Dear Boris1010:

“Are you separating the emotion itself (love? or something else) from the target of that ‘love’? I was seeing it as an either/ or proposition: I either actually DO love HER.. or else I’m in love with my mental model of her, not the actual person”-

– the way we experience the world outside of us (images, sounds, touch, smell and taste) is through our brains. Our brains translate the world outside of us to to chemicals that give us the physical/ emotional experience of the outside world: we don’t taste a cake, we taste the chemicals our brains produce when eating the cake. Similarly, we don’t feel love for another person, we feel the chemicals our brains produce when in the company of the person, or when thinking about the person.

Our translation/ interpretation of food, people.. images, sounds, touch, etc. may be true to reality, ex.: (1)  we perceive the cake to be sweet and it contains lots of sugar, (2) the person we feel love for is a kind and loving person,

Or our translations/interpretations of the world outside of us may is be true to reality: ex. (1) we are eating saltines, believing they are sweet, (2) we feel love an unkind, hateful person.

“‘Happy, joyous, and free’ I’m not; ‘Restless, irritable, and discontent’ I certainly am”- I recommend that at this time, you aim not at feeling happy, joyous and free, but at feeling less restless, irritable and discontent.

“I think maybe I was better off when those emotions were dormant… I wasn’t happy, but at least I wasn’t in such pain”- I understand. You mentioned before that your life was neck up, something along these words, and that the longest distance one can travel is the 18″ between one’s head and one’s heart. I know the experience. I too lived in my head. But I did experience joy in the context of fantasy/ day-dreaming, and on a rare occasion- I experienced an unexpected and short-lived joy.

It is not too late for you to reach your heart more consistently and in a way that does not overwhelm you. Earlier, I referred to your emotional experience with this woman as “awakening”. I used the word because your experience reminded me of the 1990 drama movie Awakening. Are you familiar with the movie?

anita