Do your couple friends annoy you with too much loving?
Before I start, I will like to say that whatever I’m going to write may sound a little like bad-belleism but hey, you will also agree with me that these couple behaviours are very very irritating:
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Getting All Mushy In Public:
nobody is trying to tell you to not look into each other’s eyes or hold hands or kiss in public but please, keep it down, people are watching. You don’t need to swallow each other’s tongues and smooch in public, save all that for your private rendezvous; we don’t need to be a spectator to something that should be between you guys alone.
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Calling Each Other Pet Names In Public:
this is just as irritating as the excessive public display of affection. We can deal with the regular “baby”, “sweetheart”, “darling” and even “bae” but don’t go overboard with private pet names that gets us wondering what the meaning is and how the name came about.
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Laughing at private jokes:
what are you trying to do? Make me feel bad that there’s nobody in my life to share secret jokes with? Don’t tell private jokes in public and laugh at it all by yourself, it makes us look clueless or dumb for not grasping the joke.
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Playing Matchmaker:
I’m single, I know but must you rub it in by making me feel like I can’t get a man on my own? Stop it, mbok. Don’t hook me up with all your friends. I may not be happy single but I’m not hopeless, I can get a man on my own; maybe just later than you hoped.
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Faking Being Happy:
your real life relationship is so sad and you’re not happy with your man yet your facebook wall and instagram page is telling another story of a happy girl who is head over heels in love. Who are you kidding? Lol. We all know the #YingToMyYang #LifePartner #Best Friends hashtags are as fake as your relationship, so drop the act already.
Statistically speaking most people form relationships with people close to their own age.
If you look around you, you will most likely find that your friends, neighbours and relatives are in relationships with people between two to 7 years older or younger than they themselves are.
Women have traditionally married men a couple of years older. There are a few rational reasons for this. In the past a woman wanted someone who was a bit more established than she was, and anecdotally men want to wait longer before they have families.
In my own life I have dated men up to 16 years older than I am, and also men up to 9 years younger. The younger I was it seemed, the older my partner was!
When I was 18 I had a 2 year relationship with a man of 34. He was just 10 years younger than my Dad, and was actually friends with him. I benefitted from his maturity, but eventually found the relationship a bit stifling. We were both volunteers for St. John’s Ambulance, and that was the only thing we really had in common.
During the time I was dating the older guy, I met a man of 22, and we had an on-off relationship for a couple of years. In many ways I was the more mature of the two of us, he was a musician and a bit of a skirt-chaser. The advantage of the relationship was that we had so much in common. We both enjoyed the same kind of music, and with that as a background would talk into the wee hours of the morning over endless cups of coffee, with our gang of mutual friends. My first really long term relationship was also with someone virtually my own age. We had similar backgrounds, similar interests, and in most ways were a perfect fit.
When that relationship broke down, I played the field for a few years and dated both younger and older men. Each age group seemed to have some advantages, younger men were mostly energetic, adorable and a tad insecure, awed by your profound knowledge! but had a totally different frame of reference. Older men were more likely to nurture and want to protect little old you, but tended to want to be “in charge”!
I remember telling one of my younger dates (He was 21, I was 30.) that I had gone to see the World’s Fair with friends, he replied that his parents had taken him – he had been 9, I had been 18, literally double his age! His tastes in music were vastly different, and his idea of a good time was dancing the night away at a party, my taste was maturing into an appreciation of Wine and Fine Dining!
My affection for him was almost condescending, and I did not like that he brought that out in me. I also found that men of my own age, despite the natural differences in personality, at least understood the same social and political references, and had seen the same movies that I had seen!
I had noticed that in many May/September romances of any kind, it is the power imbalance that strains the relationship, so if that is evened out in some way, by money, prestige, or even just personality, then relative power is not an issue.
In my opinion, similarity in tastes and experience is more important than age; but you are much more likely to find those similarities in someone fairly close to your own age. As you age, the gap can actually widen a bit. A 50 year old woman and a 40 year old man (or vice versa) probably have much experience in common, and, in North America at least, maturity is a great leveller.
Each relationship is unique, of course, what works for one is not necessarily good for another.
Problems due to different tastes can be worked through if both parties are willing to compromise. There are mature 20 year-olds, and immature 40 year-olds. As with any aspect of a relationship it works if you both really want it to. Just look at Madonna! – or maybe that’s not a good example.
Age may be just a number, and we are all as old as we feel, or as young as we look, Right now I am married to a man who is 6 months my junior, but looks and acts his age, whereas I look and act 10 years younger! The older I get it seems that age becomes just demographic information, and inside my head I can remember being 19, which makes me younger than my children!
