Damaged

As I read the first half of "Damaged" I was extremely interested in the book. I am very eager to find out what's to come in the end. I think it is absolutely insane that the author becomes obsessed by his sons new girl friend. He has everything that a man would want in life such as an intelligent wife, children, a home, and a great job. But somehow he stills feels incomplete. In this story I can see how someone probably feels sympathy for this man, but in reality this would not be a situation that calls for anyones sympathy. I think what attracted him to Anna was the fact that they both have that mysterious quality about themselves and our both great at withholding secrets. I could be wrong, it could have just been love at first sight. He is clearly showing signs of obsession. For one he followed his son and Anna on a romantic getaway to Paris. He then stays at the same room they stood in because Anna's simple presence in that room made it perfect. I do not think that he had any regards this his son was in that room. I believe that he his soon going to lose regard for his whole family and everything that he has for the one woman I do not predict that this book as going to end in any good way. I can't wait to find out!

Lolita

     In this story the author has an affair with a young girl whom he was in love with and later on died. It seemed that after the death of his young love he was traumatized and not attracted to women that were of his age range. He found himself to be attracted to young girls who were extremely younger than him. He knew in his mind that these fantasies were wrong, but he could not resist these thoughts. He was even married to a woman because of her child like tendencies. They eventually got divorced. He later moved in with a family and fell in love with a twelve year old girl whom he called Lolita. My opinion on this story is that I feel that the author is definitely psychologically ill. I feel like the reason he has a thing for younger girls is because it takes him back to the moment in time when he was a young boy enjoying his life with the girl of his dreams. Therefore, he is attracted to anyone that can invoke some type of memory of his past love. I feel that the way he thinks of young girls can be linked to obsession. I don't think that he is so much attracted to young females, but rather the features that characterize young girls. Anytime he comes in contact with these features his mind erupts with uncontrollable thoughts that he finds hard to tame. I could see why he was attracted to young girls just for the simple fact that they brought back memories, but as a whole I thoughts that his thoughts were sick.

Limerence and fatal attraction.

I had never seen the movie fatal attraction before, but I must say that it is an intense film. The woman that the man had an affair with demonstrated obsessive thoughts. At first she seemed normal woman, but after a weekend spent with him she did a complete turn around. I think what caused her to behave in this manner is that she was infatuated with him because she barely knew him to the extent that she can say that they had an intimate relationship. The relationship was based on infatuation and passion. There was not commitment or other aspects of love that he had with his wife. Cutting herself, stalking him at his job, meeting his wife, and killing a kids rabbit is not something that a normal person would do. Everything that was taking place she imposed upon herself because she knew what she was getting herself into from the beginning. This is why I firmly believe that some infatuations can be dangerous, because you are in an obsessive state of mind, and thats exactly what happened in the film.
 Limerence to me is something like love at first sight. You are attracted to them, but not on a sexual level. Instead that is the end product. Limerence and lust are quite the same to me because they both deal with heightened levels of attraction. I also think it  has a link to being close to infatuation. People in limerence are said to be head over heals not noticing the any flaws of the person that they are interested in .

Davis Chapter 6

Chapter 6 in Davis speaks about sexuality and its relation to obsession. Sexuality becomes obsessive when one cannot stop thinking about it and it becomes unhealthy. The media portrays obsessive sexuality without even realizing it. Perfume advertisements show models that are sexually attracted to one another. They do not in fact know each other personally, but one thing you do know is that there is a force of sexual attraction. This promotes polymorphous sexuality, when according to some individuals sexuality should be left for reproductive purposes. Passion leads to irresponsibility, addiction, murder, and madness. This is when too much passion is not good because it leads to obsessive sex. They are basically saying that sex is not obsessive when it is kept in moderation. Too much sex, or sex that inflicts pain on another is not healthy, and in turn obsessive. Masturbation, self pleasure, and homosexuality is seen as unhealthy. Some researchers argue that the release of semen is healthy for a male, and others argue that too much sex can lead to mental disorders. Too much sex can seem natural to a man. Being violent and aggressive in the nature of the male to prove his manliness. In my opinion, I do think that the media has a strong influence on sexuality. I do not think that it one necessarily becomes obsessive, but I do think that it promotes multiple partnerships. If anything I would have to say that the obsession becomes about oneself and their appearance. As far as too much sex, I do not think there is necessarily "too much of it". To each its own. Some may view it as an obsessive, unhealthy tendency, and some may be content. I do not think there is a right or wrong way for partners to have sex.

The Possession.

 The book Possession was a pretty interesting book. The author speaks about how her relationship ended with her partner for six years. She was madly in love with him and the thought of him being with another woman drove her crazy. She was literally obsessed with his new lover. She thought about this woman throughout the day and everything in society brought a picture to her mind of this woman. She would not be able to stop until she could find out everything that she needs to know about this new woman. I thought in a way her still having some sort of relationship with her ex-boyfriend did not help her healing process at all. I feel that as long he was still in the picture the more obsessed she was going to become. She did absurd things such as trying to find out about her on the internet and asking people if they may know who exactly she is. I think this relates to another reading that we had in class that when it comes to passion and when people are hurt they don't have the capability of thinking rationally about their actions. She ended up not putting so much thought to this woman when she wrote on paper that that she didn't love her EX anymore and by not seeing him. If she would have had that mentality from the beginning there is a possibility that she would have not suffered this long, but it seems as if she was telling herself that she was still in love with him and this woman. These routines were more like bad habits that were becoming hard to get rid of.

Triangular Theory of love

I learned that the theory of love consists of three components which are intimacy, passion, and decision/commitment component. The component I feel is the strongest is intimacy because it is the bonding and the closeness that one feels in a relationship. If there is no intimacy in a relationship than what is the point of committing to each other. Those three components can be combined together to represent 8 different extremes, which seemed to be rational to me because not everybody has the same type of relationships which makes one understand these differences. One of the extremes that I found interesting was The Decision/commitment component Alone: Empty because I feel that this is common within couples that have been together for a very long period of time. They may feel as if they are already comfortable with each other that may not want to start over because of certain things that they got used to. They mention that empty love usually happens in the last stage of relationships, but it can also happen in cases like an arranged marriage. A question that I asked myself is can an empty love convert to passion in the future. The ideal type of love seems to be the Consummate which means that all 3 components of love are present. At the same time I think this may be the hardest to achieve as it is inevitable for one of the components to wane.

Picture blogs.

The "Obsession for Men" image relates to what we talked about in class in that men can become obsessed with their body image. They become , that some will make exercise into a daily, sometimes excessive routine. Exercise is important, but when it is missed can turn into a huge problem. It becomes less about health and more about achieving a certain image. This can in turn lead to excessive trips to the gym and use of supplements. Just like we discussed that anorexia can be linked to OCD , so can this. People are led to anorexia when they are unhappy with their image. Also, not having the body image the media portrays can lead one to think that they are not good enough

http://www.umassmed.edu/uploadedimages/StudentStudying.jpg:

 This picture, in my opinion, can represent monomania. When individuals are specialized in a specific field they tend to only focus on that. They feel it is crucial to know every detail in their specialized areas of study. This can be time consuming, and like OCD can affect their relationship with others. Some become so wrapped up that they lose sleep and track of everything. This has a huge toll and their lives.