The other chemicals involved in attraction, lust and love!

Field Reports & Anecdotal Experience Men's Pheromone Advice & Field Reports
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There are more important chemicals involved in attraction and love than pheromones. Obviously pheros are important to get the ball rolling.

When we first become attracted to someone, our brains release Dopamine and Norepinephrine. The release of these 2 chemicals account for the elation, intense energy, sleeplessness, craving, loss of appetite and focused attention we feel during this period. With men the release of these chemicals happens much faster than women because of our visual nature when it come to the opposite sex.

This proably accounts, at least in part, why men are so nervous to approach a woman he’s attracted to. Women can’t understand this because they usually don’t release these chamicals until they have some reason to become attracted (the man’s intelligence, wit, status, confidence, etc). This is where men seduce women (remember, he doesn’t have to be seduced, he already has dopamine and norepinephrine surging it his system based on her looks). Some men, based on their status in society, will cause these chemicals to be released in women without any work (those bastards). Hmmm, I wonder if those girls fainting and crying in those old Beatles films had any dopamine and norepinephrine in their brains


The chemical brew surging around our brains at this time is very close to that of obsessive-compulsive people. This couldn’t possibly explain stalkers, could it!?

As the relationship progresses to sex, oxytocin is released during orgasm. Oxytocin is responsible for creating emotional bonds and healthy interpersonal relationships. Women release more oxytocin than men during sex, which may explain why they tend to bond much easier at this point in the relationship. This is why men can cut off a relationship so easy after having sex with a woman, it takes men longer to experience that bond. Women also produce a ton of oxy when breast feeding their infant, it seems there is a chemical reason why the mother/child bond is so strong.

As the relationship progresses more, vasoprssin is released. Vasopressin seems to be responsible for long term, monogymous bonds. Some studies seem to imply that vasopressin and oxytocin interfere with the dopamine and norepinephrine pathways, which explains why passionate love fades in about 6 months to a year.

Endorphines are also released during sex. They provide a feeling of well being, and combined with oxytocin provide strong feelings of attachement.

Just because lust, love and relationships are purely chemical (like all emotions) doesn’t make them any less magical.


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Definately an intriguing topic.

http://samvak.tripod.com/lovepathology.html

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Why We Love : The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love by Helen Fisher

The best non-text book written on the subject.

Actually, I meant to post this one,

Anatomy of Love: A Natural History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We Stray by Helen Fisher

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Anatomy of Love is a really good one. I did a presentation on the evolutionary perspective to human attraction in my anthropology class a couple of semesters back, using the first three chapters of Anatomy of Love as my primary source. Very good read. It really gives some good insight on the workings behind human behavior in attraction and love.

The Nature and Chemistry of Love sounds like a good read too…haven’t had the opportunity though.

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with the topics pooling around getting the foot in the door, this was a nice reminder…i enjoyed it …id like your opinion however on why (and it rarely happens but ..) a woman is attracted to someone who -for all intents and purposes- is the opposite of what she wants. is it just the confidence he exudes? status alone? the mention of the beatles is what brought this to mind, because when i read that im like yeah…what is up with that reaction???

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Well if you look at things strictly from an evolutionary/biological anthropology perspective, women are driven, at a biological level, by the desire to nurture life, and will seek a mate who can best provide such means. Confidence, power, status are indicators of a man’s ability to provide…this is why women are attracted to these types of qualities. The more confidence, status etc a man has, the better chance he has of providing an environment that will esnure the survival of offspring. Again this is a very fundamental perspective in mammalian biological behavior, but these are the types of things that women desire in a man at an unconscious, biological level.

Cultural forces, however, often instill perceptions of what is ideal and attractive (things women are consciously attracted to) contradictory of what women are biologically (unconsciously) attracted to. Women say they want a nice guy, who’s intelligent and has a good head on his shoulders etc etc, however, while these are good traits, we can’t discount the influence of the biological forces that drive us. Women may consciously desire some traits, while unconsciously desiring others. Both sides are equally important IMO, however different people are driven by different forces.

Now this is all very much debatle of course, and it goes without saying that not all women are attracted to the same things.

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In general men can be put in 2 catagories (for this discusion anyway), lovers and providers.

Women will tend to pick men that are good providers to form a long term bonds with since they are more likely to stick around and help raise the offspring, but they will tend to be REALLY attracted to (and possibly be impregnated by) the lover type. These are the bad boys, artists, musicians, athelites, politicians, actors, etc of society.

In recent studies, it was found that between 10-20% of all children are not the offspring of the person they think is their father! This is across all cultures and societies. It is good for the species to have this kind of genetic mixing. Women will tend to “stray” with the lover type of man. This is because they will tend to have offspring that are more likely to have offspring (this is actually refered to as “the sexy baby” theory).

More studies have shown that women are attracted to more masculine men (square jaw, pronounced brow, deep set eyes) while they are ovulating and more feminine (probably not the best word) men during the rest of the month. This would tend to support the above paragraph.

Rationally she knows that the porvider type is the best choice for long term, but her evolutionary/biological imparative will cause her to be attracted to the bad boys.

