Barking Bad 28 Mar 2022 8:09 AM (3 years ago)
I read your response to "Confused" (the woman dating a guy so needy he wanted her to ditch all her friends and spend every minute with him). I suggest you tell her it'll never work out and she should date someone else.
--Advice From 60-Something Male
Telling people what to do is necessary in certain situations, like when it's a more successful battle strategy than "You do you!": dispatching the troops to engage in the military version of interpretive dance.
However, in general, direct advice -- "Do this!" or "Do that!" -- tends to backfire big-time, revving up a state psychologist Jack Brehm calls "psychological reactance." "Reactance" describes our fear-driven freakout -- our reaction -- when we perceive a threat to our freedom to do as we choose. We go on the defensive -- rebel against being controlled-- typically by doing whatever we were doing...only longer, stronger, and louder.
Understanding this is why I'm an advice columnist who specializes in NOT giving advice. I use hedgy-wedgy language like "you might" and "you could" that leaves big wide-open spaces for personal choice. Accordingly, instead of telling this woman, "Dump Mr. Needypants pronto!" I offered reasons the two MIGHT be a bad match. I also identified potential stumbling blocks -- like being a "My needs last!" habitual "pleaser" -- and suggested practical steps she could take to kick them out of the way.
My ultimate goal is helping people help themselves: giving them the psychological and behavioral chops they need to render me unnecessary! I typically retell the story they've told me in ways I hope will help them gain perspective -- that is, understand what they're going through and why. I then lay out a set of tools -- ways they might tweak their thinking and behavior -- in hopes of empowering them to dig themselves out.
Basically, my column is the advice version of that well-worn fish saying -- uh, as I like to rewrite it: Give a woman a fish and she'll have dinner. Teach a woman to fish and she'll have dinner for a lifetime...OR -- let's be honest -- because my column and I are big on realism: She'll order her fish dinner in a Paris bistro, poring over photos of a fabulous Chanel fly-casting suit and sketching out her plot to rob the Louvre to pay for it.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Bed Over Heels? 24 Feb 2022 3:38 PM (3 years ago)
I'm a 29-year-old guy with a "keep it casual" relationship history, but I can't stop thinking about this new girl at work. Beyond not wanting her to date anyone else, I don't want someone to hurt her or make her sad. No other woman has ever made me feel this way. How do I know whether this is lust or the beginnings of falling in love?
--Confused
It's easy to believe you're "in love" when you're really just in lust. To be fair, lust is a form of love...if you broaden the field to stuff like "I love, love, LOVE your boobs in that inappropriately tight sweater."
In other words, lust is animal attraction, so the "inner beauty" that's elemental to loving somebody is immaterial. I know this firsthand, having repeatedly been the target of interspecies sex predators, large and small. A giant male goat chased me across my friend's parents' farm, trying to mount me -- while my friends looked on laughing.
A previous perv was six inches high and green: a friend's lorikeet (a kind of parrot). He ran after me on his little bird feet all around the friend's apartment, squawking the oh-so-sensual pickup line, "Otto, bird! Otto, bird!" I bolted into the bathroom, slammed the door, and refused to come out till he was behind bars. #beaktoo
Complicating the detangling of "love or lust?" is another important question: "Love or infatuation?" Falling in love is not love. It's infatuation -- an intense, usually lust-fueled obsession with our idea of who a person is: a projection of our hopes and romantic fantasies that often has little relationship to who they really are. That said, the sheer strength and intoxicating nature of infatuation -- like being blind drunk on romantic possibility instead of Jim Beam -- often leads to premature feelings of "We're perfect for each other!"
People tend to believe the more they learn about a new person they're into, the more into them they'll be -- a la "to know them is to love them." However, psychologist Michael I. Norton finds that when we have the hots for someone we barely know, we're prone to read ambiguity -- foggy, partial information about them -- as signs the person is like us. These (perceived!) similarities amp up our "liking" for them -- at first.
However, as time goes by, we can't help but notice all the dissimilarities poking up, which leads us to like them less and less -- a la "To know them is to loathe them." In other words, rushing into a relationship of any permanence is the stuff dreams are made of -- if you've always dreamed of being financially and emotionally incinerated in a grotesquely ugly divorce.
"Buyer beware" in love is best exercised in two ways: The first is "buyer be seriously slow." Consider putting the person you're dating on secret probation for a year (or more). This will give you time to not just see the best in them but give it much-needed company: glimpses of the worst.
Second, explore whether your compatibility with a person is surface -- "I love sushi! She loves sushi!" -- or sustainably deep. The ideal tool for assessing this is the best definition of love I've ever read, and by "best," I mean the most practically useful. It's by Ayn Rand. (And no, I'm not one of the glassy-eyed worshippers of everything she ever said or wrote, but she nailed it on this.)
"Love is a response to values," writes Rand. "It is with a person's sense of life that one falls in love -- with that essential sum, that fundamental stand or way of facing existence, which is the essence of a personality. One falls in love with the embodiment of the values that formed a person's character, which are reflected in his widest goals or smallest gestures. ... It is one's own sense of life that acts as the selector," identifying one's own core values in the other person.
