Archive for Attraction

Strong and scary

{ March 22, 2009 @ 9:51 pm } · { Attraction, Feminism, Gender talk, Moi }
{ } · { Comments (11) }

I heard a strong successful and independent lady ask a man, “are you scared of me!”, and instantly the man in me, wanted to yell, no not scared, attraction would be the right word.

I have read a lot from and about women, who fight for females rights, [I do not want to use the cliché feminist here], they always seem to be of the opinion that men fear the growth of woman. Woman going places where they were never before, proving themselves in almost every conceivable field, proving anything men can do, they can do better, these kind of things to be intimidating to men, giving men a sense of loss of monopoly, power, and that is what make men afraid. Fear brings in anger, and anger in turn violence.

If I am honest, I would say ego is a very personal subject, and may not have much to do with gender. Male ego as such goes through a lot of battering over age, be it the local bully in the school, the goon at college, the evil powerful corporate world. Many people don’t realize how slowly their ego is getting battered, and from being a strong rebel, men seem to settle into a more of a social survivor who dream of scraping through the life without having to take too many troubles.

Work pressures are at all time high with the recession affecting each one of us, does feminism help the escapist men?, who really do not mind to take some help from their spouses. If a woman wants to be the hero, fight world hard, make money, feed the family, and be happy at the end of the day that by doing so they have been better then their male counterparts, isn’t it the best thing that a man would ever want?. In a way he has more freedom and independence to pursue what he wants to do, without having to worry about feeding his family, and taking care of his wife.

I think I lost the way with this post, this was supposed to be about men being attracted strong and powerful women, and It kind of went in a different direction.

Attraction to strong women isn’t a new concept. I am sure there have been hundred’s of men who are attracted to women who are strong. Women with minds which can challenge spiritually and can fight for their beliefs and opinions about matters which can be really stimulating to both the partners. When I hear about nagging between couples, I always have a feeling its lack of topics to argue about which results in nagging, If couple spend more time discussing topics which can be really thought provoking, the mind is too busy to even bother about small things. Would you rather discus and argue about say physical intimacy then some wet towel, or a lost sock.

I remember a blogger friend teasing about my liking for women who are more modern in approach, who does not think twice before picking up a drink, or even for that matter choose career equally or more than their family life. I have a feeling that they would be in a position to understand my stand on my career a lot better.

There has been an old saying that two swords cannot fit a sleeve. Would two strong career minded people make a successful couple?, A part of practicality makes me say no, it would be a disaster. But another part of me says, why not. Let us not get into the part, where we discuss kids, I mean with two busy people, no time for kids and other things like that. But as a couple would they be successful, will it result into a lot of clashes, and an eventual disaster. I believe as long as there is a mutual understanding and a respect for equality, within a relationship, the compromises should become mutual.

How to avoid competition in such a situation is a whole new topic, may be I would love to hear from people who are more experienced than I am, to talk about that.

As far as attraction goes, as of now, looks like my taste hasn’t changed much, I still seem to like strong women, capable of discussing any topic with me, and being able to argue till we drop tired.

A romance killed.

{ December 9, 2008 @ 2:24 pm } · { Attraction, Marriage, opinion, romance }
{ } · { Comments (11) }

One of these days Times of India had a movie review which roughly talked about how marriage acts as an end to the romance, or something like that. Me being never married, and to be honest never being in love, kind of disturbed me a little. There is nothing wrong in hoping for a little bit of romance at least post marriage, isn’t it?. Anyways jokes aside, this is one of those bits of news which you just read and then sometime later when you are at peace kind of haunts you, one which makes you dig deep into your thoughts searching for your own opinion on that matter. So here I am thinking about the subject, trying to see what I have to say about this.

Its kind of stupid to prognosticate something which you have clearly not experienced, but then many parts of our life is based on perception, so thought why not try digging thoughts a little. 

I feel romance has a lot to do with attraction, buy attraction I do not just mean physical attraction. It could be anything, mind, body, aroma, smile, dress sense, any thing you could think about a person, you could be attracted because of that characteristic. Anyways so once you are married, does this attraction dwindle?.  To be honest I do not rule out, any attraction, however strong it is might dampen a little over time, if not marriage. One possibility I think of, is that the thing we are attracted to might get substituted over years of marriage. Say I was attracted to the dressing sense of a woman, may be after marriage, I might get attracted to the way she is so organized about things, or may be the way she handles life, or her way with children for that matter, I think attraction can be really volatile, and easily extend to many things.  I would really love to hear from couples who are married for long now, if they are still attracted to each other.