Anyway, there’s a lot more going on in human mating than what most people think.

Check out these facinating books,

The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature by Scott Ridley

The Mating Mind : How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature by Geoffry Miller

The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating by David Buss

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okay, for fun sigma…which one are YOU? intelligent/good head on his shoulders or bad boy ? im interested to know who is who on this forum :smiley:

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great post and thanks for the recommendations… still, my biological imperative is on my shht list :angry: ! hmm are these newer books? i was going to check out borders but the library might have a few…

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Well I don’t necesarily think its that cut and dry. You aren’t either intelligent/good head on the shoulders, or a bad boy. There is a grey area between the nice guy and the asshole where most men lie, each possessing a different set of attributes that set them apart. Being an all out nice guy is self-destructive, for obvious reasons, however being a complete assholes is just as bad. These are two opposite extremes of course.

That being said, no I’m not a bad boy in the sense that I’m not an asshole to women. Women are attracted to men with confidence and a little mystery… NOT assholes. It just so happens that assholes have more confidence than most other men - they could careless what others think. Actually, most self-assured, confident women (the kinds I’m attracted to) won’t put up with being treated like crap. The problem with ‘nice guys’ though, is that if they don’t come of as being needy (lacking the ability to provide) they make things so easy on the woman that there isn’t anything to work for and the attraction never takes off. Treat a woman respectfully, treat her well, but also give her something to work for…give her a bit of mystery to dwell on - this facilitates feelings of infatuation.

At any rate, I would consider myself intelligent in some ways, while having a good head on my shoulders. This is actually a attractive quality to most women when applied properly, though it seems intimidating to some. If anything, a lot women are impressed by the things I’ve accomplished for myself at my age, and it works to my advantage.

Most importantly though, these are qualities that I am confident in, and make use of when interacting with women. David DeAngelo mentions a really good exercise in his book Double Your Dating. Essentially he states that when dealing with women, or any situation you aren’t fully comfortable in, it helps to picture a situation where you feel completely confident, and to put yourself in your mindset. If I have trouble with women anywhere, its always on the approach and initiation, however this practice has eased my nerves considerably. If I can handle giving presentations in a room of 30 or so professionals for my frat, how bad can one lousy woman be right?

Once I get the ball rolling though, its smooth sailing from there.

When I was in high school I was very much a bad boy. I was completely apathetic, got into fights, and was into all the wrong things - I rolled with the wrong people lol. Ironically though, I was a mess with women, and didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I got a lot of attention from the girls back then because of my badboy, apathetic nature, but I was clueless as to how to take attraction further. I think as I grew more intelligent and developed a better understanding of people and their behavior, my skills with women improved considerably. So yeah being a badboy doesn’t neceassarily mean one is good with women either lol.

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There’s a difference between a “nice guy” and a “good guy”.

Not only do nice guys come off as being needy, clingy and have no mystery, when they are being nice, it’s because they have an agenda. When they do something nice for a woman, it’s because they’re trying to get something from her. “If I’m really nice to this woman, she’ll like me and she’ll be my girlfriend (have sex with me, marry me, etc)”.

A good guy will treat a woman with respect if she deserves it, will do nice things for her if he really wants to (not because he’s looking for a reward) and on his terms, won’t give her special treatment because of her beauty.

The problem in modern America is that are so many wussies, that the only prevelant confident guys out there are bad boys. So most women have a choice of being with confident bad boys (who they are naturally attraced to) or needy wussies. Fully integrated men are harder to find than the equivilent woman.

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There aren’t too many places you can go to get trained in high quality adulthood skills. America has a terrific fascination with adolescence, you could say that we are an adolescence fixated culture. We celebrate youth, young love, passionate youthful sexuality, bright shining things, tight jeans, expensive watches, perfect teeth and we fuly expect these things to come naturally, without a lot of training.

We don’t really get education, in the broad classical sense, meaning the full development of the person for participating in life, how to be intensely romantic and passionate in an evolved way while having your feet firmly planted on the ground.

We may play a mean air guitar but we don’t know much poetry… women just go nuts over real men who have a feeling nature to equal their warrior nature. Young guys especially are being seduced into asshole macho postures that might come in handy patrolling the suburbs of Baghdad then prove to be worthless when they find out that organizational dynamics, gaining valuable life knowledge, and generating excellent relationships isn’t like the elimination rounds for being the next Ultimate Fighter… those dudes are amusing to watch from the safety of your HDTV home theater but you want to have one for a co-worker on a sensitive project ? Naaaah.

So what’s option B ? Turn yourself into a Lifetime Television eunuch so Sandra Bullock can slap your little pencil nubbin of a dick into compliance ? You and your corrupted testosterone skanking the communal vibe ? Hit the road, Jack ?

