Love and Infatuation: A Response to a Student's Questions

I haven't done a personally focused video for some time and it's a little bit overdue I think and something that a student asked me about provides me with a good occasion for this I would say that it's now becoming a pattern about once a year I have a student who comes to me with some sort of problem or a question and would like some advice about it something personal and I see sort of a larger larger picture and then I shoot a video on it last year it was a student who had a friend who was very troubled by his adoption and the circumstances surrounding it and I shot a video about being adopted and this video here I mean you can see the title it's about love and infatuation and I had a student who wrote on his final exam sort of addendum to it and he said I've got a question about love and infatuation that's been bothering me and I'll read the whole question in a moment what I'm going to do in this video is address the issues the questions the topics that he's got wove into this this paragraph because they're very interesting talk a little bit about my own experience and hopefully stay fairly on point and I'll also talk a little bit about some of the bigger picture issues with with love and infatuation and maybe even give a little bit of advice I don't have a ton of advice state though but I think there's some things I can say so before I do that I want to give you a little bit of framing of you know how this came up so this semester this is the final exam for the intro philosophy class that I taught this semester and the intro class I switch it up every every semester give it a different theme this this this time around I picked the theme love friendship and desire so we read Plato's symposium and we read Cicero's on friendship and we've read Aristotle's Nicomachean ethics book eight and nine we read some Thomas Aquinas if I read some Descartes and you know we read the love letters between Abelard and Eloise and so it was a very fruitful class I don't know that they actually learned quite as much about metaphysics epistemology as they ought to but they learned a lot about ethics and about human nature and about how the emotions work and I think this is very useful to do there's a lot of wisdom contained in these these discussions and speculations about love and friendship and desire and infatuation and relationships and how we ought to treat each other and how to structure our lives in ancient and medieval and early modern thought that's why I teach this stuff so this is a this is a young man who has been thinking about these things quite a bit he can he made some really great contributions in class and in writing so I know that he's been thinking about these things my wife pointed something out as well and this is also kind of the framing thing that it's it's in certain ways kind of a sign of respect he had a student ask you about these these sort of issues and at first I was like well really you know and she's like yeah I mean that means that they actually first off they think that you might know something about this that they don't know and that by itself you know is a big step because the adolescents and young adults usually think that that they know a hell of a lot more than they do that's how they get into trouble and they tend to be and I know this from my own experience of having been one they tend to be a bit dismissive of what subtle adults have to say they think that every generation seems to think that it's facing unique new struggles that you know love is somehow different for it than it is for those old people there and back in their day you know everything was so much so much simpler and if you read literature and you read history you find out that was never the case log was always complicated we have sort of images of a past where that was the case and some people were may be able to live lives where that seemed to be the case but that wasn't a universal thing across the board so it's you know it's actually a sign of wisdom to ask older people who you think are someone on the ball to give you some some guidance or advice or some insight about these sort of things and I think she's right you know I'm not sure what it is in my manner that that makes me seem personable or receptive but apparently this student thought that I was somebody who he's willing to trust with some you know some fairly not detailed but some fairly personal revelations so let me read what he actually has to say there's there's this pretty pretty interesting stuff so he says I've recently been in contact with a girl I used to be infatuated with when I was a teen I no longer feel infatuated with girls however because I haven't been in contact I feel as though the infatuation feelings have come back so this is a guy who actually has it quite together who isn't just sort of like flitting from from girl to girl to girl from from object of affection to the next one to the next one he's looking for something bigger and better but there's this this girl from his past that he's now you know feeling these emotions towards again so he goes on infatuation is scary because you see the other person through rose-colored glasses even though that person isn't perfect my question is what is the best way to deal with infatuation because it isn't love it always seems to not work out and also can infatuation have return to love so this is actually great stuff I mean this is this is the sort of perennial matters that that younger people and even older people in every generation throughout time have to deal with we haven't always called it infatuation in earlier times they called this you know eros or desire or libido or akan coupe ascents or you know there's all sorts of names for it but it's the same it's the same basic thing and infatuation is it's within the spectrum of love well oftentimes we associate infatuation with just sexual desire but it's not it's not just or even primarily about sex it's about it's about a sort of romantic attitude towards towards the other towards seeing them like he says with rose-colored glasses seeing everything that's really good about them perhaps projecting some of that there or you know reading things in that aren't there and feeling this sense of attraction of wanting to be in their presence of wanting to think about them even if not being able to not think about them and to a certain extent even feeling a sense of awe or or wonder or curiosity in their presence and it makes us very vulnerable to the other person as well we care about what they think how they you know perceive our appearance whether they smile at us whether they frown whether they give us the time of day or don't all these things can take on great significance and so I think he's really you know he's