Love / Addiction
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Love and addiction are both borne of our brain's reward system. Our reward system essentially functions at a primitive level to ensure our survival and procreation. So they are basically rooted in the same place, and are therefore intertwined.
Where they diverge, however, are in their outcomes. Love furthers our ability to exist and flourish, whereas addiction serves to destroy us. An addiction is a hijacking of our brain's reward system.
I think a person can definitely be addicted to love if the outcomes are destructive.
I hope that makes sense. I am admittedly a thinker but not a philosopher.
ABW1
Where they diverge, however, are in their outcomes. Love furthers our ability to exist and flourish, whereas addiction serves to destroy us. An addiction is a hijacking of our brain's reward system.
I think a person can definitely be addicted to love if the outcomes are destructive.
I hope that makes sense. I am admittedly a thinker but not a philosopher.
ABW1
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Join Date: Jan 2017
Location: North Carolina
Posts: 611
Love is an emotion, addiction is an impulse. To complicate things, one can also be addicted to love — i.e. unrequited love, obsessions, crushes, serial relationships, etc. That good lovey feeling drives the impulse, just like with weed, or booze.
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Join Date: Nov 2014
Location: Australia
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There is a word "limerence" to describe intense infatuation that can become obsessive. That's what I mean by a chemical side to love. If you're interested in this subject, I recommend googling it, Brenda. I find it fascinating.
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Join Date: May 2014
Posts: 2,950
Originally Posted by ABetterWay1 
Love and addiction are both borne of our brain's reward system. Our reward system essentially functions at a primitive level to ensure our survival and procreation. So they are basically rooted in the same place, and are therefore intertwined.
Where they diverge, however, are in their outcomes. Love furthers our ability to exist and flourish, whereas addiction serves to destroy us. An addiction is a hijacking of our brain's reward system.
I think a person can definitely be addicted to love if the outcomes are destructive.
I hope that makes sense. I am admittedly a thinker but not a philosopher.
ABW1
Where they diverge, however, are in their outcomes. Love furthers our ability to exist and flourish, whereas addiction serves to destroy us. An addiction is a hijacking of our brain's reward system.
I think a person can definitely be addicted to love if the outcomes are destructive.
I hope that makes sense. I am admittedly a thinker but not a philosopher.
ABW1
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Join Date: Jun 2016
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Posts: 28,680
What every love is- it is natural, hard work and feels good.
Addiction is cruel, selfish, greedy and destructive. Addiction is dangerous. Addiction to sex- falling in lust, not love. Gambling, food, alcohol, drugs, social media- addiction is not good. Love is.
Addiction is cruel, selfish, greedy and destructive. Addiction is dangerous. Addiction to sex- falling in lust, not love. Gambling, food, alcohol, drugs, social media- addiction is not good. Love is.
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Join Date: Jan 2017
Location: the real world
Posts: 166
Originally Posted by BrendaChenowyth
Is unrequited love sometimes just an addiction?
But - then there's "Love Addiction." I question using the word "love." but "Creepy, Obsessive, Stalking Addiction" prob'ly wouldn't be a good name . . .
Interesting question.
G-Woman
Join Date: Nov 2015
Location: Mississauga, ON
Posts: 979
I know that my past relationships and experiences with "love" have been addictive in nature.
I've had bouts of extreme limerence. I was in a severely co-dependent marriage. I am attracted to emotionally unavailable people. I've now come to believe I don't know what a healthy, romantic relationship looks like.
For me, it feels similar to addiction. I crave the rush - how it makes me feel. When I don't get my "fix" I feel depressed and try to manipulate the situation to get what I want. Of course it's not a physical addiction the same way that alcohol is, but the behaviour is very similar.
I've had bouts of extreme limerence. I was in a severely co-dependent marriage. I am attracted to emotionally unavailable people. I've now come to believe I don't know what a healthy, romantic relationship looks like.
For me, it feels similar to addiction. I crave the rush - how it makes me feel. When I don't get my "fix" I feel depressed and try to manipulate the situation to get what I want. Of course it's not a physical addiction the same way that alcohol is, but the behaviour is very similar.
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Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: Sonoran Desert & Southeast Asia
Posts: 6,561
Originally Posted by shortstop81
I know that my past relationships and experiences with "love" have been addictive in nature.