“If she doesn’t scare the hell out of you a little, she’s not the one”
At first glance, this meme might seem to be implying that you need to only date emotionally unstable people. But if you sit with it for a moment, it takes on a whole other (and more important) layer of meaning.
As much as mainstream media would prefer you to think otherwise, the best relationships are not all sunshine and roses.
Relationships are the ultimate vehicle for self-growth… and the best kind of love that you can engage in is the confronting kind. The kind where your partner acts as a mirror to you and they lovingly help pull all of your demons out of you over time. They act as a catalyst for positive growth.
They’ll point a flashlight into every corner of your dark mental attic, and illuminate all of the things that you try to hide from the world. And they will illuminate it with love, patience, and compassion.
Just when you expect them to run away (after having found out about your deepest, darkest secrets), they’ll tell you that they love you even more now that they know more about you.
Intimacy is about truly letting someone see you. It’s also anxiety producing for the vast majority of people. Letting someone really know you, and really see you, can be terrifying. You are laying your heart in their hands and saying to them “Please be gentle with this.” And if they’re the right one for you, they will reply back (verbally or non-verbally) “I wouldn’t dream of ever being anything else to you.”
When I first started dating again after an emotionally traumatic breakup, I was hesitant to let anyone get close to me. I engaged in surface level relationships because I feared the anxiety that intimacy produced for me. Even ‘admitting’ that I’d had a difficult day was enough to make my heart race.
In my emotional closure I didn’t think I would ever be able to open up to someone ever again.
Until one fateful day when I met someone who shook up my world entirely.
Her eyes penetrated through me. There was no hiding around her. She never had to say it out loud, but I knew that she saw me.
My ego’s first self-protective instinct was to run away and revert back to my old unproductive habits. Run away before she finds out all of the messy things about your past. Push her away before she has a chance to see past your self-deceptions. Avoid any contact with her in case she might make you feel big, scary emotions again.
My ego resisted her every step of the way. I told myself she wasn’t my usual type. I tried to hide behind things like “She’s too young/inexperienced/small town/etc. for me.” But it was all bullshit. Every thought that tried to keep me away from her was just my ego’s sad excuse to stay closed down emotionally. It was a defense mechanism and I knew it.
When I really started to show up and tell her how I was feeling (namely, scared shitless to even be around her) she received it with grace and compassion. Because even before I had verbalized it, she knew. She already saw me.
As terrifying as intimacy can be, the process of holding up our demons in the light is deeply therapeutic. Shame cannot continue to exist or thrive in the loving context of a close intimate relationship.
Was I fixed forever for having her met her? No. It’s a process like everything else. I had to repeatedly breathe into the deeper layers of anxiety as I let myself be seen more and more by her.
But I’ll be eternally grateful that I did meet her. Because her scaring the hell out of me was my ticket to a positive transformation that I never could have anticipated.
So if you’re at a place in your life where you are starting to see someone who challenges you, confronts you, and scares you on some level, take stock of whether or not you think they might be a force for positive change in your life.
Don’t date someone who scares you because they are controlling, angry, violent, or abusive in any way. That’s the bad kind of fear and it’s an unhealthy relationship to engage in. But date someone who scares you because they encourage you to face all of the things you’ve tried to suppress for so long. Date someone who lovingly pushes you to become more who you are at your core as a person. Date someone who nudges you outside of your comfort zone regularly and helps you level up in life.
It might just be the best thing you ever did for yourself.
Robot sex! DNA dating! Dinosaur porn! New York City’s Museum of Sex (our favorite museum, for obvious reasons) and data analysis firm sparks & honey have compiled a list of 19 predictions for the future of dating, according to current trends. And we’re a little scared.
1. Microbial match
The prediction: “As we continue to map and explore our DNA and individual microbiomes, anticipate services that match people based on both.”
Because nothing says “sexy” like swabbing your cheek and putting a saliva-soaked Q-tip in a Petri dish!
2. Formula one flirting
The prediction: “The rise of instant gratification social media platforms like Snapchat, Vine, Tinder and Grindr have turned courtship into a fast and furious process. Seasoned speed daters find spontaneous snackable video snippets more authentic.”
Mmmmm, snackable video snippets. Did we learn nothing from the Charm, MeetMe and At First Sight apps? Videos of a bro showing off his skillz by dribbling a miniature basketball, a wannabe comedian doing his best Aziz Ansari impression, or some dude trying (and failing) to twerk against a wall aren’t exactly what we’d call appealing. Actually, it’s what we call “watching a stream of the most awkward homemade YouTube videos ever recorded and then giving up on dating completely.” Future, we’re kind of disappointed in you.
