LIMERENCE IS THE MOST POWERFUL ADDICTION and everyone is vulnerable to it!

If there's one subject that I talk about that everyone should know, it's this topic. Because today we're going to talk about love versus addiction. You see, there are different types of love, and one of the types of love really is more like an addiction. It can be a wonderful thing full of bliss, or it can be a terrible, horrible thing that gets you into a lot of trouble. If you're new here, welcome to Put the Shovel Down. I'm Amber Hollingsworth, and this channel is all about helping you understand the science and psychology of addiction so that you're always five steps ahead of it. Okay? So this type of addiction, almost everyone either will have or has had. So even if you don't relate to some of my other videos about addiction, you may very well relate to this one. You see, there's this very first initial stage of romantic love. Most of the time we call it, like, infatuation, but the clinical term for it is limerence. And you see, limerence is an addictive type of love. It can bring you wonderful pleasure, and it can bring you lots of pain, just like most other things that are addictive. Now, limerence can be good. Like I said, it can be good in certain situations and it can be bad in other situations. So first let's talk about what it is, and then we'll talk about when it's a good thing, and we'll talk about when it's a bad thing and maybe how to steer clear of getting yourself into trouble with this addicted state of mind. Okay? So first of all, a good way to remember what limerence is is it's like if you heard the terms when someone is madly in love, that is limerence. And there's a little truth in that statement. Like, you kind of go mad. You kind of go crazy and lose your mind for a bit. Because when you fall into this infatuated state, your brain chemicals actually change. You get an increase in dopamine, you get an increase in norepinephrine. Now, dopamine is your desired chemical. Norepinephrine is your pay attention chemical. So it's like, I want it and I'm fixated on it, and. And you get a decrease in serotonin. And there's been some research out there that shows when there's a decrease in serotonin, you're much more at risk to do risky things, scary things. It's kind of like your. Your fear sensors go down. So as you can see, you want it, you're thinking about it all the time, and your Risk aversion is down. So that can put you in a pretty high risk predicament if you're not careful. Now, limerence, like I said, it happens when you first fall into this infatuated state with a romantic partner, you get very, very obsessed about them. You're obsessed with whether or not they reciprocate those feelings towards you. You think about them constantly, all the time. You might even do silly things like try to plan on how you're going to accidentally run into them or be on their part of town and make it look like you didn't even try to. You really start to scheme, just like with any other kind of addiction, and start to scheme in your mind about, how can I get it, how can I keep it, you know, how can I have it? No one else knows something like that. And you become obsessed that you might lose this. And so you start looking for any sign from that other person about how they feel about you. When you see good signs, you are elated. And it is wonderful. If you see signs that make you think that might not even be the truth, but it make you think that the person might be pulling away from you or they don't feel the same way about you. You can become devastated and desperate. And sometimes when you're in this desperate state, you can do desperate things. You can become really clingy or even threatening or emotionally abusive to that person. You can, you can do some seriously not good things when you're in this desperate state. So you've really got to be careful and understand what exactly is going on in your mind. Now, the biggest problem with limerence, as far as I'm concerned, is that our culture kind of teaches us that that's what love is, right? But ultimately it's one little tiny stage of love. And it really is more like addiction than it is like love. And the issue is, is it doesn't last. In fact, it usually lasts somewhere between eight months to maybe a little over a year. It could last a little longer in certain situations, but it is not going to last forever and ever and ever. The problem is, is that, you know, we have in our head that this is what love is. And if you're not feeling it, it's not the one and you're not in love with that person. And so we can find ourselves feeling that way. We get married or whatever, we think this one, and then that feeling, it's a feeling, it fades away. And then we think to ourselves, I fell out of love with you, or maybe I was wrong. You're not really the one. Because you see, when you're in this limerence state, you can only see the about the person. You idealize them in your mind, they're perfect. And if someone tries to tell you otherwise, then you just think to yourself, oh, you don't even know. Like, you're wrong. You don't know them like I know them or something like that. And so you have this so idealistic view, this craving for them. And when that fades and reality starts to set in, that, yeah, it's another human being and they're human and they have, you know, their flaws and traits that get on your nerves and stuff like that, then you start thinking you fell out of love. And then that puts you in a bad situation because you make some bad decisions. If in your mind you think that's what love is, a better way maybe to think about what love is is to think about it less like a feeling. Limerence is more of a feeling and love is more of an action. When you love someone, you want to make them happy, you want to take care of them, you want to look after them. It is an action. It's a behavior that you do. It's a choice that you. Now, when you're in limerence, you do all those actions, you make those choices. But it's really easy because you have this flood of great brain chemicals and feeling that drives those loving behaviors. But when limerence fades, you don't have that feeling anymore that automatically gasolines it and makes it really easy to do so. And that's when it becomes a choice. You see, when you're in limerence, people call limerence, it's like an involuntary state. So you almost don't even have a choice about that when you're in that state. But once you fall out of limerence, if you still want to love someone, you have to make the choice to do that. And it's not nearly as easy. And like I said, the problem is, is that our society sets us up to think that that's what love is. You know, like if you're, you know, if you're dating someone and you're talking to your friends or family about them, the first thing you want to know is, well, do you love them? Are they the one and in our mind, or do they make you happy? And all of those questions, when they say them and when we answer them, we're trying to decide, do we have those really strong limerence feelings towards them? But like I said, limerence is more like an addiction and it goes away. So Making decisions, big lifelong decisions based on limerence is probably not a good thing. So limerence is wonderful. If it's two single people who are available and who fall in limerence with each other and it's wonderful, and both people feel it for each other, then it's wonderful. It's not so wonderful if you've got two people who aren't available. Either one of them aren't available, as in one of them is in a relationship with someone else, or they're just not available