The novel Letter from an Unknown Woman by the famous Austrian writer Zweig tells the story of a young woman who wrote a long sad letter beside her child who had just died of influenza fever before she died, telling the writer R about her hidden obsession and emotional pain all her life.
The girl's father died young and lived alone with her mother. /kloc-at the age of 0/3, she secretly fell in love with a young and handsome writer r in the community. In Secret Love of the Loved, the girl turned into a beautiful girl and lingered quietly near the writer's house every night.
In the infatuation waiting day after day, this girl with outstanding appearance finally caught the attention of the writer. They spent three charming nights. But she didn't tell her love for him, and the screenwriter didn't recognize her as the girl next door.
The teenage girl is pregnant. She knows that writers are born romantic and don't want to be bound by marriage. She didn't want the writer to feel that she was a burden, so she hated her, so after giving birth to a child in a poor hospital, she took on the burden of life alone. In order to educate her children in a good environment, she did not hesitate to entrust herself to the rich.
At the ball where the strange woman and the writer met for the last time, they spent another fascinating night. Her heart was broken when she carefully stuffed some money into the hand warmer. Now that God has taken their child's life, she has nothing to love. So she wrote this last letter just to say, "I love you, goodbye."
However, after reading the letter, the writer R could never recall her appearance and the story between them.
This is a woman's obsession with love. They are passionate, painful, obsessed, love to death, and more self-sacrificing.
Men's obsession with love is crazier and more destructive. After being refused to break up, it is not uncommon for some men to hate each other because of love, threaten nude photos, or retaliate with a knife. For example, the murderer in Jiangge case.
Dr Susan Forward called this emotional confusion that men and women are trapped by love, stubborn and in love.
Dr Susan Forward is an internationally renowned psychotherapist, speaker and writer. She put forward the concept of "obsession" in "obsession": learning to love and be loved normally refers to the persistent, repetitive and abnormal phenomenon in thinking and behavior. Similar to the psychological concept of "compulsion".
At the beginning of a relationship, there is not much difference between infatuated love and healthy love: the sky is so clear, the flowers are so fragrant, and the laughter of lovers around you is as sweet as music.
When one party proposes to break up or refuses to further develop the relationship, the watershed between healthy love and forced love appears. In a healthy love relationship, lovers will be very sad and painful after being rejected. But they have the courage to end the past and move on. However, obsessed lovers often can't get out of the shadow of pain and fear. They cling to each other desperately and even ruin their future.
Based on twenty years' experience in emotional counseling, Dr. Susan Forward summed up four characteristics to help judge whether a person is infatuated with love.
1. My mind is full of my lover or the person I want.
2. Have an insatiable desire for the object of obsession.
3. Has been explicitly rejected by the other party, or can't get it: physically or mentally.
After being rejected or not getting it, your behavior will start to go wrong.
When a person is obsessed with love, his/her behavioral reactions can be roughly divided into the following four types.
1. Anxiety obsessive-compulsive disorder.
The typical behavior of anxious addicts is to talk on the phone all night and the other party doesn't answer. So I kept calling, over and over again, like a robot, over and over again ... a voice in my heart kept shouting, "I must talk to her, or I will die."
2. painful obsessive-compulsive disorder.
The way they save their love is often excessive and even dangerous. The most commonly used pursuit strategies are as follows:
Keep sending gifts, flowers or love letters to each other, even if they don't want to accept them.
Find an excuse to meet, or keep harassing calls.
Always run to each other's home or office without saying hello.
Track each other.
Threatening to self-harm or hurt each other.
As a result, the more they "strive for", the further they push each other, and the more painful, desperate and inferior they are.
3. Revenge addicts
They finally gave up the hard struggle to get back their old love, because love would lead to hatred, and they were determined to punish the person who made them so miserable.