3. Selfie scrubbing
The prediction: “We’ve seen a number of auto-correcting retouching services launch, such as Facetune, to fine-tune photos effortlessly. From profile writing to history cleansing, expect perfecting practices to become standard operating procedure for daters of the future.”
Oh, come on, like you’ve never Photoshopped the dark circles under your eyes or chosen the perfect Instagram filter that makes you really, really, really ridiculously good-looking (hmmmm, Kelvin or Nashville?). Besides, no one looks like their online dating profile anyway. Especially not in an age when you can take 1,382 selfies in front of your bathroom mirror and pick the one that accents your eyes but hides your chin. It’s an art form, really.
The bizarre story of how a Taiwanese model found herself the star of one the Internet’s most popular memes spread online like wildfire. The root of the tale is based on how differently cultures view the concept of beauty and of themselves.
The story begins a few years ago, when things were going pretty well for Taiwanese model Heidi Yeh. After taking small job posing in an ad for a South Korean plastic surgery company, however, everything changed.
The ad featured an attractive couple with three children who had something noticeably different about their appearance — their eyelids were Photoshopped.
“The only thing you’ll have to worry about,” the ad read. “Is how to explain it to the kids.”
While double eyelid surgery is common for affluent people in Asian countries (it’s done to give them a “Western” look, Yeh herself never had the procedure done. But that didn’t stop the Internet from giving that ad a horrible life of its own. The photo, widely circulated online, viciously mocked the model.
People made up a story about the woman in the photo and spread it on the internet,” Yeh said. “They said her husband figured out she had lied to him about not having plastic had surgery done … [the kids] didn’t look anything like her. Then he sued her and won.”
The meme became so widespread that soon even her family and close friends quizzed her about it.
“When a friend told me about this I thought it was just rumors. Then I realized the whole world was spreading the story and in different languages,” she said. “People actually believed it and thought this had happened to me. Even my relatives and fiance’s family have asked me about it.”
Yeh shared with the BBC what a terrible impact the whole thing has had on her career and life. “I decided to speak out because I wanted to give myself some courage to deal with this problem,” she said. “People refuse to believe that I have never had plastic surgery. After this, I only got small roles in advertisements. Because of this, I haven’t been able to sleep well and have broken down many times crying.”
The model is currently suing the ad agency, J. Walter Thompson (JWT), to recoup losses she claims the ad has caused. She’s also going after a cosmetic clinic that used the photo for an online ad campaign, one that may have been the biggest force in the meme becoming so popular.
The bizarre story of how a Taiwanese model found herself the star of one the Internet’s most popular memes spread online like wildfire. The root of the tale is based on how differently cultures view the concept of beauty and of themselves.
The story begins a few years ago, when things were going pretty well for Taiwanese model Heidi Yeh. After taking small job posing in an ad for a South Korean plastic surgery company, however, everything changed.
The ad featured an attractive couple with three children who had something noticeably different about their appearance — their eyelids were Photoshopped.
“The only thing you’ll have to worry about,” the ad read. “Is how to explain it to the kids.”
While double eyelid surgery is common for affluent people in Asian countries (it’s done to give them a “Western” look, Yeh herself never had the procedure done. But that didn’t stop the Internet from giving that ad a horrible life of its own. The photo, widely circulated online, viciously mocked the model.
People made up a story about the woman in the photo and spread it on the internet,” Yeh said. “They said her husband figured out she had lied to him about not having plastic had surgery done … [the kids] didn’t look anything like her. Then he sued her and won.”
The meme became so widespread that soon even her family and close friends quizzed her about it.
“When a friend told me about this I thought it was just rumors. Then I realized the whole world was spreading the story and in different languages,” she said. “People actually believed it and thought this had happened to me. Even my relatives and fiance’s family have asked me about it.”
Yeh shared with the BBC what a terrible impact the whole thing has had on her career and life. “I decided to speak out because I wanted to give myself some courage to deal with this problem,” she said. “People refuse to believe that I have never had plastic surgery. After this, I only got small roles in advertisements. Because of this, I haven’t been able to sleep well and have broken down many times crying.”
The model is currently suing the ad agency, J. Walter Thompson (JWT), to recoup losses she claims the ad has caused. She’s also going after a cosmetic clinic that used the photo for an online ad campaign, one that may have been the biggest force in the meme becoming so popular.
