Why Opposites Rarely Attract by V. Swami

Why Opposites Rarely Attract by V. Swami

(Link): Why Opposites Rarely Attract by V. Swami

Excerpt:

But it’s not just Disney: the idea that opposites attract has completely saturated the film industry – think of the neurotic comedian who falls for the free-spirited singer in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall, for example. In fact, (Link): one study found that almost 80% of us believe in the idea that opposites attract.

But a (Link): new study tracking people’s digital footprints – how they behave online – suggests this isn’t actually true in real life. And it isn’t the first time science has come to that conclusion. For decades, psychologists and sociologists have pointed out that the idea that opposites attract is a (Link): myth.

The Surprising Danger of Being Good at Your Job (The Drawbacks to Being Self Controlled, Competent, and Reliable in Relationships) by R. Sugar

The Surprising Danger of Being Good at Your Job (The Drawbacks to Being Self Controlled, Competent, and Reliable)

Even though this article originally has the word “job” in the headline, it also discusses the impact of being reliable, competent, and self controlled in a person’s dating life, friendships, and so on.

People such as myself who are sexually abstinent into their 40s have a hell of a lot of self control (obviously, I’d say). I’m also pretty disciplined at exercise and dieting and in other areas of life.

I was the reliable, competent one in my relationship with my ex-fiance’, and yes, as a result I was over-worked and grew resentful of that idiot. I ended up carrying more than my fair share of the workload.

I was also reliable on jobs I held in the past, as well as in group assignments I was placed into by college professors to the point that bosses or other team members would over-work me, take me for granted, etc.

I definitely related to this article…

(Link): The Surprising Danger of Being Good at Your Job (The Drawbacks to Being Self Controlled, Competent, and Reliable) by R. Sugar

Science confirms what high performers have known for years: It’s not easy being so competent.

(Link): A study from Duke’s Fuqua School of Business suggests that people with high self-control — the kind of people who remember birthdays, choose the salad instead of the fries, take on extra projects at work, and resolve conflicts easily — might actually pay a price for those virtues.

“People always talk about how having high self-control is a good thing,” says researcher Christy Zhou Koval, a Ph.D. candidate and first author on the study, which was published in this month’s Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. And in many ways, it is a good thing: “Go-getters get what they go after,” she points out. “They’re better at goal pursuits. They make very good relationship partners.”

They’re also better-off financially than their less-disciplined peers; they tend to be in better health, and they generally have higher-quality personal relationships.

But all that comes at a cost: High-self-control people, the researchers found, end up burdened by their own competence.

In All Likelihood, You Are Ruining Sex For Your Lady, by A. Maloney

In All Likelihood, You Are Ruining Sex For Your Lady, by A. Maloney

(Link): In All Likelihood, You Are Ruining Sex For Your Lady, by A. Maloney

Excerpts

More than half of men regularly make one mistake in bed that could be ruining their love life.

A new sex survey found that men who bolt the minute sex is over are killing the joy for their partners.

Turns Out That the Husband’s Job Is Probably the Best Predictor of Divorce

Turns Out That the Husband’s Job Is Probably the Best Predictor of Divorce

(Link): Turns Out That the Husband’s Job Is Probably the Best Predictor of Divorce

Excerpts:

The predictors of divorce, however, remain mysterious. But in a (Link): new study published in the American Sociological Review, Harvard sociologist Alexandra Achen Killewald has found that the things that increase the probability of divorce — as they relate to work, at least — have changed over the past couple decades. It turns out that the amount of money that either the husband or wife makes isn’t that important: For contemporary couples, the biggest determinant is whether the husband is working full-time.

One Way to Make First Dates Just a Little Less Painful by C. Romm

One Way to Make First Dates Just a Little Less Painful by C. Romm

(Link):  One Way to Make First Dates Just a Little Less Painful

Excerpt:

• In both cases [in the study], cooperation was higher — the subjects shared their money more often, or settled the hypothetical strike more quickly — if both members of the pair had eaten the same thing first, a piece of knowledge that’s worth tucking away for your next awkward meal: “Consumers can be strategic in the food they consume,” the study authors wrote, “utilizing food as a social lubricant when eating dinner on a date or when out for lunch with a colleague.” Your date might not order exactly what you want, but sometimes, it’s better to ignore your cravings and take any help you can get.