Their psychology is to destroy it if they can't get it. For example, after her boyfriend broke up with barber Anne, she was addicted to revenge fantasy: "I used to comb my client's hair while thinking about where to get gasoline, how to spill gasoline around his house and how to light a fire." At first, I wanted to burn him down with his house. Later, I thought about it. I still let him live and let him watch the house burn down. That would be fun. I often think for hours. I know it's vicious, but it's the only way to relieve my pain. "
This fantasy of revenge will make people lose themselves, lose control of their behavior and do things they can't believe afterwards.
4. Notre Dame complex
Some women are easily attracted to those "Mr. Problem": unemployed, drunkards, liars, drug addicts, even sadists or fugitives.
These persistent people firmly believe that with enough efforts, they will be able to save their lovers from the quagmire. This is a kind of "savior complex". As China people often say, "Men are not bad, but women don't love them". The worse the other person is, the more I love him.
"Mr. Question" is best at taking advantage of each other's guilt and sympathy and making more demands again and again, especially asking for money. They look weak and helpless, but they are actually emotional manipulators.
If you find yourself caught in the dilemma of infatuation and love, if you want to end the past and start a new life, then you can get powerful guidance from infatuation: learn to love and be loved normally to help yourself out of this dilemma.
Different from general psychological theory books, Dr. Susan Forward's works pay more attention to emotional healing and practical operation. Aiming at the emotional problems of obsessed lovers, she introduced a set of effective healing courses in the book.
This process can be divided into two stages: getting rid of obsession and cutting off puzzles.
The first stage includes four steps: recording, pausing, evaluating and changing. It will take about four months.
In the first two weeks of the healing course, you don't have to change your obsessed thoughts, feelings and behaviors. You will still want to see your lover, and you will still wake up in the middle of the night and cry with your pillow in your arms.
The only thing you need to change is to record your troubles. The form of diary is very simple. Whenever your heart is full of him/her, or when you are in contact with each other, record it.
Each record will include the date, time and answers to the following six questions:
1. What triggered this idea?
2. What am I thinking?
3. How do I feel?
4. What do I want to do?
5. What did I do?
6. What was the result?
You don't care what others think or say, but you have the courage to record your obsession truly.
Because you have to figure out how obsessed thoughts, feelings and behaviors affect you, so that you can achieve real change.
During this two-week emotional holiday, you can travel or rent a hotel. In any case, you must leave your lover for a period of time, and the two sides will no longer contact.
Because you must concentrate your courage and attention, fight against yourself and try to shut down the "obsession system". This system consists of three parts-obsessed thoughts, obsessed feelings and obsessed behaviors, just like the three sharp blades of the trident in Satan's hands.
To close the obsession system, we must first start with the obsession behavior. Because behavior is external, concrete and obvious, it is the answer to "what did I do" in your emotional diary these two weeks.
You have to give an ultimatum about your behavior. The specific method is the "empty chair" education method. Find a quiet place, close the curtains, turn off the phone and put an empty chair opposite.
Imagine your behavior is a disobedient Xiong Haizi, sitting in that chair at the moment. You yourself are the loving and firm parents of this child. You must explain in detail the confusion he has caused you, set a bottom line for him and say what you expect of him. You can even point to that chair and scold it like a strict teacher.
In this way, it's like installing many alarms in your brain. Every time you feel impulsive again, they will scream to remind you to stop.
Turn off the trouble system and stop the trouble gear. Specific methods include removing "forced trigger", "labeling" and "setting time limit".
You should try your best to remove, bypass and avoid touching the "compulsive trigger". "The trigger of obsession" is the answer to "What triggered this idea" in your diary. It may be a photo of you two, a gift from your lover, a record you both like, or a restaurant or cinema you have been to.
Of course, there are many "compulsive triggers" in our hearts, and it is difficult to pull them out. For example, when you celebrate your birthday every year, you can't help but think of the unforgettable birthday party held by your lover and the good old days.
At this time, you can use the method of "labeling" to pour cold water on your obsession and immediately warn yourself: "This is obsession. This is fantasy. Stop immediately! "
Another method is to "set a time limit". Allow yourself to indulge your compulsive thoughts once a day for a while. On the first day of the emotional holiday, give your obsession 14 minutes, the next day 13 minutes, and the third day 12 minutes, which can be reduced. After two weeks, you will be surprised to find that you have the ability to control the runaway wild horse in your heart.