“The most important thing in this world is to learn to give out love, and let it come in.” ~ Morrie Schwartz
Love is a strange and beautiful thing.
I always thought I knew what love meant. I grew up hearing the words all the time. It was on TV, in books and magazines, and people all around were saying it.
I thought I knew how to love. I mean, I told my teddy bear that I loved him because he kept me safe at night. I told my sister that I loved her, only if she was nice to me and would play the games that I wanted.
But if I didn’t get that new limited edition beanie baby, I felt differently for my parents. If my friends at school didn’t give me the birthday presents I wanted, I felt differently for them.
I seemed to only love the people and things that would give me something in return and that would allow life to go on the way that I wanted it to.
I never trulyfelt love, a love that was unconditional and all encompassing, until the day I first saw my dad cry.
My friends always tell me that my father is the happiest man that they’ve ever met. He greets everyone with open arms, and his smile is so big you can practically count all of his teeth.
The other day I came home, and my dad looked sullen, the smile usually spread across his face missing. He looked into my eyes and just collapsed into my arms, sobbing.
I could feel his sadness before I even heard the tears, from the way he put his entire body weight on me as if he needed help just standing, and the way he gripped me so tight like a child does with his mom on the first day of school.
My sister had just made a rash career decision that would leave her in a large amount of debt and temporarily unemployed. And my dad just didn’t have the money that she needed to help her out of her situation.
Growing up, my dad always told us that his one purpose in life was to give us the life that he never had. And in his eyes, at that moment, he had failed.
You see, my parents are first generation immigrants from Vietnam. They come from impoverished families, both with more than 10 siblings each. Their journey to America is almost like a fictional tale to me, something that they rarely talk about, with my dad escaping first, then my mom, aunt, and sister, who almost didn’t even make it out alive.
At first, the American Dream wasn’t all that it was made out to be. Yes, freedom rang, but so did the challenge of learning a new language, a new culture, a new way of making money and supporting a family.
But somehow, they did it. They raised my older sister and put her through college. They raised my aunt, and put her through college. They raised my twin sister and me, and put us through college. And in the midst of all that, they found a way to sponsor all of their own siblings to emigrate to the land of the free.
I didn’t even know that you were so amazing. That you were the only person I really trusted in my life.
That you were the only one that could take care of my computer problems, my personal drama, fix anything, take care of our bills, make me laugh, plus finish our entire house inside and out. A skill set you had, O so amazing, but I didn’t even know.
I didn’t know how unique that was. I didn’t get to tell you I am in awe of you.
I didn’t get to tell you.
I would trade everything and anything for one more moment with you to tell you all of this.
I’d tell you how lucky I am to have met you. How special you are and how no one could ever be as cool as you, for me.
I’d hold you so tight and I’d never complain about your work schedule, or your meetings, or your social life. I would love you for it all, because you are perfect just as you are.
Did I love you enough?
Babes I ask myself this all the time, I loved you so much but could I have done better?
Could I have seen you more fully. Loved you more entirely? Praised you more freely?
Marriage: It’s two people really digging deep, getting to know each other and share each other’s lives, to give and take strength from each other as needed.
In my standup comedy act, I sometimes ask the audience “Who’s married?” and a lot of hands go up. Then I ask them, “Who USED to be married?” and feign amazement when lots of the same hands go up. I berate them for making the same mistake twice-
“Who ARE you people? Who on earth says, well, that sucked- let me try it again with some other asshole?”
I only sort of mean this.
But I don’t entirely not mean it.
I was married for eight years. That’s right, in a row, because anyone can take breaks, Janice!
My marriage ended badly, but that doesn’t mean that it was all bad. I learned a lot about what marriage is.
The first thing I learned about marriage is that it’s not about the engagement or the parties or the wedding, those public, social media things.
It’s the opposite of that. It’s the ultimate private thing. It is two people making a life together, alone. It doesn’t have anything to do with looking pretty in a dress or if your mom enjoyed the profiteroles at the reception. There is a whole industry geared up to tell you that marriage is about paying 100% more for shoes because they are white, and if you don’t have the right diamond ring, it means he doesn’t love you enough. It’s not about that. I learned a lot of things about what marriage isn’t, or wasn’t for me. It’s not an endless meet cute. It’s not (necessarily) about pleasing God or childrearing. It’s two people really digging deep, getting to know each other and share each other’s lives, to give and take strength from each other as needed. If you primary motivator to get married is not the desire to make and share a life with that person, you should look at what it is you really want.
