Visualisation
January 4, 2012 § 73 Comments
I know! Why don’t I visualise a new husband? A lot of people talk about visualisation, swear by it even. Nice and simple solution way of conjuring up a husband, no?
You hear about those with cancer picturing a shark chomping away at their cauliflour-like tumours and, hey ho, miracle cure!
Well, whatever works for them, I guess, but I don’t think so. Me? I happen to believe, more, in conventional medicine, and that if visualisation “works”, it is rather more in the line of coincidence than any calculated images of Jaws himself piling into malign and sprouty lumps.
Just my opinion.
But if it were that easy, surely we’d all be visualising away, all sorts of things, and living a Utopian fantasy to end all fantasies?
Luckily, no one has told me to visualise a husband into being, otherwise I might have decked them (that is a manner of speech: I am not a violent person in any shape or form), but the only thing I can visualise is all England populated by couples. I wonder, as in a childrens’ game, if I had magical powers and could see all the available men who speak English (I forgot to state that as one of my faintly crucial criteria because, call me old fashioned, I do rather rate communication in a relationship), whether there would be any, really? And I think possibly not?
My mother said that when she was a child, bored and cold on the school games fields, she used to wonder where her future husband might be at that moment and doing what? Well, it never occurred to her, then, to picture more than one. (She went on to have more than her fair share). There again, she wasn’t doing it as a means of achieving what she wanted; she was merely wondering and imagining. Nothing wrong with that. It is setting about this modern business of “visualising”, for the sake of getting, pulling off, gaining, achieving – whatever you want to call it – what is being visualised, that I find a load of bollocks.
Oh, let’s visualise away, shall we? Who do I see? Ah, that’s good, a sort of warm and fuzzy cliche of a person who incorporates the looks of Colin Firth and Dan Stephens, the wit and naughty twinkle of Dylan Moran, the intellectual fizz of a fellow of All Soul’s, the sexual oomph of… well, whomsoever it is who rings your particular bell etc, etc. Oh, yeah, right. That was a doddle. Now, it’s just the little matter of finding, meeting, attracting and ending up with just such a paragon. Or, shall we be a little more realistic, and visualise a nice, kindly, ordinary Joe in a job, with a good SOH, who looks more like cuddly Dara O’Brien, and hope for him? Nothing wrong with that.
Only, not even he seems to be materialising. Remotely. Not even as the vaguest, phantom-like shiver on the horizon.
Visualisation. One massive bollocks-a-thon.
If only it were that easy.
The Plankton 
I have some exciting news for you, P. There is something with magical powers that will allow you to see the available men who speak English. It will also allow you to visualise what they look like without you having to meet them; it will allow you to communicate with them without being in the same room as them; it will allow you to explore what it is they think and what their values are without speaking with them. It’s called the internet. And, for those with the courage to use it, it’s the magic of our times.
Plankton, Zoe is right. Although I’d draw the line at being able to discern “what they think and what their values are without speaking with them.” I think you have to actually know someone for a while before you discover those things, and given the level of, shall we say, “exaggeration” (others would say “lying”) on internet dating sites you really have only the sketchiest notion of the man with whom you’re setting up a coffee date.
But back to Zoe’s basic point: You can’t give up until you have at least TRIED the internet. I am on record here as not having had a good experience with it myself, and although I am far too lazy to make an official study, it seems to me that roughly three-quarters or more of the commenters here have had rather lackluster (or worse) experiences with it, as well. BUT several other people –yes, I admit a distinct minority — have also commented sharing stories of lasting love found online. As you have been looking for quite a while now, and as you seem to have an active social life and a spectacularly wide range of friends who care about you and yet THEY haven’t been able to put you in the path of anyone despite the passage of years . . . well, it’s time.
Will it work? Maybe not. Even probably not. But if even *I* tried it, you have to as well!
Christ, that is quite possibly the most depressing pep talk ever given.
Don’t worry! I am used to it. Much appreciated all the same. Px
I do understand Ms P’s reluctance to try internet online dating stuff. I feel much the same. I know that logically, rationally, it is sensible, and I know several happy couples who met that way (mostly the Guardian Soulmates site).
But every time I think about getting a photo, writing up a profile, waiting, going through others’ profiles, emailing — all that. I just want to weep. My throat starts to contract & I feel as if I’m going to cry. I feel shame and inadequacy. If ordinary people, with not very much going for them, can meet up and be happy, without having to go shopping online, why can’t I? What’s wrong with me?
Well, I know that those thoughts are self-pitying, self-sabotaging, and silly, as well as insulting to my fellow human beans, but that’s how I feel. It’s a gut instinct. It’s going to take a lot for me to get beyond my own ridiculous emotions. Like Ms P., I need time.
