Mutual fuckup: he was my best boy, until the sex. His fuckup, really, except he fucks up in precisely the same way with essentially mechanical regularity, and this time it was me. In this sense, my fuckup; rewind a week and watch my interest level blind me to the backbrain whisper that knew exactly what was going on. That's the power of game, I guess - nobody's immune.
"It's funny," I say, "how we're talking about this."
"Well," he says, "that's what we've always done -- we're doing it now. We look at things from an outsider's perspective." We vibrate on the same wavelength; intellectualization on both sides gives this trainwreck the aspect of an elaborate farce.
So now I have to decide whether to cut him off; this shouldn't be a question. It's never been a question before, in fact, which would make not cutting him off Round Two of allowing-my-interest-to-make-me-retarded.
Anyway, for those of you who read this blog - I'm still alive.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Relationships as Patterns, Relationships as Fair Exchange
I just bought new batteries for my handy portable tape recorder. You may notice that the writing style of this post is a little different than my usual; that's because I dictated, then transcribed it.
One of the most important realizations that I've come to in the course of thinking about human beings, human behavior and human relationships is an idea that came to me suddenly while I was reading Gregory Bateson's Steps to an Ecology of Mind: that is, the realization that relationships are not things.
Relationships have no discrete identity; talking about a relationship is not talking about a thing that actually exists. When people conceptualize relationships they conceptualize them as things, but what they actually are is repeated patterns of human behavior: some combination of human needs and human reactions to those needs, between two or more people, that result in a self-reproducing cycle of action.
One of the most important decisions I've ever made -- and I made it pretty recently -- was to stop trying to define relationships and instead to use language only to describe them. That means I've come to accept that calling something a relationship - calling someone a boyfriend, or a girlfriend, or a husband or a wife - has no substantial effect on the nature of what's between you and them.
You could argue this point, and if you did you'd be looking at the question in a more traditional way; to some extent, your objection would be valid. Naming something has an effect (and it's a meaningful effect) but naming a relationship doesn't have an effect on many of the most fundamental principles and forces that create relationships. When I say this I'm talking about affection, and talking about attraction; I'm talking about love*. These are things that cannot be willed into existence, things that have to happen as a reaction to the behavior and (to a lesser extent) the looks of another person.
When two people say things like, "Let's be in a relationship -- do you want to be my girlfriend? -- do you want to go steady?" what they really mean is "Let's execute a plan:" a plan that's often poorly understood and profoundly flawed. This is the plan that they've internalized as "How to make a relationship work."
Typically this plan has to do with commitment. Commitment is a beautiful thing if what you're looking for is a partnership, but the fuel of relationships is emotion and commitment is not an emotion. The same can be said of communication -- an incredible tool to facilitate living with someone in close quarters or negotiating contracts. Unfortunately, contracts do not make girls wet; contracts do not make boys hard. That's not to say that relationships are exclusively about sex, because they're not; more to the point, sex isn't exclusively about sex.
There are people out there who get very, very upset if you suggest that relationships are not about commitment and communication, and a lot of that has to do with fear. From a very young age we are fed a false dichotomy; we are taught that we must accept that realtionships are either built on intimacy, communication and commitment or that relationships are entirely random. Coming from this perspective, it's easy to understand why people might be uncomfortable with the idea that relationships aren't just something you decide to do. What it ignores is the idea that other people might be able to predictably influence our emotions -- that a balance of passion might be something that can be created deliberately in a relationship, might hinge on a set of skills which can be learned.
We are taught that deliberately influencing other peoples' emotional reactions is manipulation, and manipulation is evil. What I'd like to suggest in counterpoint is that putting someone in a position where they want to be with you, where they are powerfully attracted to you and fascinated by you, is one of the most powerful gifts that you can give them. This idea - inspired passion as a thing of value - leads me to say this:
The conventional view would have us believe that the principle of exchange at work in a relationship is commitment for commitment, but the reality of human behavior suggests that the real principle at work is commitment for passion. In exchange for the passion your partner inspires in you, you offer them your continued commitment -- and they do likewise.
Fair's fair.
*Footnote: "affection, attraction, and love" are the obvious/conventional fill-in-the-blank words in this context. My actual ideas about the emotions involved are sort of unconventional, but that's fodder for another post on another day.
One of the most important realizations that I've come to in the course of thinking about human beings, human behavior and human relationships is an idea that came to me suddenly while I was reading Gregory Bateson's Steps to an Ecology of Mind: that is, the realization that relationships are not things.