The second thing I learned about marriage is that you could be so proud and excited about spending the rest of your life with another person one second…
like the time I came home and found that my spouse had spent the day spontaneously putting up shelves for me, and just as aggravated the next day, when that same spouse had totaled his car doing something stupid. It’s the same person. “I’m so lucky, I can’t believe I’m married to you!” is the flip side of “OH MY GOD I CAN’T BELIEVE I’M MARRIED TO YOU.” They’ll feel the same way about you sometimes!
They WILL do stupid things, and you will too. Committing to the rest of your life together means that you’re going to have moments of strength and weakness, days when you can take on the world and days when you can’t get out of bed. If we were all paragons of virtue and strength every day, we wouldn’t need other people, we’d just be constantly having sex with celebrities. I think. And we’d never be sick or tired or unemployed or lonely, because we’d be so busy kicking the universe’s ass every single day.
The third thing I learned about marriage is that it can transform you.
The support of another person, plus all the time you save from online dating, means that each of you can really figure out what you want your life to look like, and make that life. Sure, you’ll probably stop matching your bra and panty sets and you’ll start eating more bread, but you can become a more fulfilled person.
The things your partner does will reflect on you in a way they never have before, both good and bad. If they spout off at a party, fail to keep their promises, or behave antisocially, that’s your problem too. Of course, if your spouse is a Nobel-prize winning doctor, some of that rubs off on you, as well.
I also learned that your spouse is who they are.
People can change behaviors but they can’t really change their identities. When I met my husband, he was leaving a marriage that ended in infidelity. Ours ended the same way. He’s married again and I suspect it’ll end with another woman’s number in his phone.
One good thing about being united with another human being is that you can learn more about who you are, by contrast. “That’s his thing. That’s my thing.” You can find out more about where you overlap and don’t overlap.
Sex will get really good.
Really, really good. Having sex with one person who is committed to having good sex with you, having years to figure each other out, means married sex, although the phrase lacks luster, can be incredible.
Your spouse will know you better than anyone.
I regret that my marriage ended badly, because there are things I want to tell him sometimes that only he’ll get. The person who was closest to you for ten years is hard to lose.
The thing I learned when my marriage ended was that all endings are sad.
Every person who tells you they are divorcing deserves your sympathy and condolences. Even when the marriage was bad, had been bad for years, there is a sadness in ending something that you hoped would last forever.
The last thing I learned is that other people like being married, and when they’re healed and feeling strong, they’ll seek it out again, and I won’t. And that’s OK, too.
What are the things you learned from your marriage?
I am sitting with my sister-in-law, a contented wife and mother of four, in the garden of her summer house on a balmy afternoon. We are discussing the recent remarriage of a friend of hers, an older man who might have been expected to marry a different sort of woman—less arm-candyish and more compelling—than the shiny young blond he ended up choosing. My sister-in-law goes on to observe how none of her single older female friends, whether divorced or widowed, are dating. She says it matter-of-factly, but the obvious implication is that this is an unfortunate situation, something to be clucked over. Looking across her dock at the seagulls companionably weaving in and out of the water, I find myself thinking that I am just like these women, uncoupled and dating no one. The truth of the matter, however, is that far from seeing this as something to be pitied, a large part of me sees it as a condition of inadvertent freedom to be devoutly held on to.
Lest you think this claim is no more than some form of adroitly rationalized sour grapes, let me hasten to add that I have arrived at this point of view only lately. Like most other heterosexual women, I have spent much of my adult life in relationships with men, as either a girlfriend or once, briefly, as a bona fide wife. After I got divorced in my late thirties, I pretty much expected to marry again and, within the next decade, came close to doing so twice. On both occasions—one contender was an immigration lawyer with an acute case of separation anxiety, the other a compulsively womanizing psychiatrist—I pulled back, unwilling to take the next step. I was afraid of the claustrophobic feeling I associated with being a couple—the way it closes off other romantic options, for one thing (certainly if you’re monogamously inclined, as I am), and, for another, dictates that you go through life two by two, like the animals entering Noah’s ark.
Sometimes it seems to me that the prospect of waking up every morning to the same face seems like too much of a muchness, a condition primed to induce restlessness in all but the most emotionally sedentary of us. Getting tired of one’s partner isn’t all that different, when you think about it, from wearying of one’s own too-familiar self. To be quite candid about it, being identifed as a couple has always made me feel a bit entrapped, like finding yourself inside a room with the door locked from the outside. I understood implicitly what Michael D., one of the patients in Stephen Grosz’s book,The Examined Life, was getting at when he explained that “when I’m in a couple, I feel I’m disappearing, dying—losing my mind.” It may be an exaggeration of my own sentiments, but not by much.
