The other day I was talking to my 11 year old daughter about attraction. She was telling me about all the little Junior High boys that she either likes or dislikes. It was probably one of those moments that should either give me nightmares or that I should fondly remember forever. However, I'm not normal.It got me to questioning how we choose who we are attracted to. It's not a decision we typically make with our "logical" brains. That's where the "chemistry" comes from. When you think logically about who you should be with, you think: nice, smart, successful, has a lot of money, etc. When you are out in the world the person you are attracted to has: a nice ass, great set of boobs, long legs, etc. That last part was somewhat of a joke. Sometimes you'll see someone with no ass, no boobs and 5 foot tall and you'll be thinking, "I don't know why I am attracted to her, but I am."
The point is, we don't really choose (logically) who we are going to be attracted to. It's some kind of emotional response. We end up with a person that was serendipitously placed before us at the right time when the neurons were firing in the proper sequence and Neptune was aligned with Venus.
I have therefore decided that prearranged marriages are the way to go. If you trust your parents to be intelligent reasonable people then they will be able to logically choose who your best mate for life should be. It's also in their best interest to appoint someone that will help provide good looking grandchildren. Most importantly of all is that they have a better chance of keeping emotion and chemistry completely out of the equation. It should be a purely logical decision for the best chance of a long term relationship and to positively impact the greatness of the human race.
Good luck with that.
ReplyDeleteWorks great for the billion or so people in South Asia (and has for a LONG time). I still can't completely wrap my head around it, but I know many extremely intelligent, well-adjusted PhDs, engineers, etc. (men & women) who live in the US, but have roots in India. Most of them have arranged marriages & it seems to work out really well.
ReplyDeleteFor something along these lines, check out the movie Outsourced (Netflix or whatev). Aside from being a fun movie about an American in India, they talk a little about arranged marriages.
Thanks Twister. I'll need all the luck I can get.
ReplyDeleteHey Ed, welcome back. I had trouble wrapping my head around it as well. But, I got to thinking of when I was younger and all the girls that my dad pointed out to me. I would probably have been a lot happier in the long run if I had listened to my dad. Of course, my dad went to the same school I did so his educated recommendations were probably a lot better than most parents are capable of.
Sooooo.... Gimme some examples! Who did your dad suggest for you?!
ReplyDeleteYou know, of course, that I can't drop names like that here without hurting the feelings of all the girls that had tremendous crushes on me in high school and have idolized me for so long that they have discovered and religiously read my blog.
ReplyDeleteI believe if that conversation between Mr. F and Gar truly existed it would have gone something like this: Well, um...err...you see it's, uh...like this...
ReplyDeleteConsidering that my parents weren't happy with any of my choices it made it all the more fun, but in the end...i did pay the consequences of choosing poorly.
I also don't remember them suggesting any possible mates either...so they really have no room to complain!
I know that with my 8yr, we have created a journal/photo/memory book. (Yes, it serves all 3purposes) We have one section entirely devoted to future mate. I know it sounds creepy, but she has already made some astounding observations based on what she knows...such as "I'm going to marry someone who loves animals as much as I do." So, i have her write this down on her future mate page and after twelve years i figure she has enough guidelines that she'll do a pretty good job picking for herself. J