Relationships have no discrete identity; talking about a relationship is not talking about a thing that actually exists. When people conceptualize relationships they conceptualize them as things, but what they actually are is repeated patterns of human behavior: some combination of human needs and human reactions to those needs, between two or more people, that result in a self-reproducing cycle of action.
One of the most important decisions I've ever made -- and I made it pretty recently -- was to stop trying to define relationships and instead to use language only to describe them. That means I've come to accept that calling something a relationship - calling someone a boyfriend, or a girlfriend, or a husband or a wife - has no substantial effect on the nature of what's between you and them.
You could argue this point, and if you did you'd be looking at the question in a more traditional way; to some extent, your objection would be valid. Naming something has an effect (and it's a meaningful effect) but naming a relationship doesn't have an effect on many of the most fundamental principles and forces that create relationships. When I say this I'm talking about affection, and talking about attraction; I'm talking about love*. These are things that cannot be willed into existence, things that have to happen as a reaction to the behavior and (to a lesser extent) the looks of another person.
When two people say things like, "Let's be in a relationship -- do you want to be my girlfriend? -- do you want to go steady?" what they really mean is "Let's execute a plan:" a plan that's often poorly understood and profoundly flawed. This is the plan that they've internalized as "How to make a relationship work."
Typically this plan has to do with commitment. Commitment is a beautiful thing if what you're looking for is a partnership, but the fuel of relationships is emotion and commitment is not an emotion. The same can be said of communication -- an incredible tool to facilitate living with someone in close quarters or negotiating contracts. Unfortunately, contracts do not make girls wet; contracts do not make boys hard. That's not to say that relationships are exclusively about sex, because they're not; more to the point, sex isn't exclusively about sex.
There are people out there who get very, very upset if you suggest that relationships are not about commitment and communication, and a lot of that has to do with fear. From a very young age we are fed a false dichotomy; we are taught that we must accept that realtionships are either built on intimacy, communication and commitment or that relationships are entirely random. Coming from this perspective, it's easy to understand why people might be uncomfortable with the idea that relationships aren't just something you decide to do. What it ignores is the idea that other people might be able to predictably influence our emotions -- that a balance of passion might be something that can be created deliberately in a relationship, might hinge on a set of skills which can be learned.
We are taught that deliberately influencing other peoples' emotional reactions is manipulation, and manipulation is evil. What I'd like to suggest in counterpoint is that putting someone in a position where they want to be with you, where they are powerfully attracted to you and fascinated by you, is one of the most powerful gifts that you can give them. This idea - inspired passion as a thing of value - leads me to say this:
The conventional view would have us believe that the principle of exchange at work in a relationship is commitment for commitment, but the reality of human behavior suggests that the real principle at work is commitment for passion. In exchange for the passion your partner inspires in you, you offer them your continued commitment -- and they do likewise.
Fair's fair.
*Footnote: "affection, attraction, and love" are the obvious/conventional fill-in-the-blank words in this context. My actual ideas about the emotions involved are sort of unconventional, but that's fodder for another post on another day.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Burn Your Own Trail: This Is You
This is for the woman I was four years ago; this is what I looked for then, and didn't find. I'm not even sure if there's an audience for it -- if you enjoy it, please let me know. If I'm the one writing, this is where an honest intro to Game, for women, starts.
You are a woman.
For a long time -- perhaps without even realizing it -- you've been searching, and this search is rooted in the knowledge that what you see in human relationships around you is needless and purposeless chaos, a happy accident when it works and a human tragedy when it fails.
You have a conviction that the social world works in a consistent and orderly way, that human action follows principles that can be understood and predicted. When you talk about this, people will probably get angry without realizing why. They will probably not understand.
This may make you feel alone.
You've listened to what your family tells you and what your friends tell you and what the media tells you about being a woman: what you should want, how to get it, what constitutes correct and incorrect action. Very little of what your family tells you and your friends tell you and the media tells you has any ring of truth.
You may not be unhappy, but you know there's more. And you're right. What you're looking for exists; finding it will make you wiser, more confident and more effective. But no-one will support your search, and for the most part you will be searching alone.
Being rational is a lonely business.
You are a woman.
For a long time -- perhaps without even realizing it -- you've been searching, and this search is rooted in the knowledge that what you see in human relationships around you is needless and purposeless chaos, a happy accident when it works and a human tragedy when it fails.
You have a conviction that the social world works in a consistent and orderly way, that human action follows principles that can be understood and predicted. When you talk about this, people will probably get angry without realizing why. They will probably not understand.