And, indeed, who among us hasn’t experienced on occasion the smug, airless “we”-ness of couples, the enforced common ground of their thinking: “We love Verdi,” or “We’ve never gone for Indian food”? Of course, you could argue that this commitment to an unchanging dual identity is a small price to pay for feeling less alone in the world. No matter that it takes a certain degree of clear- eyed, bottom-line calculating to become a couple in the frst place, a cumulative (albeit largely unconscious) assessment that there is no one better for you out there. Or that if there is, the chances are small that you will discover each other— and now is an improvement over never.
Experts say apps like Tinder and Hinge make it easier than ever to meet your match—but it’s also easier than ever to cheat. What’s a married couple to do?
A few weeks ago, Vanity Fair‘s article on “Tinder and the Dawn of the Dating Apocalypse” came out and almost shut the Internet down with gems like, “It’s like ordering Seamless. But you’re ordering a person.” Married people were feeling all smug and relieved until they got to the part about how many people on Tinder are not actually single: GlobalWebIndex found that a full 30 percent of Tinder users are married, 12 percent are in a relationship, and the majority of those dishonest users are men. Tinder disputes the statistics, telling Redbookmag.com they did their own study and found that just 1.7 percent of users were married. However, they wouldn’t detail how they conducted the survey, and GlobalWebIndex stands behind its research, saying their firm talked to 47,622 Internet users around the world.
Even if Tinder’s numbers are correct, we’re still talking about tens of thousands of potential cheaters out there. (And that’s not counting the millions of AshleyMadison.com users who had their information leaked recently.) Yes, people have been cheating since the dawn of time, but some experts think dating apps are changing the landscape more quickly and in a much more troubling way than any pre-Internet tryst ever could. “Exploring online is a known gateway to experimentation,” says Dr. Pepper Schwartz, love and relationship expert for AARP and Life Reimagined. “It’s like going down the street looking in windows. Once you look, you might buy.”
That seemed to be the goal of a guy named Ray*. Nicole*, 29, says she tried Tinder since everyone was talking about it, and came across Ray, who seemed cool and well-educated. They matched, got to chatting, and eventually exchanged phone numbers. At first, he kept asking her to come over to his house during the day, telling her he rents out his house, but all his tenants were away on vacation. She (smartly) said she’d rather meet in public, but the two hadn’t yet met in person. Then, one morning, she woke up to this text message:
“I was thoroughly offended and disgusted,” Nicole says. Since she didn’t get the text message until a few hours later, she figured it was too late to call Ray’s wife and tell her he was trying to cheat. But now, she says she’s learned a lot from the experience. “I assume that everyone on Tinder is single,” she says. “Now I actually have to ask people on dating sites whether they’re married or attached!”
Male thoughts decoded. What are the signals he is giving?
There he is, the man of your dreams. He’s sitting across from you at the coffee shop or standing at the opposite side of the bar. His eyes meet yours, a quick glance, and then it’s back to his drink. Was he giving you a signal?
It’s not easy to decipher the mind of the modern male, but learning to decode what his nonverbal communication truly means is an invaluable asset in the game of love. So in order to be sure you’re reading him right, look out for the following 10 signs.
Leaning into Love: If a guy is interested in you, you’ll find that his body will lean forward toward yours. This move can be either very subtle or extremely “in your face” (literally!). It’s his way of letting you know he’d like to get even closer. Once his interest is piqued, you’ll both find it hard to pull away!
Keeping It Even Closer: A vital aspect of the physical nature of romance is reciprocity. Translation: meeting his advances with your own. This not only signals your own interest, but also serves to keep his.
The Eyes Have It: We’ve all heard the proverb, “The eyes are the window to the soul.” If he’s interested in you, he’ll focus on you with those piercing peepers and hold it. Return his romantic gaze with a quiet smile and let him know that you are interested. He’ll be at your side in no time.
Touching Is a Good Thing: If a guy is interested in you, then he’ll want to be near you. He’ll also want to take every opportunity to touch you. Maybe it’s your arm, your leg, your knee — it doesn’t matter, as long as his presence is physical and affectionate. It’s his way of letting you know he likes you.
Funny Meeting You Here: Coincidence is out. Serendipity is in. Those so-called “happy accidents” may not be so accidental after all. Perhaps his “surprise” appearance at your favorite Starbucks or hangout is a signal that he’s trying to connect with you (but doesn’t want you to think he’s a stalker!). Take this as a positive sign and make the most of your next encounter. You may find that you share more in common than just an addiction to double lattes.