Using this "values model" to determine compatibility requires some preliminary work: figuring out your own values, meaning the principles you care most about -- the guiding standards for the sort of person you want to be. If you're in the "gotta get started on that" stage, recognizing what isn't love -- those love fakers, lust and infatuation -- should help you avoid sliding into the committed relationship nightmare zone.
Ultimately, love is nautical: It's both the ship that launched a thousand sappy cliches and, more vitally, a lifeboat. In lifeboat form, it gets romantic partners through the worst of times, major and, um, somewhat less major -- like when your bae spends your entire date night searching Hulu for a movie to watch. Love is dropping your phone in the goldfish bowl to keep yourself from whispering, "Hey, Siri, where's the legal line between murder and involuntary manslaughter?"
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Easy Rewriter 17 Feb 2022 3:36 PM (3 years ago)
At a dinner, a woman asked how my husband and I met. He says he spotted me in the campus dining hall, deliberately bumped me and spilled my drink on my tray, and used getting me a refill to ask me out. This never happened. (We met in class, and he asked me out.) What does it mean that he has such faulty recall about the entire origin of our marriage?
--Disturbed
There is such a thing as "total recall," and it's what automakers rush to do after they sell a car that is not only self-driving but self-destructing: dropping parts like breadcrumbs as it tools down the highway.
What total recall is not is a feature of the human mind -- despite the widely believed myth that memory is a form of mental videotape: faithfully preserving our experiences for playback. Ideal as this would be for spouses with prosecutorial tendencies, our minds are, in fact, hotbeds of fragmented, distorted, partial recall.
We create this mess ourselves, simply by remembering -- and remembering again. "Using one's memory shapes one's memory," explains psychologist Robert Bjork. Basically, the more we tell a story, the more we believe it -- along with all the embellishments (aka big fat lies) we added to funny it up and otherwise impress (so social situations feel less like reenactments of being picked last for dodgeball).
And when I say "we," I mean me. When I lived in Manhattan, I'd brag about my response to a street-corner flasher: "Looks like a penis -- only smaller." I'm now pretty sure this never happened. I did see an escaped trouser snake or, uh, five on the subway. (New Yorkers think of this as "Tuesday.") That was probably my sourdough starter for the cleverbrag I trotted out endlessly at parties -- till I was snidely informed that my "original" circa mid-'90s line appeared in the 1978 movie "Bloodbrothers."
Consider that your husband's memory might not be the only one that's been, um, redecorated. Also consider (see my cleverbrag above) that we tend to "remember" events in self-serving ways. Any guy can ask a girl out after class, but in your husband's version, he goes on a mini-quest to get a date with you. Not exactly the stuff Sir Lancelot was made of, but modern men must make do with the heroics available to them: "I won her love -- after a bloody battle with a cafeteria tray and a glass of 2% milk."
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
The Incredible Sulk 17 Feb 2022 3:33 PM (3 years ago)
I hang with friends about twice weekly and also like my alone time. The guy I'm seeing not only wants to be together constantly but seems to need that. He's upset and anxious on nights I'm not with him. The first time I said I couldn't get together, he was annoyed. He now complains I'm "dependent on" my friends, meaning unhealthily. He claims a great relationship is two people who are always together (a la "you complete me"). I don't want to hurt him, but I won't give up my friends or myself for a relationship, and I don't know how to tell him.
--Conflicted
Dating sites work very hard to be inclusive in the type-of-partner options they list -- "man seeking woman," "man seeking man," and even "man seeking genderbeige" -- yet they omit a checkbox for "man seeking hostage."
That appears to be the model for your man's ideal relationship (as an adult who gets "upset and anxious" on nights his boo's away). Though he paints his longing for nonstop togetherness as the height of romance, his "You complete me!" is not so much a romantic declaration as an accidental disclosure of extreme neediness. It also makes him a poor match for any woman whose relationship goals are best summed up as: togetherness, yes; conjoined, no.
As a woman, you're likely on the high end of the spectrum of a personality trait called "agreeableness." On a positive note, this plays out in being "kind, considerate, likable, cooperative, (and) helpful," reports psychologist William Graziano. On a less positive note, it often leads to prioritizing these lovely behaviors over one's own needs.
A personality trait is not a behavioral mandate. You can shift out of auto-"pleaser" mode by pre-planning to assert yourself -- "Here's what I need!" -- and then doing it, no matter how uncomfortable it feels at first. The more you do it, the more natural (and even rewarding!) it'll feel -- till your default position becomes standing up for yourself instead of rolling over for everybody else.
Guesstimate how much weekly togetherness and apartness works for you, and make it clear to men you date -- starting by informing your current guy that your social world will continue to extend beyond being his human binky. In short, the sort of relationship that works for you is one in which you're bonded but not zip-tied.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Bark Ranger 10 Feb 2022 3:31 PM (3 years ago)
I'm a divorced guy in my 40s using dating apps. I'm keenly aware of what I do and don't want in a woman and make it clear in my profile. For example, I write, "If you're in a weird co-dependent relationship with a five-pound dog," we are not a match. A friend looked at my profile and was all, "Man, you have to delete that." I see no problem with what I've written. Who's right?
