Fake It ’til You Make It! ‘Faking’ Attraction Leads to Love

“The key to success is sincerity. One you can fake that, you got it made!”

French dramatist Jean Giraudoux was really onto something, at least when it comes to matters of the heart.

A recent MedicalDaily.com article reports, “Pretending that you find someone attractive increases your susceptibility to their charms and heightens your chances of truly falling in love with them, according to new relationship research.”

The latest findings [1] suggest that behavior can lead to certain emotions just as much as emotions can lead to behavior, and may offer explanations for the relative success of arranged marriages compared to conventional marriages.

Past research has shown that those in arranged marriages or those who have had their partner chosen for them by a parent or matchmaker, tend to feel more in love over time compared to those in regular marriages who feel less in love as time passes.

Lead researcher psychologist Richard Wiseman tested the theory of the “positive action” technique, which he believes could be used to not only accelerate feelings in new relationships but also rekindle them in older ones, by holding a speed dating night where some of the prospective partners were instructed to act as if they were already in love with each other.

(This is True Love. You think it happens every day?)

“Just as people feel happier when they force their face into a smile, so pairs of people behaving as if they find one another attractive became emotionally close,” he said. “The assumption was that the emotion leads to the action or behavior but this shows it can happen the other way around, action can lead to emotions.”

“Behaving like you are in love can lead to actually falling in love. People are always going about positive thinking when this suggest positive action is just as valid,” Wiseman said. “We actually had a problem stopping people. We had go around pulling couples apart.”

“Actions are the quickest, easiest and most powerful way to instantly change how you think and feel,” he said.

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[1] The findings are published in the professor’s new book Rip It Up, which is described as ‘ripping up the rule book, where Wiseman will present radical new insights into ways to improve your body and brain.

Coital Cephalalgia: Not tonight. I have a headache.

An orgasm, the ultimate pleasure? For those suffering coital cephalalgia, or “sexual headaches”, it’s quite the opposite.

A recent article indicates that this rare type of headache occurs in about 1% of men and is characterized by a sudden, severe “explosive” pain at the base of the skull that builds just before or during orgasm. Afterward the intense pain may last for several hours or even a few days.

(They are the 1%!)

(A headache? Seriously?? That’s MY line!!)

Doctors aren’t certain of what causes this disorder. Erectile dysfunction medications such as Viagra could be a malefactor, as it’s estimated that 10% of men using this kind of medication may experience coital cephalalgia. Although these headaches are often benign, it’s always important to seek medical attention if you are experiencing them as in rare cases it could indicate a tumor or worse.

Over-exposure seems to be the best treatment. According to Wikipedia, “a doctor may recommend heavy sexual activity and masturbation for a short period of time ranging from a few days to a few weeks.”

(Thanks, Doc!)

To sooth the pain, it’s recommendable to take medications that prevent such headaches (Propranolol) during this intense sexual period.

(In other words… Take An Aspirin, Buddy!!)

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Anand KS, & Dhikav V (2009). Primary headache associated with sexual activity. Singapore medical journal, 50 (5) PMID: 19495503

What is Love?

What Is Love? [1][2]

(And no, it’s not that ‘A Night at the Roxbury’ song by Haddaway)

We live under a massive cultural delusion about the nature of real love.

Propagated by mainstream media, from the time you’re born you’re inundated with the belief that love is a feeling and that when you find “the one” you’ll sense it in your gut and be overcome by an undeniable sense of knowing. When the feeling and corresponding knowing fade (for the knowing is intimately linked to the feeling) and the work of learning about real love begins, most people take the diminished feeling as a sign that they’re in the wrong relationship and walk away. And then they start over again, only to find that the now-familiar knowing and feeling fade again… and again… and again.

If love isn’t a feeling, what is it?

Love is action. Love is tolerance. Love is learning your partner’s love language and then expressing love in a way that he can receive. Love is giving. Love is receiving. Love is plodding through the slow eddies of a relationship without jumping ship into another’s churning rapids. Love is recognizing that it’s not your partner’s job to make you feel alive, fulfilled, or complete; that’s your job. And it’s only when you learn to become the source of your own aliveness and are living your life connected to the spark of genius that is everyone’s birthright can you fully love another.