This may make you feel alone.
You've listened to what your family tells you and what your friends tell you and what the media tells you about being a woman: what you should want, how to get it, what constitutes correct and incorrect action. Very little of what your family tells you and your friends tell you and the media tells you has any ring of truth.
You may not be unhappy, but you know there's more. And you're right. What you're looking for exists; finding it will make you wiser, more confident and more effective. But no-one will support your search, and for the most part you will be searching alone.
Being rational is a lonely business.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Apples and Oranges: Get One And...
I was talking with a friend of mine last night about the mechanics of guys getting laid in social circles, versus the mechanics of girls doing the same. He's one of those guys that the community would call a "natural". We concluded the following:
If you're a guy and you sleep with one girl in a social circle, it gets easier to sleep with all the rest of the girls.
If you're a girl and you sleep with one guy in a social circle, it gets harder to sleep with the rest of the guys.
As he put it, "The more girls who know about your exploits without knowing names and without you telling them, the easier it becomes to get sex."
As I put it, "Boys like to feel like they're special, like they're planting a flag in an unclaimed piece of territory. And once you've hooked up with one of them, his friends will pay lip service to the idea that he has some claim to you."
If you're a guy and you sleep with one girl in a social circle, it gets easier to sleep with all the rest of the girls.
If you're a girl and you sleep with one guy in a social circle, it gets harder to sleep with the rest of the guys.
As he put it, "The more girls who know about your exploits without knowing names and without you telling them, the easier it becomes to get sex."
As I put it, "Boys like to feel like they're special, like they're planting a flag in an unclaimed piece of territory. And once you've hooked up with one of them, his friends will pay lip service to the idea that he has some claim to you."
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Apples and Oranges: Soft and Hard Game
So I recently mentioned, on an ASF thread, that I'd been thinking about writing up a guide to Game for Girls.
I've been thinking about this a lot.
I'm not ready to write it up yet, but I have a few more thoughts in order than I did at the time when I first mentioned the idea. I'm more of a strategist than a tactician, so this is a post about strategy. I also tend to work from inner game to outer game, so if you're not comfortable with that kind of approach this may not do much for you. This is rough-sketch stuff only, at this stage, and mostly concerns the situation prior to first lay.
The foundation of gaming boys is the suitable application of both hard game and soft game. Soft game: the frame you adopt. Hard game: the logistics and realities of the situation you engineer.
People like to think that human behavior is 75% personality, 25% circumstance; my experience has always been much closer to the reverse. The situation you create will dictate what people do. The frame you create will dictate how they interpret what happens.
Hard game is when every girl at the party but you has a boyfriend. Hard game is when everyone else is asleep and the two of you are alone on the couch together. Hard game is when there's nowhere to sit but your bed. Hard game is when you start touching him. Or, Hard game can be when you're never alone together. Or when you sit in a chair instead of on a couch.
Soft game is mentioning your boyfriend. Soft game is "I'm on to you." Soft game is "This is so bad." Soft game is "I hate you." Soft game is hugging all your guy friends when you see them. Soft game is whether you shaved today.
For me, soft game falls into a "Soft Yes" - along the lines of "I would hook up with him" or "Soft No" - something like "I don't intend to hook up with him." There are boys I would never ever sleep with, of course, but game in the sense that I'm talking about it now doesn't really apply to them. Assume Soft Yes and Soft No are reserved for guys who are either practical choices, or appealing choices, or (in the best case) both.
"Soft Yes" - "I would hook up with him": This is for boys who have cleared the bar of fuckability and who there is no practical reason not to sleep with. Players who you've determined absolutely do not judge, make repeat visits, and are neither a danger to your social situation nor a danger to your physical health are soft yes candidates. So are attractive nonplayer boys who don't violate any of your standing rules, assuming you have standing rules.
The key thing to remember with the soft yes is would. Would, not will, is the necessary ingredient. Expectation is the ultimate killer of sexual tension before first lay. To take all the uncertainty out of a pre-hookup situation is, knowingly or unknowingly, to emasculate the guy that you're with. He will feel better about himself, and you, if on some level he wasn't absolutely 100% sure that the lay would work out until it did.
"Soft No" - "I don't intend to hook up with him": This is for boys who are over the bar of fuckability but remain objectionable in some way, boys who judge, or boys who need that kind of challenge.