--Constructive Honesty
Admittedly, when people advise women, "Find a man who's like a dog!" they mean like a big loyal-to-the-death black Lab, not a purse-sized poodledoodle that spends a quarter of its life getting foofed up at Monsieur Marcel, the doggie hairdresser.
Of course, because a woman has a tiny ridiculous dog doesn't mean she's rife with psychological shortcomings. Including that bit in your profile -- and especially as you worded it -- says a few things about you, none of them lady-magnetizing. And sure, you wrote, "IF you are..." (in some sort of unhealthy relationship with your micro dog). However, even women who are emotionally together (and maybe even dog-free) are likely to swipe left or knock your profile into the little trash can icon.
Most problematically, this remark and other similarly cutting ones in your profile suggest you're an angry guy: a big flashing skull-'n'-crossbones "STEER CLEAR!" for women. "Anger-prone individuals are volatile and frequently dangerous" -- to the point of violence, evolutionary social psychologist Andrew Galperin and his colleagues explain. Women, on average, are smaller, physically weaker, and thus more physically vulnerable than men, which is likely why they err on the side of overperceiving signs that a guy might be a Mr. Angry. In fact, per the Galperin team's research: "A single instance of angry behavior" in "new acquaintances" is enough to provoke this keepaway motive -- even when their anger seems justified by the situation at hand!
Your sneering about behavior being "weird" and "co-dependent" is another red flag -- suggesting you view life through puke-colored glasses and are quick to think the worst of total strangers. That's Bigotry 101: using one infobit about an individual to leap to all sorts of ugly assumptions about them. It's toxic, irrational, and unfair -- and, if it's your go-to thinking, perhaps something to work on changing, lest you pay an unintended price (both in an ugly-first view of others and in others seeing you as a person to block, delete, and/or avoid).
By the way, "co-dependent" is an insulting term that's in need of either retirement or scientific validation. It's generally understood to describe two individuals in a persistent dysfunctional dance. The "enabling" individual temporarily eases the suffering of the other person (or pet!) -- in ways that, in the long term, are harmful to both. "Co-dependence" was flung on the public by self-help authors -- without any scientific basis: no evidence for the long lists of its supposed symptoms. It's now promiscuously applied to shame people -- to the point where showing none of the supposed symptoms gets used as proof of one's co-dependence!
That said, you're wise to try to proactively shoo off women who are wrong for you, as it could keep you from wasting your time and theirs on the phone (or worse, on a happy hour date that flies by like a week of medieval torture). However, there's a way to tell the wrong women, "Yoohoo, move on!" without coming off scolding or demeaning (and in turn throwing out the babes with the bathwater).
Probably the best constructive yoohoo is subtle fact-stating, like mentioning you're an atheist to discourage interest from those on Team God. Similarly, in the "who am I?" portion on a dating app, a 40-something, Johnny Depp-alicious hottie of a guy posted, "Living a plant-based life," suggesting he doesn't just eat vegan; it's major in his identity. If, like me, you are committed to "steak-based living," you know to give a big sad pass to Mr. Pirates of the Cauliflower-ribbean.
It's tempting to try to escape the emotional toddlers by announcing you're seeking someone "psychologically healthy" or "emotionally solid." Probably pretty useless. Those who have an unhealthy relationship with their dog -- or their mom, crystal meth, or tennis -- are often the last to know or admit it.
Ultimately, you might simply accept that you'll likely end up on a date or two with women you'd do anything to avoid. Keep first dates casual -- like meeting for coffee for an hour -- and your disasters will at least be Hobbesian: nasty, brutish, and short. Finally, I must say -- while typing this with my tiny, "My Little Pony"-like Chinese crested curled up asleep in my lap: Five pounds of dog may elicit laughs -- till it's cleanup time and you need a single sheet of Kleenex instead of a backhoe.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Leaping Sickness 3 Feb 2022 3:28 PM (3 years ago)
I thought I was happily married. Recently, I found a cherry Chapstick in my husband's coat pocket -- a kind he'd never buy. He claimed he randomly grabbed it at the drugstore checkout. Last week, he said he'd be visiting his mother at the nursing home, but I later learned he never showed. I asked him about it, and he said work ran over. Additionally, our sex life has picked up, and he's been extra thoughtful lately. Doesn't all of this, put together, scream that he's cheating? How do I confront him?
--Nightmares
You don't expect marrying the man of your dreams to turn your actual dream content into all-night notifications of impending disaster: dozens of inch-high coal miners in tiny hardhats and goggles scaling you and repeatedly jabbing you with cupcake toothpicks topped with little red flags.
Are you right to pile these infobits into the verdict your husband's cheating? Maybe -- but maybe not. Evolutionary psychologist Martie Haselton explains that we evolved to be protectively wrong: to err on the safe side, meaning make the least evolutionarily costly error. Suspecting cheating where none actually exists is less genetically costly than shrugging off signs that seem to point to it -- and then possibly losing your man and/or having him funnel his resources away from your kids to those he'd make with some hussypants he's seeing on the side.