Well said Zoe. The reticence towards the merest peek at this baffles me.
Yes P. That includes you with all your – and others’- talk of ‘resorting’ to it. Not ‘quite up to it yet’ et al. It’s not some monster machine and yes, may lead to nothing or disappoint. Yes, you have heard -and may yet still hear- accounts of others’ experiences here. But when writing about lack of available men etc etc. what is stopping you?
Funnily enough, the tedium of the actual process. The process of filtering and elimination and dating total strangers. Not sure I have the energy. But am working up to it, I guess.
But P. How can you say this if you haven’t tried it? Or even looked at it?
you have your own – brilliant – mind. Don’t just go on others’ say-so.
Yes it’s a gamble. But the ‘energy’ of having a look? ‘Dating total strangers’? Of course you wouldn’t! You wouldn’t even get that far until after a good deal of communication and knowledge and some sense of wanting to -maybe- meet. can take many weeks -or not- if you want.
No ‘energy’ in the way you talk about it, required. No ‘working up to it’.
Is it that it is so much a ‘last resort’ that if it doesn’t work then all hope is gone?
Sorry to harp on dear P. Only want the best for you. x
Thank you, Jo. Still have some of my children with me before school starts. May be when it does, in the peace and silence. Px
Hear hear! That was brilliant and I agree with your skeptical views.
Do you have a skeptics society in Britain? There’s one in Ireland and its members are clever, inquiring people of all ages and at least 50% are male. They’re not necessarily single or age appropriate but they’re clever and stimulating.
A platonic conversation with one of these men beats a stultifying brain dead internet date hands down. The women are interesting too, they tend not to moan about weight, men etc because they have other things to talk about. A bit like Lydia without the bragging! Sorry Lydia.
If you like clever, nerdy science types consider joining your local skeptics society. At the least it will be a change from the usual depressing scene.
Dara O’Brien? I would…
Me too.
I suspect visualisation is what stops some people finding a spouse because they believe she has to be 6 foot with massive breasts or he has to be tall dark and handsome. Don;t have preconditions and you’re more likely to find someone.
Let’s hope we never again hav a generation visualising husbands when they are at school but instead visualise themselves as leading the cabinet or the country. We must drum “I will grow up and marry and that’s my life” ethos out of every girl in the land.
I am absolutely swamped with potential men but as I’m not well I can’t much bother and as it’s January they all want someone. I notice it ever year. if I had a second from work I’d sit down and write a few notes so I don’t muddle them up. There is one with the brand new baby; one with no hair; married one (don’t of course want that); and a few others to whom I ought to reply. Perhaps I should sell them on or claim at 20% commission based on the wedding cost to anyone to whom I pass them on who marries them.
Please can you tell me what you write on your profile that attracts men like bees around the honey as I’m not getting any takers?
I have perfect pitch , tonedeaf singer so perhaps that’s it.
I don’t want to give away trade secrets. A lot of men just look at photographs so (a) have a gopod one those. (b) I only like clever men so my profile is quite long and reasonably clever (c) Most men want a lot of sex so if you do too I am sure it helps. I am also different from man y women, own an island and stuff like that and many men have had to make payments to exwives who don’t work so I think they might find it attractive than some women are reasonable well off and have an interesting career.
I’ve no idea really.
“Mrs Robinson Crusoe seeks erudite Man Friday for hot debates by day and passionate frolics by night on her private tropical island. Hobbies include quantum physics, astronomy (I have my own observatory), midnight skinny dipping and crab fishing. I am independently wealthy but if you’re an overworked stressed out Big Swinging Dick from the City I’d love you to come out here, play the stock market with me and we can watch your and my best assets grow.”
Dear ToneDeafSinger, I’ll condense that to the most important components for you. Since a large number of the men online are after sex you need a) a picture that shows someone that they would be willing to have sex with, and b) a profile that indicates that you are willing to have sex with them. I promise you those will guarantee attention.
It may not be the sort of attention you’d want though, since you are then getting a lot of attention from men who are just looking to have sex. Depending on where you live it may be that over 90% of the men online are there because they only want sex. Good luck trying to weed out someone who is going to be good for long term relationship from that group. It is very true that most don’t even read the profile at all and only look at the pictures, which is fair enough since no one wants someone they don’t fancy whether it be for a relationship or a quick shag.
Don’t forget, although Lydia is a world champion of boasting and has an ego that can be seen from outer space, at the end of the day Lydia is still as single as the rest of us. (Cue her post about how it is her choice and none of the men were good enough for her and she is just so happy and women don’t need men it is better to have an island blah blah blah…)
Like it Elle. Although I think it’s best to down play islands etc if you’re female. Men like to think you can support yourself but they are not all that keen on being out earned not that I am particularly well off anyway. I have the debts and my chidlren’s father has the money because of how English divorce law treats higher earners.
