The 21 Convention 2014, Tampa, FL

I wrote this back in November when I got back to Korea, but haven't thought to post it until now.

A lot has changed since I last attended the 21 convention in 2009.  For one, I'm no longer interested in becoming a professional pickup artist.  But for another, it's as if the convention has evolved itself right alongside my own interests.

The convention is sold as "a panorama event for life on Earth as a man" which seems like a broad, bold claim.  However, in attending this past October, 2014 I learned that there actually is quite a lot to that tagline.

The presentations this year were across the spectrum of topics.  In 2007 it was pickup or shut up.  in 2008 and 2009 things broadened slightly by adding a bit about exercise and diet.  2014 included talks on: dating, proper exercise, managing fear, proper diet, lifestyle, philosophy, social anxiety, the sexual marketplace, attracting a mentor, proper rational thinking, fatherhood, and even social security.  My list may not even be entirely comprehensive, and yet it's easy to see that things have changed since my last visit in '09.  not just that, but my experience of the convention was also entirely different.

This year I took a little time to actually talk with the speakers and attendees, rather than just watch the presentations.  Every one of the speakers was personable and willing to answer questions, and many among them were such accomplished social artists that they made me feel like my questions were not just important, but that i was the center of their world and attention when we talked (ahem, Damien Diecke and Steve Mayeda).

Damien's talk was about dating and understanding how to quantify your effort in such a way as to not miss out on all of the genuine progress you're making.  I recently began an exclusive relationship with my girlfriend and so I listened out of casual interest.  Afterward, I asked Damien what advice he would give to somebody who is not looking to meet new girls but wants to improve things with the one he already has chosen. Damien, leaning forward and listening to me as I spoke like nothing else mattered (or ever could), responded that in addition to systematizing meeting women, he likes also to systematize within a relationship.  Put simply, he schedules out specific small events or things that will make his girlfriend feel appreciated and sexy.  For me this was pure gold - I'm always the guy who can't seem to show he cares enough - and Damien explained that his girlfriends know the timing is artificial and they don't care.  I asked a female friend about it in front of her boyfriend what she thought about it and she turened to him and said she would LOVE if he would do something like that for her.  I'll take that as evidence enough to try.

When I listened to Steve Mayeda's speech, something in it struck a chord in my heart.  it brought to the forefront of my mind a very personal issue that I wasn't willing to share in front of the rest of the convention, and so I approached him after his speech and asked if maybe, just maybe it would be possible to speak with him privately for a moment regarding my issue.  Steve did not hesitate for a second and only asked me to wait until he had an opportunity.  He didn't forget.  A short time later he asked me to sit down with him in a private area outside the convention hall and explain.  Steve listened to my story and heard my problem and related part of his own story and challenges.  He talked about where he is now and how he got there and his knowledge that he is still working to improve.  Steve knew intuitively that I didn't need advice (or at least, I'll credit him with knowing), but rather somebody to just listen and help me be heard.  I know I thanked him, but it bears saying again that I'm grateful for the time he gave to me.

In addition to these, I also had the opportunity to spend a great deal of time with speaker and philosopher Greg Swann.  Greg and I had been communicating over e-mail for several months and he had the good grace and kindness to meet me for dinner one night before the convention.  We talked like new friends and old friends at once, and as the convention proceded, Greg and i had a great deal more conversations and interactions that culminated in what was, for me, a very difficult goodbye.

These are my personal stories of time with the speakers, and I'd be willing to bet that nearly every one of them has some similar story to share about some other attendee to whom they gave their attention, advice, and time without reservation.  This was the first time I saw the full value of being there for the live event and it was, unequivocally, life changing.  That I focused so narrowly on these few interactions gives no credit to the value of the other presentations - the shortest way I can say it is there was not a single presentation that aws not worth listening to and from which I didn't take something valueable.  At the risk of running even longer than I already have, I also want to give a short thank you to Anthony for putting on the event, and to the volunteers who I had the good fortune to meet and spend the majority of my social time with - J, K, B, and A, you guys were a second convention in and of itself.

It was a blast and I hope I can make it back next year.

Girls, take care of your fucking friends.

I thought this was something only college girls did.  Going out to a party "with their girls" and just having a good time.  Really getting in touch with their feminine side by dressing up sexy and flirting around and being the sexual (but not slutty) life of the party.  Bringing men in from all sides and glorying in the attention and power.

Then drinking too much.

Then abandoning their friends.