I think another big factor in romance is curiosity, you know you take a young teenager with a lot of sexual curiosity to a nudie bar, he might be many more times impressed than a middle aged guy who has seen the thing many a times. Does this hold good to romance as well?.  May be we do begin with a lot of curiosity about love and relationship, and once you marry after an year or two, you would have seen and lived the romance part of it. So does that mean the romance gets old?. It does look possible a great deal. But one good thing to look forward would be the way the romance comes out in situations, life is so unpredictable, that it has surprised up its sleeve every corner of it, so may be there is a tinge of curiousness as to how our romance builds up in these unforeseen circumstances, as we cope together as a couple.

A big factor which can be a big turn off with respect to romance, is family life and responsibilities. I mean we all know the ups and downs of life, the money to be made, bread to be earned, the shelter, the future, retirement plans, kids education, so many things to worry about. So does the worries [responsibilities ;) ] which comes in along with the marriage, do they affect the romance?. I think they would, I am sure they would. Its not just romance they affect they basically almost every single thing of our life. But the thing is that, they may not kill the romance. Or may be it depends on us, if we can let it kill the romance. I can see old people, after becoming grand parents, taking a flower back to their wives, its definitely a form of expressing the romance. Even the gratitude that one develops towards one another over years of marriage acts as a catalyst in their romance.

so what do you think?…does marriage kill the romance?

Amateur thoughts

{ May 3, 2008 @ 12:37 pm } · { Attraction, Gender talk, opinion }
{ } · { Comments (7) }

My views on this topic are very amateur, with almost none or very little understanding of the topic, the post is just a creation of my thoughts and what I feel about the subject, lot of views are abstract and am not really sure if my views are correct, finally the post is incomplete I might continue this some day again, all I wanted to say was I do not mean to offend any person homo/hetro sexual, please do let me know your views or please feel free to correct me if my views are totally off reality.

————————————————————————————-
I once commented about homosexuality on one of the posts by Chennai ramblings over at her post “rant for the day”, it was long ago in February, I never got myself to think more on the matter, until today.

To begin with I was a lot like my grandmother, she just dismissed the possibility of a man marrying another one, in her books its impossible, well I started out very much like her, I could not imagine, how such a relation could exist, to imagine copulation amongst two men was something I couldn’t not even think off, same with women too. I know men are supposedly turned on by two women together, but believe me I could never imagine something physically meaningful between the two women or men. Anyways as my comment on the post, I feel there is a lot more involved in a gay relationship more than just sex.

One question that crossed my mind was “do people get into a same sex relationship as a result of a hetro sex relationship turning sour?, when people have had a bitter experience or a string of bitter experiences with people of opposite sex, do people give up?, or may be with a hope that people of the same sex may understand then much better do they change their orientation?. Do they end up searching for what they could not find in people of the opposite sex in their same sex partner?. It looks logical to me, may be in many cases it is true.

Physical proximity in many a cases could also influence one’s choice I guess, during times when one needs an emotional partner, and I am sure every one needs emotional support at times, and may be at times like such physical proximity to people of the same sex, may lead to mutual admiration and a lot of emotional bonding, which in some cases may end up turning sexual. I do know that there are a large number of platonic same sex relations everywhere, and I am part of some such relations too, and not all of them turn romantic, but may be in some cases people do develop a natural liking just like a hetro sexual platonic relation turns into a romantic one.

One question I would love to survey across the world would be, how many gay relationships have triggered of from a sexual attraction?, I will not be surprised if many of them are not triggered by sexual attraction, all people think about homsexuals are their “sexual orientation”, I believe there is a lot more to it, it’s not just lust, I do agree that just like hetro sexuals there will be cases where people sparked off relationships based on pure sexual attraction to begin with, but I think there is a lot more to it then just the physical act of love.

I once read somewhere that people never turn gay, they are born gay. I am not so sure if this is true. When I was a kid, I hardly knew about whom to get attracted to, nor today, I mean I cannot force myself to like a person, same way is attraction too, but what makes me yearn for a relation with the opposite sex but not same sex?, sometimes it puzzles me, what tells me or what prevents me. So if this can happen at this age, I am sure as a kid not many people can control who they get attracted to?, can a boy or a girl who has no idea what a relation or a physical relation means decide his/her orientation?, I mean can some young kid really get attracted?, let alone same/opposite sex. I somehow can’t get myself to believe that someone is born homo or hetro sexual.

more ramblings to follow… someday :)

Platonic, what’s that?