As for MissM’s point, yes I am currently single but it’s not that hard to find someone. i was seeing someone in the summer. I’m being pretty discriminating at the moment and I am busy with work and children and various other things. Also I don’t share the view of low life plankton that people need a spouse to be happy so I don’t think – ah if I find a man my life will be happy and that my life is wrong and broken because I am single. I think you can be as happy without a spouse as with one.
Happy New Year Plankton. I LOVE your blogs, you never fail to cheer me up as I sit here in my dull office job on a grey, cold, cheerless January day with the horizon looking just as bleak …. The visualisation thing I have toyed with at times, all the Law of Attraction stuff (“The Secret” etc etc). The premise is said to be that what you put out you attract back … and it all works on ‘vibration’, so if I am ‘vibrating’ at a low, negative rate then I will just attract crud back into my life. I don’t actually think this works. I have vibrated myself into a stupour (not in that way) and my situation hasn’t changed one iota. And we are talking consistent applied effort over many months/years here! My friend has read the books, watched the DVDs, done it all, yet her situation hasn’t changed dramatically either.
I would like to think it DOES work and I am just “doing it wrong” but for all the visualising, getting into the space of what you are seeking, gratitude, etc etc, right now I’m feeling pretty depressed and demoralised.
Sorry not to be more help.
Thank you, Lulu! px
Hmm. “Visualization.” Seems right up there with “When You’re Least Expecting It” and its corollary, “It Will Happen When You Stop Looking.” I think I will pass on this particular piece of New Age fluff.
Visualisation might not work for everybody but it is about having a positive mindset. What do we have, if not hope? Is it really all so bleak?
The best advice I was given post-divorce, is that if I hadn’t met someone new (and I’ve done all the usual things, internet dating, asking friends to introduce me to single men, blah, blah, blah) it’s because it’s not my turn yet.
I accept that and hope for the best…..what more can I do?
LBB 🙂
My father has had the wish to win the lotto for more than half a century. Many tickets, syndicates, systems, positive thinking, books on how to win the lotto, all have been employed, though whether visualisation was included I don’t know. He has definitely done his bit to up his chances nonetheless. He hasn’t yet won the Big One. I’m guessing when what you want is more a result of blind chance there isn’t a damn thing you can do to ensure that it will happen, no matter how much you want it to.
Same with finding a partner. One can do all one can to up one’s chances, but at the end of the day it is not an investment that guarantees returns, and you can just not be lucky. Which is just bloody annoying to say the least.
Yes but if you never leave the house or turn all men down or put on 6 stone you don’t find a partner. Without doubt if you look quite good and are nice you’re more likely to find one so there are certainly things you can do to aid the process.
Eh? You don’t know any of us Lydia. What makes you think that we ‘never leave the house or turn all men down or put on 6 stone’. Therefore we ‘don’t find a partner’.
Generalised claptrap. Insulting to us all and bloody rude to boot.
How bloody dare you presume to describe us thus.
Wouldn’t it come as a dreadful shock to you Lydia if you were to actually meet some of us and discover we are not in fact 6 stone overweight, housebound rejecters of all men. No wonder you think yourself so superior if your image of us all, is of that.
The whole point of my post was to say that no matter how much you work to “aid the process” you can still end up alone purely because of bad luck. I was saying that once the element of luck is in play, good looks and niceness or anything else for that matter are not going to guarantee that someone will not still end up single. It is not even a “process”. Going to university, studying and doing the work well to lead to you getting a degree with certainty, that is a process. Finding a partner is more of a lottery, since there is nothing you can do that will give you a 100% certainty of getting a result.
Of course I don’t think you all are 6 stone ove weight. I think you are more likely all to be middle class well educated and some perhaps not even working full time with lots of time for pilates etc. I assume most of you are thinner than I am.
My point was a more general one – that youc an improve your chances of finding someone, even plankton accepts that as she goes out with the hope of meeting men.
Isn’t visualisation just daydreaming with a lot of wishful thinking thrown in?
I feel the same about ‘The Secret’ – much loved by many I know. As for cosmic ordering ….
Although I am always open to be shown miracles…so if any of this has worked for anyone else it would be interesting to hear!
Visualisation does work, but only when you visualise yourself doing something that is within your control. For example, it works for a Wimbledon finalist who visualises herself following through on her serve. It would just be silly for her to visualise her opponent pulling a muscle during the warmup and handing her the match. Could happen, but visualisation ain’t going to make it happen.
