That's up to her; what's it to me? I would imagine that if she's into her sexuality then she does desire sex, but that doesn't necessarily mean she desires *me*. One might argue that if she's fully into her sexuality and is having open, connected sex with me then that mean she desires me but again, that's her business. I don't need to know what's in her head. I'm just there in the moment with her.
Interesting. Isn't it the case that seeking validation during sex is basically the same thing as being self-conscious or "spectatoring" during sex and not being in the moment? One thing I've noticed about myself is that I actually have the tendency to sometimes positively or happily spectator during sex. It's like the monkey-girl part of my psyche will be yelling out from the merry-go-round of sex to the cow/lion part of my psyche something like "Look at me. I'm having fun!" Then it's like a sensual image is seared in my memory and that becomes what my little dopamine seeking monkey-girl wants to do again and again and frequently it's difficult for me to separate the instance of sex from the man with whom I shared the instance. It's like I'm convinced that there's only one house in town that has good crack because I associate the dopamine or oxytocin high with all the sensual specifics and context of the moment. I would say that maybe I should follow your suggestion and engage in some non-fantasy oriented MB but the fact is that I don't feel much urge to MB at all without fantasy. If there aren't any cookies in the house and I don't think about the cookies at the store, I pretty much just forget about cookies except maybe once a month.
"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" - Mary Oliver
Self validation avoids these relationship problems, but it leaves a bad taste in people’s mouth because the pull of being desired and loved is so great.
Being loved and desired is great. *Needing* to be desired and loved (which I think is the same as the pull of being desired and loved being so great) is a big problem.
How can that part of other-validation be so bad?
Because no one can provide it to you all the time and what will you do when you don't get it? You've already decided you *need* it and now it's not being provided. Plus, to get what you *need*, you almost always mold your behavior to something that you believe will result in receiving what you need from the other person. This is the Nice Guy covert contract. "If I provide for you and help with the housework and support your activities and do whatever else it is you say you want, you will in turn provide me with what I want...sexual desire (or whatever else)." Now you're not *you*, you're the person you think will earn the love and desire you want. That's a recipe for disaster.
This reminds me of Don Miguel Ruiz's "magic kitchen", though it's not exactly parallel. (see Don Miguel's "magic kitchen"). Until you can love and accept yourself just as you are (which implies not needing outside validation), you're susceptible to letting someone else control you in exchange for giving you the validation you believe you need. That other person may have no early desire to control you and they may not want to be on the hook for providing the validation you crave, so you go out of your way to figure out what it is they *might* want and you start giving it to them so they'll give what you want. And you become pissy and resentful when they don't live up to their end of the covert contract, since it seems perfectly reasonable in your eyes. "See, I'm giving you what you want and what *I* want would be very easy for you to give, why won't you do it?"
...interdependence looks on the surface to be exactly the same as enmeshment. There is the deep involvement with the affairs of one another, the concern over how each other feels, and I suspect there is even the need to be desired and loved.
You had me right up to the last part. If you don't need validation you're MORE free to be deeply involved with another and have concern over how they feel, not less.
I think I agree with most everything else in your post, but I don't see the way you describe interdependence as being anything more than the natural state that would exist between two self-validating people who enjoy being in a relationship with one another. Interdependence isn't a separate entity.
Stop WaitingFeel EverythingLove AchinglyGive ImpeccablyLet Go
It's like the monkey-girl part of my psyche will be yelling out from the merry-go-round of sex to the cow/lion part of my psyche something like "Look at me. I'm having fun!"
That seems okay. It would be a problem if it was the bunny-girl part of your psyche yelling out, "Look how much he digs me! He must really be into me if he's willing and able to do all this!!"
It's like I'm convinced that there's only one house in town that has good crack because I associate the dopamine or oxytocin high with all the sensual specifics and context of the moment.
I can see how that would be an issue for me as well, or anybody really, not just you. That's where the self-validation comes in...believing you can get that again from somebody else and do a pretty good job yourself in the meantime. Having the ability to look forward to repeating the event rather than needing it with a hint of desperation.
I would say that maybe I should follow your suggestion and engage in some non-fantasy oriented MB but the fact is that I don't feel much urge to MB at all without fantasy.
That's a little bit of a red flag because it makes it seem like you're not in it for the sensations, you're in it to have someone else willing and able to provide you those sensations.
Btw, I have a friend who can make herself squirt using her rabbit. I'm guessing one would have to be totally in the moment, concentrating on themselves, without the distraction of fantasy, in order to make that happen. Take it as a challenge and let me know how it goes...
Stop WaitingFeel EverythingLove AchinglyGive ImpeccablyLet Go
Cobra - How can that part of other-validation be so bad?
Burgbud - Because no one can provide it to you all the time and what will you do when you don't get it? You've already decided you *need* it and now it's not being provided. Plus, to get what you *need*, you almost always mold your behavior to something that you believe will result in receiving what you need from the other person. This is the Nice Guy covert contract. "If I provide for you and help with the housework and support your activities and do whatever else it is you say you want, you will in turn provide me with what I want...sexual desire (or whatever else)." Now you're not *you*, you're the person you think will earn the love and desire you want. That's a recipe for disaster.
I would phrase it the problem with other-validation is when it is a substitution for self-validation. This then leaves you dependent on the other person in order to feel good or to feel "happy."
This can then create lots of further problems for you and your relationships. 1) You can be susceptible to manipulation if someone is aware of your dependence on other-validation. (In the book "the art of seduction" the author upfront says to AVOID grounded confident individuals. Why do you think he says that? Because that self validation leaves them more immune to manipulative other -validation) 2) Even if you are in a relationship with a "good" person, they may not be able to ALWAYS validate you and when they don't you will feel "badly." a) Then you will blame them and be angry which won't help. b) you will blame yourself and begin the Nice Guy covert contracts and possibly be Passive aggressive. 3) And I am sure there are other ways.