I have seen literally dozens of groups of female "friends" (with each other) out at parties doing exactly what I say above.  As soon as one of their friends has too much or the emotional stimulation of something grabs their attention harder than their girlfriends, they flit off and leave their friends to their own fates.

Un-fucking-believable.

Tonight was the Halloween celebration night for Seoul and I was out with some friends in Hongdae.  I was having an awesome time and my group was doing great.  I noticed suddenly that some female friends of a girl I've been seeing for the past year, 손님, had arrived at the bar.  I greeted them happily and asked where 손님 was since I knew that she usually went out with these girls when she went out.  They pointed to her, passed out on a bench.

Maybe some people would have let her sleep.  Maybe it was the best idea.  But when I have a friend in that state, I take care of them - and that means getting them water and getting them home.

손님 is a girl I care about very much, but she isn't my girlfriend.  But I woke her up and went and got her water from the bar.  As I pulled her upright and was attempting to get her to drink, her friend comes over and IN A GOOD NATURED TONE (the friend didn't recognize me either because she doesn't know me well or because I was in costume) confronts me about touching her passed out friend.  I say to her, "Do you know who I am?" and explain that I'm 손님's boyfriend (the other friend I recognized in the group recognized me immediately).  I ask her why she hasn't done anything to help her friend and I move to take 손님 outside.  I have to walk her because she can barely stand.  The other friends ghost away.

I get outside and dumb bitch friend confronts me and demands that I have 손님 sit on a farther away bench than I am already taking her to.  I tell her to get out of my way and I'm sitting her down and giving her some water.  She gets up in my face and threatens to hit me.  I told her if she touched me I would slap her.  She starts cursing at me and trying to be a belated good friend (because she's a dumb bitch and couldn't admit she had acted poorly and didn't take care of her friend) to 손님 by trying to get her away from me because she "doesn't know if I'm just thinking with my dick or not." She berates me about stupid shit like how convenient it is I found 손님 like this and how I live in Seoul and it all has worked out so perfectly for me.  I ignored her and moved to deal with the situation by talking to the other friend who approached.  The other friend, the one who knew me, seems coherent and seems to understand 손님 needs to go home.  I asked her to please go inside and get 손님's coat.  She says she will.  Ten minutes later (and a lot of dumb bitch friend being a dumb bitch, of fucking course) she hasn't returned and dumb bitch, trying to regain some lost ground of general intelligence, demands I go inside to find 손님's jacket and purse (which I politely asked dumb bitch friend to do earlier while I was sitting 손님 down and giving her water, but she vehemently refused because she's a dumb bitch).

I go inside and find the other friend WHO HAS GONE BACK TO DANCING AND HAVING A GOOD TIME INSTEAD OF DOING THE ONE SIMPLE ERRAND I ASKED HER TO DO IN ORDER TO HELP HER FRIEND.  She hands me what I find out later to be a random purse and jacket that don't belong to 손님 at all.  A whole ordeal ensues of finding the owner whose purse I have mistakenly stolen (thank goodness it ended up being a girl who was part of the group, and who was equally uninterested in taking care of things until I informed her I had accidentally taken her purse and probably jacket and could she please come out and check and see if it's hers.)

I go out and 손님 starts clinging to me.  She's drunk as fuck, probably going to be sick, but not in any real danger.  She just needs to go home.  Some white knights out there would probably take charge to the point of getting her all the way to her house or a place to stay.  I had other friends who I had abandoned (who were not in any kind of trouble because I'm not retarded) and felt I was already going above and beyond when this lady friend of mine had a whole group of friends who SHOULD HAVE BEEN LOOKING OUT FOR HER! But the friend who recognized me, seeing an opportunity to be irresponsible, took it, and drank too much and ended up in EXACTLY THE SAME STATE AS 손님!  Her boyfriend came out and took care of her right away, because he's a man and not stupid (which doesn't mean all women are dumb, just these ones and every girl who abandons her friends when they need help).

They try to figure out where they will stay for the night while I practically carry 손님 to a cab.  They sit there and puzzle over how to get a cab for fifteen fucking minutes and nobody takes my advice to have one person cross the two god damn lane road and hail a cab from the other side, then have people join it if they stop.  I was sitting with 손님 at the time and she was clinging to me and recovering somewhat.

They finally hail a cab, dumb bitch friend gets in with 손님 (oh I also went to a convenience store and got plastic bags in case she were to get sick in the car, because I think of things further than 30 seconds into the future) and the other two friends who came along bail and go look for more fun things to do.

