Thoughts on Zizek, Bernard, and "The Obscure Object of Desire"

While reading "Courtly Love or Woman as Thing" I was intrigued by the writers prospective of women having the upper hand in love, however this was not unwelcome. In the passage on page 90 Zizek notes that "the Lady functions as a mirror on to which the subject projects his narcissistic ideal" this only reinforces the ideas we discussed in the Mirror stage about about how we desire completion of self that can only exist outside of ones self. Prior to that Zizek noted that "the Lady in courtly love loses concrete features and is addressed as an abstract ideal, so that 'writers have noted that all the poets seem to be addressing the same person'"  this feelings ring true to the idea that we carried away from the myth of narcissus that perfection that can only be desired and found outside of ones self is merely a tantalizing  mirage that we all can experience the same sorrow of never being able to obtain it because this object of desire does not exist. Now while Zizeks essay presented the reality of love I enjoyed the parallel I saw between that and the troubadour poems by Bernard. Bernard stated that "A man is really dead when he does not feel some sweet taste of love in his heart" (127) The new human perspective that Bernard is writing from shines a light on the ideas stated above, to put it bluntly we desire what does not exist in hopes of achieving completion of self that comes from outside of ourselves but we still need that desire to fuel us no matter how bleak the outlook is in terms of successful completion. To further expose this consider the differences in Bernards own writing, specifically between the first quote on 127 and this quote from 133 "I bear more pain from love then Tristan the lover who suffered many sorrows for Isolt the blonde", In this Bernard himself is exposing both sides of the story to the reader, Love as the life drive for all men, and Love as the eternal tormentor.