Listen Closely: How do you know that you have a guy’s attention? When he’s not talking about himself. It’s that simple. The next time you’re in a bar, listen closely to any table full of men and you will hear them speaking rapturously about their favorite subject: themselves. For a man to shut up and really listen to what you have to say, you know it must be love (or at least a strong attraction). He’ll put that male genetic ADD to rest once and for all after he’s found his Miss Right.
The Guy Who Liked Chick Flicks: Okay, we all know he’d much rather be watching the big game, but it’s an important sign if he shows an interest in the things you like as well. If he’s happy to watch a movie you picked out or doesn’t complain when it’s time to hit the mall for a little shopping trip, you’ve made a serious leap forward in the dating game! Give him extra points if he makes the popcorn.
Funny Lady: Can’t tell a joke to save your life? Does he laugh at it anyway? Men are very in touch with their sense of humor (women often complain that men never take anything seriously, right?), so if he’s sending some hearty laughter your way, it’s a good bet he’s looking at you as relationship material.
Confidence, Man: If a guy’s into you, you make him nervous. He’ll get goose bumps or a rapidly beating heart just from being around you. Look for signs like unexplained laughter, sweaty palms and fidgeting. Guys always want to be in control of their emotions — we like to be in charge. If he has trouble doing that around you, it’s most likely because you make him nervous and excited. Don’t take it for granted; help him to relax, and he’ll thank you by being a great guy you can depend on.
The Feeling Is Mutual: Men and women have very different brain chemistries: She is verbal; he is not. He is driven by visual desires, while she is guided by her deep emotions. Women are taught to rationally express their feelings and feel no shame in crying, and men punch things. Therefore, if you get a guy to actually open up and express his emotions, consider it a major achievement in your relationship. Discussing your feelings for each other is a powerful bonding experience for the two of you and serves to strengthen a relationship for whatever challenges the future may bring.
I’m kind of an insular socializer. I tend to stick to the group of people I know, occasionally branching out to the people they know, but mostly just staying in my comfort zone. But here I am, heartbroken for the millionth time, same guy as always, same story, too. I know that the only way to change patterns is to actually do things differently, so I decided to try out Tinder. I have a ton of friends who use it, and though none of them have formed solid relationships with the guys they’ve met, they’ve at least gone out with new people and gotten unstuck from their ruts, which is exactly what I need. Now I’m not totally new to Tinder, but I’m pretty close. I’ve had it on my phone 5 times, 4 of which ended in app deletion within 10 minutes. It just hit me wrong, when the app would ask if I’d like to “keep playing” after I matched with someone, it always felt weird. The admission that the hunt for intimacy is just a game makes me sad, and then I’d feel bad for swiping left so quickly, so much so, that I’d lose any recognition that all these faces blurring together were actual people sharing the same city, sidewalks, air as me. I thought it wasn’t fair of me to deny the possibility of a connection with someone just because I found their photo on a boat or mountain, or crouched in front of a graffiti wall (as though they had anything to do with it) embarrassing, and I’ve always deleted the app almost as fast as I’ve installed it, never giving it any sort of actual chance to grow on me. So I decided to commit to 48 hours on Tinder, and reply to any and all messages I receive. Here’s the diary of my first 48:
Hour 1:
I’ve downloaded the app. Can’t bring myself to open it. I don’t want to find a date on my phone, I want to find one face to face. Maybe I don’t even want to find one at all.
Hour 2:
Ugh. Why does it have to say my age? I hate this. Changed my profile pics. Hard to find the right ratio of good-weird, cats to tits..
Hour 6:
Opened the app to find that someone “superliked” me. Closed the app, took a Xanax. Didn’t realize “superliking” was a thing, that’s a pretty bold claim to make.
Hour 8:
Reopened it. Left swiping like there’s a pot of gold at the end. Dude in a business suit sitting in full lotus position? Left fucking swipe. Cop with tattoos superliked me? I hate this. Guy on a boat, guy on a mountain, guy on a jet ski proudly wearing wrap around shades, another guy on a boat, and another. All left swiped. And now they won’t show me any more matches. They say I have to swipe on someone to see more matches. Maybe if you gave me ANY acceptable choices, but this has been shit so far.
Hour 12:
My phone tells me I have a new superlike. I throw my phone.