It’s a crushing moment when the infatuation drug wears off and they’re left to begin the real work of loving. And it’s even more devastating when this happens during their engagement, a time our culture hammers into their head as the happiest in their life. It’s time to send a different message to young people about the difference between infatuation and love. If we’re going to restore marriage to a place of honor and respect, we must teach that the role of one’s partner is not to save you from yourself and make you feel alive, fulfilled, and complete; only you can do that. It’s time to teach a different message. Let’s begin the conversation here.

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[1] This piece is a re-blogging of most of a blog article by Sheryl Paul in the online edition of the Huffington Post (yeah, I real all kinds of things).

[2] Sheryl Paul, M.A., has counseled thousands of people worldwide through her private practice, her bestselling books, her Home Study Programs and her websites. She has appeared several times on “The Oprah Winfrey Show”, as well as on “Good Morning America” and other top media shows and publications around the globe. To sign up for her free 78-page eBook, “Conscious Transitions: The 7 Most Common (and Traumatic) Life Changes”, visit her website at http://conscious-transitions.com.

Why I Hate Almost Everyone (Part 10): PDA

Lord knows, I’m no prude. Trust me on this one. Really. [1]

I’ve been known to enjoy the occasional hug and kiss in public along with the best of them. [2]

HOWEVER…

There is a time and a place for everything, people.

Aside from a hug and an air-smooch when greeting a dear or long-lost friend, can we please knock off the Public Displays of Affection (aka PDA)?

Truth be told, PDA is a bit of a misnomer, actually. It is not the ‘affection’ to which I object. Not really.

Mind you, depending on the people involved, even the occasional goo-goo eyes and blushing smirk can be a bit stomach-turning… but I tolerate it. I look away. I suddenly become engrossed in the cocoa design sprinkled on the foam of a nearby latte.

(Alleged latte art. What I won’t do for ‘romance!’)

In the interest of love and the continuation of the species, I employ a bit of wilful blindness now and again, I admit.

If that was all there was to it, I would not have any strenuous objections to how most right-thinking members of society choose to comport themselves in public when bewitched, bothered and bewildered.

Alas, that is not all there is to it. Not by a long shot, I can assure you.

(There’s plenty of time for that later, people!)

Most people can take the hand-holding. The cutesy-baby talk… that’s harder to handle.

But it’s the making out in public that really gets to me and, I suspect, everyone else except the people making out.

You’ve all seen them. The guy on the street corner who looks like he’s trying to suck his girlfriend’s ribs up through her neck. The couple who seem to believe that the back seat of a bus is some kind of public transportation love nest. The pair who have not quite figured out that unless there is a rather generous piece of gingham in front of them, the entire Italian restaurant, including the children, can see exactly who is grabbing what under the table!

It’s the obscene osculation and grotesque groping that makes one want to woof one’s cookies. The ‘oh lord he’s chucking his tongue down her throat’ horror that makes one want to wash out the old eyeballs. The silent scream as a crass hand disappears down someone else’s pants.

And spare me the ‘you’re just jealous’ shtick, OK, because most of the people I see engaging in PDA are not exactly fashion model types. In fact, there seems to be a direct correlation between the amount of PDA and the repellent aspect of those engaged therein. They are, in fact, just the type of people who simple-mindedly chalk all negative reaction up to either ‘envy’ or ‘fear.’

Let us draw our line in the cappuccino foam, people!

Let us promulgate the Anti-PDA message loudly and clearly!

When you see PDA happen… wherever, whenever…do not stand idly by! Take action! Make loud retching sounds! Shout, “Oh, the humanity!” Turn a hose on the offending (and offensive) parties. Do something!

Only by direct and forceful intervention can we make our little slice of the world a better place.

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[1] Full Disclosure: I am still somewhat queasy from the Valentine’s Day fallout and this year’s detonation has been particularly hard on my system. I’m afraid it may have, in some tiny way, coloured my usual stalwart objectivity.

[2] Full Confession: I have in the past also engaged in some wildly inappropriate PDA with my dear friend, CFD, who must be asking, “Who are you? And what have you done with Vampyre Fangs!!??”

Americans Willing to Pay for Laundry Folding Robots!

Americans are willing to pay for laundry folding robots.

Well, Lord knows I am!

According to the online research firm Persuadable Research Corporation [1], more than half the people surveyed said that a robot would be useful for, among other things, folding laundry.

The ‘among other things’ include:

• Providing home security
• Cleaning windows
• Washing floors and dishes.

And that’s not all. Almost half (46 percent) wanted to use their robot to remind them of things, kind of like a personal assistant. A smaller number wanted robots that would interact with humans, including working with the disabled (12 percent), assisting the elderly (11 percent), or functioning as babysitters (9 percent).