The last day of the emotional holiday is the evaluation day. Don't arrange any work or parties. The two lists provided in the book clarify the actual situation of the relationship between the two people and think about the nature of your feelings.
The first list contains only one item. Has your lover cut off all contact with you? If you answer yes, then the relationship between your is over. No matter how painful you are, you should accept this reality.
Sit down, take out paper and pen, miss the touch and pain this love has brought you, and take a moment to write it down. Then read it out loud, like a eulogy at a love funeral.
Just like the death of a loved one, the living will come out one day, no matter how painful. No matter how painful it is to bury a persistent relationship, it will be cured one day. The length of this course of treatment depends on you.
The second list contains nine items. For example, do you contact each other every time? Nine points. If one of your answers is yes, then the relationship between your should not continue.
But if you don't want to give up and think that there is still room for your love, then you must also make changes and give yourself three months of love therapy.
In these three months, you should not try to change your lover. You can only change yourself. You should change your old obsession and leave some room for the other person to breathe freely.
You know, no matter how close the relationship between two lovers is, it is just two eggs, and it is impossible to merge into one and become one egg. The most suitable relationship between two lovers should be like two hedgehogs in winter. They are close enough to keep each other warm and keep a certain distance to avoid stabbing each other.
After three months, do the "emotional status checklist" again. If your's relationship is as bad as before, then you'd better let it go.
Because your happiness is too important, you can't give it to someone who has rejected you under any circumstances.
The second stage of love healing course for obsessive-compulsive disorder is to cut off obsession.
Dr Susan Forward believes that most drug addicts grew up in unhealthy families. When they are young, they often feel that their parents don't love them, care about them and abandon them. It is conceivable that this feeling of repeated rejection will make children more eager for love.
When these children grow up, they seem to be adults who can live independently, but they are still weak children at heart: they are afraid of being abandoned. When they meet the people they love, they are awakened by the desire for love. They were drunk. They took it.
If the other party does not accept or propose to break up, it will tear their wounds, and the fear and anxiety of childhood that had been dormant in the deep heart will be activated.
In the first stage of the healing course, you made a difficult and brave attempt to get out of the original obsession mode. But if you want to internalize these changes as a part of yourself, rather than external coercion, then you must uproot your inner fear of being abandoned.
You can try the following methods to see which one is more effective.
There is a case in the book in which Margaret's father ran away from home when she was a child. She is very sad and helpless, and this feeling will never be forgotten. Encouraged by Dr. Susan, she wrote such a letter.
Dear Dad:
When you left, my heart was broken and I was so scared. I can understand why you left your mother. Many people are divorced, but why did you leave me? Why don't you come to see me? I was even sadder when I saw other children with their father. I'll never understand how you can treat me like that. You just left and never looked back. You shouldn't do this to me. Everything I do is because I love you.
When she read the letter, her words choked and broke. She felt miserable, but after reading it, she found that it was not that terrible. Every time she reads it again, her inner pain will be relieved by one point.
For adults who were abused by their parents as children, Dr. Susan designed a "remolding parents" rehabilitation exercise.
Imagine going back to childhood and sitting in an empty chair in front of me. And adults are his parents, standing in front of the children, saying sorry to him, making him suffer so much pain and suffering. Asking for his forgiveness, the family embraced and tears filled their eyes.
By persisting in this wonderful exercise every day, I can reshape the image of my parents in my mind, instill love and affirmation information into myself, and resolve my inner fears bit by bit.
In the end, you will build a healthy response model to rejection in love. Rejection is only part of normal communication. You will cry and get hurt, but you will not despair of life.
When you are trapped by feelings, painful and stubborn, ask yourself, what are you afraid of? Is this love worth it? Don't rush to answer, read Dr. Susan Forward's book "Obsession: Learning to Love and Be Loved Normally". It can help you, take you out of your inner cage and learn to love and be loved healthily. You have to believe that your happiness may be late, but you will not be absent.