really smart for for saying hey infatuation can be a lot of trouble so he's really saying three different things about infatuation here and I think we should look at each one of these in turn he says infatuation leads us to look at the other person through rose-colored glasses even though that person isn't perfect he wants to know what's the best way to deal with infatuation because it's not love and he says it always seems to not work out so we got three different interesting issues there and then to two questions so let's look at these issues in turn does infatuation make us look at the other person with the proverbial rose-colored glasses yeah it tends to make us overlook their their flaws you know if you think about this is just an example what happened when we went to HDTV and how people were complaining that the newscasters now you can see like all the pores of their skin now they're wrinkled hgtv was giving us a more accurate representation of how people really look and people were looking at and they're like I don't think I want to watch that you know it's kind of creeping me out and infatuation think of infatuation as being like the ultimate foundation makeup it covers covers over all the blemishes and all that all the cracks and crevices and that's what it does it surrounds a person with kind of an aura now that that that's kind of good in some ways because nobody is perfect and let's just think about physical appearance you you can pick the most attractive person who you know you think is attractive and then change the light and they're not gonna be quite as attractive you're gonna find some some flaw to them or you know there's things over time where you're like man I love that quality about that person and then after a while you're like they're driving me nuts because of that I thought that was really great this is one of those things that happens when opposites attract right you're like oh man I love that person because she's so outgoing and I'm kind of shy then after you're well after a while and you're like man she's always dragging me into stuff that I don't want to be involved with so you know it's it's kind of good to have some things paved over and to look at them optimistically through the rose-colored glasses but there's danger signs that you also want to watch out for as well you know somebody is prone to cheating on you or to stealing your stuff or to playing fast and loose with your privacy or you know you can think of all sorts insanely jealous infatuation can blind you to those and that's not good and that infatuation can play into this whole dynamic where they screw you over or they do something that's you know stupid or thoughtless and you know you you're bothered by it but they said well you know I really like them and and you feel a little bit ashamed of being taken advantage of and then you you know you look at it more optimistically and then you're just setting yourself up to get get treat badly again so yeah infatuation can be dangerous in that respect and can lead us to to have bad judgment about the people who were involved with if it's just a matter of having coffee with the person and hanging out with them probably not that big a deal if it's you know hooking up with them and then moving in with them that could actually be life you know life-changing consequences depending on you know what they're like and yeah it's good to bear this in mind you know you're when you get involved with somebody you're not just vulnerable to them physically you're vulnerable to them emotionally in terms of your goals and plans in terms of your finances in terms of your circle of friends so there's there's all sorts of other goods that that come up over for that so that's the rose-colored glasses issue let's now let's think about infatuation in law is infatuation fundamentally different from love it really depends on what you mean by love and infatuation is a narrower term like I said we have a lot of other terms that we can translate as infatuation but love is a very broad term and love can mean a lot of different things if you want to see some examples of this watch those videos from my intro class and see how many different models of love we talked about where friendship is a kind of love and friendship can be of all different sorts you know it can be about the person themselves and this intimate connection it could be about pleasure it could be about usefulness we have the kind of love that that parents and children have for each other you know the country can be an object of love the divine can be an object of love animals can be an object of love there's all sorts of modalities to love so you you know when you say I want to be careful about infatuation because it isn't love I think what's really being said there is something more like this I need to be careful about infatuation because in fact raishin can crowd out or cut off the possibility of or even you know masquerade as these other kinds of love that are in the long run perhaps more valuable but you don't want to like you know totally leave infatuation out you know if you think about a marriage for example a marriage shouldn't just be this sort of self giving love that that Christians call agape and it shouldn't just be a friendship it should include the erotic dimension desire for each other of attraction to each other as well that's what makes it complete but you wouldn't just you know this is where a lot of people go wrong they they hook up and they're like yeah let's make a marriage out of this that's not going to be enough because there's this other stuff over here and the question is how much are these going to interfere with each other that's a judgment question that you can't settle across the board for every single relationship you have to look at the relationship you have to look at the person and this goes to that question can infatuation turn into law can't infatuation lead to these other kinds of love like say a deep abiding friendship yes it can but that doesn't mean that it automatically will so that's that's the second thing now let's think about the the third one infatuation always seems to not work out well why is that the case a couple different explanations we can give for that one would be that infatuation by its very nature is kind of ephemeral kind of short-lived if it's really about you know you think about this but it's really about sexual desire once you have sex then you know you're satisfied and that's it you might want have sex some more but you know and you might be sort of happier now that you've actually had it but you know that that's about as high as it goes and you know Plato has has some of those characters talk about that in their the symposium as the bad kind of love and the same thing could go for for other