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Related Posts:

(Link):   Is Dating Worth It? by A. Schwartz (Re “Labor of Love: The Invention of Dating” book by Weigel)

(Link):  Why “Netflix And Chill” Replaced Dinner and A Movie – Dating in 2016

(Link): Are We Dating Wrong? by J Smith

Woman Book Author – Andrea Tantaros – Suggests That Single Women Are Miserable And Can’t Get Husbands Because Feminism. My Critique of Her Article / Book

Woman Book Author – Andrea Tantaros –  Suggests That Single Women Are Miserable And Can’t Get Husbands Because Feminism. My Critique of Her Article / Book

(This post has been edited to add several new comments and a link or two)

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If you are new to my blog: I am right wing, I don’t agree with most secular feminism, but I do think secular feminism is correct on a point here or there.

This article I link you to farther below is about a book a woman wrote (I believe she is right wing), and it reads like one of those “blame feminism” type works. The book is by Andrea Tantaros, and its title is “Tied Up in Knots: How Getting What We Wanted Made Women Miserable.”

I have not read the book; I have only read the author’s article about the book, which you see linked to farther down the page. I take it that her article is a sort of preview about what one can expect to see in the book.

This article argues that most women got what they wanted (via feminism), and they are miserable as a result: they are not getting men. Women want marriage and are not getting married. The women want to have great careers, but they also want a manly- man who will marry them and sometimes take care of them; they want a partner to share life with.

How My Wild Sex Drive Killed My Marriage – review by L. Crocker of book by R. Rinaldi

How My Wild Sex Drive Killed My Marriage – review by L. Crocker of book by R. Rinaldi

I’ve read an article about this woman’s book (“The Wild Oats Project”) before. I may have blogged on it a few months ago.

Her story makes me want to barf. She made a mockery out of her first marriage.

One problem or area of weakness I have seen with Christian teachings on sexual purity (in which I include virginity and celibacy) is that if or when Christians bother to defend or promote sexual purity anymore (they seldom do these days), is that they tend to emphasize it only for singles who are teen-agers to about their mid-20s in age.

Anyone past age 25 or 30 who is sexually abstaining is ignored by Christians in regards to sexual purity encouragement or teaching.

Married couples are usually ignored in Christian sexual purity teachings as well, although every other testimony I see on Christian blogs and television is about married couples who are porn addicts, or one partner is cheating on the other with other sexual partners.

Note in the story below that sexual behavior has consequences. It can sometimes end in negative ramifications for yourself and/or your partner.

At one point, this review says that Rinaldi goes on about how much she enjoys penises and finds them beautiful, and that she enjoys sticking them in her mouth. Warning here for any men reading: the vast majority of women do not like penises or find them beautiful.

Rather, most women think penises look horrible or ridiculous, and most do not want to perform oral sex on men.

Most women don’t enjoy looking at penises and do not enjoy (Link, off site: Should You Send A Lady A Dick Pic) getting “dick pics” on dating sites, or anywhere else.

Christians – if bothering to support virginity at all these days – will tell singles that if they wait until marriage to have sex, the wait will be worth it, because the sex will be (this is their favorite phrase in this area of discussion) “mind blowing,” and it is implied by these Christians that married sex will be regular and frequent.

What this book shows that I am blogging about here is that after several years, plenty of married couples find their sex lives to be hum-drum, routine, and boring, not “mind blowing.”

Some of these spouses are fine with routine, boring sex, but the other partner in the relationship may get bored and tired of it. That is why some of them seek out affairs or weird, kinky sex moves with each other.

One of the few positive things I can say about the revolting information and story in this review about this book is that it lays to rest some secular and Christian stereotypes about female sexuality.

Here is a long excerpt from the review:

(Link): How My Wild Sex Drive Killed My Marriage – Review by L. Crocker

• Robin Rinaldi wanted to spice up her marriage by having sex with other people—which ended up bringing a lot of heartbreak, and destroying her relationship.

• Forty pages into her new memoir, The Wild Oats Project, Robin Rinaldi has mined every modern female anxiety: fear of being alone; boredom in monogamy; a ticking biological clock; a husband who doesn’t want children; a marriage devoid of passion.

