The Rules of Attraction.
Oh my goodness I am sunburnt. In typical male fashion, I will complain about it instead of going to buy myself some aloa vera.
I mean really, why fix something when I can schmooze as much sympathy from the opposite gender as possible?
I could score a free Sunday meal out of this! Or some attention! Or mockage.
I’m shooting for the meal.
I was up late last night, trying to get some cheap tickets for the amusement park we went to today. The activities director had shown up and we were surfing the Six Flags website and he was showing me the tickets he was planning on buying (this was on his very slow, virus laden laptop). I started reading the fine print on the Church group package.
We had to send the request in two weeks ago.
Well, that settled that. It looked like the Activities Director and I would just be taking people to the local park, and pushing them in swings. Eventually through my masterful use of google, and my astounding ability read a website, I found that King Soopers had a good deal on tickets.
Which leads me to my question.
Whilst I was riding the rides (Family, I rode a roller coaster, and I have witnesses) and walking the park, I noticed that I was getting some extra attention from a girl. Whilst I may be slow, I’m not stupid. When a girl starts talking to you a lot and sitting close to you, well, you start to notice the attention.
So here’s my question.
Most of the time, when I first meet a girl, my attraction level is pretty much set and if I’m attracted, I’ll move from there. This happens in the space of a few seconds. Guys, you agree or disagree?
For you Girls, it seems like a girl can all the sudden decide she likes a guy depending on if the wind is blowing the right way. Am I wrong?
Let me know. It’s time for me to take a shower and go to bed.
You are too funny. When I was dating, I don’t think I really decided if there was a long term attraction right away. Of course, there was the “Oh, he is so handsome!” reaction sometimes, but usually it was something they did, said or acted.
For example, I thought that Ron was handsome, but I never approached him really. In fact, he had invited me to come to ward choir and was really irritated that I said no. Of course, later I joined, but that was after we dated! However, he could really dance and he was super articulate and when I saw those things come into action, I was hooked! 🙂
A lot of the boys I dated were similar. They would be someone I knew, but then I would hear their testimony, or that they loved doing something really fun, or an act of kindness. . .I don’t know, the real personality traits that one looks for in a marriage partner. So then I would be attracted to more than just their physical side. For some, even though I wasn’t physically attracted in the beginning, I would become so, just because I learned to love THEM.
Anyway, probably too much information from the crazy Aunt.
PS
What do I know anyway? I had to date over 150 guys to find the one I wanted to marry.
Melanie, you just confirm what I think..
I don’t believe in love at first sight, or that you can accurately make this kind of a decision on little information. Yeah, looks has a lot to do with it, that is, making the first date, but after that, it is getting to know the person. After all, we hope we will be living with that person the rest of our lives. I think everyone deserves at least three looks.
Thanks Dad.
Yes, I know your three looks, and I’ve heard the lecture before.
I wasn’t asking if I planned on marrying the girl.
I was saying, “How do you become attracted to someone”. Thus the title 😉
I assume you were attracted to mom, since I am arround 😉
If I gave everyone three looks, well, I’d still be going through the beginning of the alphabet of the branch, and dating myself into poverty.
You miss the point. I think sometimes your generation is too worried about that intial look. You all seem preoccupied with that. My point is, don’t put so much stock in it. Yeah, I liked her eyes, but I didn’t dwell on the fact. I think you all should be more occupied and dwelling on the follow up.
I by the way think Melanie has a great point. She said that there was an initial attraction, but that neceesarily isn’t good or bad. It makes someone noticed. I don’t believe you should dismiss a girl (nor do I believe that women shold be fickle and dismiss a guy right away) based on some mysterious setting of attraction or not attraction. The fact that Melanie dated 150 guys doesn’t mean she was fickle, it means she was looking for a lot more than if she was initially attracted. I am sure she dated some guys she had not a lot of interest in, but how do you find out what they are “really like”, unless you move beyond that first reaction and get to know them. I believe that is why the younger generation is experiencing even more divorce problems than my (th 60’s) generation. Everything is rush, rush, rush, got to decide now. Instant gratification or attraction. It is only later they find out the person, who attracted well, is in fact, a real looser. Slow it down. Take more chances, and find out who the real person is.