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women inherently know that special treatment because of their beauty (assuming she is even aware of it) means that when when its gone,so is he. have you ever met a trusting stripper? someone like that uses their outer beauty to further themselves, only to fall into the trap that they are nothing when it fades.
everything you said then describes a friend. which isnt a bad place to start if you want anything longer than a month with her.
you both are right on :frowning:

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And a lot of guys who attract women using the asshole approach also fall into a similar trap of distrust and insecurity. Believe it or not a lot of guys put up the asshole front in defense of their pride - they’re scared to get hurt. A good friend of mine used to always say trick the tricks, before the tricks trick you. Eventually his girlfriend at the time, who he was madly in love with, got fed up with getting treated like garbage and dumped him. He later admitted that he only treated her that way because he was scared of losing her. Ironic isnt it?

Playing games to spare your pride/emotions or to enhance attraction isn’t only wise - its a necessity. However, we shouldn’t allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by the insecurities from which these indirect type behaviors take root. Games can only go so far, however, and there’s always some degree of emotional risk that we have to take in order for attractions to progress. Learning how to manage these risks is largely a matter of understanding one thing: timing is everything.

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It seems that the older women get, the less games you need to play that maintain attraction. Over time, women “ripen” and so do men, and you can just be “human” together and have a good time.

Vice versa, young women (who are often very vocal about not needing or desiring games), in reality… require games, with an ample shot of BS for good measure. The bulk of them are like screwed up social robots – the more authentic and “real” you get, the more you are pushed away.

That said, it’s not like it’s their fault – it’s in their genes. What we act on unconsciously is often at odds with what we value consciously.

Lor is actually at a good age to start finding real partners mano-a-mano. Men she can just enjoy “being human” with.

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John Grinder was right about healthy cultures providing healthy behavioral models

Young guys need to be able to observe high quality male identities at various life stages to have some idea of what it means to inhabit high quality maleness. The same applies to female identity.

Where are you supposed to go, what reference point to operate from, what behavioral template to pattern yourself after ?

Today, most gender identity is demonstrated though media channels… and you have to always have in the back of your mind that media culture is often lowest common denominator culture… where immature, narcissistic, extreme, often imbalanced behavior is more telegenic (read: profitable) than elegant, well balanced, socially artful conduct.

The people you love to watch on TV are probably not the people you want to have sitting next to you at a good restaurant. They aren’t renowned for the quality of their relationships, or the longevity of them either.

The plain truth is that high social competence requires sophisticated social skill sets, and those have to be educated in somehow. Get this… there are now “social camps” sort of like the old finishing schools one century ago where the rich and well connected send their kids to master high level social arts… no… not in some run down hotel in the Catskills where you learn to express yourself like “When I was a kid, I was breast-fed by my father.” … unh uhh… think chateaux in the Loire valley where for thirty grand your kid can learn to handle himself like a member of the old nobility…

Or if your existence is geared to the vin ordinaire of life there are still vast resource bases you can log into and develop your skills to an impressively high degree… but you have to make the effort to find the right trainings for you, at this point in your life and you really have to lean in and do the work… teachers cannot magicaly transform you, at most they can show you an efficient way to transfrom yourself.

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Where are we supposed to go, Mr Tac? Alexander technique, Improv, voice coaching, NLP bootcamp. Where after and beyond that?

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/health/HealthRepublish_1671683.htm

Here is another piece suggesting adults aren’t growing up. Perhaps not everything about neoteny is good.

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There’s no simplified recipe. The basic thing is to be as mentally active as possible, constantly challenge your boundaries, always be moving one step beyond the comfy bubble. You quickly notice that we place huge social value, today especially, on being mentally comfortable… so I see endless numbers of folks walking around like soft headed children, vaguely glazed over and ever so comfortable, even comfortable with their mediocrity and discomforts… you don’t see too many wide awake, palpably in the moment humans any more, you will see a good selection of contented adult-children that look like they have just crapped their man diapers and are enjoying the warm moist poo swaddling their butts…:open_mouth: How nasty is that thought ?

On the NLP front you could hit the circuit and study with all the talented masters… it’s a start, not the finish, but a good start at that… each one will have something kind of specific and personal to their knowledge, so Tom and Kim with Essential Skills will take you to their place, Jon Altfeld will take you to his, LaValle and the Bandlerites have their take on life… do enough of it and it begins to cook… like all things you have to push yourself past the mediocrity wall, its the focused intention and the willingness to be in what Grinder calls his “know nothing state” … like be egoless and totally driven at the same time for a while, suck it all in, own it, and change it into your own expression of being… then go forth and take on some other stuff and grow into that… being passive and stagnant in this world is a mortal danger... things are moving too fast, you think you’re on your game and another player from some other realm you never heard of beats you to the punch and eats your lunch… and that sucks.:cool:

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Yes, why is this? Related tangentially to trendy elevation of self-esteem ? The instant gratification of electronic media vs the hard work needed to appreciate more traditional oeuvres?

:o :open_mouth::smiley:

wonderful inspiration and advice. exhausting and sometimes lonely to leave the fuzzy comfortable world behind, but one gets into the journey once the blisters on your feet harden. how does one maintain that state? being around people equally committed to growth helps, but they aren’t so common as one gets older.

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someone help this simple mind understand what the prize of all this “bettering” yourself is getting you… am i to understand that happiness is the result?

im trying to determine how being mentally comfortable has a social value..
what ,in your opinion, should they be feeling about their “mediocrity”? bad? im just missing the point here.