Impulse

Edgar Allan Poe coined the phrase “the Imp of the Perverse” to describe an impulse to do something because you should not. In his story of the same name, a murderer confesses his crime not despite, but because, he knows he would be a fool to do so. He describes it in terms of someone standing on the edge of a cliff and pondering what it would feel like to jump.

The ravine below you is vast, the depths obscured by fog. You’re surrounded on all sides by your silent foes, but even if you weren’t, the word “back” has lost its meaning, leaving only a vague memory that it ever existed. The word “no” is nearly as fuzzy, a soft mumble. The word “jump,” however, is almost deafening. “The impulse increases to a wish, the wish to a desire, the desire to an uncontrollable longing, and the longing … is indulged.”