It is the positioning of the camera that does it.
How does it apply to dating and this enigmatically-titled chapter? By allowing us to reposition the lens through which we view dating and see it for the fresh, attractive person it always was. Your past pessimism was actually a kind of reverse beer-goggles, by making something ugly that was handsome all along.
People have often described certain singles’ bars as a “meat markets.” Although it’s sort of a grotesque metaphor, it demonstrates a couple of instructive points. First, it underlines the essential pessimism with which most people view modern courtship. Any euphemism that describes a butcher shop won’t exactly fill one with positive associations.
“It was so romantic the first night I met [Boy A]! We met at a meat market, and we danced all night on the killing floor!”
As repellent as it is, the image of a “meat market” is somewhat useful. Dating does take place in a “market,” one that isn’t much different than the capitalist market that guides our economy.
Most people have taken basic courses in economics at some point during their education, so you’re probably already familiar with the concept of “supply and demand.” Suppliers or “sellers” provide products that compete with similar products for the spending dollar of consumers or “buyers.” A seller’s primary motivation is to sell his product. Full stop. The price he gets is entirely dependent on the amount of existing demand for the product. If there is no demand, he’ll drop the price again and again until the product sells. Moreover, he doesn’t care who buys his product, as long as someone does.
The buyer has a different motivation, to find the best product in the marketplace at the best price possible. Not only does he not have to take the first product available, the buyer is expected to survey the marketplace before making his decision. The buyer weighs each product against the others, noting their various features and determining which one most closely mirrors what he’s looking for. If he is patient, discerning, and knows what he wants, the buyer will find the product that best fits his needs at a price he can afford.
Look at these different motivations and ask yourself: in the dating “marketplace,” am I a buyer or a seller? If you’re reading this book for any reason other than recreation, it’s likely you’ve been the seller more often than the buyer. Don’t feel bad about it. Our culture has been telling you since you were born that is the way it’s supposed to be. Turn on your TV and look at the way your gender is regularly objectified for profit.
Ad execs love to say that “sex sells,” but if you look at the gender iniquity in how men and women are portrayed, it’s more honest to say that “the female sex sells.” The fact that occasional ads in which men are ogled stand apart so memorably proves just how pervasive the objectification of women really is.
So don’t feel bad if you feel like a product for sale. Our culture keeps telling you that you are.
You aren’t a product. You’re a wonderful, flesh-and-blood modern woman. You weren’t put here to serve anyone, and you sure as hell aren’t some object to be obtained, used, and discarded. The time has come to flip the gender script that has been insidiously fed to you from the moment you first sat Indian style on the floor in front of your television.
You’re the buyer starting right now.
This new approach introduces an entirely different set of questions. Any queries about motivations other than your own are no longer relevant. In fact, you can completely relinquish the following questions:
“Does he like me?” and its cousin, “How much does he like me?”
“Will he call?” and “When will he call?”
“Is he really attracted to me?” and “Is he attracted to other women more?”
“Is he seeing someone else?” and “Does he like her more than me?”
These questions make a common, but crucial, mistake. They employ the wrong pronoun: he. Forget what “he” wants, and ask questions the questions you can solve, the only questions that really matter.
“Do I like him?” and “What is it about him that I like?”
“Do I want him to call?” and “Why do I want him to call?”
“Am I attracted to him?” and “If yes or no, what is it about him?”
“Do I want to be in an exclusive relationship with him?” and “Do I trust him to be faithful?”
The latter set of four example questions is more important, because it gets at at the root of your choices. Understanding your own motivations is an essential step in your self-exploration. Introspection about your own preferences will lead you to seek out traits that make someone a complementary partner and avoid those men that don’t. In addition, you may find that you’re seeking negative traits (selfishness, narcissism, possessiveness) without knowing or choosing to acknowledge it.
Of course, not all of your motivations for choosing a mate will be immediately clear to you. Research shows that we all have a series of unconscious predispositions that influence our choices, sometimes even more so than our stated desires. The MHC factor presented earlier is one of the stronger ones, but it’s far from the only example of our secret motivations.
Not only do women emit pheromones during ovulation that make them more desirable to men, a study at the University of California, San Francisco, found that women are 24 percent more likely to engage in sex during the most fertile period in their menstrual cycle. Many studies have demonstrated that women are more likely to cheat or have one-night stands during this fertile period as well. Even women’s preferences change during this period, as they’re far more likely to choose rugged and overtly masculine sexual partners than during periods of infertility.[vii]
Some other influences discovered by science seem almost arbitrary. For instance, studies have shown that, across genders and even cultures, people are attracted to the color red. In one study, people examined a series of photographs and assigned a number rating based on the level of sexual attractiveness to each person shown. Participants consistently rated higher those people wearing red. This result applied even to previously viewed photos in which the clothes were then digitally altered to red. Test subjects rated people in exactly the same photos as more attractive when they wore red.[viii]
The likelihood of sexual contact on a first date can come down to something as simple as what kind of movie you watch. The experience of fear (like seeing a scary movie) with someone you’re attracted to reads as arousal in our brains.[ix] When that killer in the movie makes you jump and clutch your date, your brain is quietly but insistently whispering, I know what you should do with him after the movie…
This confusion of fear and attraction goes both ways, so if you really want to see a certain someone naked, don’t rent The Notebook. It will definitely not prompt subconscious desire, and your tears will actually produce a hormone that dampens the male drive to procreate.[x]
So if you really want to get laid, watch The Texas Chainsaw Massacre with him while wearing a red dress and ovulating. Science puts his chances of resistance at somewhere between slim and none.