I've had bouts of extreme limerence. I was in a severely co-dependent marriage. I am attracted to emotionally unavailable people. I've now come to believe I don't know what a healthy, romantic relationship looks like.
For me, it feels similar to addiction. I crave the rush - how it makes me feel. When I don't get my "fix" I feel depressed and try to manipulate the situation to get what I want. Of course it's not a physical addiction the same way that alcohol is, but the behaviour is very similar.
I've had bouts of extreme limerence. I was in a severely co-dependent marriage. I am attracted to emotionally unavailable people. I've now come to believe I don't know what a healthy, romantic relationship looks like.
For me, it feels similar to addiction. I crave the rush - how it makes me feel. When I don't get my "fix" I feel depressed and try to manipulate the situation to get what I want. Of course it's not a physical addiction the same way that alcohol is, but the behaviour is very similar.
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Join Date: Sep 2015
Location: America
Posts: 4,136
There are different kinds of love.
Romantic love. Plutonic love. Parental love. Agape/divine love. And yes, addictive "love".
When it gets into an area of "love addiction" I think it involves more the chemistry in the brain that is similar to substance addiction. It's primarily about 'feeling good' and getting a certain 'high'; getting that dopamine surge. Then seeking out that high again and again until it becomes a compulsion.
The most healthy type of human love is when a person is complete within their self and they love another unselfishly...but in which there is healthy give and take. Some people will love so unselfishly that it can get into an area of allowing yourself to be walked all over to your own detriment. ...trying to please another person overly so...
We all want love and belonging as a basic human need. We are designed that way. So, we tend to seek out love ... and the ways in which some people end up seeking out love can be unhealthy and manipulative at times too; even unrealistic; interpreting another person's actions as love when all they are doing is being caring and personable. True love does not have to be orchestrated. But in a person's desperation to be loved they will read into things that aren't there...analyze another person's words and behaviors; looking for 'signs' that the person loves them. If another person really loves you, you know it and are secure in it and don't need constant reassurance. Again, actions not words.
Romantic love. Plutonic love. Parental love. Agape/divine love. And yes, addictive "love".
When it gets into an area of "love addiction" I think it involves more the chemistry in the brain that is similar to substance addiction. It's primarily about 'feeling good' and getting a certain 'high'; getting that dopamine surge. Then seeking out that high again and again until it becomes a compulsion.
The most healthy type of human love is when a person is complete within their self and they love another unselfishly...but in which there is healthy give and take. Some people will love so unselfishly that it can get into an area of allowing yourself to be walked all over to your own detriment. ...trying to please another person overly so...
We all want love and belonging as a basic human need. We are designed that way. So, we tend to seek out love ... and the ways in which some people end up seeking out love can be unhealthy and manipulative at times too; even unrealistic; interpreting another person's actions as love when all they are doing is being caring and personable. True love does not have to be orchestrated. But in a person's desperation to be loved they will read into things that aren't there...analyze another person's words and behaviors; looking for 'signs' that the person loves them. If another person really loves you, you know it and are secure in it and don't need constant reassurance. Again, actions not words.
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Join Date: Jan 2017
Posts: 9
Originally Posted by BrendaChenowyth
In your words..
What is the difference between love and addiction?
I'm not fishing for anything, it's just something that popped in to my head. I am curious how other people look at it.
What is the difference between love and addiction?
I'm not fishing for anything, it's just something that popped in to my head. I am curious how other people look at it.
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Join Date: Feb 2014
Location: Western NY
Posts: 1,209
I was just rereading this thread and I must have just crawled out of the woods from a spaceship or something.
If love has been condemned to being an 'addiction' then life's outlook seems pretty damn bleak. The ONLY way I have found to deal with addiction is complete abstinence. If someone is addicted to love then I guess they have a life of celibacy ahead of them. I guess we all better start sharpening our knitting needles. Am I missing something?
I had bad relationships in the past too (really bad ones). Guess what...we are all human, and it comes with the territory. Has anyone ever turned the radio on in their car and listened to what 90% of people are singing about? Relationships, heartbreak, getting cheated on, etc. Hell, a country station probably never plays anything that doesn't talk about relationships! People listen to music because they can identify with it. As much as self-centered addicts would think that the music industry was built solely for their personal listening pleasure, it is made for everyone (yes, even non-addicts exist and listen).
There have been a few books written about that same topic. Some people have painted about it. Some folks wrote poems about it.