Hour 12.25:
Curiosity is killing me. So many new superlikes, none of them fuckable. I swipe right on a guy who says he likes dark humor, and that nothing’s off limits. We match, whaddya know. I’m not going to reach out first, I’m not at all invested or intrigued, I just don’t want the machine to make me stop. Keep letting me play mystery date!!!
Hour 16:
Two bulging handfuls of matches, no messages yet. I’m okay with this. I’m finding it kind of therapeutic to embrace my pettiness without consequence, mocking the photos with wild abandon. Doubting loudly one’s age, another one’s actual blood relation to the child on his lap, yet another one’s sincerity in general. Score one point for the hidden benefits of this terrible, terrible social experiment.
Straight women who are turned on by both naked men and women are considered to be “bisexual or gay, but never straight,” say researchers. Pixabay, Public Domain
What turns women on? This question has baffled men for ages. A groomed beard, a generous penis size, or a sexy cologne are all tried and true, but science has found something else that sexually arouses women — other women. According to a recent study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, eye tracking devices found videos of both naked men and women caused straight women’s pupils to dilate, signaling sexual arousal.
“Even though the majority of women identify as straight, our research clearly demonstrates that when it comes to what turns them on, they are either bisexual or gay, but never straight,” said Dr. Gerulf Rieger, lead researcher of the study from the University of Essex’s Department of Psychology, according to The Telegraph.
Women’s sexual preferences tend to be a gray area. A 2011 study from Boise State University found 60 percent of heterosexual women admitted to being attracted to other women, while 45 percent had kissed another woman. Fifty percent of those participants also reported same-sex sexual fantasies. Based on these results. the researchers suggested women are more affectionate with other women because of their friendlier nature. In turn, this presents an opportunity for intimacy or even romantic feelings to develop.
Although previous research has shown women are sexually aroused by both sexes at varying degrees, the differences in arousal between straight and gay women has been overlooked. Which is where this study comes in.
To clearly define the differences in the physiological sexual responses of straight and gay women, Rieger and his colleagues used eye tracking devices on over 300 women who were shown videos of both naked men and women. The devices were used to capture pupil dilation (or lack thereof) in response to the sexual stimuli.
The findings revealed straight women were strongly sexually aroused by videos of both attractive men and women, even if they chose men as their sexual preference. This was in stark contrast to lesbian women who showed much stronger sexual responses to their preferred sex — women. Lesbians were seen as more “male-typical” in their arousal than women, meaning their responses seemed to align more with those of men, and were therefore distinct from other women.
Prior to the study, the researchers theorized since lesbians can be more masculine in their non-sexual behaviors (like the way they dress), they are also more likely to be masculine in their sexual responses. However, Rieger and his colleagues did not find supporting evidence to prove masculine-behaving lesbians always exhibited male-typical sexual arousal patterns. This suggests how women appear in public does not say anything about their sexual role preferences.
“Although some lesbians were more masculine in their sexual arousal, and others were more masculine in their behaviors, there was no indication that these were the same women,” said Dr. Rieger, in the press release.
The truth is straight women, not just lesbians, ogle at beautiful women. For straight women, these sexual fantasies and feelings of intimacy and romance with another woman may be projected onto their porn viewing habits. A recent study by Pornhub found lesbian content is the most popular among women, with “ebony lesbian” and “girl on girl” among the most common search terms. This highlights women are watching more porn than we might expect.
Remember, these findings should not be generalized because not all women have same-sex fantasies. Rather female sexual desire is a complex subject and unique to each and every woman. After all, “men are simple, but women’s sexual responses remain a mystery,” Rieger said.
Sources:Rieger G, et al. Getting in touch with our female sexuality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 2015.
Morgan EM and Thompson EM. Processes of Sexual Orientation Questioning Among Heterosexual Women. Journal of Sex Research . 2011.
Women. Journal of Sex Research. 2011. Pornhub and The Daily Beast. More of What Women Want. 2015.
When we try to express how we feel for a spouse or loved one, sometimes the English language just comes up short.
Thanks to London-based illustrator Emma Block and the diamond company Vashi, we now have an illustrated dictionary of words for love from around the world that have no English equivalent.
Block told HuffPost her favorite word in the series is the Welsh word “Cwtch.”
“It’s a lovely word. It means a hug/a safe place provided by a loved one,” she said. “I have no idea how to pronounce it though!”
Check even more words out below (and good luck pronouncing them!).
The bizarre story of how a Taiwanese model found herself the star of one the Internet’s most popular memes spread online like wildfire. The root of the tale is based on how differently cultures view the concept of beauty and of themselves.