Confronting your husband -- accusing him of cheating -- is a risky tactic. If he is cheating, he's likely to deny it. If he isn't, your accusation could destroy your relationship. A possibly less risky tactic is evoking his empathy: telling him that, collectively, these infobits triggered fears of losing him. The subject becomes your seeking reassurance (which, P.S., may or may not be truth-backed). If he has been straying, he might be inspired to reevaluate and stop. Might.
Over the next few months, observe your husband's behavior -- including that which suggests he loves you and is faithful. Your observations are likely to be inconclusive (compared with finding him in bed with somebody), but if you amass enough information over time, it should begin to point you to some sort of understanding.
I personally make peace with the freakouts of life that way; for example, a new mole that (apologies to Judy Blume) seemed to scream: "Are You There, Alkon? It's Me, Malignant Melanoma." One dermatologist visit later: "Hello, drama queen. I'd like to introduce you to your spider bite."
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Junk Male 3 Feb 2022 3:23 PM (3 years ago)
Do men even read online dating profiles? Mine says I'm a "sober divorced writer." Inevitably, guys message me: "What do you do? Ever been married? Wanna go for a drink?" Um, hello? I'm flattered I apparently get picked on looks alone, but even men who aren't into hookups do this.
--Mystified
There's a case to be made for a guy being a rushed or generally careless reader and sliding right past "sober divorced writer." However, men are likely to blow past an even more standout description, such as: "I enjoy fine dining, walks on the beach, and dismembering my date and feeding bits of him to the squirrels."
Though men seem more likely to hit on hot women on their pictures alone, they probably do this even when women are, shall we say, lukewarm or even room temperature. Because birth control used to be "Cross your legs, honey!" women evolved to be "the choosier sex," wary about getting it on with a man until they vet him for his willingness and ability to "provide" for any resulting kids. Because men don't get pregnant, it's evolutionarily optimal for them -- best for passing on Ye Old Genes -- to have vastly lower standards. (Vastly. Like: "So...she has a pulse?")
This sex difference makes a strong showing on dating apps. Computational social scientist Taha Yasseri, with three students, analyzed piles of data from online dating studies. "Men are much less selective in who they communicate with," they report. In fact, it's "optimal for men to use the 'shotgun method'": blasting out "likes" like buckshot from some backwoods Cletus' hunting rifle. The strategy is not finding a really great match (true love with a woman much like them -- or a man if they're gay) but messaging "a large number of people, irrespective of their potentially low fit" and hoping some of them bite.
Basically, many men on dating apps are like 2-year-olds. They only look at the pictures. Take it super slowly with any guy you meet via app, meaning keep him on secret probation until you see ample evidence you might be well-matched (and that "Conor" is not long for "Con"). If you're awakened one lazy Saturday morning by the man in your bed, the part of your body he's most interested in should not be your thumb -- which he got a little clumsy with while trying to unlock your banking app.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Fossil Fool? 27 Jan 2022 8:31 AM (3 years ago)
My husband died of a heart attack at age 75. On his phone, I saw several unsettling texts from younger women, alluding to improper liaisons and asking for money. We often helped needy families, but I'm suspecting these women tempted and took advantage of a kind, caring old man, or maybe he turned dirty old man (looking for something more exciting than his wife). Before his death, he started viewing pornography online and seemed not quite himself. Could this apparent change in personality point to dementia? Finding these texts has turned my grieving upside down. I'm often angry with him for possibly cheating on me. I'm not sure how to put this to rest in my mind.
--Perplexed Widow
Sadly, elderly men are often easy prey for young scamstresses. These women sexually tempt or even just flatter an old man out of his money -- all, "You remind me of that dude from 'Star Wars'!" -- making him think of himself as a young, hot Harrison Ford (when the "dude" he actually resembles is Yoda).
I'm so sorry -- both about the death of your husband and the apparent death of what you believed about him and your marriage. But I'm hoping my frank exploration of what you do and don't know will help you make your way to peace of mind.
First, it is possible your husband's apparent behavioral changes were due to dementia. Dementia is not technically a disease but an umbrella term for "a decline in mental ability severe enough to interfere with daily life" (per the Alzheimer's Association). Symptoms include personality changes, memory issues, and impaired reasoning. "Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia, accounting for 60 to 80% of dementia cases."
My friend Stef Willen wrote movingly in her McSweeney's column about the tragic thief of self that is dementia, explaining, "For most of my life, my days with my grandmother had been spent hiking, identifying birds and having beers in a small-town Colorado bars. ... I'd always thought she'd die of a swift heart attack, but death snuck in the back door and did a real hit and miss job. None of us even noticed until the essential parts of her began to go missing."
Her grandma's doctor explained to Stef that her grandma's neurons weren't communicating. Some were dead, and some weren't firing in the correct pattern. As Stef put it: "Apparently, who we are is an electrochemical reaction, and my grandmother had blown her circuits."