Granted, some tasks are of a much greater magnitude.

Watch the video from LiveScience.com to see how rescue robots are being used and even adapted to be more personal and interactive with (in this example) humans trapped inside a collapsed building.

That’s all very well and good (especially for the trapped person) and truly is a noble endeavour but let’s get back to the laundry folding, shall we? Because I spot a dark and evil side to this. After all, dark and evil IS in my nature!

Some people are not so much the laundry folding type as they are the ‘toss the clothes back in the drawer’ type. Does this person NEED a robot? I know I sure would like one… or rather, I like the idea of one… but do I need one. And by need, I mean ‘is it truly good for me… and society as a whole?’

Here’s my concern about what I see as the dark and evil aspect to all this. There are all kinds of uses for a House-Bot, I’m sure, most of which are perfectly sound and rational. And herein lies the slippery slope, my little geeks and nerdlings.

As was pointed out in a recent blog by the Kosher Samurai, it’s just a matter of time before human nature rears its all-too-true-to-form head and we get… Robo-SexBots!

I don’t know about you folks but off the top of my head, I can mention at least a dozen people who, being the proud owner of a state of the art Robo-SexBot, would never leave their house. Society would collapse. People wouldn’t show up to work or, if they do, show up in such an exhausted and addle-headed state as to be completely useless.

Wall Street would crash. The economy will crumble.

The media would trumpet the dangers of Robo-Sex Addiction. Talk show host would focus on the looming problem. Jerry Springer would showcase people who’ve left their spouses for their Robo-SexBot. Pulpits throughout the land will proclaim in the most fiery language how we are all facing a total societal breakdown as a direct result of this new evil right in our own homes!

Far too much drama for me.

So… for the betterment of Mankind and at great personal sacrifice, I will fold my own laundry.

You’re welcome!

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[1] Their motto? ‘Reliable. Responsive. Rocket Powered.’ And no, I am not making this up!

Pale Girl Problems

For those of you out there who have been too busy doing whatever it is that you do out there, here are a few highlights from a great Twitterer, #whitegirlproblems:

(It’s now a book)

• Casey Anthony will burn in hell for wearing a pink, ruffled top on national television.
• That would be such a cute outfit if it were cuter.
• I just want to be rich when my husband dies.
• It’s so upsetting when people aren’t photogenic.
• I’m so sick of rooms that are just four walls and a ceiling.
• I quit smoking every night before I go to bed, and every morning when I wake up I decide to start smoking again.
• I’m super tired from being tired all morning.
• I farted in front of my boyfriend, so I made him move out.
• Every job I’ve ever had is the worst job I’ve ever had.
• Judging me will only make you fat.

If I had a Twitter account (which I don’t), these would be some of my tweets for #palegirlproblems:

(‘Pale Girl Problems’ by VampyreFangs!) [1]

• You can be a moron, just don’t be a moron around me.
• I don’t have the right body for my make-up.
• Is ‘loser’ a state of mind or a state of mindlessness?
• Do I always fall for psychos or do they become psychos once I fall for them?
• Is dark a colour?
• Eff off and die. Wait. You don’t have to die. Just eff off!
• Edward Cullen is the decaf espresso of vampyre fiction.
• I’d SO go after Dr Who until I realized I’d have to live in a phone booth.
• That girl is a fashion tort.
• Is this a cry for help or are you just kvetching?
• Die, Cheerleader! Die!
• I’m afraid that inside me, there’s an even fatter person dying to come out!

Yeah, yeah… I know. Don’t give up the day job. Sheesh! Everyone’s a critic!

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[1] No, that’s not a picture of me.

Why I Hate Almost Everyone (Part 8): The Mouth Switch

Somewhere in my Grade One view of the human head, I imagine a tiny switch between the brain and the mouth. It is this switch that prevents one from saying everything that happens to go through one’s mind.

Some people either lack this switch or the switch is faulty/burned out.

Either way, if they are thinking it… they are saying it.

Little kids tend to say what they are thinking. This is what allows them to look at a total stranger from their vantage point in the grocery store shopping cart and exclaim loudly, “He’s fat!”

The switch has not fully developed. It has not matured. It is not yet properly in place and functioning.

The 3-year-old in the shopping cart has an excuse. Adults don’t.

(Dogbert explains it all for you!)

