is it because we imagine that we could be rejected and even worse off than now? We imagine that love is a co-dependency situation in which we could feel even more the pain of isolation, loneliness and fragmentation. IF we have ever fallen in love with anything or anyone, and lost, we begin to fabricate a story that the universe is treacherous and undependable.
We spin out a story that subtly substitutes power for love. Love becomes a battle for control. Love is not about control. Love is about that unity which precedes control and makes control issues obsolete. Love is the ultimate dependency, the ultimate oneness, the ultimate vulnerability. That is why people are always embarrassed to speak about love, and feel uneasy about it. That is why people prefer the sense of security and control if they can reduce love to money, to sex, to power, to being right, to knowledge, to hundreds of little habits and addictions.
Addiction is a substitute for absolute love. If I don’t have love for the entire universe, at least I can love my cigarettes. If I don’ t experience unconditional love for each lover I meet, at least I can be unified with my love for food. I am not separated, I am not alone, I am not divided…I love my sport totally. I love my cocaine totally. I love my pornography totally. I am safe. I am in control. Nothing can hurt me. My stash is always available. My connection is not subject to human whim. No one can take my security away. My habit is dependable. My obsession is guaranteed. Something is dependable in a chaotic universe. Love is not necessary. Love is not needed. I can survive well without it, thank you. I never could depend on love anyway. Love is for the stupid and the foolish. I got over that childish thing in my teens. Look at the lovers around you. They are not really lovers, they are just out for what they can take from others. They don’t really care. They just want something. Yes, I am a cynic. But I am the realist here. Love is not realistic. Love is a come on, love is a deceit, love is a scam, love is a manipulation. Love is a farce. Love is a pretense. I had rather be safe than sorry. I had rather be safe than foolish. I had rather be powerful than vulnerable. Who can live with an open heart in a world of wolves.
And so, we have the desire for love and the fear of love. That is what all of our symptoms are about. That is what all of our medical and psychological problems are about. We build a fortress of safety to protect us against the dangers of love, and then we wonder why we suffer numerous diseases and numerous health problems. We get addicted to our safety mechanisms and strategies and then we wonder why life doesn’t flow and sing. We distrust flowing and singing. We resist flowing and singing. The cat purrs and we complain. The birds sing and we whine. The river gurgles and we burp and belch.
We prefer war to love. In war at least we are battling for our rights and our power and our security. We get to yell about national security. We get to fight and die for our liberty.
We get to kill those who try to take away our freedom and our power. Our history is studded with wars and memories of wars. Our young men die for our protection. The lonely Nazarene says to love unconditionally. But look at him. He was nailed to a tree and shut up. He loved everything and everyone and look what it got him. Do you think I am going to get myself crucified! And besides, he was not even human. If he had been human, he would have seen the truth of the situation. How can you defeat armies without a bigger army. Love may be a nice thing to talk about in the back of a car on lover’s lane, but not on Wall Street and not in Harlam or in Iraq. I want an automatic weapon in my bedroom. I have constitutional rights. If love means giving up power, forget it. Any realist would tell you that love is not the rule in society. Armies, police, guns and laws are where the real power is. Just try going to court and you will find out that love has nothing to say about judges and jury decisions. You can go to jail. And what rules the prisons? Certainly not love or anything that even sounds remotely like love. Lawyers rule courts and prisons. The double-talking power of legalese is what is in control. And you had better put your money in an overseas account or it can be taken by the IRS.
Paranoia rules the streets, the courts, the Pentagon, and Congress, does it not? Do 1000 points of light hold any power? Do “inclusion and compassion” mean anything?
Are those just shibboleths to hoodwink the public for all sorts of crooked politics in smoke filled rooms? Paranoia is the underlying ego problem which we all have to face and work through, is it not? How do we survive in a power hungry world which is denying the relevance of love.
Has love succumbed to power? Has power become loveless? Has the patriarchy destroyed femininity? Have money, armies and walls won? Has rape, lust, and intimacy-less sex won?
Do addictions have the last word? Can medication control the recurrent damage being caused by powerless love and loveless power? That is your decision. This little love poem is not just for idealists and romantics, is it?
Love cannot be tamed and put in a jar of peanut butter. Love cannot be tamed and confined to a zoo. Love cannot be tamed and sold at Victoria’s Secret. Love cannot be packaged and sold in beer, pizzas and Viagra. Yet I would not be one to say that love is not the essence of peanut butter, tigers at the zoo, Victoria’s panties, beer, pizza, and Viagra. Love is the essence of all things. At the heart of every thing and everyone, there is only love.
posted by Dr. Joe at 6:21 AM
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