I bring up these fun facts to show that we’re motivated by factors both conscious and unconscious when choosing a mate. Most people look for a particular “type” of partner, whether for a lifetime or just a few delightfully sweaty hours. In the next chapter, we will examine your “type” and ask the burning question:
Is my type kind of an asshole?
Chapter Five
The Type Re-Writer
Most of you by this point in your life have a certain “type” of man that you’re consistently drawn to in matters of romance. For some it may be quite specific—a certain body type, hair and eye color, height, etc. For others, it may be a matter of career, education, political affiliation, or moral attitudes. Whether we choose to acknowledge it or not, all of us are drawn to certain personality types and turned off by others. The relevant question for our discussion is this: Is my “type” helping or harming my pursuit of true, lasting love? For some of yo
u, the question can be phrased more plainly: Why do I keep going for these hopeless assholes?
In his book, The Eight Personality Types of Men Who Are Successful with Women, David DeAngelo outlines these allegedly desirable types of men. Here is a summary of them, with tongue planted firmly in cheek:
1) The Bad Boy: He’s the “dangerous” dude your mother wouldn’t like. He’s the tough loose cannon who refuses to yield to societal laws and mores. He’s often an abuser of alcohol and drugs; being with him causes the same addictive rush in you. Oh, one more thing about the Bad Boy; he often expresses his anger with his fists pointed in your direction. An unstable narcissist with a penchant for domestic violence? Where do I sign up?
2) The Adventurer: He’s a junkie too, but his narcotic is the quest for greater and greater thrills. He’s a lover of extreme sports like skydiving and bungee jumping. He won’t physically abuse you like the Bad Boy, but he’s 100% more likely to watch you fall to a grisly death because you overestimated your rock-climbing skills. Yet like the Bad Boy, the Adventurer is a wild horse you’ll never break. He’s rarely monogamous and is likely to abandon you as soon as he feels the thrill of the relationship is gone.
3) The Seducer: He’s the one who knows your buttons, how to push them, and exactly how fast or slowly to do so. Seducers understand women implicitly and appear to make your pleasure their life’s mission. But when the lights come up in the morning, you discover that their “mission” was more like a commando raid—quick, explosive, and leaving no trace of themselves behind after their target has been vanquished.
4) The Artist: He’s that mysterious creative spirit who represents a complex challenge for you. He’s the poet who is forever wrestling with The Meaning of Life. He’s the tormented musician trying to exorcise his troubled childhood via guitar solo. No one “understands” him, his demons, and his passions like you do. He tells you that you’re the sole light in his world of darkness. Then one night he has dirty, drunken sex with a groupie in the alley behind the club after the show. Suddenly you don’t understand him anymore, so he takes your microwave, laptop, and jar of coins as payment for his pain.
5) The Successful Guy: He’s the budding tycoon, the corporate titan, the man who “makes things happen” by his sheer force of will. He drives a car with a monthly lease more expensive than the mortgage on your house. He has a home theater larger than your entire apartment. With him you’ll never want for anything, or at least not anything tangible. He does have a few drawbacks, however, and they’re confirmed by research. Studies show that powerful men are far more likely to be selfish and ego-driven.[xi] They’re more likely to lie and cheat. Their power has given them an irrational sense of entitlement. They’re also far less likely to show compassion, making them the worst kind of person you need when going through personal crisis.
6) Daddy: He’s the surrogate patriarch who dictates your every action; he thinks he “knows what’s best for you.” He may be appealing either because of his similarity to your own authoritarian father, or because he provides a substitute for the father you never had. He may be considerably older than you, but he doesn’t have to be, just as long as he provides a strong, guiding hand in every facet of your life. He loves you, but only on the condition that you never attempt to assert your independence.
7) The Regular Guy: He’s the salt of the earth—dependable, ardently loyal, and a model of stability. He works hard, has a strong sense of right and wrong, and makes an ideal parent. The Regular Guy is idealized as “the guy you marry,” but he’s often dismissed as “boring.”
8) Ass-Kissing Guy: He’s the inverse of the Daddy. He’s the pawn who does your bidding. He always puts your needs first and defines himself as your boyfriend or husband. While he satisfies your every request and attends to your every need, he’s usually held in quiet contempt for his spinelessness.