  Rinaldi loves her husband, Scott, and has been with him for 17 years. He never wanted children, and when Rinaldi begs him to reconsider, he responds by getting a vasectomy.

  With no hope of having a family and desperate to feel passion that had long ago flickered out in her relationship, Rinaldi—then 44—negotiates an open marriage that permits both to see other people for a year.

  They jokingly refer to it as the “Wild Oats project.” She lays out ground rules—“no serious involvements, no unsafe sex, no sleeping with mutual friends”—and proceeds to break them all within a few months.

  … She advertises for hookups on Craigslist and Nerve.com (Tinder didn’t exist yet) and sleeps with men half her age…

  … Rinaldi’s husband is, for the most part, a saint. He frequently entreats her to quit the project and work on their marriage. He is patient and loving when she refuses, and reneges on his threats to leave her when she collapses in tears at his feet.

Why Some People Take Breakups Harder Than Others by L. Howe

Why Some People Take Breakups Harder Than Others by L. Howe

This is one very long article. I am not going to paste all of it here, so you will have to use the link if you want to see the whole thing. It’s on The Atlantic’s site.

(Link): Why Some People Take Breakups Harder Than Others by L. Howe

• Part of it depends on whether they believe personality is fixed or constantly changing.

• It’s a question that often plagues people after a painful break-up:

• What went wrong? As they work to figure out the answer, people typically create new relationship stories, analyzing the events leading up to the breakup and using them to build a cohesive narrative.

• In some cases, this type of storytelling can be positive, helping people to make sense of—and come to terms with—painful things that happen to them. Other times, though, the storytelling process can be a negative one, compounding pain rather than easing it.

• My colleague Carol Dweck and I research why some people are haunted by the ghosts of their romantic past, while others seem to move on from failed relationships with minimal difficulty. Over the course of our research, I’ve read hundreds of personal stories about the end of relationships, and these stories offer some clues as to what pushes a person into one group or the other.

Why and How Romantic Relationships Stay Together or Fall Apart – “Science says lasting relationships come down to—you guessed it—kindness and generosity”

Why and How Romantic Relationships Stay Together or Fall Apart – “Science says lasting relationships come down to—you guessed it—kindness and generosity”

I found this article very interesting. It’s kind of long, but IMO, worth the read.

Parts of this article explain how couples can fail to encourage one another, or fail to give the sort of encouragement one partner needs, or how one partner may insensitively dismiss something, like an accomplishment, the other is excited about – all things I discussed in my previous posts about my ex fiance (Link): here and (Link): here. (That section is farther below, under the “Shared Joy” subheading.)

(Link): Masters of Love “Science says lasting relationships come down to—you guessed it—kindness and generosity” by E E Smith

Excerpts:

• “Disaster” couples showed signs of being in fight-or-flight mode in their relationships. Having a conversation sitting next to their spouse was, to their bodies, like facing off with a saber-toothed tiger.
• …Psychologist John Gottman was one of those researchers. For the past four decades, he has studied thousands of couples in a quest to figure out what makes relationships work.
• I recently had the chance to interview Gottman and his wife Julie, also a psychologist, in New York City. Together, the renowned experts on marital stability run The Gottman Institute, which is devoted to helping couples build and maintain loving, healthy relationships based on scientific studies.
• John Gottman began gathering his most critical findings in 1986, when he set up “The Love Lab” with his colleague Robert Levenson at the University of Washington. Gottman and Levenson brought newlyweds into the lab and watched them interact with each other.
• With a team of researchers, they hooked the couples up to electrodes and asked the couples to speak about their relationship, like how they met, a major conflict they were facing together, and a positive memory they had.
• As they spoke, the electrodes measured the subjects’ blood flow, heart rates, and how much they sweat they produced. Then the researchers sent the couples home and followed up with them six years later to see if they were still together.
• But what does physiology have to do with anything? The problem was that the disasters showed all the signs of arousal—of being in fight-or-flight mode—in their relationships. Having a conversation sitting next to their spouse was, to their bodies, like facing off with a saber-toothed tiger.
• Even when they were talking about pleasant or mundane facets of their relationships, they were prepared to attack and be attacked. This sent their heart rates soaring and made them more aggressive toward each other.