Dementia messes with the functioning of the brain's "prefrontal cortex" (PFC), the section just behind your forehead. If you think of your body as a factory and your behavior as the workers, the PFC is the executive boardroom of you: in charge of planning, prioritizing, remembering, reasoning, and "inhibitory control" (professor-ese for resisting temptation). That last one, when the PFC's cells are in healthy working order, keeps us from just giving in to whatever impulse -- sexual, gluttonous, violent, or just rude -- flies into our head.
But let's back up a sec. You don't know whether your husband had dementia, as he was never diagnosed. Sure, you've pulled together disturbing fragments of information, and they're pointing you toward a conclusion. But you can't know whether your conclusion is correct -- though I'm guessing you strongly suspect it is, because that's how our minds evolved to work.
Uncertainty -- ambiguous situations, partially answered questions, and other forms of mental untidiness -- fill us with anxiety and dread. This makes evolutionary sense -- survival sense -- because wanting these uncomfortable feelings gone motivates us to try to get answers and information. Knowledge we acquire (of possible lurking harms) really is power: power to take meaningful steps to protect ourselves.
However, our brain has a feature (that's also a bug!): a psychological mechanism in the left hemisphere -- named "the interpreter" by cognitive neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga -- that works like mental grout. When we're wading through ambiguities or spot inconsistencies in our behavior (or others'), the interpreter creates stories to fill in the blanks: stories that make us feel comforted, consistent, and smart. Conveniently, no sooner does our mind spin some explanatory yarn than it turns right around and believes it, as if it were cold, hard fact.
Since you can never know the full story, it's pointless to torment yourself by rerunning painful bits of information and guessing. However, you could find comfort by using that crafty bugger, the interpreter, to your advantage. Shift over to the story you do know -- the happy, loving times you two shared for decades -- and focus on that. If you're gonna go in for torment, make it a healthier class of it -- like hot yoga (aka the commercialization of hot flashes paired with stretches easily accomplished by anyone who finds a wizard to turn them into a wire twist-tie).
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Con Juan 20 Jan 2022 8:27 AM (3 years ago)
Lately, women's magazines keep mentioning "sociopaths." What is a sociopath? From what I've read, it seems like both my exes were sociopaths. How do I avoid attracting others?
--Wary Woman
When a guy asks you on a date, it would be great if you could check him out on LinkedIn and be all, "Oh, look...endorsements for embezzlement, insurance fraud, and identity theft!"
Set aside everything you've read about sociopaths, much of which is probably wrong. Sociopathy and its nasty sibling, psychopathy, are manifestations of "antisocial personality disorder": a relentless pattern of exploitative behavior involving a disregard for the rights of others and a lack of guilt upon violating them. However, sociopathy and psychopathy differ in meaningful ways, though they are often written about as if they are interchangeable -- in the media and (ugh!) even by researchers.
In short, sociopathy is "fire," and psychopathy is "ice." Psychopaths -- the icy ones -- are coldly calculating manipulators who fake caring about others but are incapable of forming any emotional attachments. (Think lurking plotters lying in wait.) Sociopaths are the fiery ones: impulsive, hot-headed, and boastful; easily enraged -- even to the point of violent outbursts -- making them more likely to end up in the slammer. Sociopaths sometimes form one-on-one emotional attachments, but these are typically pretty toxic.
Psychopaths are born, not made, meaning psychopathy is genetic and present from birth, reports forensic psychologist Scott A. Johnson. Sociopathy, on the other hand, is environmentally driven: typically resulting from harsh, abusive, indulgent, and/or neglectful parenting. There's "no known effective treatment" for either psychopathy or sociopathy. However, a psychopath "easily cons treatment staff" to get a positive progress report, while sociopaths tend to act out angrily and get cut from treatment programs.
You can't avoid attracting sociopaths, but because they're impulsive, explosive, and braggy, they can only hide their true nature for so long. You can be speedier at ejecting them from your life (along with other human nightmares) if you aren't too quick to be "all in." When you start dating someone, take a wait-and-see approach -- over, say, three or even six months -- and pay special attention to his behavior when he seems unaware he's being observed. See whether a guy actually is your Mr. McDreamy, rather than sliding into the temptation to simply believe that -- making yourself prone to ignore behavior that suggests he has a big scoop of hummus where his conscience is supposed to be.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Uneven Steven 20 Jan 2022 8:26 AM (3 years ago)
I'm a 22-year-old woman. I'm bothered my best guy friend's shift in priorities. We talked about meeting up, and when I asked about his schedule, he said it depends on the schedules of women he's meeting for dates. I found this really rude, especially because I always have the decency to prioritize my friends over any random romantic prospect.
--Angry
Apparently, the lyrics of the Carole King classic, "You've Got a Friend," should've included disclaimers throughout; for example: "You just call out my name, And you know, wherever I am, I'll come running" ("though there may be a several-day wait if there's a really good opportunity for my penis").
