What stood out most here to me is the observation regarding how what we find attractive in a mate, is often something of an externalization of qualities that we desire for ourselves. In my own sexual odyssey, I came to this realization as well. We all have underdeveloped parts of ourselves, or things we wish we were better at, and without consciously recognizing it, we see it in others and just know "I want that". This desire is really one of self actualization, we long to feel complete. However the reality is that another person can't do that for you, sure they might help keep you company, get you off, and cheer you on as you grow and change through the trials of life, but they can't do the work for you. So many relationships fall apart because we become discontented with our significant other, without recognizing that actually its just a dissatisfaction within ourselves and who we really want to be. The best lover and partner isnt one that checks all your boxes, they are a mirror that helps us to see who we really are, and holds our hand on the long walk through it all. Bonus points for being great in bed, because if it isnt true love, and it isnt good sex, it isnt worth your time.
Abigail, your examination of “type” made me think about how preferences can become compressed bundles of social signals: appearance, status, profession, and other markers carrying desires we have yet to name clearly for ourselves. The deeper inquiry begins when we ask what a preference is pursuing, protecting, or performing in our own lives. Your realization about wanting the rockstar energy you had been seeking through someone else gives that question particular force. Grateful for the candor with which you placed your own assumptions under examination.
Thank you, Rev! Grateful for your considered analysis. Our preferences can indeed pursue, protect, or perform — that alliteration was a gift for the tongue!
I actually did something like this as a man--I figured beauty is an entirely superficial characteristic which is uncorrelated with morality, intelligence, or other desirable qualities for a long-term partner, so I should avoid it and find all these amazing people who everyone else passed on for shallow reasons! Wasn't rejecting patriarchal ideals of beauty vaguely feminist or something?
A few decades later I finally realized why I didn't like sex that much, which everyone found very odd, and why I had never actually fallen in love.
So, you can only take this sort of thing so far. Or at least I could. If you were more fortunate...good for you!
Oh fuck, I GET this. 😑 I’ve been married for 24 years to a man who, if we’re using the completely ridiculous checklist society handed us for what a desirable man is supposed to look like, probably doesn’t tick the obvious boxes. We’re the same height, he has short limbs, got called Stumpy growing up, but in every way that actually matters to my life, he is my person.
But, just to really hammer the lesson home, I had an affair with a man ten years younger than me, tall, ridiculously Prince Harry handsome, who fucked me so well I confused the whole cocktail for love 🙃😂 and who also turned out to be a narcissistic prick capable of doing things that eventually made his character impossible for me to unsee. THANKGOD the universe allowed me to keep my marriage intact even though it destroyed me for quite a while.
So when you talk about having our beliefs around attractiveness completely cooked, YES. Because I’ve lived both ends of that particular experiment and still needed several years and a large existential crisis to understand what I was looking at. 😂
I think whats interesting for me now reading this reflection and seeing my own, is how much shit we’ve unconsciously bundled together under “attraction.” like beauty, desire, chemistry, goodness, compatibility, status, love. as though one is evidence of the others, but it’s absolutely fucking isn’t.
Anyway, 24 years in and I think the whole thing is crazier than I ever realised really 😂 Who you find attractive once you actually know someone is a completely different thing to who we were all taught to look at and go, yep, that’s hot!!
Leanna, omg I love this response so much - so real and absolutely bang on. I don’t know how I missed it until now, but glad I found your reflections! We ought to have people explaining this to our little brains as all the convolutions start getting baked in, but alas, we’ve learned them through trial and err ❤️
This essay came across my feed at exactly the right time. Questioning long-held beliefs is such a process, but I'm finding it can be totally fun, too. I want to be the rockstar, so I got the eyebrow piercing that I envied about my ex. I don't think I'm cool enough to get a stomach tattoo - so I have one scheduled for next month.
What stood out to me especially was the comment about travelling to places we've seen others enjoy. I'm going to be turning that gem of an observation over in my head for days.
Yes! It’s definitely fun. Breaking down the fake constructs feels good and so does building up our true selves. Get the tattoo. I hope you feel like a more you you afterward xx!
Oh it was long and I enjoyed every bit of it 🩷 I kinda avoid to go for the exploration - as there are some urgent matters in my life but I will definitely add in my side quests to examine my type.
Haha I figured it was a matter of time for someone to suggest this. But technically this piece is the opposite of propaganda. I’m suggesting individuals stop buying into culturally influenced ideas of attraction and to ask yourself what you truly like. And if what you truly like is a direct overlap with conventional beauty standards, well, enjoy! You look hot and young so I don’t blame you for being attached to hot and young energy 💫 attachment is tho, as many philosophers suggest, a root of pain 🤷♀️
I appreciate the thoughtfulness and insight behind this piece. It creates a true definition of terms for those looking for how to understand their preferences.
"Whenever I defiantly proclaimed, Oh, I’d never, I found myself forcing myself to experience whatever it was I believed was unsuited to me."
Seems like a good practice, examining our 'nevers'.
