where is lover’s anonymous?

I’ve posted about “impulse” before. but I want to speak of it in a different way. To quote my own book, [sic] “We’re all human. We all sometimes fall victim to our compulsions and impulses. I try to be forgiving of the impulsive behavior of others, because I often fall victim to my own.” But in recent days, as I reconnected with someone I lost last year, after smashing our friendship with an unfair volley of impulsive jealous profanities, something I was not proud of, and ultimately wasn’t in my best interests, particularly if I wanted to continue to connect with her in the future…I began to ponder. What are my own impulsive drivers?

People have different impulsive drivers. For some it is alcohol. For some it is gambling, drugs, money, sex… the thrill of the con. We all know someone driven by each of these impulses.

But as I really think about it. Alcohol is not an impulse of mine, nor are gambling, drugs, money, or any of the others. I’m not really even very driven by sex, even. After thinking about it… I realized that really I’m driven by “love”. In a pivotal chapter of my book, there is a chapter, where the main character “Yuki” is mocked and berated intensely by the love of his life, “Inari”. In an explosive tirade she quotes his bad poetry back at him… mocking him… “I KNOW WHAT YOU WANT! LOVE IS YOUR GOD! IF YOU DON’T GET WHAT YOU WANT FROM ME, YOU’RE GOING TO END UP HATING ME!…”I realized that I am abnormally and intensely driven by love and romance, the dream of a fairy-tale and the happily-ever-after. I have obsessed over this idea since I was 3 or 4 years old.

But, you might ask, “Ada, how can you say horrible things to other people driven impulsively by love?” Well, if I’m being honest with myself. Love often leads to jealousy… jealously leads to anger… anger results in saying horrible things to people who break your heart… even if you love them.

Love leads to dumb decisions, putting yourself in dumb situations where maybe you’re gullible, gaslit, and taken advantage of. Love leads potentially to drug and alcohol problems. Love leads to impulsive spending.

In a message to someone who shall not be named, I once wrote “I’m the only one of us who cared enough to tell you to ‘fuck off!’… When I tell you I hate your guts, you realize it is because I love you, right?” There are many people I know who would certainly scold me for being out of line. Logically they would be right to scold me… but again, impulse doesn’t really follow logic, as it is driven by emotional desire often disconnected from logical reasoning. When you have the impulse to punch someone in the face (something that I’ve NEVER done, but many of you have), you’re not really thinking about the logical side of things, the idea that you might get sent to jail for doing such a thing… or once upon a time…. sent to detention. At the time I told said person to “fuck off”, I was certainly feeling like dog shit under her shoe… a place that is my own personal version of “hell”… a place I try to claw out of by any means necessary, usually willing to do anything, try anything, say anything, that results in a mending of my relationship, including… eventually… saying horrible things when the nice words don’t work. Logically… there would be no way I could mend a relationship with someone I said horrible things to out of jealousy. The logical outcome, in fact, could be that I might actually acquire a bad reputation with our mutual friends, ultimately ruining my whole social life. Saying “fuck off” was a bad impulse, yes, but an impulse driven by “love”…. specifically the loss of it.

Just about everyone knows someone who is an alcoholic. Maybe you’re an alcoholic yourself. If you’re an alcoholic, you join AA. If you’re a drug addict you join NA. If you’re a gambler, you join GA. There’s even groups for sex addiction these days.. Where’s the “anonymous” group for Lover’s Anonymous? It doesn’t seem to exist. But I think I’ve come to realize that the core of ALL of my life’s problems is rooted in the fact that I “love” too much, and that LOVE makes me dumb, gullible, financially irresponsible at times, sometimes angry and jealous. Love can make you crash your car, lose all your money, or even kill yourself. Many of you know that I’m building a karaoke website… is this driven by my love of music? No. It is driven entirely by LOVE… as a means for finding it through music and song. “Love Stinks” sometimes, you know?…. Where is lover’s anonymous? Maybe google knows.