So in your situation, you might usefully visualise yourself reading responses via an internet dating site: dealing with them purposefully, neither slumping in despair at the inevitable pile of dreary SFARisms nor flying into a frenzy of fantasies at the hint of a passable prospect, but cheerfully and methodically working your way through, setting up meetings, returning home from meeting a man who had seemed perfect on paper but turned out to be either totally unattractive in the flesh or perfect in the flesh but totally unattracted without considering the time spent as wasted, keeping going, keeping going…
You said yourself, it’s a matter of luck. It’s a lottery. Do yourself a favour and buy a hundred tickets a week, instead of spending months hand-crafting one or two.
Exactly; see below.
Visualize a person into your life? Bollocks (first heard that from The Sex Pistols). Visualizing yourself as contented, harmoniously at peace in that realationship, confident, radiant, happy and positive-possible.
So much much easier being a man. To step into your analogy, as you are plankton, I am driftwood. Men are never really romantic; horny as hell, to the point that we’ll appear so to get “some”, but it isn’t at our core. As our sex urge wanes we become hard, isolated, and if it weren’t for our spouses dragging us around couldn’t give a pinch of owl shit for social interaction. As driftwood, I relax comfortably on the ocean, warmed by the sun, needing nothing but my own thoughts. Very very many men like this I’m afraid. Some men my age (I’m 59 1/2) pop viagra and have the $ to chase young stuff; the rest are pathological weirdos. Once I stopped needing sex, I stop needing my wife (in fact, I stopped needing anybody-I still love her, but no longer need her sexually). If I had felt this was at 20, my life would have been entirely free of anxiety. The only reason men (most) need $ ( and thus to strive for it with all that entails) is to maintain a standard of living for HER. I love my wife, but if she were to die or leave me I wouldn’t consider having any sort of relationship with a woman anymore then I’d consider cutting off my own balls and transgendering myself. As for alone, we are all of us alone. Some are in “relationships”. Ain’t no thing as the hip hop hooligans say.
What a bitch it is for you.Biology-fewer men to start. Social-more gay men precentage wise; less for you. Actuarial-men die younger, more of them die by misadventure. Miscellaneous-more men are true weirdos, not just neurotic like women. Social-women want men fo the same or better social class, upbringing , education. And you want a guy with some $, the amount varying in proportion to your estimate of your own attributes (admit it).Limit, limit, limit, limit.
One authot called it supply & demand. It must be hard to be the “supply”. I wouldn’t know. I am inexorably drifting toward the beach, where a pelican may briefly land upon me before the sun, sand and surf conduct me to my inevitable annihilation.
He he, I’m a 59 year old guy and I can really relate to you last 3 paragraphs tymunsun. I am with a really nice lady but if it all ended I do not think I would attempt to have a relationship again, just too much hassle….for what ?? Well, maybe to assuage loneliness, that great scourge of old age. And lets face it, for all the denial prevalent in our society, once 60 arrives you’ve hit old age.
Dear god Chris, old at 60, you men amaze me most women i know would never think that way. Perhaps thats why so many women of your age find you too old for them. You are as old as you feel or act, age is a state of mind, think like you and tvmunson do and we might as well all give up the ghost now. You will be suggesting everyone commits suicide at 60 next. Might i suggest HRT for men.
Tvmunson, you’re right about one thing, more men are true weirdos, you must have been looking in the mirror when you typed that. The tale about the connection between younger women, older men and older men’s $$$$ has been told so many times before that it’s narcolepsy inducing. The oldest profession in the world was there before any of us were born and will be there when we are all gone. Dry up and crawl back under your bridge.
It’s pathetic when men of 59 think it’s all over. I was at a ski lesson last night and a man in his 70s knocked spots off everyone, including a 19 year old who plays rugby for his university.
.
Yer know, I just don’t buy into all this wunderkind crap about 70’s year old guys knocking spots of 19 year olds at ski classes blah blah. Fact is life expectancy is about 80 odd years, and that is quite generous. So at first you are young, then you are middle aged, then you are old, then you die. So, do you become old about 20 minutes before you die ? What a load of tosh, in a survey done in Britain the result came back from people of all ages that a person in this country is considered old at about 58 – 60. If you are in doubt about this raise the question with prospective employers. I know that this is hard for some people to take and that it has become unfashionable to admit to being old in western society but none of us is immortal.
Chris. You may be right in terms of numerical age. But the fact is we’re talking about a mental attitude. No-one pretends to be other than the age they are. No ‘mutton dressed as lamb’ here.
But I know many 30/40/50/ year olds who seem much much older than they are because of their ‘old’ mental attitude and who restrict themselves therein.
It’s simply about being who you are, as you feel and not restricting yourself or your joie de vivre, curiosity and wonderment of life because of a number. That’s it.