for some other kind of reason, then it. Then it is a problem because either you're going to end up starting a relationship with each other and one of you is not available, and that's going to lead to some really bad choices. The other thing that can happen is when you're in limerence, when someone like you have this mad crush on them and they don't feel the same way back about you, that's pretty painful. Most of us have been there. Come on, admit it, you guys. Let me know, have you been in limerence before? Was it the good kind of limerence? Was it the bad kind of limerence? Let me know your experience with this, because I really do feel like most people have some experience with this topic. I mean, right? We've been teenagers, right? So you've probably got some experience with this. Now, another time when limerence can kind of be a little problematic is when, let's say both people are in limerence, they're dating each other. It's all wonderful. Well, relationships, real relationships, happen in stages, right? And we don't always go through those stages at the exact same period of time. So it's pretty likely that one of the one person in the couple might fall out of limerence before the other person moves to the next stage. And when that happens, the person that's still in limerence is looking at that other person like, don't you love me anymore? Why don't you want to be around me as much? Because when you fall out of limerence, you might start wanting to, you know, like, hang out with your friends again or, you know, do your hobbies. And it doesn't mean you don't even like this person anymore. It just means that that, like, crazy obsessive trait is gone and that your regular self starts to come back into play. When that happens in a couple, each one is on a different sort of stage of that. That can cause a lot of arguments and jealousy, and it can cause a lot of really chaotic behaviors. We see it in teenagers all the time. Like controlling, possessive, jealous. We're talking about not good, not pretty kind of stuff. And so you've got that. That's when limerence can be bad. In the worst possible state of limerence is when you've got one or both people who are in limerence with each other who aren't available, meaning they're in a committed relationship with someone else and you've been in this long term committed relationship with someone else. So you are past limerence with them. So you have this sort of more realistic view of this person who they're more like a teammate to you. And love takes a lot of work and action. And then all of a sudden this other person comes along and they just make you feel feel magical and blissful. And it really, just like any other addiction, it distorts your thinking. Like I said, it makes you feel like this person you're in limerence with is perfect. And you think they get me and they're my soul mate, and you forget and you distort your past. So maybe you were in limerence with the person that you're with right now. Maybe you were in limerence with them a long time ago, but in your mind it's almost like it didn't even happen, right? And anytime there's an addictive behavior, this is one of the reasons why it's so much like addiction. When you're obsessive about something and you sort of know you shouldn't be obsessive about it, or you're going overboard, or you're doing something sneaky, then you start to have this little twinge of guilt inside because you know you're doing something you shouldn't be, whether that's drinking, drugs or limerence, or gambling or shopping or whatever. And you start to feel guilty because you know you're sort of breaking a boundary with someone else that you care about in order to get this thing that you're obsessed with. And the way that people deal with that guilt and shame usually is that they distort in their mind this other person. They vilify them, they make them the mean person. They tell themselves they never liked that person anyway. They tell themselves, well, they had it coming. You can begin to tell yourself any kind of like story that makes you feel better in order to chase this thing that you're obsessive with. And that's why when you're in an addicted state, your thinking really just is not clear. And so the issue is, let's say you have two people that fall in limerence, one or both of them is in another committed relationship. One or both of them leave that committed relationship to be with each other because they think this is the special one and they're perfect for me and I've never felt this way before and I can't live without it. And then they get in that relationship and guess what happens? The limerence goes away just like it did before. And you're going to find yourself in the same situation. So a really good thing to remember for yourself here, especially if once you're in a committed relationship, is to understand that the grass isn't greener and if you want to protect yourself from making these really bad choices. Because once you're in limerence, your thinking is just not good and it's hard to control. It's kind of like once you're addicted to heroin, stopping really isn't easy. So your best bet is to not get yourself in that state. And the way that you do that is you be really honest with yourself and don't put yourself in high risk situations. Don't put yourself around other people consistently in some kind of intimate way like where you're, where you're talking with them about your feelings. You know, don't, don't find someone else that you could possibly be attracted to and start talking to them about the problems you have in your current relationship. Now you may say, well, they're just my friend, but that's a really dangerous setup. You've got to protect yourself and be. It really requires a lot of honesty with yourself. I'm not saying like you can't be friends with someone of the opposite sex. I'm not saying that anyone can't be friends. But there is a sort of level of that friendship that you need to be careful with, especially if, you know, it's like a someone of a similar age or maybe they're attractive to you or something like that. You got to really be careful, otherwise you're going to find yourself in a really bad situation. You're going to make some really bad decisions based on a feeling and that feeling is going to go away another time. You know, that limerence can be dangerous is let's say you're like you completely in limerence, infatuated with someone and you think they're wonderful. But your friends and your family, they can see some things about this person that you can't see and they're really saying, I don't know, like I don't have a good vibe or, you know, like they've been arrested 14 times or you know, they're trying to tell you something about this person you don't want to hear but you can't see it because you feel this certain way about this person. Please understand that this feeling can distort your thinking and it will distort the reality of the situation. And so I understand that you don't always have to sort of make decisions about what your friends and your family think but when you know someone really truly cares about you and they're looking out for you at least take the time to listen to what they have to say even though it's really hard and understand that you might not can see some traits in this other person like the people around you who aren't in limerence with them they have a little bit more of an objective viewpoint. Okay so to know more about love and attachment and sustaining good long term relationships I want you to watch this video next. I'm going to put it right up here and so you can check it out.