Monday, October 01, 2007
WTF is attraction
Attraction is more than a physical thing, we all know this. It's loaded with intangibles and unknowns and mess and mystery. Everything involving attraction is rolled up inside some kind of amorphous, psychological nebula we haplessly fly through over the span of our lives. It's easy to explain away attraction as a manifestation of lust, but most of us need something more than simple, physical stimulus to get our proverbial juices flowing. We might talk to a hundred members of the opposite sex that we find physically attractive, but there may be only one of them that ignites the cerebral firestorm that instigates a more substantial attraction. That's not to say people don't act out of purely physical attraction, as they all too often do, but the type of attraction that really sticks in us is something different than the type that makes us want to screw like dogs in an alley.
If we're lucky, we find ourselves attracted to healthy, happy people who are in turn attracted to us. In my personal experience, that is generally not how things work. The type of women I find myself most powerfully drawn to are typically unavailable, whether it be emotionally, socially, or both. If a woman is off limits or emotionally detached, a part of my brain that defies all reason and sense will work itself into a state of perpetual motion. Perhaps it is the allure of wanting what you can't have or some sort of martyrdom complex that gets my cerebral cortex in an uproar when I come into contact with this type of female. Honestly, I'm not at all certain, and in many ways it seems that I am passenger on that particular journey. I am left with no explanation for why, and no effective means of counteracting the phenomena. Experience tells me that I am not alone, but it also indicates that there is not much to be done about it.
How do you change what attracts you to others? There seems to be something hardwired in us that predisposes us to a 'type'. Some of us will be drawn to weakness, some to strength. We might be drawn in by abusers, or by those who like to be abused. Some of us will be fortunate enough to encounter healthy souls and be psychologically healthy enough to embrace them. For the rest of us, there is what seems to be an endless search bearing little fruit beyond the psychological scars we pick up along the way. Maybe I'm being too pessimistic, but the odds are higher that we will end up alone or in a relationship that leaves us wanting more, than they are that we will find ourselves in a genuinely happy, healthy relationship. Somehow I doubt that I am the only one worried by that reality.
But how do you unlearn behaviors and perceptions that may or may not be learned in the first place? If who we are attracted to is a product of our hardwiring, can we undo it? If it is a learned behavior, how do you go about changing behaviors that are so deeply wound into who we are? I'm not sure we can. Attraction, as opposed to lust, is a complex and organic thing. Even if we come to understand our past and how it affects our present, that's no guarantee those ingrained processes will change. Likewise, we can't expect others to change, as they are as their as thoroughly entrenched as we are. There is no easy answer, but what's more distressing is that there is no apparent answer at all.
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I think sometimes people just need to hang out and get to know each other, even if there isn't a big physical attraction at first. Example:
When your brother and I met there was absolutely NO physical attraction. I had just had my heart crushed (at least what I thought was crushed back then) and your brother was sick of being treated like crap by you know who. Back then Scott was on the scrawny side and he wasn’t into the typical drink/party scene like I was... so I really had no interest in him at all. On the other side of things, he liked very skinny blondes and by high school standards a girl who wore a size 8 was considered FAT and as you know I certainly don't have blonde hair.
Anyhow, my point is we got to know each other. We ended up having classes together and became good friends and things just progressed and next thing you knew the attraction was there, we became inseparable, got married and had kids.
Bottom line - stop worrying about who you’re attracted to, and trying to meet the right girl. Strike up a conversation with any girl even if she is NOTHING like what you think your looking for, hang out get to know each other and you just may find that you are attracted to her after all.
i think learning to be happy, healthy, and productive on your own drastically reduces the chances that you'll find yourself settling for a relationship that isn't right for you.
L - There's wisdom in what you're saying, I won't argue that. At this point, I'm so detached from functionality in the greater social sense, the odds of me ending up in a relationship are slim to none. This was originally supposed to be about how fucked up our radar can be.
At my age, getting to know a woman in my general age range is agony! lol You learn things you never wanted to know, and every girl I meet seems compelled to share the skeletons in their closet(anticipated I'll have a room full of my own).
With every passing year, I have less in common with the women I meet. In the end, it's seeming like this will be a solo trip.
S - Couldn't agree more. The biggest mistake one can make in love is settling. Settling is a slow death sentence, where you willfully watch as pieces of you are eroded away by time's attrition. I'd rather be alone than suffer through that kind of slow torture.