craschworks

“Both men and women were found to be unhappier four years on than people in similar unhappy relationships who didn’t break up. An entire presidential term later and women were still two percent poorer. A year after the breakup, only 29 percent of men surveyed said they felt satisfied with their lives.

To be fair, they said it between doing lines of blow.

And 29 percent of men who were still single reported feeling sad and lonely four years after the breakup. Ending a relationship can send shock waves that even years of healing can’t fix.”

Via Matt Bell

“It’s actually not that hard. Use a decent camera. Go easy on the flash. Own the foreground. Take your picture in the afternoon. Then visit the nearest Apple store. Done.”

The analogy even applies to being happy in life, finding a mate, all sorts of things you wouldn’t expect. The old adage that “you will find someone when you stop looking” in part is true because the act of looking itself is a cost, something that takes away time and creativity and focus from other things, and those other things are often the real fuel behind the fire of your life that will put you in those places, and doing those things, and creating all of what will bring you to that person or bring that person to you. Sometimes you just have to throw in the towel, and realize that from where you are you cannot reach what you want, whatever it is. Take a step back from it, take it off your list, lose some altitude for a time while you regain speed. Stop reaching, and start climbing, put your hands on the rung you can comfortably reach, and pull. Right now, with good effort, and keep going.

Roger Andrews, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., is 49 years old and has never had a sexual relationship with anyone except himself. In fact, he’s had intercourse just once — in July 2003 with a surrogate partner he engaged to help him, in his words, “get over his terrible handicap and join the world.”

To look at Roger you’d never imagine his secret, or the deep shame he has suffered because of it. He’s an attractive man: light complexion, thinning blond hair, strong chin. He’s a successful computer engineer. He has friendly dealings with co-workers and clients. He’s smart, articulate and insightful, especially about the issue that makes him “a freak.” He’s a jazz drummer, and he showed enough acting talent in college to consider a theater career. He’s well traveled, and has scuba-dived all over the Caribbean. But he’s always been shy and never learned how to have an intimate relationship. “I never grew up in that way,” he says.

What really turns me off is when I see someone who assumes immediate compatibility merely because of their own initial desire for their target.  This happened to me all the time during the brief interlude I had with internet dating (don’t get me started on that).  I would receive messages in my okcupid inbox that literally read, “FINALLY!” or, I kid you not, “I think we’d be really compatible because I find you mind-numbingly attractive.” For real — that’s the causation right there?  We’re compatible because YOU find ME mind-numbingly attractive?  What about me and what I want?  Is our compatibility affected by whether I find you attractive, or do I just not get a say in the matter?

When we foist our desires upon our target too soon, we are essentially telling them that they don’t get a say in the matter.  We want a relationship, or a house and kids, or whatever it is that we want, and because we are ready for this at this point in our lives, they ought to deliver, and their own needs don’t really count. 

Discover the Magic of Bonding Behaviors

While waiting for a concert to begin at our local county fair, my husband and I checked out a reptile exhibit that included an animal trainer with a live alligator resting calmly on his lap. As we stroked the gator, I asked the trainer why it was so tame. “I pet it daily. If I didn’t, it would quickly be wild again, and wouldn’t allow this,” he explained.

I was surprised. Only months earlier I had begun to grasp the power of bonding behaviors (skin-to-skin contact, gentle stroking and so forth) to evoke the desire to bond without our having to do anything more. I didn’t realize reptiles ever responded similarly.

Bonding behaviors, or attachment cues, are subconscious signals that can make emotional ties surprisingly effortless, once any initial defensiveness dissolves. (Bonding behaviors are also good medicine for easing defensiveness. Here’s a dramatic example: After three weeks of daily attachment cues an orphan with violent reactive attachment disorder finally bonded with his adoptive parents and began to form healthy peer relationships as well.)

These behaviors are effective because they are the way mammal infants attach to their caregivers. To survive, infants need regular contact with Mom’s mammaries until they are ready to be weaned. Bonding behaviors work by encouraging the release of neurochemicals (including oxytocin), which lower innate defensiveness, making a bond possible.

In short, these generous behaviors are the way we humans fall in love with our parents and children. Caregiver-infant signals include affectionate touch, grooming, soothing sounds, eye contact, and so forth.

In rare pair-bonding mammals like us, bonding cues serve a secondary function as well (known as an exaptation). They’re part of the reason we stay in love (on average) for long enough for both parents to attach to any kids. Honeymoon neurochemistry also plays a role, but it’s somewhat like a booster shot that wears off. In contrast, bonding behaviors can sustain bonds indefinitely.

The healthiest, largest male chickadees have the highest crests on their heads and they are sought after as mates. When researchers outfit runt males with little pointed caps, much like the human dunce cap, females line up to mate with them, forsaking the naturally fitter, hatless males.