Other than the “regular guy,” what do seven of these eight types have in common? They are, by their very nature, unable to provide compatibility and lasting happiness. Whether the storm comes early or late in the relationship, the clouds are always encroaching and never far from view, if you bother to look. Nearly all of these types, which girls supposedly want (per De’Angelo and his alleged vice grip on female desire), have a sense of disdain for your ability to rationally choose a mate who’ll be good for you.
If you see your “type” among those described, don’t despair. A ton of men out there fit one of those descriptions. They may even make up the majority of the men you’ve met or dated. Seven of the eight types—Bad Boy, Adventurer, Seducer, Artist, Successful Guy, Daddy, and Ass-Kissing Guy—are ruled chiefly by selfish and juvenile desires. Not only do these desires usually have nothing to do with your feelings, they may even be their enemy. Nearly all of these personality types are embalmed in a stage of arrested development.
One type is the least glamorous and, therefore, most easily taken for granted. He’s The Regular Guy. By studying the description above, you’ll find that only his type exists in a state of equilibrium with his mate. He isn’t selfish, but he isn’t spineless, either. He knows who he is and what is important to him, and he’s willing and able to care for and protect it.
It’s important not to get caught up in the semantics of the author’s definition of types. The “regular” man he describes is actually pretty rare. Regular doesn’t mean “average,” though; the average man probably more closely fits one of the other personality types. It’s easy to be another kind of man; it’s easy to seek out and make preferential your own desires at the expense of everyone else.
There is no valor or nobility in looking out for “number one.”
It is in our DNA to pursue our own interests. Survival of the fittest, right? Even the simplest life forms do this. You, on the other hand, aren’t a simple life form; one hopes that your mate won’t be, either. Ideally, you’ll foster mutual caring, love, and respect that will make it as natural to pursue each other’s happiness as it is to pursue your own. The desire to do this is supposedly one characteristic that marks us as the most elevated and sophisticated species on Earth.
In DeAngelo’s (silly and contemptible) book, The Regular Guy is the only one who isn’t motivated by unadulterated egotism. The Regular Guy wants a partnership, whereas all of the other personality types just want an acolyte (except for the Ass-Kisser, who wants to be an acolyte).
Discussing The Regular Guy brings to mind the dating travails of a close friend in Los Angeles named Karen. Karen was a beautiful, successful girl who possessed, quite literally, a genius intellect confirmed repeatedly by childhood tests. Yet, when it came to romantic affairs, she was repeatedly drawn to hopeless egotists with whom no real future was possible. One day she shared her woes about her affair with a guitarist in a prominent alternative-rock band:
“He says he doesn’t love his girlfriend anymore, and he always complains about her. After we make love, he always claims he’s going to leave her so he can be with me. But, ultimately, he can’t bring himself to leave her. I don’t understand.”
Karen’s type was “The Artist.” The men she dated snugly fit the cliché of the unfaithful, self-absorbed guy that DeAngelo describes. With every new one, Karen would inevitably come to me with the same complaints. The Artist used her for sex and, occasionally, for money. He never cared about her like she cared for him, and he was never faithful to her, despite all his empty promises.
Here’s the thing. Complaining about The Artist being unfaithful is like taking issue with a crack addict for not maintaining a savings account. After listening without comment to Karen for many years of spinning similar woes, I suggested that, despite her labeling “regular guys” as dull and unable to satisfy her sexually, it was time to give The Regular Guy a try. Today, Karen is happily married to a smart, funny, and loving “regular guy.” They have been together for six regular years now and have two beautiful, regular kids.
If you study carefully DeAngelo’s eight personality types and think abou
t your own complex inner-self, the descriptions seem hopelessly shallow. How can we possibly choose a mate whose primary characteristics are so simplistic and immature? Yet many of us may find that, if we really analyze our motives, we’ve become conditioned to seek out only a superficial, easily-categorized set of traits in a prospective mate.
Chalk it up to the failures of our parents or our empty, quick-fix, sex-and money-obsessed culture. We’re generally taught that the easy answers are the only answers, so why bother delving any deeper? In the next chapter we will go a little deeper and look at more thorough, research-backed ideas about personality “types.”
Chapter Six
Making Personality Personal
If the goal is to seek substantial and lasting compatibility, it is time to start looking at some useful models for assistance. The idea of psychological “types” has been around since famed psychologist Carl Jung introduced it in the early 1920s, and even in our era when every new thing has the shelf-life of a pink taffeta bridesmaid dress, an idea introduced when your nana was a child is still the foundation for how we view personality today.
But I didn’t buy this book for a refresher course in psychology, you may be thinking. When do we get to the bit where I find a decent guy? The answer lies in psychology as much as in physiology and sexuality.
But back to Carl Jung. According to his theory, there are two basic personality types: extroverts and introverts. Extroversion is defined as “the act of directing one’s interest outward or to things outside the self.” Extroverts are happiest and most energetic in the company of others. They’re more comfortable in unfamiliar surroundings and situations. They don’t experience social awkwardness around new people. Moreover, they seem to thrive in these situations and make friends easily.
Your Ex-Boyfriend Will Hate This Page 3