Falling in love is a bit of a sickness because we go insane, but if that insanity lasts for a long time and you can’t find your inner compass, then I think that’s a sign it isn’t in balance. And if this imbalance goes on and is laced with control + jealousy, then is it, in fact, not love but an obsession?
Let’s start this lesson by saying that most of the information gathered for this video is presented as a larger question rather than a statement. What is the difference between love and obsession? Love itself is a hard construct to define, and even the most reputable researchers and psychologists struggle to narrow down what it means to love another person. Obsession, albeit somewhat easier to define than love. However, the boundaries between the two can get easily crossed. And obsession isn’t something to be ashamed of because, like love, it can portray itself in levels of degrees. It may not look like stalking someone; however, it could look like silently glancing over to see who your boo is texting so late at night. It may not look like placing a tracking device in your lover’s car but maybe looking at who they just added on Instagram.
Love is a healthy emotion that grows between two people once they’ve invested time and energy into getting to know one another, flaws, pet peeves, and all. People who are in love trust each other. No questions asked.
Obsession is different. In the beginning, it may feel a lot like love. It makes your heart race, and you can think of almost nothing else except the other person, and it makes you feel like you’re floating on a cloud. Love without the foundation of trust and balance can lead to obsession. Obsession is a constricting and roller coaster emotion that becomes more and more suffocating over time. Obsession’s main characteristic is a lack of trust. One partner does not trust the other, so jealousy and control ensue.
Difference between love vs. obsession
Obsession is like vines. Flowing from the creator to its object of affection. Unfortunately, obsession is a double-edged sword. Even though it feels like the creator has control over the vines, the vines wrap around their body none the less before they reach their prey. The vine begins its first wrap around its beloved’s ankle and slowly works itself up to coiling around its torso and arms like a snake. The vines constrict; thus, both parties lose air and lose their freedom because the vines are so tight that neither can move. And we wonder how and why both people can live this way. After a while, the pain from the vines doesn’t hurt as bad; in fact, they begin to feel comforted by this pain. They are bonded to this pain because it ties them together. Almost like children wrapped safely in the mother’s womb, there is no real safety with obsession, only comfort in the concept of the devil, you know.
If you’re a visual person, you can view love as air. It takes no real shape or form because It’s expansive, and you cannot capture it in your hand to hold it, no matter how hard you try. It’s invisible and yet a force of nature. Love is omnipresent, one of the highest vibrations we can experience on this planet. It’s always there. Silently nourishing us, encouraging us to live, exist, and breathe. Love, in its purest form, is the opposite of obsession. Love gives you wings so that you can fly. So that you are not a songless yellow canary trapped in a silver cage but one that glides through the air with a nest in the oak tree that it calls home.
When two people fall in love, they maintain their identities and interests. They are not threatened when their partner elects to spend time with family or friends without always including them. They are happy for and proud of their partner’s accomplishments, even when those accomplishments are exclusive to the relationship. With obsession, it becomes nearly impossible to be without one another.
The obsessive partner feels a physical need to be with the object of their obsession every day and to know exactly where they are and who they are with whenever they are not together. Negative feelings such as jealousy and paranoia begin to creep into the relationship. The obsessive individual suspects that their partner may be cheating or that everything they do or say is somehow a reflection of their feelings.
With obsession, there is no boundary between your life and another’s. Your thoughts rotate around the object of your affection, and no matter how hard you try, you cannot get them to think about something else. Obsession, in many ways, is like an addiction. Because the object of your affection makes you rush whenever you interact with it, quite like a drug would. When your addiction is a walking and living person, things can get a little tricky. Because of your obsession, your addiction has a mind of its own because it can choose to leave you at will and choose to disappear. With drug addictions, as long as you keep your job, you are certain to be able to control buying and obtaining that obsession. But for an obsession over a person, they have free will. And, therefore, cannot easily be contained nor controlled. And who is to say that you will ever find another person who can give you that kind of high? So, there is a lot of fear and scarcity behind the obsession, to the point that it plays dark stories in the mind and creates paranoia.
Obsession may be combined with the feeling of control, that you know better for the other person’s life, and taking it one step further that you take action towards crafting this “better life” for the other person, so much so that you forget to live a life of your own. As seen in YOU, Joe Goldberg does everything he can to create a version of Beck’s life that he thinks it should be, without including her in any of these decisions. In that way, he traps her in a neat little cage, which he traps her in at the end. The cage is a metaphor for feeling trapped in a life that beck didn’t choose for herself, in a cage that was fueled by obsession, jealousy, and control. Obsession takes freedom away from both parties. It takes freedom from the obsessed person because they completely lose their sense of self in trying to create the cage to hold their object of affection. Because they are ultimately afraid that they aren’t worthy enough on their own for this person to stay. The person trapped loses their freedom because they no longer feel like they have a choice about how to live their life without external consequences. But one has to question the person who is trapped. How did you allow it to get this far, and is this something you secretly desire? With YOU, Beck was constantly seen flirting, throwing herself at men, wanting someone to want her to desire her. Was she secretly hoping and wishing that someone would love her, lust over her, or become so addicted to her that they would do anything they would never leave? So that opens an entirely new question, do you like to be obsessed over?
Obsession is shrouded with jealousy, but many can say that they like to make their partner jealous because it indicates that they care. My point is there are levels to obsession. So, what is your level? And how does that level of obsession relate to passion and sex?
Obviously, with YOU, Joe Goldberg murders people for Beck, and obsession here is dramatized for entertainment, but obsession doesn’t always look like it does in tv and the movies. So, let’s take the murdering out of the way. Did you like the way that Joe doted over Beck, how he helped her pursue her dreams, how he was constantly available, he would set aside anything for Beck, do anything for her, for her to succeed, how devoted he was to her? So much so that he began to lose himself in the process. And is it possible to have that heightened amount of passion, intensity, and attraction without obsession? Another famous couple that you can see in real-time is Johnny Depp and Amber Heard. Here it’s an interesting tale because I believe that both were obsessed with each other. Both wanted control over the other and used many ways to get at it. Johnny’s control consisted of money, fame, and opportunities, and Amber’s was more psychological, emotional, alluring, and sexual, like a Siren. They both had vines wrapped around each other, tugging and pulling until the chaos became too great to handle until it ripped them both apart. Publically, I might add.
In the love stories glorified in movies, tv shows, and books, the characters are so taken by each other, falling so hard that nothing else matters but this other person. So, is that love, or is it obsession? Or is it possible that the two interplay with each other, and it’s not something we can help as humans? One question I have for everyone is, can you have a wild and orgasmic sex life without a degree of obsession?
Really interesting topic! Let us know what you think, and leave a comment in the section below! And see you later, Moodlings.
