all human sufferings is rooted in desire.
desiring another person is perhaps the most risky endeavor of all.
as soon as you want somebody -- really want him --
it is as though you have taken a surgical needle and sutured your happiness to the skin of that person,
so that any separation will now cause you a lacerating injury.
all you know that you must obtain the object of your desire by any means necessary, and then never be parted.
all you can think about is you beloved.
lost in such primal urgency, you no longer completely own yourself.
you have become and indentured servant to your own yearnings.
this is how infatuation begins.
and infatuation is the most perilous aspect of human desire.
infatuation leads to what psychologists call "intrusive thinking" -- that famously distracted state in which you cannot concentrate on anything other than the object of your obsession.
once infatuation strikes, all else -- jobs, relationships, responsibilities, food, sleep, work --
falls by the wayside as you nurse fantasies about your dearest one that quickly become repetitive, invasive, and all-consuming.
infatuation alters your brain chemistry, as though you were dousing yourself with opiates and stimulants.
the brain scans and mood swings of an infatuated lover, scientists have recently discovered, look remarkably similar to the brain scans and mood swings of a cocaine addict.
and not surprisingly, as it turns out, because infatuation is an addiction, with measurable chemical effects on the brain.
infatuated lover, just like any junkie, "will go unhealthy, humiliating, and even physically dangerous lengths to procure their narcotic."
hypnotic obsession can lead to a sense of euphoric abandon, and euphoric abandon is the very best way to find yourself accidentally pregnant.
reality exits the stage the moment that infatuation enters, and you might soon find yourself doing all sorts of crazy things that you would never have considered doing in a sane state.
i am consumed by a romantic obsession, that kind of love makes me feel superheroic, mythical, beyond human, immortal.
my beloved fills my lungs like oxygen.
to graduate sooner ==
Sherly Gunawan
February 2010