I could be called guilty here as well because I didn't get into the cab or take 손님 to my house like she was asking me to (dumb bitch friend already made it clear she thought I was a rapist and wasn't to be trusted, despite all evidence to the contrary including her own stupid actions and inability to handle a crisis).   But like I said, to dumb bitch friend I referred to myself as a boyfriend but I am not the boyfriend.  I'm the guy 손님 likes, who also likes her and we hang out occasionally, and I didn't go to the bar with her (she just ended up there with me) and I didn't go out with her together.

In conclusion, women.  Don't be fucking childish dumb bitches who have the loyalty of hungry house cats.  When your friends need you, you should be there, not some guy your friend is boning, not some stranger, and you should definitely not be leaving your friend to deal with it herself when she's fucking incontinent.  This is not the first time I've seen this bullshit and it should NEVER happen.  Have some god damned decency.

The Impropriety of Power

To anybody who may stumble upon this, while it isn't perfect, I believe it should be read.

This is a piece I started working on this past week.  I put a number of hours into it but, as I neared the finish, I realized I missed the mark.  There's simply too much going on in this.  While my intention was to create a realistic dialog between two friends in order to illustrate my ideas about relationships, the message gets convoluted.  This makes sense, because this is how this sort of conversation goes, however if I'm going to write something about my ideas I want it to be focused.  This piece brings in around 11 different themes, and it's possible you could read more into the subtext. At about 10 pages, you can see how I no doubt fail to develop many of them fully.

Having said that, some background information is in order.  I cut the first half page and never wrote the intro to this because it was so unfinished.  I began this as a sort of thought cultivating paragraph with no real punctuation and only vague ideas of the actual full concepts I would delve into.  As i was writing I picked up steam and decided, what the hell, time to start doing it right.  this piece picks up where I started paying attention a bit closer to what I was saying.

****************************

The scene takes place in a bar, two friends have met up for drinks and conversation.  One of them (and it will become obvious which) makes a comment to the effect of "Men just need to chill out and let the girl control things, otherwise there will be problems" in the manner of a joke.  His friend presses him on why he says it and the first man's misgivings with his own relationship come out.  They proceed in question and answer style, discovering the root of the problems in the first friend's relationship and uncovering dangerous and false life and philosophical premises that the first friend has accepted.

The scene opens after the second friend has said, "If you don't believe what I'm telling you is true, and your girlfriend doesn't really like you, then test her."  The first friend asks how and...

(Note: I took notes in Word on some of the things I wrote, they copied in here as the little [D] tags which reference all the way to the bottom of this post.)

“Well you can’t usually do the same things that she’s doing.  For example if she wants you to text her each night, you can’t ask that you text each other on alternate days, you one then she the next.  Though there are probably women who would balk at that.  The result is the same, it’s what she desires you to be or more precisely what she desires the relationship to look like.  This is what most people consider “working it out” or “compromising” by the way  - working together to do what one person wants.  She doesn’t mind sharing some of the burden to make her perfect world, but she’ll be damned if she’ll share any of it to help you be happy in yours.”[D1] 

“That sounds so selfish”

“Of her or of you?”

“Of her.”

“Well it is, in the sense of a child’s selfishness.  A child throws a tantrum when things don’t go their way or, to use my language, when the world doesn’t conform to what they think it should be.  An adult, by my standards, accepts the world as it is and changes themselves or their situation – something won’t become better by demanding it be better.  That requires purposeful action.  Except of course, in relationships where one person accepts that it’s their job to do exactly that.  And hey, if that makes you happy, then go on doing it.  I don’t think it’s possible, but I can’t speak for the whole of the world.  Besides, I don’t think we’d be having this conversation if you were fully happy.  You would have said from the beginning ‘Maybe that’s so, but I’m happy’ and I could say nothing against it.  I’m not arguing against happiness.  It’s your life, and unlike her, I’m not going to demand that you live it my way so I can live out my fantasy of how things ought to be in the real world.”

“Well what are you arguing against?”

“The idea that your happiness is subordinate to hers.  The idea that relationships require the sacrifice of one person to the other.”

“Sacrifice is important.  I can’t have my way all the time.”

“Isn’t that what she demands of you?”

“Of course not.  Sometimes we hang out with my friends and sometimes with hers, we take turns choosing the restaurants or movies, I’m not always happy with her choice but I don’t mind doing it because it makes her happy and I like to make her happy.”

“That’s excellent, I think that’s extremely healthy.  Wanting to make other people happy is what benevolence is all about.”

