Possessiveness - A Deep Dive

Emotions typically rise from instinct or conditioning, and the intellect is what we use to deal with it. After all that's our most powerful tool.

Possessiveness or Jealousy is a great example.

Jealousy and Possessiveness are extremely instinctive emotions. You know when you see it in little children in relation to their siblings, or between your pet and your child. Sociological institutions of rigid relationship structures have been built on the same instinct, and so directly feed into it. It gives you the moral authority to be possessive and jealous.

That's a multiplier effect through expectation and conditioning. And ironically, one that's done the most damage to relationships.

I wouldn't be far from the truth if I said that Possessiveness is one of the single biggest factors that breaks relationships. No brainer, right?

                                                 

The green eyes monster, as likely coined by Shakespeare in Merchant of Venice, 1596, is an ultimate exemplar of jealousy, where Othello is tormented by jealousy, thinking his wife, Desdemona would cheat on him; and we continue to see this in the millions who spend so much energy based off their genes rather than their own thinking. 

So many of could relate to these commonplace..... 'what's my wife (or husband) doing talking to that man; oh, my god, she's laughing with him, she never does with me, she's looking straight into his eyes, .... I think she just touched his arm'. 

It's also easy to see how it's the most rampant and the most self defeating of emotions, as its common experience that the tighter you hold, the more the need to escape and the higher the chances of your losing it. Sure, the person might stay on in the relationship for a multitude of other reasons.......habit, society, responsibility, respect, but aren't we losing out on that positive space it could have been.

When you feel a surge of sexual jealousy, you're responding to the possibility of being abandoned by your partner. Which comes from our own need and insecurity. Fear. Again base instinct.

Dr. Nando Pelusi, a psychologist, says:

Like many emotional adaptations, jealousy is an imperfect and often overzealous call to arms. That's because the human life span was, until not long ago, perilously short. Evolutionary psychologists and anthropologists believe that our ancestors rarely got a second chance to woo a mate. 

Today, you can round the corner into a new neighborhood and invent a new life. Your emotions, unfortunately, have not caught on to this. That makes most of your experiences of jealousy historically urgent but mismatched to modernity.

When jealousy simply alerts us, it is likely to result from a concern for the relationship. But when it is possessive, it gets destructive.

By accepting that life is dynamic, freedom is integral, perfect reassurance cannot really exist, and that you do not even absolutely need it..... in place of energy spent in seeking and ensuring a guarantee of fidelity it could be better spent, say, being the freedom loving, fun-loving person with who your partner would actually want to have an affair. Would surely be worthwhile.... more fun all the way round. All you need to do is think about it....use the intellect (too)....it's very doable !!