The actual problem here is not the apparent shift in the guy's priorities but how they now differ sharply from yours -- leading to an imbalance in what you put into the friendship versus what you're getting out of it. "Equity theory," developed in the 1960s by behavioral psychologist J. Stacy Adams (and originally applied to business relationships), suggests this sort of "inequity" leads to "dissatisfaction and low morale."
Recent research on equity theory confirms that we evaluate our friendships (and other relationships) based on how fair they are. We look for reciprocity: a level of mutualness in how much we and our friend are each investing in the friendship. When we perceive a friend is giving much less than we are, we get miffy and are motivated to put them on notice or give them the boot.
The guy isn't wrong to have more mating-focused priorities. However, you might decide it's too painful to remain friends with him. Telling him how you feel might inspire him to change his behavior (or hide it better) -- my bet...for a few days or a week. Another option would be to make peace with the sort of friend he's able to be -- which could be a temporary thing while he's on the hunt -- and spend more time with friends who share your priorities.
There are friends who -- upon getting your faint, staticky phone call for help from the Alaskan tundra -- will drop everything, hop five planes, rent a team of sled dogs, and come rescue you...and then there are friends who will get on with dropping their pants on some chick's floor, telling themselves you'll probably get through to somebody else before your phone dies and you follow its lead. ("Testes before besties!")
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
On Crowd Nine 13 Jan 2022 6:22 PM (3 years ago)
I'm a 43-year-old woman in my second marriage with a man who's also on his second marriage. We are both determined to make this marriage our last! We have a scheduled date night. We make sure sex happens weekly. I'd like to know whether there are other things we can do to keep from walking down the aisle a third time.
--Hopeful
In some marriages, somebody could lose consciousness and it wouldn't be all that noticeable.
Date nights are good for keeping the marital jets firing, as is having sex weekly, but regular dates and sextivities don't change how being married is like subscribing to Netflick. No, my copyeditor isn't day-drinking, and yes, I mean "flick." Netflick would have only one movie, and you and your partner would be forced to watch it every night of your life together...until one or both of you shrivel up and die of boredom or start dialing jackals with law licenses (aka divorce lawyers).
What can help is making your married life more like single people's lives -- uh, in ways that don't remodel your vows into something more along the lines of suggestions. In a New York Times op-ed, social historian Stephanie Coontz explains, "Single people generally have wider social networks than married couples, who tend to withdraw into their coupledom." Though marriage "can provide a bounty of emotional, practical and financial support ... finding the right mate is no substitute for having friends and other interests."
Disappointingly, Coontz trots out a view widely (and uncritically) accepted among researchers: "On average, married people report higher well-being than singles." And sure, there are studies that conclude this. However, social psychologist Bella DePaulo points out rather glaring flaws in some of the research making this claim. For example, she observes that even respected developmental psychologist E. Mavis Hetherington couldn't see her faulty reasoning in concluding: "Happily married couples are healthier, happier, wealthier, and sexier than are singles." The problem? Hetherington is comparing a subset of married people -- HAPPILY MARRIED people (as opposed to ALL married people) -- with ALL single people. I put this in perspective in a 2013 column: "Yes, shockingly, happily married people are happier than clinically depressed single people."
In fact, people who are unhappily single -- who feel "distress" about being single -- tend to be those who'd previously been married (and especially those newly divorced or widowed), notes Coontz. About the single-'n'-miserableness of the newly divorced or widowed, you might think, "Duh...they're lonely or grieving!" Some or many might be. But I think Coontz is onto something in advising married people to "cultivate the skills of successful singlehood." (Conversely, "people who are successful as singles" -- meaning socially connected and relatively content with their lives -- "are especially likely to end up in happy marriages, in large part because of the personal and social resources they developed before marrying.")
Coontz suggests you bring other people into your marriage -- though not like they did in the '70s at those suburban parties with all the couples dropping their keys into a bowl. She's talking about friendships with people beyond your spouse, and ideally, not just one or two others but a whole group. Research (by evolutionary social psychologist Stephanie Brown, among others) consistently finds being socially connected increases individuals' personal well-being and is even associated with better physical health. Likewise, "maintaining social networks ... after marriage" can also "enhance and even revitalize your marriage," writes Coontz.
As for how you two could put this into practice, you might start by making some date nights double-date nights. This might seem like a bad idea -- a date-night romance- and intimacy-killer. However, Coontz describes a date-night experiment in which researchers "assigned some couples to spend time by themselves and have deeply personal conversations," while others were set up with a couple they'd never met "and told to initiate similar conversations." Afterward, all of the couples "reported greater satisfaction with their relationship," but only those who'd been on the double date reported feeling more "romantic passion" for each other!
Because it seems "the more" really is the (maritally) merrier, you and your husband could also host regular dinner parties, cocktail hours, brunches, and/or game nights. However, it's also important that you each maintain individual interests, activities, and friendships. Ironically, regularly spending less time together -- as well as following wise advice from Coontz to each maintain your ability to be self-reliant -- should help you avoid going your separate ways. It's great if your relationship starts to remind you of an iconic one in a classic movie -- but not if the movie is "Cast Away," starring Tom Hanks and a volleyball he draws a face on so he won't be all alone on a desert island.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Bare Tracks 6 Jan 2022 6:19 PM (3 years ago)
My boyfriend asked me for nude photos of myself. I reluctantly sent him one. I feel very uncomfortable about sending it, and I don't want to send more -- though sending naked pics now seems very common. Am I paranoid?