“So what’s your point then?  You’ve just agreed with me.”

“I don’t see it that way.  I think you’ve agreed with me.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, I just proved to you that not only do I sacrifice in my relationship, but she does too and it makes me happier.”

“Yes, but does it make her happy to make you happier?”

“Of course.”

“Then tell me one major thing that she sacrifices on, for you.”

“Well, she doesn’t like all my friends and feels a little uncomfortable being around them sometimes, but she still let’s me hang out with them.”

“Jesus, listen to yourself.  ‘Lets me…’ ugh!  Really?  Do you need permission?”

“Don’t move the goalpoasts, it’s just the word I used, it doesn’t mean anything.”

“It does, but you’re right.  So she ‘lets you’ hang out with your friends sometimes.  That’s major?”

“Well yeah, she comes sometimes too.  That’s a pretty big sacrifice.  Who wants to hang out with people they don’t like?”

“I agree, who does?  How does she act when she comes out with us?”

“Well she’s amicable.  She doesn’t insult you or anything and she talks to you guys when you talk to her.  Being totally honest she isn’t her normal self.  She’s more quiet and seems to be a little uncomfortable or bored.  When it’s just us we have a great time, she’s funny and we have great conversations.  I think she just can’t relate well to my group but she’s trying to accommodate them into our life.”

“Again with the word choice, whose life are you living?  But anyway, that’s very noble of her.  Have you asked her why she comes to hang out with you and your friends?"

“No.  Does it matter?”

“Yes.”

“OK, fine, I don’t know the full reason but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume it’s because she’s making an effort.”

“It isn’t.  Not at all, and what I’m going to suggest sounds manipulative and low.  You care about this girl so you won’t want to believe it of her, but just take a moment and evaluate this through what you know.”

“I’m not going to listen to you insult her.”

“Nor should you, I’m not going to.  Everything here depends on perspective and what’s happening.  Like if you tell somebody they’re fat it’s an insult unless they’re comfortable with who they are or with who you are and where you’re coming from.  Whatever their feelings about it, it doesn’t change the fact.  Does that make sense?”

“So, you’re saying it’s OK to call people fat all the time?”

“Don’t be a dick.  I’m serious.”

“Haha OK, so you mean that there are facts and things that are real, and sometimes those things are uncomfortable or make us angry.  But that fact that it makes us angry, doesn’t make it an insult.  It just means it’s a truth that we don’t like.”

“That’s the gist of it.”

“Ok, hit me with the facts.  The FACTS.”

“You want to make her happy.  It makes you happy when she’s happy.”

“Right.”

“So how do you feel when she’s out with your friends and she, I’m using your words here, ‘seems to be a little uncomfortable or bored’?”

“Responsible.  Like somehow I’ve messed up and I want her to be having as good a time as I could be.  And I try really hard, too.  I’ll explain jokes to her and ask her opinion and talk with my friends when we’re away from her, asking them to try to help her feel comfortable.”

“You’ve asked me to do it.”

“Right?”

“So you try really hard to help her to have a good time out with your friends, but despite all your effort, how often does she have a good time?”

“Mostly she doesn’t.  When it’s a bigger group and we kind of have our own bubble together because everybody has broken up into their own talking pairs, she has fun.  It’s just around all my guy friends.  But she doesn’t complain!”

“She doesn’t have to.  How do you feel when you want to go out with your guy friends?”

“Alone?”

“Alone or with her.”

“Well when I’m going out alone, honestly I have a great time.  But if I’m not texting her letting her know what I’m doing and telling her I’m thinking about her, she gets pissed off.  And so it kind of ruins my guy time.  Not completely or anything, I still have a good time, but I can’t do it without feeling at least a little guilty.”[D2] 

“Would I still be within the facts if I said that a lot of times you end up on the phone, fighting, and you either go home to deal with it or stick around a bit resentfully?  Dare I say rebelliously?”

“You’ve been there often enough, you know it’s true.  She just misses me.”

“After a couple of hours?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I don’t think you know what you mean, but we can dissect that later if you really want to.  So here are some more facts.  Earlier you said it was a big thing that you guys compromised on, for her to come out with your friends and for you to come out with her, right?”

“Yeah.”

“So what do you do when you go out with her friends?”

“I try my best to have a good time.  Her friends are cool for the most part and I don’t mind being dragged along if she really wants me there.  Rachel is a dumb bitch…”

“Yeah she is.”

“…but I still make an effort to be nice.  And I’ll dance and buy drinks for everybody and try to keep things fun.”