The Mouth Switch keeps the internal dialogue… well… internal. Very few people need or even want to hear what you are thinking. And just because you are thinking it, that in and of itself does not mean there is a corresponding interest in hearing your random thoughts.

Faulty Mouth Switch Disorder seems to be spreading throughout our society.

My dear friend RS was commenting just last night on how some fellow-moms (and, more irritatingly, non-moms) in her neighbourhood feel free to beak off regarding her parenting skills and techniques. And these aren’t even friends or acquaintances… just random people. Now, I am sure these women mean well. I will not presume that they are meddlesome busybodies or full-time kvetchers or even merely opinionated. The point is, you don’t walk up to a young woman and start rattling off your opinions on parenting and how you feel she is falling short of your expectations. ESPECIALLY someone you don’t know!

Young moms aren’t the only ones are risk. People feel free to express whatever floats through their minds on any number of subjects… politicians, celebrities, the law… politicians and celebrities at odds with the law, etc.

As some of you may know, I am a criminal defence lawyer. Apparently, this gives many people carte blanche to pontificate on what they think is wrong with the criminal justice system. They are almost never informed (let alone rational) opinions. These people put the ‘jerk’ in ‘knee-jerk reactions!’ I try my best to smile and nod and hope they suddenly remember a pressing appointment to which they need to go immediately.

To sum up… No one cares what you happen to be thinking. Seriously. I really mean it. NO ONE CARES!

Thumper’s Mom had it right. Follow her simple rule and you should be fine.

If you can’t say somethin’ nice… don’t say nothin’ at all.

Why I Hate Almost Everyone (Part 7): Household Pets

My aversion to household pets (aka household pests) did not developed gradually over many years like so many of my dislikes. No, this one came upon me virtually overnight.

(You’re not fooling anyone!)

Before The Great Epiphany, I was much like everyone else in that I had deluded myself into thinking that cats, dogs and other such fur-bearing freeloaders were my ‘friends.’ There was a time when I had four (count ‘em, FOUR) cats. There was a time when I couldn’t imagine that any best friend in the whole world could possibly be better than my black labrador retriever.

(Trista: Man’s best friend? Or professional panhandler?)

When the scales finally fell from my eyes, I saw with a chilling clarity that I had been duped by a bunch of cute parasites.

(Chuckles: Yeah, yeah. I get it… you’re cute)

The main purpose… the raison d’être for any household creature… is to eat and poop, get you to spend money on them and have you clean up after them in the process. And in return you get… what? Some feline fleabag rubbing against your leg and almost causing you to fall and get a concussion as you try to navigate your way across the room? A canine con-man who sheds, drools and barks whenever it’s not knocking things over as it clears the surfaces of coffee tables with its tail?

(Who is the bigger freeloader?)

Some pets are more or less easy to understand. People have been mooched off of by dogs and cats for thousands of years. There is at least an element of history and tradition to these deadbeats. Some are less easy to fathom. Rodents, for example. For millennia, Man has been trying to rid his living quarters of rodents. To bring mice, gerbils, hamsters, etc., into one’s house is a slap in the face of progress.

(Copper: What a chazzer!)

While we’re at it, why not bring in lice, cockroaches or bedbugs? I’ll tell you why. Because lice, cockroaches, bedbugs, etc. are not cute. They are every bit as parasitic… just not nearly as adorable as other scroungers like bunnies and pot-bellied pigs.

(If only I could’ve trained Toots or Louise to do this!)

And don’t even get me started on birds. Evil-tempered, nasty creatures who will take a nip at you just as soon as they’d poop on your head (a feat few other household pets can pull off).

(I’m hoping no one drinks from that cup again!)

I’ve noticed that the photos I really like are ones that show these household bums in distress. They really do bring a smile to my face.

(Can you say ‘Schadenfreude’?)

It makes me want to throw a bucket of cold water on a kitten just to see this reaction in real life!

(Now this is just funny!)

It also, I suppose, makes me an evil, wicked, cruel and heartless person. So be it. I am at peace with that.

How Long Will People Find Your Child Adorable?

How Long Will People Find Your Child Adorable?

Not very long at all and certainly not as long as you think, according to a recent study published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. [1]

Psychologists Lu Zhu Luo, Hong Li, and Kang Lee - in China, and at the University of Toronto - recruited 60 men and women and showed then a large sample of children’s faces ranging from infants to 6-and-half-year-olds. The participants were asked to rate each face’s likeability (i.e. how much do you like the face?) and attractiveness (i.e. how attractive is the face?). The researchers wanted to know if younger kids would be given higher attractiveness ratings than older kids - and, if so, at what age does the cut-off happen from ‘OMG how adorable’ to ‘merely cute?’