{ February 23, 2008 @ 12:23 pm } · { "Body or Soul", Attraction, Friendship }
{ } · { Comments (8) }

Something bad seems to be happening these days, all my thoughts seem to be triggered by something or the other from the newspapers I read. Its been three weeks in a row now, an article in one of the local newspaper making me think on it. Am I in dearth of original thoughts?, or does it mean our newspapers have become more thought provoking?, or I have finally began to get the right message out of them.

As I opened todays newspaper, an article in the His/Her section caught my eye, I generally avoid that section of the newspaper because, most of the times it has some tips for dating which is almost useless to me. Today they had an article about platonic friendship. I really did not know what it meant, so went ahead and read on, the article was about how to make sure your relationship does not end up in a platonic friendship. The article was boring in content, but the idea struck onto me. How do I cope with this problem, if we ever get into one such. Firstly how often does one face this issue?, is it really common?, more importantly can one successfully convert a platonic friendship into a relationship of romantic nature, or the only way is to make sure you never let the relationship get into the platonic mood because there is no way out of it.

Interesting thoughts mainly because, I have written m any a times about cross gender friendship and how it need not mean its romantic in nature, how people misunderstand something very pure, and in a way make it harder for people to have such beautiful friendship. I had also experienced this recently when one of my friendships was in question, and so was one of my good friend’s and she was really upset with this.

I never thought about the other way around. What if both the people do not want it to be platonic but are wondering how to make the next move, who should make it, and how to give hints as to the other person knows there is a romantic interest in the friendship.

The topic is very close to the previous post I wrote about how to define flirting, unfortunately when one of the pair does not get the hints what does the other person do?. There are many of the stupid persons around like me, so unless things are made explicit we may not understand what the others are trying to say. Actually the worst part is, more than reading signs one is more worried about reading the signs wrong. I guess doubts must be there on the both sides, I mean no one would want to ruin an existing friendship by trying to bring in romance.

Actually I am feeling kind of stupid these days writing about these things, mainly because its on the lines of a blind man describing a beautiful scenery, all he says are things which he imagines it to be, so what all I am saying over here are things which I feel “what it must be like”.

Do people really get into this issue often, I always imagined that there must be a lot of clashes when it comes to friendship because more often or not one of them might develop the romantic interest and the other might resist. This might spoil the friendship. But again as I said I just am assuming this might be the case, listening to many of my friends and people I know who have experienced the one way traffic as I mentioned above. What would one do in that case, does he or she try to make the other person see the romance which they are seeing?.

Can one really convert the platonic friendship into a romantic relationship?. I am not sure on this regards, have not met many people who have successfully done this, or may be these aspects never come out for others, mainly because its too personal. Many of the platonic relationships might have moved on to romance, mainly because both of them had the inclination, but can it happen that one said no and other made him/her change his mind?.

One thing which still amazes me is that, people who have moved on from strong platonic friendships for long time, can they really get physical in the relationship?. I somehow cannot picture being physical with many of my female friends, mainly because they have been such good friends, and you know personally what they like and don’t, and what things in a guy they hate, so one refuses to get the thoughts of that nature involving them. I am sure there must be hurdles related to these in such relations.

I really wanted to type a part of the article here, mainly because I found that really funny, and kind of surprised if one can really do it. The article was titled “Platonic relationships preclude more interesting things, we tell you how to avoid the trap“

“An out of town trip where only two of you end up going is a sure sign that nothing is going to happen between the two. A dangerously high comfort level has set in already. This means that you need to break the pattern urgently. Don’t accept the invitation for an out of town picnic unless he has naughty intentions“

On a totally funny side, a Father of a daughter should get to read this. I would love to see his reactions.

Victim of “Attraction”

{ December 8, 2007 @ 2:09 pm } · { "Body or Soul", Attraction }
{ } · { Comments (4) }

Recently a post on my other blog virtual ramblings titled  “Couple of good news“  created a little bit of friction amongst my blogger friends and me. It was a mixed reaction to a topic which, when I decided to write about, did not even expect such kind of mixed reactions. It was meant, felt and thought about, as a natural and honest outburst of the attraction I felt to a certain woman/girl I saw couple of times on my way to work.

Some months back, I would have never thought it is well accepted and natural to express these personal feelings like attraction openly to others via the internet, share something as personal as love/lust over a place, where people may not be totally aware of the intentions, and so may be they would end up mis-judging your intentions. In fact I was never comfortable talking about anything personal some time back. My “Body or soul” series, and comments on them from various people, male and female, made me realize, that this is something very natural and there is nothing to hide about it.