“What if she wants to go out alone?”

“I’m cool with it.  Like I said it makes me happy to make her happy, so if she wants to do something by herself or just with her friends I’m all for it.  Sure there are times when I want to see her, and I say it to her, but if she wants to stick to her plans I don’t resent it.  Not much.”

“Not enough to call her and remind her to be thinking about you?”

“God no.”

“Not enough to get upset and, not demand, but create the impression that the only thing she can do to make it up to you is to leave?”

“No…”

“Do you see what I’m driving at?”

“Yeah…Yeah I think so…”

“Well don’t let me put words in your mouth.  Say it.”

“No, I get it.”

“This is important.  You’re about to name this thing instead of just letting it be a feeling of dread or a vague fear.  You’re going to tell me what it is, not because I told you to, but because you know deep down that identifying it is important to you.  It can’t be something I just explain to you; you have to see it for yourself.”

“OK…If we put it side by side, when I go out alone she gets upset at me and I feel guilty for not making her happy.  Not always, I won’t say always.  When I go out with her and my friends she doesn’t have a good time and I feel guilty.  When she goes out alone I’m happy for her because she’s happy.  When she brings me out with friends I try very hard to have a good time and make a good impression, even if some of her friends - Rachel - are unbearable.”

“Do you disagree with anything you said, as a fact?”

“No, of course not.  It’s all true.”

“Then what does it mean?”

“It means that I’m the only one sacrificing.  It means she doesn’t have room in her life for me to have friends.”

“Do you notice you said ‘her’ life?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you know that when you’re talking about yourself, you say ‘our’ life?”

“Yeah.”

“So what does it mean?”

“It means that I’m working hard to accommodate her life and her friends into our relationship.  I’m working to make things work.  But when it comes to my life and my friends, she just tries to make me feel guilty.  Jesus, I feel bad just mentioning something I heard or did with you guys, let alone actually asking if I can go out.  Oh god you’re right.  I have to ask her.”

“Keep going.”

“You were talking earlier about making me fit her image of what things should be like.”

“Sure.”

“Talking that way, her image of what things should be like doesn’t include my friends and my time.  How could it?  Taking time with my friends, for myself, means I’m either detracting from the perfection of what she wants or I’m creating a possibility that I will take something away from what she wants.  Like if she had toys still and one of them threatened to just up and walk away and do its own thing.  It’s hers so she should be able to play with it whenever and on whatever terms she wants.  In her perfect image of how things should be, I’m on call.”

“What does that make your relationship?”

“Fuck me.  It does not.”

“Don’t hide from this.”

“It means that she treats me like a servant.  It means that to her this isn’t a relationship.  A relationship between equals has to be bidirectional, but I’m the only one giving anything.  I work and I work at it and any chance I get to squeeze something out for myself, if it doesn’t include her she stomps on it.”

“Don’t go off the deep end.  I’m sure she doesn’t mean to do anything malicious.”

“What’s it matter if she means to?  I spend most of my time wondering what I’ve done wrong, and if things are going well I can’t stop wondering when I’m going to be accused of fucking up again.”

“What would happen if you stopped serving her?  What would happen if you demanded that she give you what you want?”

“That’s exactly what she’s doing to me though!  I don’t want to just do the same thing to her.  I’m not a hypocrite.”

“There is an important difference though.”

“In what?”

“In your idea of how a relationship should be, and in her idea of how it should be.”

“Seems to me it’s the same.  She’s demanding that I sacrifice to her, it’s the same thing if I refuse to budge or accommodate her on anything.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“Then what’s the answer?  Honestly I’m too pissed off now to think it through.”

“Your way of doing things doesn’t require anything of her, while her way requires everything of you.”[D3] 

“How do you figure that?”

“You want to make her happy, and while that means doing things together and making her feel special, sometimes it also means giving her space.  Doing things you might not do on your own.  Accommodating her life alongside yours.  But she doesn’t want to make you happy.”

“Is that true though?  I mean, in this situation I guess it is but I don’t know if we can stretch that to everything.”

“Does she hate your friends so much that she wants you to drop us because we’re bad for you?  Do we drain you or make you terrible to be around?”

“No come on, you know you don’t.  Hanging out with you is like taking a mental shower sometimes.  I’d probably be way more pissed off day to day if I didn’t have my friends.”

“So does it make sense that you want her to have friends?  That you accommodate them, you work to accept and enjoy them because you want to make her happy?  And yet she tolerates yours, at best, and makes you feel guilty for wanting to be around them?”