--Online Privacy Fan
Unfortunately, "online privacy" is one of the more absurdo oxymorons -- a contradiction in terms on the level of "planned spontaneity," "working vacation," and my favorite: "civil war." (The warring factions yell "Thank you!" and "No, thank you!" across the trenches until more people pass out on one side than the other.)
Digital-world technology has made our lives vastly easier, more efficient, and more fun, but it can also cost us big-time -- on a scale previously unseen and even unimaginable throughout human history. Back in the Middle Ages, no one had to worry about some brainy malcontent hacking their "cloud" and releasing all their nudie shots to the Global Village. At worst, one other person might come upon a lone sketch of them in a state of undress or maybe a few slutty etchings.
In other words, you are far from unreasonable to say no to sending any further nudiepix, and it would not be unreasonable to ask your boyfriend to delete the one you sent him (explaining your privacy concerns). That said, he might find that request unreasonable, vis-a-vis how common it is for people to sext those they're dating -- or (when those people are guys) show random strangers on the internet their erect willy.
If he does find it unreasonable, you might feel bad saying no. Women, much more than men, tend to be on the high end of the spectrum of the personality trait "agreeableness" (first identified in the 1930s by psychologists Gordon Allport and Henry Odbert). High agreeableness manifests in a "pleaser" personality: being kind, empathetic, cooperative, and driven to have positive interactions with others (often to one's own detriment).
Understanding that you might have a predisposition to say yes can help you stand up for yourself. At first, announcing your boundaries -- saying no -- will likely feel bad. Be prepared to override that feeling and act in your best interest. Sure, many people share all sorts of naked 'n' crazy without having it exposed to the universe, but there's always that possibility. At a work retreat, your co-workers should not try to bond with you with: "Don't you find the Cool Whip requires too much cleanup?"
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Mute Point 6 Jan 2022 6:17 PM (3 years ago)
I'm a guy in my early 20s. I love my older brother and look up to him. But starting in high school, girls flocked to him, and he was crowned prom king, though I'm objectively more attractive. Recently, a girl I really liked and became friends with started dating him after I introduced them at a party. Neither knew about my feelings for her because I never told them, but I now feel resentful and envious of my brother.
--Bitter
Ideally, if a woman is asked to guess your "spirit animal," her answer won't be, "Hamster lying cold and dead in the corner of his cage?"
Your "I feel resentful" is a bit entitled snowflake, since you never did anything to let this woman know you were interested. In short: Good things come to those who ask. (Full disclosure: often, though not always.)
As for your envy, research by evolutionary psychologist Bram Buunk overturns the bad name this emotion has long gotten. Envy is actually adaptive -- functional -- and its function appears to be making us go: "Whoa! He's way ahead of me! Gotta put on my lady-chasing track shoes!" Envy is only a destructive emotion when people experiencing it engage in "malicious envy": trying to sabotage those doing better than they are rather than trying to up their own game and outdo them fair and square.
In the future, when you want a woman, don't silently watch as she wanders off into another guy's arms. Say something! As I noted, it won't always end well when you hit on a woman, but possibly getting rejected is the cost of possibly having dates, sex, and love.
That said, there's a way to repurpose bummerino brush-offs into "small wins": organizational psychologist Karl Weick's term for small positive outcomes experienced while failing to solve a big (or even massive) problem. An example of how that might play out in your head: "Okay, that girl I hit on at the bar was nasty, but yesterday, I would've spent all night just staring at her. Today, I grew a pair and approached her. Yay, me!"
Though this is admittedly the slow, emotionally grubby approach, you should find it much more effective than your current MO: waiting for a woman you're into to read your mind and have herself shot out of a cannon through your open window and into your love pit/bed.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Venus Envy 30 Dec 2021 3:37 PM (3 years ago)
I got a boob job two years ago. My best friend, seeing the results, wanted one, too. When she realized she couldn't afford it, she started making snide comments about women who get them. Recently, a guy was hitting on me at a party, and she started flirting with him and asked, "Do you think I need a boob job?" and told him I'd gotten one. I was shocked. I'd like to say something to her, but she's the louder part of my friend group, and I'm unsure how.
--Disturbed
Self-defense for men is karate or maybe Krav Maga. For women, it's ducking mean remarks.
Many people have a romanticized view of women as the sweet, ever-nurturing "better angels of our nature." That's a major myth, but it continues to have traction due to the nature of female rivalry, which is much like slow-acting poison gas. (It's often hard for a woman to recognize she's been dosed...till she's writhing on the floor like a goldfish sucking in its last desperate breaths.)