'Good' is such a subjective idea, but I always thought of it as caring about others and showing kindness. Everyone has to decide what it means for them, probably.
this might be TMI but when you were with some of these people that you weren’t very attracted to, did you ever have trouble getting… physically aroused?
asking because as a straight man i’ve had some trouble with that when im with someone that im not very attracted to, and i guess i could just take a pill or something but it feels… wrong and bad somehow. like im tricking the person
Second, yeah, this is a good point. It’d certainly be harder for a straight man, especially if you’re centering intercourse and penetrative sex, but even if you’re not, many straight women see a flaccid dick and take it personally, which ideologically they shouldn’t, as there are many reasons, but as you point out - one of those reasons does make that insecurity legitimate, doesn’t it? For me, it was the same. Sometimes I didn’t feel aroused in the usual sense. But I’m turned on by weirdness, and transgression, so I felt some sort of arousal even if it wasn’t from physical attraction. And I guess this is one of the many lessons from the exerperience - I learned to base my own arousal on things that are internal, instead of it being dependent upon what I was seeing, or worse, what I thought other people would think about what I was seeing. I ended up getting aroused by the touch I was feeling, and the newness of the experience, and all manner of things. It didn’t come in the ‘oh my god what a fucking babe’ way, which I’ve enjoyed, of course. But once I unlearned my conception of attraction, it meant I could feel that ‘oh my god what a fucking babe’ feeling about more things - I could sexualize the hands that were touching me and forearms attached to them, and the lips and the voice, even if there were conventionally less desirable attributes. Perhaps a winding answer here, but yes, I think it’s worth trying for straight men. So long as there’s something that draws you to this person - that makes you curious to be intimate with them - I don’t believe you don’t have to find everything about them attractive. And I think after doing this sort of thing in earnest - not just to get laid, but to genuinely try to push yourself outside of your mental model of attraction, I think you’ll find it easier and easier. And you’ll probably have way hotter sex, too.
What stood out most here to me is the observation regarding how what we find attractive in a mate, is often something of an externalization of qualities that we desire for ourselves. In my own sexual odyssey, I came to this realization as well. We all have underdeveloped parts of ourselves, or things we wish we were better at, and without consciously recognizing it, we see it in others and just know "I want that". This desire is really one of self actualization, we long to feel complete. However the reality is that another person can't do that for you, sure they might help keep you company, get you off, and cheer you on as you grow and change through the trials of life, but they can't do the work for you. So many relationships fall apart because we become discontented with our significant other, without recognizing that actually its just a dissatisfaction within ourselves and who we really want to be. The best lover and partner isnt one that checks all your boxes, they are a mirror that helps us to see who we really are, and holds our hand on the long walk through it all. Bonus points for being great in bed, because if it isnt true love, and it isnt good sex, it isnt worth your time.
100% Stifler’s mom! You ought post that yourself 😘 btw, I mention your namesake in my previous post about milfs 😇
Abigail, your examination of “type” made me think about how preferences can become compressed bundles of social signals: appearance, status, profession, and other markers carrying desires we have yet to name clearly for ourselves. The deeper inquiry begins when we ask what a preference is pursuing, protecting, or performing in our own lives. Your realization about wanting the rockstar energy you had been seeking through someone else gives that question particular force. Grateful for the candor with which you placed your own assumptions under examination.
Thank you, Rev! Grateful for your considered analysis. Our preferences can indeed pursue, protect, or perform — that alliteration was a gift for the tongue!
I actually did something like this as a man--I figured beauty is an entirely superficial characteristic which is uncorrelated with morality, intelligence, or other desirable qualities for a long-term partner, so I should avoid it and find all these amazing people who everyone else passed on for shallow reasons! Wasn't rejecting patriarchal ideals of beauty vaguely feminist or something?
A few decades later I finally realized why I didn't like sex that much, which everyone found very odd, and why I had never actually fallen in love.
So, you can only take this sort of thing so far. Or at least I could. If you were more fortunate...good for you!
Ha! I appreciate the attempt and effort 💫 We must never deprioritize the attraction, but questioning it, in aim to expand it, isn’t a bad move either
Substack surfaced this for under the sub header “Personal Growth”… which I suppose it was!
lmfao indeed
Score one for the follicularly challenged short kings! Woo hoo!
A well-deserved win! xxx
Oh fuck, I GET this. 😑 I’ve been married for 24 years to a man who, if we’re using the completely ridiculous checklist society handed us for what a desirable man is supposed to look like, probably doesn’t tick the obvious boxes. We’re the same height, he has short limbs, got called Stumpy growing up, but in every way that actually matters to my life, he is my person.
But, just to really hammer the lesson home, I had an affair with a man ten years younger than me, tall, ridiculously Prince Harry handsome, who fucked me so well I confused the whole cocktail for love 🙃😂 and who also turned out to be a narcissistic prick capable of doing things that eventually made his character impossible for me to unsee. THANKGOD the universe allowed me to keep my marriage intact even though it destroyed me for quite a while.
