ABSTRACT
The different modes and objects of loving are a challenge to the uniformity of feeling, as well as to the simplicity of any theory that might be applied to explain the diversity of human experience in the sphere of emotion. To the extent love is a conscious decision, the feeling is diminished, while to the extent it is a passion, it is mocked for lack of discernment. The shift of egocentric feeling to an other-centered locus follows the phase-transition of microgenesis. The ingress of the other to a subjective locus and the assimilation of the other to the self of the lover allow the affect in the love-object to dominate and help to explain why the love for the other prevails over self-love. Into the mix of need, choice and despair comes psychoanalysis to the rescue, in which the manifestations of love, its distortions and pathologies can be explained by oedipal conflicts and the traumas of life experience.