I’m not saying people don’t get old and the 70 something told us he had been skiing for 25 years while the 19 year old hadn’t done it before. The fact is that the 75 year old was doing well at a ski lesson despite being old. He was leaner, fitter and more flexible than many 40 year olds.
We were all inspired by him, not least the 19 year old rugby player. The instructor said that skiing attracts a lot of people who refuse to give up when they get old. That applies to any sport.
We all get old, but we don’t have to moan “I’m old now so I’m parking myself in that armchair and I won’t get up again!”
Elle
I made glancing references to the old men $ deal-you sound as if I wrote an article about it. I did not write a “tale” but then doubt you know what a tale is.Your hair-trigger response suggests you have issues. I was contrasting myself to them. I married 30 years; I am 5′ 10″ 200lbs. with a 34″ waist. I will not dry up as you suggest. I rather think it is you who is dry, and in a particular spot;and not very bright either. I did not say it was over.
I’ll match your 70 year old anytime. I jog every day 2 miles with 16 lbs of weights on EACH arm, and then go work out at night.I know you won’t believe but do not care because since it is true it thrills me to write it here.
Like many dimwits you overread; I did not say “it was all over”. I said if anything happened to my wife I would not actively pursue romance. That’s it. Is romance everything in your life? Apparenlty so although I cannot believe any man would want to be in the company of such an intemperate histrionic.
I know you’ll respond with more of your half-baked nonsense, but I am not writing for you. I am writing fro the readership and the author of this site, who has expressed to me opinions about myself quite at variance to your own which I discount becauase you are a hystericla.
BTW physical stamina strength etc. are not implicated in romance except for the conflation that ccurs when little girls will not, or cannot, grow up.
As for you june I enjoy life immensely. A while back I was jitterbugging in Ensanada; none of the kids had ever seen it done and loved watching it. I have a great son, healthy , happy-I did one thing right in this world and that is raise him. Jackie O once said if you fail as a parent it doens’t matter what you are a success at; my success is in Seattle, conducting a lab about now. When my wife and I scheduled our trip to Italy for last fall for our 30th we promised no gifts as it was expensive. It was the one time we made that pledge that she didnt get me something- a tie, book , something. When I got down on my knees and presented her with a 3 diamond (corresponding to our 3 decades) ring-she told me for days afterward she cried when she looked at it. .
Mine was a hypothetical. Sincerely given, but apparenly you both misapprehended its implications.Nothing I’ve written just now changes a word of it.
Tvmunson, I’ll believe you when your wife posts here and tells everyone about how her wonderful husband of 30 years gave her a surprise ring for their anniversary.
Not many married women post here and those who do are very supportive and understanding. They are too busy being happily married to be unsupportive. I thought it would be the same with happily married men (how come you’re all married nice round figures like 20 or 30 years instead of say 13 or 27 years?) but according to you and Ian Ironwood, not so. Married 30 and 20 years respectively. Nice round figures.
Romance is mentioned a lot here because this is a blog about women at the bottom of the sexual food chain. You are well aware of this and I suspect this is why you contribute here.
I was going along with your comment until, “-not just neurotic like women.” I agree with you, for our sakes you are better off alone.
@Munson; I thought you quantified the statement about not ‘needing her for sex’ quite well.
I am not sure how or why so many respondents misunderstood that.
Thank you. Obviously these women have been hurt very badly out there, and have no male SO to read my missive to. Any male my age reading ti would understand; not necessarily endorse, but understand. And be able to explain it to them. They did not get it as I refer to below.
Oh I like that tvmunson.
My ‘Oh I like that tvmunson’ referred ONLY to the comment on Jan 4th at 10.49pm.
None of the other comments were there then and therefore I was not referring to any of those.
Just need to make that clear.
From what I understand about the whole vibration stuff and visualization stuff is to imagine you in a picture…ex, enjoying a loving relationship, feeling tender feelings, laughing, communicating, having fun…
They say to focus on the “essence” of what you want instead of giving specifics of how that would come. That would mean instead of visualizing a type of man just imagine having the “essense” ie, companionship, a good friend, good sex!, feeling of love, etc.
I just got a cd on “making movies in your mind” and the examples of what occurred when others did them, dramatically improved health, improved relationships, meeting new friends, was pretty impressive.
Isn’t visualisation just another word for positive thinking? I’m all for that, even if I’m not exactly the world’s best practitioner.
I think I’ve already mentioned my hideous internet dating experiences and I really haven’t got the wherewithal to go there again. BUT there was one (and I only need one) who could have turned out to be ‘Mr Right’ if I hadn’t messed it up. My excuse is that I was so expecting another disaster, after the many who had preceded him, that when he turned out to be ‘normal’, I was thrown into a tizz, got plastered and behaved like a dickhead. This was five years ago and I think about it even now. Five years of planktonhood that could have been wiped off my life, yet here I am, half a decade later, still regretting it and with my chances of fixing it diminishing by the day.