“But what about when she does something nice to make me happy?  Like sometimes I’ll have a hard day at work and she’ll know it, and I come home and she’s got this great dinner made for me.  How is that not her wanting me to be happy?”

“I don’t think anybody would argue that that isn’t her trying to make you happy.  It sounds awesome, honestly.  But you’ve got the tools now to figure this one out.  Think about it.”

“Well…It’s a private thing when she does that…and if you’re right and she wants me to fit the image of her perfect relationship, it makes sense that she would do things like that because that’s the sort of thing that perfect couples are thought of as doing for each other.”[D4] 

“Exactly.”

“So wait, I’m supposed to hate her for doing something that really is amazingly kind, and really does make me happy?”

“Not at all.  You just need to see that that piece of your relationship, while it’s good, is still related to the fact that she’s creating an image of what it ought to be.  Think of all the times she’s been upset at you for not doing something cutesy, romantic or thoughtful.  Now maybe some of those you probably should have done something, I can’t argue that, all I’m saying is that’s the other side of that nice looking coin.  She does it because that’s her image of who you are and who she is and who you are together, and when you don’t do it you’re not conforming to her image.  And that pisses her off.”

“You make her sound so calculating and manipulative.  Like she’s trying to break me down.”

“She isn’t at all.  You’re doing that.”

“Huh?”

“You’re the one breaking you down.  All you have to do to fix every problem that you have in your relationship is to own your desires and have boundaries.”

“But you know that if I did that she’d get pissed off at me for not doing enough.”

“So what does that tell you?  If you’re a person who wants things one way, and she’s a person who wants them another way.”

“That we want different things.”

“Exactly.  It isn’t that she’s a bad person or manipulative.  She has an expectation of what she wants in a relationship, and I’d say it’s probably mostly unconscious.  It isn’t a bad thing that she wants what she wants.  The problem comes up when we get what you both want muddled with the kind of platitude you were saying earlier, about how men should just shut up and let women handle things and then everything is fine.  But it isn’t just a funny thing that people say to each other about the pitfalls of men and women being together.  It’s how people really behave.  You accept that she’s allowed to dictate things, and so does she.  You both act on that.  And you ignore the fact that behaving that way makes you miserable because you think relationships require sacrifice.  So you sacrifice, and you believe that because you’re doing it for her she must also be doing it for you.  And while you’re busy falling over yourself to make her happy, ‘working it out’ and ‘compromising’ and ‘making sacrifices’ to make things come together, you don’t realize you’ve completely missed a fundamental truth about real relationships.”

“Yeah, and what’s that?”

“Relationships do not require the sacrifice of one person to another.”

“Hold on though.  Are you saying that in your relationships, you never do anything just because she wants you to do it?  You don’t make any sacrifices?”

“We have to get nitpicky about language here.  I don’t consider insignificant choices to be sacrifices.  I don’t trifle around with the idea of a ‘small sacrifice’.  A sacrifice is always of something important.  If she wants to watch a comedy and I want to watch a horror film and we go with the comedy, it isn’t a sacrifice.  The choice of a movie is much less important to me than seeing her happy. And I don’t hate comedies, besides.  I don’t mind making concessions and letting her win on choices that have nothing to do with my happiness as a person or my higher values.  But when you look at something bigger, something important, a real sacrifice -  I don’t compromise.”

“Give me an example.”

“I get a new job and it requires me to move.  I want this job, I’ve worked hard for it and I’ve earned it.  But she doesn’t want to move.  She likes her job too, maybe she even makes more than me and she makes the argument that I should turn down the new job because our life here is more stable and better off financially.  If that job is important to my happiness, and in this example it is, I’m going.”

“So you’d just leave her?  Just like that?”

“I’m not a robot.  I’m not saying it wouldn’t be hard.  It would be terribly painful to leave somebody I love.  But ultimately, I know myself well enough to know that I’d resent staying there and missing out on my dream.  I’d hate to leave her but I wouldn’t regret it.”

“What if it was her who had to go?  Wouldn’t you want her to stay?”

“Of course I’d want her to stay.  I’m a selfish guy and I’m living my life to make myself happy and if she makes me happy I want her around.  But I wouldn’t demand that she stay, and I would never use guilt as a weapon to force her hand.  Of course I’d talk it over with her, and if I could find a solution that kept us together I’d jump on it.  But if it was a choice between my happiness and our relationship, I’d choose my happiness and I could never love a woman who wouldn’t choose hers.  What is a relationship for if it doesn’t bring more joy to your life?”