Coming back to the topic of physical attraction. We all do get attracted to certain people. At times it is their smile, their face, their dressing sense, their interaction with people around them, and so on. Sometimes just a look you get instantly attracted. Is it really wrong to do so then?, is it wrong to “give in” to attraction?. I feel it is very natural to give in to attraction, and try to get more information about the person, try to see if you feel the same the next time around, or was it just your body that was talking the last time around.

I am sure gender is not a differentiator here, even women too might feel attraction towards a certain kind of men, may be physique, sense of humor, intellect, knowledge, smile, manners and so on, out of blue amidst crowd haven’t we all felt attracted to some one?, Haven’t you got attracted to anyone?.

Coming back to the question, Attracted yes so what should be the next step?, should one always walk up to the person and ash her/him out?, or may be try to get to know the person, or may be until he/she feels the urge to know more, try to confirm if there is attraction left? or was it just a passing thought.

Personally I do not give more importance to attractions. I would like to believe it takes a lot more than that to make me approach to the person to know more about her. I think spending time with the person is very much necessary even before thinking about the next step, may be if not in person, at least you got to observe the person a little more, because any relation which you get into in haste is sure to doom. Though I am not a big fan of living things to shape up by themselves, in areas like these where there are no right methods, or right ways, one has to just live it to the time, to shape things up and see where it takes you.

The next topic my mind drifted to was if the situation has changed over years, have people started to accept the natural attraction more, are they less prejudiced about it now?. I am not so sure, even though my opinion on the topic has changed over years, even though I have started to believe that  there is nothing wrong in getting drawn to someone physically, there are still reservations when I get in the opposite seat. I have caught some girls, though very rarely staring at me, that generally leaves me embarrassed and somehow feel like getting of the scene. And am really bad in seeing signs, I mean there have been couple of occasions where after a conversation, my close friends have come back to me and said, what was happening there, I think the girl was totally impressed with you.. but then I have to admit none of those times it was with someone whom I was attracted too.

Topics such as these have no resolutions, more the opinions more the information sharing. Something really worth discussing.

Again I am not saying one should stare at a particular person, or try to act smart or anything like that, nor am I trying to defend what I did. There is going to be limits for anything, and for this too. But one cannot ignore the fact that attraction is going to be there, you like it or not.

Attraction and Age

{ October 13, 2007 @ 11:39 am } · { Attraction }
{ } · { Leave a Comment }

Suddenly, when I was sitting with couple of my close friends, one remarked “You always have had a liking for older women, don’t you?“, Even though the circumstances in which this remark came out was very funny, and I kinda knew she was trying to pull my leg, the remark kinda struck me, one of those sentences you here and forget, only to remember it when you are alone and mull over, trying to think about it.

Continuing the earlier topic of attraction, and age being all over mind in couple of weeks or so, it made me think now, does age affect attraction?. Does a feeling of getting attracted to grow with age and diminish along with it?, do old people feel less attracted to others?. How about age within the attraction, I mean whom do you get attracted to, same age, older woman, young nymphs so on.

There is an old belief that when a guy is around 18, even a female donkey looks attractive, in other words it tends to indicate that around 18, a man is at his hormonal peak, and kind of blinded by it, he probably feels attracted to as unattractive thing as a female donkey. Sso does it mean as we grow older does people feel less attracted, hmm not really sure, not aware much about this topic, and being taboo not much discussed either. But from what I have observed I guess people become more sensible as we grow older, and kind of know the difference between plain lust and pure attraction, sounds too idealistic?

I do interact with a some middle aged people, and I kind of felt shocked at their behavior, they do get attracted to people a lot more than what I do, and not only do they have the sense of that this is nothing but a visual attraction, still they kind of give into their attraction, which I guess is very short lived.

Older people, sorry have no clue, wish I could speak to some old person how they felt. Also the same with young woman/middle aged woman/old woman/

I have a feeling that women to have peaks of attraction around 14/15 when they are totally visually driven, with see and get attracted kind of phase, as they get older they tend to get attracted to more maturity in people, and when they get still older come back to the old visual attraction. May be I am shooting an arrow in the dark here.

Coming back to age difference within the relation. Many people advocate relationship with couples have a considerable age difference something like 2-7 years, Probably the Idea here is to make sure there is an emotional and decision making upper hand with one of them. Though traditionally it has been older man, a slightly younger woman, its kind of into acceptance now with younger man and slightly older woman.