Go for it, P, even if you only have one date and decide you’d rather eat your own poo than do it again!
Well said Rosie.
You only need one to be so right for you P.
@tvmunson, you say that as someone happily married but you might well change your mind about wanting to meet someone if, god forbid, anything were to happen to your wife. Being on your own when you don’t want to be is no joke
Don’t doubt that rosie; I have assessed the situation. I am quite pepared for the “quiet”, should it come. It won’t. My wife is 6 years my junior, exercises as much as I do but, most importanlty, changed her diet over 20 years ago. She strictly limits, or entirely avoids, the “bad” stuff that as we all know tastes good and I still enjoy. Barring misadventure, she will outlive me close to 2 decades (based on the online calculators we use). I harbor no fear she will leave me-none. I expect I shall hear shorlty from thsoe of you offended by m remarks that she should do so, immediately.
But I know you feel my remarks on isolation are glib; they are not. My statement we are all of us alone, with some in relationships, concisely expresses my reality. “Don’t die alone”-there is no other way.
Tvmunson has confirmed one of our suspicions, though. Once we’re not wanted for sex, we become utterly surplus to needs.
Such a lucky woman, his wife.
Wrong: I still love her. I would die for her. I love her. She is not surplus; sex was, and is, a minor point after 33 1/2 years. My god do you think a man remains as he is at 26? What I meant was if she were to be gone wouldn’t look to replace her. I am a man; men’s social tendrils dry as we age. Have you seen “Sex and the City”? In it Carrie tells Big “you should be firends (referring to a rival now gone platonic)”. He say “we’re middle aged men-we don’t make friends”. Every middleaged man I’ve told that too agrees. You women retain the ability to connect, your whole lives. Look at rthe 60 some couples you see-for every event, gathering he tkaes her to sh etakes him to 4. How many coules can you think of where the men are clsoe but the wives or not? How many reversed. Look, disparage me as yo will. But not Susan. I love her, she knows it, and if you asked her on my life she’d tell you that. She and my son ar emy last threads to the wolrd and I’ll not allow any putdowns , even implied, of them to go unchalleneged.
Not all are like that. That feels rather sexist. The press like stereotypes. My husband was more social than I am and I like my own company. My last boyfriend’s ex wife is relieved all that socialising he likes and fixes has disappeared now from her life and his last girl friend complained there was too much of it.
I agree with Tvmunson, and that’s what I’ve always suspected men are all about. That’s probably why I’m single, too.
It’s ironic that Tvmunsen and his ilk call themselves Red Pill Guys when it’s the blue pills that keep them from collapsing. Think about it.
I have never called myself that and only recently even learned what it is. My last date was on August 17, 1978 in Moscow idaho at the Bisquit Root restaraunt with my now wife. To the extent I do understand what that is all about is suggests to me that these people believe love is something you cna manipulate someone into. You cannot amipulate anyone into giving you anything worth having. And you have to risk something to gain something, and you can only receive what you give. If you want Redi-whip sex, go on-but don’t expect it to be creme broulle i e real intimacy, and don’t be surprised that the physical act underscores rather than ameliorates you risolation.. If you want love you MUST risk it and you MUST give it-no exceptions anywhere. If that is red p[ll or whatever then yes I am red.
Tvmunson, I thought you came to this blog via theprivatemman, which is associated with Ian Ironwood. As far as I know Ian coined the term Red Pill Man and used it on his blogs, no doubt you will correct me if I am mistaken.
I agree with Dawn and Maria, in that I both have long expected and been extremely saddened by the fact that men only want women for sex.
What ever happened to love and care and compassion and company and empathy? How about sharing experiences, being supportive in troubled times and enjoying the good times together? What about conversation? Affection? Feeling wanted and accepted and loved just for being who you are and not because you can offer an orgasm? Do men really not want that? If so I completely fail to understand it.
Seriously, as much as I love sex and don’t want to have to do without it, I would not drop a man simply if for some reason he were not able to perform in bed. There are more things about being part of a couple that are much harder to do without, than sex.
Also as Rosie said, no one who has not actually experienced loneliness for a number of years can really say how they will react to it. Even people with children at home are still not as alone as those who come home each day to a house completely devoid of life. I guess that is why cats become so popular, at least something notices you exist even if it is only because you can use a tin-opener. It may be a novel experience to some for a time, but I assure you the novelty wears off pretty quickly.