“Why does your happiness have to be separate from the relationship?  That doesn’t make sense to me.  It seems like you’d be making yourself unhappy by leaving behind a good relationship.”

“In the short term, you’re right.  Pain would be unavoidable if she really meant so much to me.  But my relationship with myself has to come before any relationship with another person.  I’ve said it already; I’m living my own life.  A relationship with a woman is an enhancement to my life.   It can never be the purpose.”

“That can’t be completely right.  What if she was the most important thing in your life?  You love your job and you match each other and everything is grand, why then couldn’t she be the most important piece of your life?  The one that brings everything together?”

“She can be the most important person in your life but it’s still your life.  Look at the abysmal success with women ‘nice guys’ have.  They have no life or qualities outside of the fact that they’re nice and will devote themselves to a woman – and probably any woman.  Any man in the world can devote himself to a woman, even to your ideal woman.  And it’s important to mention we are talking about ideals here.  If you’re fine with ending up with somebody who is good enough, but not perfect, then what I’m talking about has nothing to do with you.  I will say that you can be happier, you can find somebody better.  But if you’re more interested in just being OK then I have nothing to offer you.  If you think the goal of finding what is right for your life and your purpose in everything is too hard to accomplish and not worth seeking then what we’re talking about at this point is irrelevant for you.  You’ve got other issues to contend with. 

“But to answer your question, look at your relationship now.  That’s exactly what you’re doing.  She is the most important thing in your life and you’re pushing aside those other things that matter to you in order to please her.  And it is pleasing to her when you do it.  You’re succeeding.  But it’s destroying you.  And if you continue down this path, if God forbid you got married to this woman, the rest of your life would be based on the premise that your relationship is built on now.  That your happiness is subordinate to hers.  But what if you grew a metaphorical pair sometime down the line, let’s say 10 years into your marriage.  You suddenly realize that you’ve been denying yourself to make her happy because she was your purpose.  You do what I’ve said you should and you discover and hold your boundaries and you own up to your desires.  If you’re stronger than her, and she doesn’t leave you, then your positions will have switched.  Now she’ll be the one denying herself in order to please you.  You’ll enjoy it for awhile, but soon you’ll start to wish she would do or say something on her own.  You’ll pray for a spark of rebellion, for her to say ‘no’ to you just once so that she’ll be a real person and not just a doll who does whatever you say and desire.  People have opinions, people have desires and needs, people care about themselves.  What person is there left to love if they deny their self?”

“It’s all very logical and it makes sense from a certain perspective, but look at her now.  She loves me more the more I am devoted to her.  That’s a contradiction to what you’re saying.”

“No, it isn’t.  You said it yourself already.  You want different things.  She wants the man who is devoted to her, whose purpose is her.  You want to live your life and for her to live her life, and for the two of you to do so side by side.  Am I wrong about that?  Am I putting words in your mouth?  You want to have friends, you want to accommodate her friends and you want her to do the things that make her happy even if it doesn’t always include you.  She doesn't.   She wants a servant.  She doesn’t want to love a real person, she wants to love her fantasy and  fortunately for her, those men who are willing to give it to her exist.  Whether or not there is one who can do it happily I don’t know, but I doubt it."

“It’s a contradiction then, because she is able to live that way and be happy.  She is holding to her standards and desires, and she is also demanding that I hold to her standards as well.  Her standards require me to devote myself to her, and I’m doing it, and she’s happy.  You were saying that real relationships can’t have one person who…oh.”

“Oh?”

“It isn’t a real relationship then, is it?”

“Nope.”

“We’ve said all this.  It’s a relationship between a master and a servant.”

“Which is a legitimate relationship, provided the servant is being paid and can leave at any time if conditions are unbearable.  A person who provides a service for a price has the luxury of not becoming too emotionally invested in the person or business paying them.  It might be a little awkward to leave, but few are the people who would hesitate to leave a business that was treating them horribly.  And if they have no other option, well, what does that tell you about the state of that person?  We think business and love are so different because there are things about a person that you can love while overall being very unhappy in a relationship with them.  And when it’s a person you’re loving, not a job, it’s easy to fool yourself into believing that you can work through it.  Good luck giving your employer a list of demands on how you must be treated for you to work together, or compromising with them on their standards for how you’ll work.  You’ll be fired or ignored.  As you should be.  Instead, know what your list of demands requires and find the employer that is willing to meet those from the beginning.  It’s the same with love and relationships.  Find the person who meets your standards, don’t demand that a person change themselves in order to meet them.”