The answer? Yes, it’s as expected. Men and women rated infants as cuter than toddlers, who, in turn are rated as cuter than young children. The big drop-off in cuteness appears to happen somewhere between preschool and kindergarten. The researchers identified it as approximately age 4 ½.

So why the big drop-off with school aged kids?

It has to do with the change in the shape of the children’s faces.

Infants have a special set of features, such as a protruding forehead, a large head, a round face, big eyes, and a small nose or mouth. As a species, we have evolved to be attracted to these very babyish features and find them adorable. These cues make us feel soft and protective, whether or not we’re biologically related — which increases the likelihood of the baby’s survival. Their cuteness is a kind of self-defence mechanism because, I presume, if parents weren’t reduced to cooing high-talking idiots at the sight of their baby, any rational adult with have tossed the little bundle of trouble onto the trash heap long ago. Good for the parents… but bad for the long-term survival of the species.

Doubt me? Scientific studies have found that infants that have tiny eyes, flat foreheads, and square faces, for instance, are less likely to receive attention.

So, that explains why most people are dippy for babies. What about older kids? And why four and a half years old?

Facial cranial growth is gradual, as is a child’s independence from constant care-giving. Children’s faces lose some of their universal appeal right around the age that they don’t need it anymore to (merely) survive — somewhere around kindergarten-age. Incidentally, this interval — four to five years — is the same as natural birth spacing — when our foremothers would become pregnant with their next baby.

In short, we find kids less adorable at about the age where they are more or less able to take care of themselves to a large extent… and it is also at about this age (give or take) that mom’s are ready for the next child.

So next time you find a baby too cute for words and want to pinch its cheeks… just remember… if it wasn’t for this reaction, you’d probably put the baby on the curb on recycling day.

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[1] A tip of the hat and a huge debt of gratitude to Jena Pincott’s blog for the inspiration and source of much of the material in this article.

Full Disclosure: I am not the kind of person who usually gushes and coos when I see a baby. In fact, almost every time I have an infant presented to me, it is all I can do to stop from saying, “Oh my goodness! This baby… looks just like every  other baby I’ve seen in my whole life!”

There have been exceptions. A certain RLS comes to mind. Yes, the next generation of Stealth Hasidim has begun to arrive!

Stealth Hasidim!

A week ago, my SigOth (i.e. Significant Other) and I were at a hasidic bar mitzvah. Afterwards, we were kindly invited to have lunch over at the bar mitzvah boy’s house. As we were getting to know the various members of the extended family and trying to figure out who was what, religiously, my SigOth asked a married couple if they, like the bar mitzvah boy’s parents and grandparents, were hasidim. They answered that they were hasidim but they were ‘under-cover’… that is, while they defined themselves as hasidim, they did not overtly dress or speak like hasidim. They were, in effect, ‘plainclothes’ hasidim.

It occurred to me that we knew a few people like that. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized that my SigOth and I were also, to a some extent… ‘Stealth Hasidim!’

(Hasidic man with payess and a shtreimel)

You’d never know it to look at us. You won’t see payess, a shreimel or a bekishe being worn… at least not yet… not even a black Borsalino fedora. We look frum, I suppose… but not ‘ultra-Orthodox’ (I hate that term)!

(Hasidic man with shtreimel and bekashe)

So the thought of us being Stealth Hasidim holds an enormous appeal for me!

(Not like us)

For example, we both dress conservatively, but not out of the 18th or 19th century.

(Well, the woman looks about right… but not so much the man)

Aside from a hat (a greek fisherman’s cap, btw, not a black fedora), a yarmulke and a sheitel, I don’t know that a non-Jew would instantly spot us as Orthodox.

(Eeek! Not THAT kind of Orthodox!)

So, Gentile World (i.e. 98.3% of the population out there!), be aware that the nice conservatively dressed people next to you on the sidewalk or the grocery store or the coffee shop may not be who or what they appear. Outwardly, they might be missing the fur hats and side curls and long coats… but inside, they may be not a heck of a lot different from those bearded ‘ultra-Orthodox’ Jews you sometimes see in the movies or on TV.

They may be us! They may be… Stealth Hasidim!

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