I have a feeling that age difference kind of strengthens the attraction, and my feeling is solely based on the fact that age difference brings in levels of maturity in a relationship, and more difference in interests, perspectives, patience levels, and even ideas about love. Thus whatever it is that you get attracted to with your partner, you tend to see the difference in him/her and over the years develop respect, and with respect the attraction will never diminish, if not increase.

I think my slightly drunk friend was speaking absolute truth, I guess I do get attracted to slightly older woman. Its mainly because the respect they command, and the things which attract me which I have said in previous post, their composure, their patience, and I am one of the people who loves to be told whats to be done, and the command is easily visible in older woman.

When people are off the same age, key thing in a relationship would be diversity, as diverse the taste, stronger will stay the attraction, this is just my theory, I have had no experience of any kind of relationship, so whatever I say here might be just a theory or a perception. I have seen lots of these attraction during college, when I have been attracted to a certain person, or its a friend who is attracted, in most of those cases, it would have been really just an hormonal urge at a person, a physical attraction, which I agree that is very common, and natural.

So is the attraction more between the same aged couples as to couples with age difference, I want to say, no they are the same, somehow I have the feeling that latter its more in the latter case.

Any insights people?

Attraction, a first look

{ September 30, 2007 @ 4:44 pm } · { Attraction }
{ } · { Leave a Comment }

Attraction, a thought which keeps baffling me day in and day out. what it about attraction which makes it hard to define?, why is it that we get attracted to few people and not to others, what makes them stand out in crowd to us. Something which might be as subjective as it can get.

I have always stood by my belief that I get attracted to personalities rather then people. I think its true to very large extent, When you talk to a person, there are so many things that talk to you, so many things in you develop conversations of their own sub consciously, and that’s where the attraction begins for me. But this is something which is when you are mind is thinking, when you are making a conscious decision, you are always in control of what you want, and begin to see if its present, so get drawn to it.

Some people really can come across and talk what they have in mind, some don’t, for example when I hear Lara Dutta, the ex miss world, I just listen, she has some poise and makes sense, I still remember the miss world pageant and the way she answered, I have never seen some one so bold, and level headed as her, its a shame that she chose a career like bollywood, to waste her talents on.

So you might say she is extremely beautiful, so its obvious that I got attracted and then found a way to defend my attraction. Then the same should go with people like Aishwarya Rai, Jeniffer Anniston, Angelina Jolie, Pamela Anderson and so on, all of them very beautiful, many of them have hardly left any beauty left to be imagined. But no, they don’t strike a chord with me, may be with someone else they do.

Again, keeping all these intellectual attraction aside, there must be still something which I am missing out here. When you are at a mall, or a movie theatre, or even when you are at work, amidst crowd there is always someone or the other which makes your heads turn, I would be lying if I say they don’t. What about these, you haven’t spoken to them, no you haven’t even heard them, so what attracted you to them?

Obvious reason which comes to my mind, or anybody other’s for that matter, is of course their body, the physical attraction, the lust. But again I have been proven wrong here many times. Its age old belief, that men get drawn to the big sizes, the swaying hips and what not, and women on the other hand have always known to fantasize tall, dark, handsome, bulging muscles and so on.
Honestly guys try to remember, how many times you have turned your heads for such features,
and how many times you have just smitten by people who are not many of those, no I am not talking about plane jane fantasy, somebody who is perfectly normal, not even wearing something provocative, just plain attraction.

There is always something that stands out, in my case in most of the cases its their choice of clothes and colors, whites and peaches are always in, blacks and greys are okay if they really chose the right things to wear. One other thing is smell, I have an acute sense of smell, so anybody who has put on the right perfume, I get easily drawn. I am generally very happy to see smiling people, even though I not always in good mood, it kind of puts me into it, so there you go another attraction, happy smiling people.

Once I asked someone do people really notice/care about what one wears, and I am shocked to find the answer in myself, people do, may not be directly the personal style one carries forms a big part of the person’s aura.

The next thing I notice is public behavior, if you really out spoken, or extremely friendly with people, I am a big admirer, but would never get attracted, the person should, I guess, leave a nice spell of curiosity, and want to hear more kind of impression, shyness, the tone, the voice, and of course a little secrecy all adds to the attraction.

But all said and done, this is just to turn people’s heads, but the real attraction again I would like to argue does not come bodily, it has to be the mind.

Planning to continue this soon, next stop attraction and age..

———————————————————————————————-
P.S Guys I am hoping to get more of you to write on this topic “Attraction”, let me know if any of you want to share your opinion on this.
please send me a mail at rambler1981@gmail.com