If you have personal boundaries set which are good in theory but occasionally breakable in practice (I have several of these; "Only one hookup per social circle" is an example), you can deal with them with a soft no. There are also boys who think that a woman isn't a good woman unless she didn't want to sleep with them and they changed her mind; I'm not in the habit of hooking up with these boys, but the appropriate way to handle them is with a soft no.
Not knowing how you feel about a boy - "soft yes" or "soft no" - will trip you up. Pick one, and stick with it. Further, though I know some girls who make it work for them, "soft direct" game i.e. "I will fuck that boy" has always, reliably caused me to blow myself out. The only girls I know who make soft direct work are girls who have self-esteem problems and feel they can prove something by sleeping with very desirable men. Socially, their reputations tend to be pretty smeared. Also, it sort of inherently implies outcome-dependence. I'm still toying with a "soft bratty" frame of "I want that boy to fuck me."
Hard game is where the real work gets done. Hard game brings together a broad set of skills and factors; your ability to befriend groups and disarm obstacles (yours and his), your ability to isolate, your comfort-level with touching people, the logistics of your living situation, your willingness to rock the boat, and the boy in question's level of game.
"Hard Yes" - First of all, a hard yes means both touching and being receptive to touch, working to isolate and being receptive to isolation. It's okay to be bratty and demanding with your kino pre-lay, though I'm generally not. Start touching early: make it a habit to hug. Just as male community guys do, keep things at your house that you pitch to boys. Obliquely sexual things are okay for this - nay, great. Personally I pitch a lot of movies, because I love movies. If you have a hot tub, you had better be using it. Better. Seriously. If you have a hot tub and you don't use it to get play, shame on you. Almost anything will work, though.
A "hard yes" means anticipating and dealing with logistical issues, and never ever mentioning that you did. Also, arranging a healthy degree of competition can be useful in this respect, if you're interested in a guy who has more buying power than you do. Make it oblique, though; merely having a bunch of dudes around and not many girls is enough for this.
"Hard Maybe" - Practically speaking, "hard game" is the only setting in which the word maybe should ever be relevant. In the realm of soft game, you should always know your answer; in the realm of hard game, "maybe" is an answer. Boys who think of themselves as players, and only think of girls as worthy if they're challenging, get a soft no. Boys who are players, and need challenges get a "hard maybe." All this means is, you let the cards fall as they may; maybe the two of you will hook up, but if you do by God the motherfucker will work for it.
"Hard No" - "Hard no" is the response that boys get when they're doable but truly ill-advised, meaning: boys who would be a violation of an absolute standing rule (for me, "no cheating" is one of these rules), or boys you know don't take care of themselves (they have a reputation for not getting tested), or boys who won't take care of you. Hard no means you don't isolate, you don't cuddle, and you're not receptive to any sort of escalation. Hard no can also mean deflating sexual tension, which can be done in a variety of ways.
I might have more on this soon; comments welcome.
I've been thinking about this a lot.
I'm not ready to write it up yet, but I have a few more thoughts in order than I did at the time when I first mentioned the idea. I'm more of a strategist than a tactician, so this is a post about strategy. I also tend to work from inner game to outer game, so if you're not comfortable with that kind of approach this may not do much for you. This is rough-sketch stuff only, at this stage, and mostly concerns the situation prior to first lay.
The foundation of gaming boys is the suitable application of both hard game and soft game. Soft game: the frame you adopt. Hard game: the logistics and realities of the situation you engineer.
People like to think that human behavior is 75% personality, 25% circumstance; my experience has always been much closer to the reverse. The situation you create will dictate what people do. The frame you create will dictate how they interpret what happens.
Hard game is when every girl at the party but you has a boyfriend. Hard game is when everyone else is asleep and the two of you are alone on the couch together. Hard game is when there's nowhere to sit but your bed. Hard game is when you start touching him. Or, Hard game can be when you're never alone together. Or when you sit in a chair instead of on a couch.
Soft game is mentioning your boyfriend. Soft game is "I'm on to you." Soft game is "This is so bad." Soft game is "I hate you." Soft game is hugging all your guy friends when you see them. Soft game is whether you shaved today.
For me, soft game falls into a "Soft Yes" - along the lines of "I would hook up with him" or "Soft No" - something like "I don't intend to hook up with him." There are boys I would never ever sleep with, of course, but game in the sense that I'm talking about it now doesn't really apply to them. Assume Soft Yes and Soft No are reserved for guys who are either practical choices, or appealing choices, or (in the best case) both.