I’m insanely curious.
What have you seen that leads you to believe this?
Chris, you know I agree with you on this one.
Well, time for the Brendo to weigh in on this one. I think you are all correct. I should be a politician right? Lol. I think “twiterpation”, the decision a guy makes if he is attracted to a girl is an instant thing. It takes a few seconds and either it’s a yes or no, like a light switch on/off. (Granted there are different degrees to hotness, but that’s a whole other topic and would be the dimmer switch) So in that sense I agree with the Hard man that the switch is flipped fast. However, from my personal experience with my lovely bride (Hi Leigh!) I think that the “twiterpation switch” is not absolute and that it can be flipped the opposite direction just as quickly. Take any hot celebrity and look at the tabloid photos of them. All of a sudden, in that instance, the switch is flipped “off”, yet in the back of your mind, you are saying “well, she’s hot most of the time, this is just an off day”, so in general you are still attracted. Right? Well, I think it can go both ways and this is why you take time to get to know someone, to increase your odds. In my case, my switch was flipped into the on position the day I saw my wife with curly hair for the first time. It was just like a switch, all of a sudden, she was hot. She might tell you there was more to it than that, but in my mind that’s all it took. Interestingly enough, since we have been married, she doesn’t wear her hair curly much anymore, even though she knows I like it that way, yet she is still hot to me with strait hair. She would say love is blinding, but I know better. So in this sense I agree with Hardy Sr. (mike aka dad) that if you give someone time and get to know them on a personal level, what you are doing, besides making sure they aren’t mental, is increasing your odds that the switch could be flipped the other way when she does something different with her hair, or wears that outfit that just rocks your world. And when they know you are interested, they will get even more gussied up and make your jaw drop. It just takes a little extra motivation sometimes to do a little extra primping and go beyond the norm. This motiviation comes in the form of what I call “Hardy Lovin.” It’s all about personal attention, give it, and it comes back 10 fold. I wrong ladies? Maybe this is why my wife wears her hair straight. I had better work on this.
Brendo, I feel a lot like you do.
The initial attraction happens, and it can be turned off pretty fast by what someone does.
I have also experienced an attraction afterwards, but that’s very rare.
So I still think I’m right 🙂
Brendo is right, Melanie is right, I am right, Chris is right. Is that confusing enough on this issue?
PS. By the way, Kelly is right too.
You know, it’s kind of funny. Outside of the church, I would say that this is not necessarily a girl / guy thing. I know a lot of non-Mormon women who base almost everything on that initial impression. I don’t know why it’s different with the gals in the church vs. outside. It might be that we spend more time with guys that we could possibly become interested vs. you might go on a blind date with someone once and never see that person again.
Within Mormons that I’ve met, I do think there is a lot of what you are talking about where the guy is or isn’t initially attracted to someone and that’s pretty much where his relationship to that girl is established. If he is attracted to her, things move on from there. If not, she’s immediately in the friend column and can’t work her way out of it.
For me, there are definitely physical things that I am attracted to more than others, but it’s more about who that person is vs. what he looks like. I don’t think this has anything to do with the way the wind is blowing, but I could be wrong.
Sue Anne,
Well, do you see the way guys act being different in the non-mormon world?
I actually don’t see much of a difference in most guys “rules of attraction” inside vs. outside the church. Although, with men outside the church I have found that there is a broader range of what they find attractive. But, the fact that most of them make up their mind fairly immediately seems to be consistent.
When you say wider range of attraction, do you just mean that they tend to be less looking for perfection? 🙂
I thought about this a while back:
http://browneyedsue.blogspot.com/2005/04/you-say-im-not-your-kind-of-girl-what.html
Really only the third paragraph applies, but yeah…
Susannah,
Parts of that fit, and parts of that post I just don’t agree with.
I am in a bad if I do, bad if I don’t situation… I also like talking to girls. You all are an interesting species.
If I don’t flirt w/ and ask girls out, then I’m concerned a deadbeat. If I ask lots of girls out, I’m a player/commitmentphobe/serial dater.
A guy just can’t win.
You’ve seen photos of me on the blog as well, I don’t know where all this interest is coming from 😉
Eh, I didn’t say the entire post applied. 🙂
Well then, WO HO! 🙂