Interdependence
I really liked Cobra's point about interdependence. I guess I thought that was what I have been trying to explain but probably didn't do a good job of it. The difference I have from Cobra is that I don't see a path to interdependence THROUGH enmeshment. Instead I see the path to interdependence THROUGH differentiation. So you would move from enmeshment to differentiation and then you would be free to be interdependent with a partner.
But what is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads? ~Albert Camus
Would you continue to have a relationship with a woman that clearly did not desire you, and if so, WHY?
In my de facto single state, no. If I was already in a relationship with a woman that clearly didn't desire me, I'd continue it if I got something out of it that was greater than what I'd get from having a relationship with a different woman that *did* desire me.
And so I'd suggest you're wrong when you describe sex with a desirous woman as some sort of happiness pinnacle because whatever you're getting from continuing your current relationship is making you happier than sex with a desirous woman would.
You're happier maintaining your religious morality, or standing, or however you might describe it, than you would be if you left and had sex with a desirous woman. Good for you. Seriously. You're already living your purpose. For some reason, though, you seem to not believe you deserve to be happy so you're focusing on a reason you have for being miserable.
If you started being happy with and enjoying living the purpose you currently are, I wonder if that would impact your wife?
Stop WaitingFeel EverythingLove AchinglyGive ImpeccablyLet Go
That other person may have no early desire to control you and they may not want to be on the hook for providing the validation you crave, so you go out of your way to figure out what it is they *might* want and you start giving it to them so they'll give what you want.
This very much rings true for the way my H behaved in the early years of our R. I would say he stored up a lot of resentment that I did not fulfil my part of the covert contract.
I completely agree with pretty much everything you've said Burg, the ideal R to my mind is two high functioning self-validating individuals who happen to get a kick out of being together. Finding they have a lot in common, enjoy the same kind of food, music, hobbies, conversation etc which means they can spend plenty of quality time in each other's company. And if they enjoy each other sexually too - well WOW!
Fran
if we can be sufficient to ourselves, we need fear no entangling webs Erica Jong
I think I may not have made my self very clear as I was writing my post. I do understand the danger with enmeshment and other-validation. But my point is that other-validation per se is NOT bad. In fact, there should not be anything wrong with it if both people could be trusted to hold up their end of the validation duty. The problem comes during times of stress when people revert to the dysfunctional defense systems they learned in their past (which is why understanding your FOO is so important). When this happens one person stops validating the other and instead focuses on self protection. THAT is the problem with other-validation. The system is unstable because people are imperfect.
Fearless, I did not mean to say the path to interdependence is through enmeshment, but through differentiation, as you state. But I do not see differentiation itself as a final goal. As I understand the idea, differentiation means you re immune to compliments or criticism (was it Lil who said that?) I may be wrong, but I interpret differentiation to be sort of an emotional dead zone, in which two people stay together purely out of choice and not out of an emotional bond (which is doomed to eventually fail anyway). BUT we are human and as CeMar constantly reminds us, we do crave validation and desire no matter how differentiated we try to be. Being validated feels good! That is reality and that gives a "spark" to relationships (often the critical "spark" that got us stuck in the mess we're in).
The problem as we all know is when this source of good feeling is cut off. So put the best of both worlds together. Welcome the good feelings that come from other-validation (which is what I meant by "How can that part of other-validation be so bad?") but block the negative consequences that can occur when that validation stops by having already become capable of self-validation through differentiation. In other words, two truly healthy, secure very highly functional self-validating people should be able to engage in healthy enmeshment without fear of its negative consequences, which to me is interdependence.
That seems okay. It would be a problem if it was the bunny-girl part of your psyche yelling out, "Look how much he digs me! He must really be into me if he's willing and able to do all this!!"
No, it's pretty clear what he's "into" when monkey-girl is on the merry-go-round and, unlike CeMar, I don't really think of that as being "me." - LOL
Quote:
I can see how that would be an issue for me as well, or anybody really, not just you. That's where the self-validation comes in...believing you can get that again from somebody else and do a pretty good job yourself in the meantime. Having the ability to look forward to repeating the event rather than needing it with a hint of desperation.
Yeah, it's actually kind of amusing when I try to think that way because I'll be like "You can always date a guy with an Israeli accent who gives great head or a Hispanic youth with a serious breast fetish or a lumberjack type who will do you against a tree etc." There isn't any specific sexual sensation that I crave and need some generic guy to do for me again. It's more like I just want sexual/sensual sensations that are high quality and unique. That's just my personality overall. I don't care if I eat Thai or Ethiopian or Irish Pub or Mexican but I don't want bland.
Quote:
That's a little bit of a red flag because it makes it seem like you're not in it for the sensations, you're in it to have someone else willing and able to provide you those sensations.
I guess the point I was trying to make above is that I like high quality, novel sexual sensations and it's kind of hard to do yourself "novel". But probably I'm not using my imagination. Now that I've given it a little thought probably what I need to do is start MB in unusual places like in my car or at the beach. Probably I need better music too.
Quote:
Btw, I have a friend who can make herself squirt using her rabbit. I'm guessing one would have to be totally in the moment, concentrating on themselves, without the distraction of fantasy, in order to make that happen. Take it as a challenge and let me know how it goes...
I actually don't have a huge desire to do that again with or without a man. Maybe I'll work on the no-touch orgasm using my kegels. Once I've got that down there will be no limit to the interesting places I can MB!
"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" - Mary Oliver