things as well it's not always like I said it's not always about sex sometimes we just want to have that person around us and with us and oftentimes we're very confused about what it is that we really want from the other person who were attracted to who were infatuated with but so why doesn't it work out sometimes it's just because it's short-lived and we get infatuated with somebody and like I said you know traits that we find endearing at the start after the infatuation starts to fade we'll like I can't stand this person and they're they're BS anymore I gotta get the hell out of here so you know there's that and I think that infatuation if we give too much sway to it and here I'm actually talking from from experience can crowd out those other perhaps more valuable types of affection or love you know like friendship like charity or agape like like the you know sort of thing that develops just with companionship they can become too much so to speak and if you don't have these other things the relationship is probably not going to be all that all that viable over time all that long lived now if you have these other things the infatuation could in fact develop into other types of love you know you could start dating this person and you become friends with them and now you go through some common experiences together you're there with them when when their grandpa dies and you know you see them graduate and walk across the stage and you know you tell them your hopes and dreams and they tell you their hopes and dreams and you you become close you become connected with each other you get to meet their family they meet your family and you know people get along or don't get along these are the sort of things that that relationships are really composed of and that's possible with the starting point of infatuation it really did hands-on what kind of person that we're talking about and there's there's no information here that would lead me to be able to give more detailed advice that's something that each person would have to figure out for themselves this young man in his own case but I mean there's there's certain things that like I said are sort of red flags and if infatuation isn't blinding you to them then that that can help so do I have any any useful advice here's what I would say it's really great that this young man actually recognizes the difference between infatuation and other things that we call love and that it you know it doesn't it doesn't substitute for them and that it can be dangerous and you know preclude them or occlude them or however you want to put it get in get in the way of them that's a really good good thing to have in your belt I think it's also good that he recognizes just how strong infatuation can be this is the problem what we call a moral philosophy the problem of across the upper self-control oftentimes we we know what the good is and we know what the bad is and we know what we ought to be doing but we find ourselves kind of pulled over here and we could resist that if we really really really wanted to if we persevered in our our choices but that's really tough to do and then we find ourselves you know sort of getting getting drawn into things that work even at the time we're like man I shouldn't be doing this but but do you do it and so that's something else to pay attention to another thing that I would say is if you do choose to get involved with this person do not cut off your friends and family and use them as a sounding board if you have decent friends and your friends don't like the person who you're going out with there's probably something that they're attuned to that you're missing out on because you're wearing those rose colored glasses or you're wearing blinders right like a horse in drawing a carriage well oftentimes people who are bad for you will actually want to sideline your friends and family and isolate you from them you when you're involved with another person you want them to actually be in sort of a harmonious relationship with the rest of your people who matter to you the people that you love the people that you care about and who care about you and so you want to you want to use them as sounding boards you want to take advice from you know parents or in this case you know from a college professor who you think actually knows something or you know your friends oftentimes oftentimes your friends won't be able to put their finger exactly on what's off with somebody but they'll say yeah that I don't know about this seems like there's something off you know the jealousy is kind of weird there's there's a strange vibe from this person provided that your friends are actually decent people they think they can be very good sounding for so that's another piece of advice that I would give and I would just you know I would keep on thinking about these issues it couldn't hurt to actually write down some of this stuff this is a last bit of advice that'll get you I would actually sort of like keep track over time about of your feelings and about what you're tempted to do and how you're how you're feeling about your feelings and what you actually do decide to do because that way if things get dicey or seem off you've got a kind of paper trail that you could look back at and say oh wait a second I thought something was kind of weird back here because a lot of times our memories get kind of jumbled up and you know when our emotions get involved if we've got it down on paper I think sometimes that can be very helpful you don't even have to put it on paper you could you know create a Google Doc that only you have access to don't make it public and and you know chart it out there that would that wouldn't be a bad idea also don't share it with the person if it's about that so I really enjoyed thinking about this and I hope here I'm just sort of addressing my former students but this can go for my other YouTube viewers it is of any help to you I hope that this actually gives you some insight some some framework for thinking about these things I hope that if you are going to have a relationship with this person that you've you've you're now well equipped to sort of see it through and think about the things that you need to take account of at the right time so that you'll actually be happy because a good relationship I think and a lot of the philosophers who we studied in this class think this as well is really integral to the good life so that's about all the advice that I have

Channel: Gregory B. Sadler

Views: 10,276

Rating: 4.9122806 out of 5

Keywords: Lecture, Lesson, Talk, Education, Student, College, University, Sadler, Infatuation (Quotation Subject), College (Film), Love (Quotation Addressee)

Id: Wcaxafus3FI

Length: 23min 12sec (1392 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 26 2013