So when you talk about having our beliefs around attractiveness completely cooked, YES. Because I’ve lived both ends of that particular experiment and still needed several years and a large existential crisis to understand what I was looking at. 😂
I think whats interesting for me now reading this reflection and seeing my own, is how much shit we’ve unconsciously bundled together under “attraction.” like beauty, desire, chemistry, goodness, compatibility, status, love. as though one is evidence of the others, but it’s absolutely fucking isn’t.
Anyway, 24 years in and I think the whole thing is crazier than I ever realised really 😂 Who you find attractive once you actually know someone is a completely different thing to who we were all taught to look at and go, yep, that’s hot!!
Leanna, omg I love this response so much - so real and absolutely bang on. I don’t know how I missed it until now, but glad I found your reflections! We ought to have people explaining this to our little brains as all the convolutions start getting baked in, but alas, we’ve learned them through trial and err ❤️
The title of this was diabolical and had me howling. The best man I dated was significantly shorter than me as a 5'9 baddie. No regrets.
Hahah Im glad for the howl and the double vouch 👏❤️ thanks for reading 🥹
This essay came across my feed at exactly the right time. Questioning long-held beliefs is such a process, but I'm finding it can be totally fun, too. I want to be the rockstar, so I got the eyebrow piercing that I envied about my ex. I don't think I'm cool enough to get a stomach tattoo - so I have one scheduled for next month.
What stood out to me especially was the comment about travelling to places we've seen others enjoy. I'm going to be turning that gem of an observation over in my head for days.
Yes! It’s definitely fun. Breaking down the fake constructs feels good and so does building up our true selves. Get the tattoo. I hope you feel like a more you you afterward xx!
Oh it was long and I enjoyed every bit of it 🩷 I kinda avoid to go for the exploration - as there are some urgent matters in my life but I will definitely add in my side quests to examine my type.
Type examination side quest! I love that phrasing. Thanks for reading and glad you’ll fit I in as and when 😘
This is Ugly man propaganda and as a straight woman I have been barraged with it my whole life already. No thank you
Haha I figured it was a matter of time for someone to suggest this. But technically this piece is the opposite of propaganda. I’m suggesting individuals stop buying into culturally influenced ideas of attraction and to ask yourself what you truly like. And if what you truly like is a direct overlap with conventional beauty standards, well, enjoy! You look hot and young so I don’t blame you for being attached to hot and young energy 💫 attachment is tho, as many philosophers suggest, a root of pain 🤷♀️
I appreciate the thoughtfulness and insight behind this piece. It creates a true definition of terms for those looking for how to understand their preferences.
Glad to hear u think so 💫😘
I love your stories and writing. Personal and deeply culturally important...and funny! Thank you!!
🥹 thank you so damn much I’ll pin that to my (nonexistent) affirmation board ❤️
"Whenever I defiantly proclaimed, Oh, I’d never, I found myself forcing myself to experience whatever it was I believed was unsuited to me."
Seems like a good practice, examining our 'nevers'.
'Good' is such a subjective idea, but I always thought of it as caring about others and showing kindness. Everyone has to decide what it means for them, probably.
''Plus, shorter men live longer'' Pretty sure some philisopher said that ;)
Damn, I need to add a footnote ;)
Fascinating and enlightening
I'm glad you think so xx
this might be TMI but when you were with some of these people that you weren’t very attracted to, did you ever have trouble getting… physically aroused?
asking because as a straight man i’ve had some trouble with that when im with someone that im not very attracted to, and i guess i could just take a pill or something but it feels… wrong and bad somehow. like im tricking the person
First, very few things are TMI here.
Second, yeah, this is a good point. It’d certainly be harder for a straight man, especially if you’re centering intercourse and penetrative sex, but even if you’re not, many straight women see a flaccid dick and take it personally, which ideologically they shouldn’t, as there are many reasons, but as you point out - one of those reasons does make that insecurity legitimate, doesn’t it? For me, it was the same. Sometimes I didn’t feel aroused in the usual sense. But I’m turned on by weirdness, and transgression, so I felt some sort of arousal even if it wasn’t from physical attraction. And I guess this is one of the many lessons from the exerperience - I learned to base my own arousal on things that are internal, instead of it being dependent upon what I was seeing, or worse, what I thought other people would think about what I was seeing. I ended up getting aroused by the touch I was feeling, and the newness of the experience, and all manner of things. It didn’t come in the ‘oh my god what a fucking babe’ way, which I’ve enjoyed, of course. But once I unlearned my conception of attraction, it meant I could feel that ‘oh my god what a fucking babe’ feeling about more things - I could sexualize the hands that were touching me and forearms attached to them, and the lips and the voice, even if there were conventionally less desirable attributes. Perhaps a winding answer here, but yes, I think it’s worth trying for straight men. So long as there’s something that draws you to this person - that makes you curious to be intimate with them - I don’t believe you don’t have to find everything about them attractive. And I think after doing this sort of thing in earnest - not just to get laid, but to genuinely try to push yourself outside of your mental model of attraction, I think you’ll find it easier and easier. And you’ll probably have way hotter sex, too.