Just because someone had bad relationships in the past doesn't mean that they have to have bad ones going forward. I'll be damned if I am going to let fear control my life going forward. To me, recovery is about freedom. It is not about being scared to enjoy life because everything that you do that provides any pleasure is labeled an 'addiction'.
Ok, that is my 2 cents. I must be the only romantic left on this planet.
If love has been condemned to being an 'addiction' then life's outlook seems pretty damn bleak. The ONLY way I have found to deal with addiction is complete abstinence. If someone is addicted to love then I guess they have a life of celibacy ahead of them. I guess we all better start sharpening our knitting needles. Am I missing something?
I had bad relationships in the past too (really bad ones). Guess what...we are all human, and it comes with the territory. Has anyone ever turned the radio on in their car and listened to what 90% of people are singing about? Relationships, heartbreak, getting cheated on, etc. Hell, a country station probably never plays anything that doesn't talk about relationships! People listen to music because they can identify with it. As much as self-centered addicts would think that the music industry was built solely for their personal listening pleasure, it is made for everyone (yes, even non-addicts exist and listen).
There have been a few books written about that same topic. Some people have painted about it. Some folks wrote poems about it.
Just because someone had bad relationships in the past doesn't mean that they have to have bad ones going forward. I'll be damned if I am going to let fear control my life going forward. To me, recovery is about freedom. It is not about being scared to enjoy life because everything that you do that provides any pleasure is labeled an 'addiction'.
Ok, that is my 2 cents. I must be the only romantic left on this planet.
Recovering
Join Date: May 2012
Location: UK
Posts: 1,361
"Love is patient;
love is kind;
love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its own way;
it is not irritable or resentful;
it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends".
(From Paul's first letter to the Corinthians)
love is kind;
love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its own way;
it is not irritable or resentful;
it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends".
(From Paul's first letter to the Corinthians)
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Join Date: Sep 2015
Location: America
Posts: 4,136
I guess we all better start sharpening our knitting needles. Am I missing something?
That cracked me up! Haven't you heard about the exotic knitting classes they are offering these days? Just kidding. Seriously, I get what you mean about the music thing. Rock music is about sex...just listen ACDC's lyrics sometime....country music is about cheatin'....and bluegrass music is about MURDER. That's the simple synopsis.
That cracked me up! Haven't you heard about the exotic knitting classes they are offering these days? Just kidding. Seriously, I get what you mean about the music thing. Rock music is about sex...just listen ACDC's lyrics sometime....country music is about cheatin'....and bluegrass music is about MURDER. That's the simple synopsis.
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Join Date: Feb 2017
Posts: 12
[QUOTE=BrendaChenowyth;6329731]In your words..
What is the difference between love and addiction?
I am actually taking a neuroscience class about the effects of drugs and alcohol on the brain. To sum up the research findings below, studies on prairie voles (monogamous mammals) and brain scans show the release of dopamine in the nucleus accumbens with pair-bonding/social attachments that mirror the same processes that happen during drug and alcohol taking. I posted the quote below:
Burkett & Young:
There is an exceptionally strong parallel between these plastic changes from pair bonding and the plastic changes seen in drug addiction. As D1R is upregulated during pair bonding and D2R is stable, this plastic change represents an alteration in the balance of D1R/D2R signaling in the striatum in favor of D1R, similar to what is seen in human PET studies of drug addiction” (p. 7)
If you're interested in this topic, there is a lot of research in this area.
☺
What is the difference between love and addiction?
I am actually taking a neuroscience class about the effects of drugs and alcohol on the brain. To sum up the research findings below, studies on prairie voles (monogamous mammals) and brain scans show the release of dopamine in the nucleus accumbens with pair-bonding/social attachments that mirror the same processes that happen during drug and alcohol taking. I posted the quote below:
Burkett & Young:
There is an exceptionally strong parallel between these plastic changes from pair bonding and the plastic changes seen in drug addiction. As D1R is upregulated during pair bonding and D2R is stable, this plastic change represents an alteration in the balance of D1R/D2R signaling in the striatum in favor of D1R, similar to what is seen in human PET studies of drug addiction” (p. 7)
If you're interested in this topic, there is a lot of research in this area.
☺
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Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: Lakeside, Ca
Posts: 10,208
Originally Posted by Outonthetiles
Love is a pain in the ass.
Resentments faded away.
M-Bob
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