THE WEIGHT OF DESIRE | LOVE | RELATIONSHIPS
Are You Really in Love, or Are You Lying To Yourself? Part II
Real love is about intensity
Love is just like every other great thing in the modern world. Everyone seeks it out, and only achieved by a very select few.
Love is all about intensity.
Society is completely wrong because it teaches us that love is: (i) about and (ii) measured by endurance.
Everyone talks about how long they have been together, but time together only means that those individuals were capable of enduring being together over a long time; it says nothing about whether they love one another. Intensity says it all.
This should make intuitive sense because there has never been a success story without a person exhibiting extreme intensity and obsession. Yet, our culture looks down upon both and tells us it is unhealthy.
The raw truth is that this subconscious programming on what’s healthy has to happen to keep society functioning, which requires most of us to be average, docile, and underachievers.
It becomes evident that the persistent societal revulsion to intensity is a tool to control individuals when you notice that everyone we hold on a pedestal in society only got there through intense obsession.
Yet, we are told not to be intensely obsessed with anything and to have balance in our lives instead.
In other words, society’s message is “run the local marathon with the masses because it isn’t healthy to sprint the 100m at the Olympic games.” But wait, whoever sprints and finishes first at the Olympics, we will honor with gold. However, for the rest of you, don’t even dare to imagine sprinting and don’t even consider the Olympics, you might get hurt, and it requires too much of a commitment, too much time, and too much energy — endurance running is safer. . .See how this type of thinking is contradictory?
This works because society only needs a few leaders, but many followers, one first place winner, and an innumerable amount of fans in the stands.
It’s a way of keeping us in our place. We are all given these calcified scripts about how we are supposed to be “healthy” and “normal,” and consequently, we are subtly guided into being followers.
But there will always be a few extremely odd, uncommon, gifted individuals that buck the system, become intensely obsessed with something, hit elite levels, and become something special that then the masses can be amazed by.
With this context, I would advise you to be as intense and obsessed as possible with anything that truly makes you happy.
Is this unhealthy? Yes, by a societal definition, it is unhealthy.
However, success originates from what we deem unhealthy. The raw and frightening truth is that healthy in our culture is code for ordinary, unremarkable, and mediocre.
Bottom of the pyramid is failure. Healthy is failure. Average is failure. Mere endurance is failure.
“Healthy” and “normal” relationships are what we see all of the time. They are commonplace. These are the couples that live together, see each other before and after work, split the bills, go to obligatory events together, but essentially live separate lives.
They might talk during working hours, but that would only be if something is necessary and important to talk about–usually, it would involve logistics or plans that need to happen–extra chit-chat would not be permissible here. The chit-chat is saved for their friends, and those group chats they are individually a part of that bring real joy to their life, and they can engage with for hours on end.
They prefer girls/boys trips over vacations with their person. They go to different stores, eat at different restaurants, have different interests and hobbies, watch different television shows, they read different books, and ultimately they don’t live as one. They might be in a loving relationship but aren’t in love.
Contrast this with so-called “unhealthy” couples. Those couples can’t help but refer to themselves as “we” when speaking about themselves individually because they have no concept of themselves without the other.
They are independent because they do not control each other because they are both doing what they want to do. But, they acknowledge and accept their dependence on their partner; separation is painful no matter how short the time period is.
For example, if one of them needs to go somewhere for just an hour, it becomes a hug and kiss fest because they must somehow cope with that time apart.
Seriously, these couples go to doctor appointments together, they read books together, they talk all day and every day without ever running out of things to say, they find themselves in a bubble that only really has room for the two of them because anything else is a distraction.
They speak a different language among themselves.
“Unhealthy” couples live in their own world.
Now, how intense is that? How unhealthy is that? Those unhealthy couples though live in love.
And when the unfortunate time comes for one of those individuals to die, they typically die of a broken heart because there is no living apart from a soulmate. That is how unhealthy love and the perfect partnership is.
So then, is it worth it?
In my opinion, to be healthy in any aspect of your life that you deem important is to lack. It will never enable you to experience the full extent or depth of the thing.
Yes, it is risky to become dependent on another, yes it is scary to acknowledge that they are mortal beings and one day won’t be on this Earth, and yes, you will be seen as crazy by your peers who don’t get it and haven’t experienced it.
But, if you pursue what society calls “healthy,” what you are giving up is real love, and real love for just a day is better than a life without it.
Stay Tuned for Part III…
This is the second article of a 3-part series on love. In this 3-part series I aim to first provide a framework for evaluating whether you are in love and then go into the implications of real substantive love (not the fake performative love that we so often see). Afterward, I’ll offer a new way of seeing and talking about this phenomenon. If you missed it, Part 1 and Part 3 of this series are linked here.