Having the remote control to yourself is really not all that great. Yes you can go on a holiday to where ever you want, but holidays on your own are not much fun. Yes you can eat whatever when ever you want, but you are always eating alone and it hardly seems worth the effort at all then. Yes you get to have the bed all to yourself but that means you don’t get to have someone nice and warm to snuggle up with. Advantages to being alone, sorry, but I don’t see them as much of an advantage.
Miss M..re your first paragraph, it simply is not true that men want women ONLY for sex.
Sure sex (and intimacy) features highly but a quick straw poll amongst my friends included the words “companionship”, “support”, “best friend” as well as …”to be a Mum” (that mate is rather practical!)
So , please disabuse yourself of that notion. Its about as false as the one that we men think about sex every 6 seconds!
I was following the lead of Tvmunsen who claims that once he no longer had an interest in sex, women fell right off the radar entirely. Seems that at least one man out there wants a woman ONLY for sex. Thank you for reminding me that there are some men who do want “companionship”, “support” and a “best friend”. Surely those are very human needs and I cannot understand why only one gender and not the other would want them met, especially since I view people as human first and male or female second.
Actually I can’t even understand how anyone can not want companionship, support and a best friend at the level that only an intimate romantic relationship can provide. For me having that is a much greater achievement and source of contentment than owning an island.
I still wish there were more men like your friends and less that are like Tvmunsen.
Miss M-once I lost interest in “women” when I became married. There is only one woman-my wife. I love her, but desire has waned. But you misread. Among all others, she chose me to love. And she was good to every word of her vows and remains so; for richer or poorer (we were both) through sickness and health (several times) she has forsaken all others and loved and honored me all the days of my life, and me to her. On all I hold dearest we will be together until death do us part, and should I lose her, I will be done;I know she will cleave to me even in death and I to her.
Go ahead and twist that around you miserable bitches.
Yes of course its how you feel mentally that keeps you young, noone is saying we dont age of course we all do, but its how you feel that matters and how fit you keep yourself too, age is really a state of mind, ive met people of 30 who seem old and people of 80 who dont. And of course medical science is helping with many signs of ageing. My mum suffered badly from osteoporis, i know this puts my risk up so i am taking steps to make sure i dont get it,it is a disease of getting older. I dont like to be sexist here but i think we females do look after ourselves better and age better. I have to say females of my age i know do seem younger than the men.
Chris you say life expectancy is about 80, well my dad died at 98 with all his marbles, and until he was 92 was very mobile, so dont lets generalize here, he was a man who did age slowly, but on the whole i think we women are more positive about it.I honestly feel better than i did at 50, Im with Elle here, its pathetic men thinking life is over at 59 or 69 come to that, can you wonder women would rather have younger men if you have that kind of attitude.
Oh dear, I did not say life was over, I just offered a grounded realistic perspective. OK, so yer dad pushed the envelope and lived till 98. I had a great aunt who lived till she was 99, the last 40 years with shot kidneys so not much fun there. My mother is 87 now…and a physical wreck. Never mind, still got all her marbles though. My dad lived till he was 81, and spent the last 15 years of his life bed ridden merrily shitting himself….sounds like a loada laughs to me. All I do is counteract the image of endless healthy youth in old age that is peddled in the media, because a lot of the time it ain’t the case. As for younger men, go for it. Men have been playing with younger girls for years, so we know the rules. Get ready to be a sugar momeee!!! Oh, and ask Demi Moore for a tip or two….there’s a woman who outlived her cougarish usefullness and got sidelined. Seriously, nothing wrong with women going for younger guys, but do it with yer eyes wide open !!!
Hi Chris. Yes, yours and tvmunson’s comments do rather lend themselves to the conclusion that women would be better off – and perhaps more welcome – with younger men. Sorry to disappoint, but older women aren’t interested in being sugar mummies. Don’t assume that there’s a parallel with the sugar daddy and the younger woman. The dynamics are quite different. My basic approach in dating a younger man is the same as with dating any man. It’s a 50:50 split. Although sometimes, it is true, they insist on picking up the tab. And sometimes I let them. As for Demi Moore, I can’t see the relevance. One in two marriages fail in society at large; and many more than that, I imagine, in Hollywood. Moore’s last marriage ended in divorce too: did you generate similar grim prognostications about same-age relationships then? As for keeping your eyes open, I personally wouldn’t advise going into any relationship with them shut.
Hi Zoe…dynamics different for older woman/younger guy relationship. Oh really. Sorry to disappoint but I have discussed this with younger guys who do the older woman thing. Reasons: easy lay, get stuff payed for, less demanding than younger woman. Now they ain’t gonna tell you that are they ? See, guys do talk about these things, just like you ladies do, and nothing wrong with that.