"Soft Yes" - "I would hook up with him": This is for boys who have cleared the bar of fuckability and who there is no practical reason not to sleep with. Players who you've determined absolutely do not judge, make repeat visits, and are neither a danger to your social situation nor a danger to your physical health are soft yes candidates. So are attractive nonplayer boys who don't violate any of your standing rules, assuming you have standing rules.
The key thing to remember with the soft yes is would. Would, not will, is the necessary ingredient. Expectation is the ultimate killer of sexual tension before first lay. To take all the uncertainty out of a pre-hookup situation is, knowingly or unknowingly, to emasculate the guy that you're with. He will feel better about himself, and you, if on some level he wasn't absolutely 100% sure that the lay would work out until it did.
"Soft No" - "I don't intend to hook up with him": This is for boys who are over the bar of fuckability but remain objectionable in some way, boys who judge, or boys who need that kind of challenge.
If you have personal boundaries set which are good in theory but occasionally breakable in practice (I have several of these; "Only one hookup per social circle" is an example), you can deal with them with a soft no. There are also boys who think that a woman isn't a good woman unless she didn't want to sleep with them and they changed her mind; I'm not in the habit of hooking up with these boys, but the appropriate way to handle them is with a soft no.
Not knowing how you feel about a boy - "soft yes" or "soft no" - will trip you up. Pick one, and stick with it. Further, though I know some girls who make it work for them, "soft direct" game i.e. "I will fuck that boy" has always, reliably caused me to blow myself out. The only girls I know who make soft direct work are girls who have self-esteem problems and feel they can prove something by sleeping with very desirable men. Socially, their reputations tend to be pretty smeared. Also, it sort of inherently implies outcome-dependence. I'm still toying with a "soft bratty" frame of "I want that boy to fuck me."
Hard game is where the real work gets done. Hard game brings together a broad set of skills and factors; your ability to befriend groups and disarm obstacles (yours and his), your ability to isolate, your comfort-level with touching people, the logistics of your living situation, your willingness to rock the boat, and the boy in question's level of game.
"Hard Yes" - First of all, a hard yes means both touching and being receptive to touch, working to isolate and being receptive to isolation. It's okay to be bratty and demanding with your kino pre-lay, though I'm generally not. Start touching early: make it a habit to hug. Just as male community guys do, keep things at your house that you pitch to boys. Obliquely sexual things are okay for this - nay, great. Personally I pitch a lot of movies, because I love movies. If you have a hot tub, you had better be using it. Better. Seriously. If you have a hot tub and you don't use it to get play, shame on you. Almost anything will work, though.
A "hard yes" means anticipating and dealing with logistical issues, and never ever mentioning that you did. Also, arranging a healthy degree of competition can be useful in this respect, if you're interested in a guy who has more buying power than you do. Make it oblique, though; merely having a bunch of dudes around and not many girls is enough for this.
"Hard Maybe" - Practically speaking, "hard game" is the only setting in which the word maybe should ever be relevant. In the realm of soft game, you should always know your answer; in the realm of hard game, "maybe" is an answer. Boys who think of themselves as players, and only think of girls as worthy if they're challenging, get a soft no. Boys who are players, and need challenges get a "hard maybe." All this means is, you let the cards fall as they may; maybe the two of you will hook up, but if you do by God the motherfucker will work for it.
"Hard No" - "Hard no" is the response that boys get when they're doable but truly ill-advised, meaning: boys who would be a violation of an absolute standing rule (for me, "no cheating" is one of these rules), or boys you know don't take care of themselves (they have a reputation for not getting tested), or boys who won't take care of you. Hard no means you don't isolate, you don't cuddle, and you're not receptive to any sort of escalation. Hard no can also mean deflating sexual tension, which can be done in a variety of ways.
I might have more on this soon; comments welcome.
Monday, January 28, 2008
It's Only Mostly Dead
So, I'm sure most of the guys who still check this blog are assuming it's dead.
It's not, though! Promise. Your favorite Hitori is seriously brimming with ideas, presently, many of them worth sharing. Just been a little stalled on the actual writing-down bit. I should be back with you soon.
It's not, though! Promise. Your favorite Hitori is seriously brimming with ideas, presently, many of them worth sharing. Just been a little stalled on the actual writing-down bit. I should be back with you soon.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Temporary Lockdown
The Chicklogical Blog is on temporary lockdown for the month of November. I'll still get comments (and, in fact, should anyone wish to email me directly you can do so at chicklogic at gmail dot com), but there'll be nothing new until December. Enjoy your month!
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