While from boyhood on, guys tend to relish competition and are openly aggressive (like when one socks another in the jaw), psychologist Anne Campbell describes female aggression as "indirect" and "covert" (sneaky and hidden). She believes women evolved to compete this way to avoid physical harm that might have damaged their ability to have or care for children.
Common sneaky ladywar tactics include weaponizing a group of women against a targeted woman by spreading nasty gossip about her and rallying the coven to ostracize her. In the presence of a man or men, one woman will try to undermine another woman's mate value by revealing her supposed hussyhood or trashing her looks -- as you experienced.
Men tend to prefer natural breasts (though their eyes go boi-oi-oing! at the big, pert fakeuns). Your "best friend," spotting that a guy seemed into you, performed the vital public service of informing him your bodacious boobs are, in fact, siliconey islands.
Why would she do this? Well, unbeknownst to you, you violated an unspoken rule of female society by amping up your appeal to men via Boob Fairy, M.D.: openly competing with other women. It's the "openly" part that's the problem. Psychologist Joyce Benenson explains that, in contrast with "the constant male struggle to figure out who is better, faster, smarter, or otherwise more skilled," girls and women enforce "equality" among themselves and resent and punish women who stand out.
"Should a girl appear superior, even accidentally," she is guilty of a crime against the rest and "faces social exclusion." This carries through to adulthood, with the thinking (summed up by Benenson): "Nice women don't try to outdo their female peers."
Of course, women do compete. But, Benenson notes -- per interviews with hundreds of women by various researchers -- women deny they compete with one another, even to themselves. This subconscious self-deception -- "a woman's honest belief that she never competes with other females" -- allows her to do just that without any pangs of conscience getting in her way.
That's one reason why confronting this woman about what she did might be problematic. Additionally, research by evolutionary psychologists Tania Reynolds and Jaime Palmer-Hague suggests your standing up for yourself -- telling this woman her behavior was out of line -- could be portrayed by her (to other women in your circle) as your victimizing her! Thus putting a big stain on your reputation!
Compared with "traditional forms of gossip" (the sort readily perceived as catty and mean), women's disclosures of a friend's hurting their feelings (kindness "violations") get a pass, Reynolds and Palmer-Hague observe. They are "relatively trusted and approved," suggesting women have "a social blind spot" to a tool used to trash the reputation of other women. Reynolds explained to me via email: Basically, if a female friend says about another woman, "'You wouldn't guess how mean Mary was to me the other day,' you're less likely to recognize this friend's disclosure as gossip."
In their research, disclosures like this "effectively tarnished ... social opportunities" of the women they were made about. "Participants evaluated women who treated their friends poorly as immoral," avoided having them as friends, and wanted to "warn others about their bad character."
You might decide to say something anyway: gently tell this woman you prefer to keep news of your boob job unbroadcast. Note that even this approach could be turned into ammunition against you through a "victimhood" story she might tell.
Consider whether you have the social and emotional capital to bear the potential costs -- while factoring in the psychological cost of just sucking it up and saying nothing. Ultimately, though many women are nothing but supportive of other women, it's wise to remain mindful that, well, behind every beautiful woman is a crowd of other women looking to push her into a shed and padlock the door.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.
Foresee Sick 23 Dec 2021 3:35 PM (3 years ago)
I'm good friends with an ex. She's a great person, but we just don't work romantically. For two years, I've been seeing a woman I love and want a future with. She initially said she was fine with my friendship with my ex. Two months ago, she said she was uncomfortable with it and it might even be a deal breaker. How is it fair for her to decide this now?
--Don't Wanna Dump A Friend
There are a number of things absent from straight men's friendships with other men -- namely how two dudes boozing it up together on the couch never leads to anyone's bra being yanked off and flung onto the ceiling fan.
Two years ago, your girlfriend did say she was okay with your friendship with your ex. So, your feeling like you've been played is understandable -- but probably driven the (very common!) tendency to overestimate our ability to engage in reliable "affective forecasting." "Affect" is researcher-ese for emotion, and affective forecasting involves predicting how some future event will make us feel. Research by psychologists Daniel Gilbert and Timothy Wilson suggests we're pretty bad at foreseeing what we'll ultimately want and how happy or unhappy it will make us down the road.
Our guesses about how we'll eventually feel are colored by our circumstances and preferences at the time we're making a prediction. For example, before your girlfriend was very attached to you, she might've believed your friendship with your ex was (and would keep being) no biggie. As her love for you grew, the stakes of losing you loomed large in a way they didn't back in the cool light of "Mmmkay, let's see where things go with Mr. (Possibly) Right."
Tell her you want to understand her feelings -- and do something few people do when they have a goal of their own in mind: Listen fully and open-mindedly (as opposed to giving the appearance of listening while mentally cataloging all the fantastic points you'll make). Hearing her fears could help you empathize with her -- which should make her feel understood. Explain why she has nothing to worry about (uh, assuming that's the case). You might also actively reassure her: regularly do stuff to show how much you love her. Ultimately, however, you might have a big ugly choice to make if you can't get your girlfriend to stop seeing your friendship with your ex as something along the lines of Wile E. Coyote getting the night watchman gig at KFC.
For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.