I’ve long thought that men and women, once they hit 30, should have to swap gender for at least two years. Only then would you get any kind of empathy and understanding of what it means to be the opposite sex. And I’d put money on more women than men not wanting to change back again.
@ToneDeafSinger It’s best to take Lydia’s comments with a large shovelful of salt.
Most men aren’t like this, though. Plenty of them love women, love conversations, love sex, love all the business of being in a good relationship. A good few need women for money too. there are lots of reasons they are needed. Some have youngish children and would quite like a step mother for them. There are all kinds of reasons men want relationships.
Anwyay if someone has gone off sex (male or female) you know to avoid them for a relationship as presumably most of us want sex at its heart.
Munson_could you please get my name right before you twist my meaning?
I do apologise for spelling it Munsen and not Munson, I made a mistake, it was nothing deliberate, just me being careless and for that I am sorry.
Would you not allow that a comment like “once I stopped needing sex, I stop needing my wife” can be easily interpreted as it has been by quite a few of those commenting above, as meaning women are only needed for sex? You mentioned you would not seek another relationship if you were to lose your wife, inferring that relationships have nothing to offer you once the desire for sex is gone, as if sex is the only part of a relationship that is of any importance. I don’t think anyone was deliberately twisting your meaning, that was simply how your post came across. Just because your ideas are clearly formed in your head doesn’t always mean that they have been as clearly communicated via text.
Also I am sorry you think of us as “miserable bitches” for reading your comments in a way that you hadn’t intended. While you are entitled to share your opinion, it may well be seen as a little bit rude to just throw insults.
Point taken Miss. I should have explained “needing” her in the second part of that sentence. Will you grant that, within the context of my overall remarks, the import of that was over stressed by this readership? But let’s go further. Why would I wan a women for a “pal”? to go to all those things I went with m wife only because I loved her? I’ll never never be in love like that again. Read what I said about tendrils. Look this whole thing started as my expression of sympathy for middle aged women. Your choices are dismal. I explained that above. I was not extolling old men who chase young stuff I was laughing at them, and realizing you need a lot of $ to do it. I live near Sun Valley Idaho; I’ve seen dozens of 80 year old men with 20 somethings; why are those women there? Men are fewer, and weirder, than women. Look at the goddamn newspaper and count the number of women gunmen mowing down total strangers (an American past time). Then the category I belong to: I’ve gotten all I want from “women”. I have the best wife a man could imagine. I know it. She would never never leave me for a man she could kill me, but she’d do that 100 times before she would forsake me. And I’ve know that every single solitary second of the last 33 1/2 years-over a 1/3 of a century. I only suggested her divorcing me as a rhetorical devise. It will take death itself to take her from me, and not even death will deprive me of her completely.
Yes I will agree that the import of that one remark was overstressed, and your post did contain a lot of other very interesting ideas that have been largely overlooked, which I think is unfortunate since I see the truth in them. I would suggest the idea that women are only wanted for sex is one women are overly sensitive to, especially since quite often we have been used thusly in our past, and so you touched a very sore spot with that one.
I do note that you have gone to great lengths subsequently to address this. Yes indeed you are right when you said earlier “these women have been hurt very badly out there, and have no male SO to read my missive to”.
Congratulations on having such a strong bond with your wife, I think she is very lucky. The story of the ring with the three diamonds suggests you may just be a little more romantic than you give yourself credit for.
Munson, I hope you don’t use that language in church, you miserable fuck.
Ok I think we have spanked Mr Munson enough and sitting at home, reading the comments on this blog with our own agendas it is easy to miscontrue what he might have meant.
I also can see from his posts that he honestly loves his wife. My mother, since my father died three years ago, says the same thing regarding finding another man – she is not interested. She has friends, both male and female, but no desire for another husband.
Also I think he makes a very good point – in long-term relationships and as we age (check your endocrine biology here ladies) all of our attitudes to sex will change.
And he makes a good point regarding sex not being the most important thing in a long-term relationship – it is the committment through thick and thin and how you deal with the bad times, most of whom don’t have sex attached to them, that are the hallmarks of a good relationship.
That he brings up next is what scares me – the needing to give selflessly that is necessary for these types of relationships.
Having done it myself and had it blow up in my face I often wonder if I have the strength to do it again.
Now back to cleaning out the cupboard under the stairs.
Many do love their psouse forever even after divorce and death. Indeed many love their spouse and also love their lover. Love as I say to the children is infinite. You can love two children as much as one.
I don’t agree that the prospects for pretty sexy middle aged women who are fun to find a man are at all hard. I think they are dead easy given how many unattractive middle aged people there are around who aren’t interested in sex. So if people just move themselvse to the rarer category and are fun then it gets easier.
Be the radiator not the drain.