---

 [D1]Something is wrong or missing here.  It just doesn’t fully ring true.  What do you know of the compromises people make in relationships?  I don’t know if anybody would disagree with the example you give later of her treatment of his having friends, but what are some more common compromises?  Also, about sharing burdens, this feels like a contradiction.  Is she not sharing a burden of yours if something terrible happens in your life and she helps you out?

Consider talking about cooperation and admitting when you’re wrong.

 [D2]I’m starting to talk about guilt but I don’t think I ever get into talking about why it’s negative to accept unearned guilt or the orgin of his guilt (accepting the premise that his happiness is subordinate to hers, so when she feels bad he feels guilty for failing.)

 [D3]Could this be rewritten in terms of happiness, “Being happy that somebody else is happy requires only that they make themselves happy”  Or  “It doesn’t take anything from you to be happy for somebody else”

 [D4]There are too many issues going on.  While all of this might come up in a typical advice session and conversation, it’s a lot for a piece that explores my philosophy and ideas.   It’s too convoluted. The ideas at present are:

- your happiness is not subordinate to hers,

-relationships do not require sacrifice,

-unearned guilt

- accepting that a man has duties toward a woman in a relationship particularly pertaining to the power relationship,

-psychological unhealthiness of holding an image of somebody and forcing them to conform,

- having expectations and standards for a relationship rather than trying to build them from a person who may not share them.

-mixing of bad premises creates problems fundamentally

-what she wants isn’t bad, it’s just not in alignment with what you want.

-ideals vs. enough

-nice guys

-denying yourself makes you an unreal person

Drunken Philosophy

About four weeks ago I came home drunk.  The sort of drunk that makes the recollection of details near impossible.  I had recently been rejected by my long time crush (another story), and I was talking with a friend about a mutual friend and his hookups.  My self esteem was low, my defenses were token, and it came out that the mutual friend had hooked up with one of the Korean teachers at my school.  My crush is a Korean teacher.  My liquor sodden brain came to the sudden realization that however unlikely it is that she is the one, it was possible that this mutual friend had hooked up with my crush - who had recently rejected me. I pressed my friend for information.  Who was it?  Not that it matters at all, and the mutual friend isn't here anymore, but, really.  Who?  It's OK to tell me.

He wouldn't, and I managed to keep my composure long enough to say goodbye.

In my apartment I collapsed into jealous rage, just controlled enough to keep me from screaming.  After pacing and talking out loud for a few minutes, trying desperately to throw the drunkenness off so I could manage my emotions comfortably, I turned to my previously most successful therapist.  Writing.  I decided not to limit myself, not to worry about punctuation or clarity, just to get my thoughts out and see what came out.

While most of it was just rehashing of things I had already said to myself in the past or descriptions of sexuality designed to incite me, while simultaneously chastising myself for permitting myself the weakness of jealousy, (Sidenote: Jealousy to me is a feeling of ownership and right.  You cannot have ownership of a human being or their time, you cannot by right expect a behavior or action from another person, and that is jealousy.) there was one particularly insightful section that I wrote.

Here it is, errors preserved with names altered:

And the thing that kills me is that it’s entirely possibl that it’s (my crush).  I don’t give a shit if it’s any other teacher, but(my crush) would destroy me.  If I accept it as truth, which I can’t at this moment because there is no evidence, it would mean admitting that there is no excuse for me to hide behind in (my crush) not wanting to kiss me.  None whatsoever.  It isn’t because she’s Korean and prudish, because she fucked one of the other foreigners (so even if she is prudish, she made an exception which was not me which is also insulting).  It means that she wasn’t just delaying a possibility... 

If I accept as truth that this woman who rejected me hooked up with somebody else, somebody close to me socially (or not), then I have nothing to hide behind.

How profound a realization.  I had thought of a hundred reasons why she may have said no.  I had analyzed it from a dozen different angles, I had tried to think of it only as a factual interaction (I asked, she said no), but the truth was staring me in the face.  If she had hooked up with another person (any other person, ever), then I had no excuse to hide behind for her rejection of me.

Every thought regarding the interaction was a barrier I threw up between myself and reality.  The reality that she just doesn't want me the way I want her. The reality that I would feel a serious decline in self worth if it were true that there were no extenuating circumstance to her rejection of my advances.  That it wasn't the method of the advances she was rejecting, their timing, or even the situation they came during.  But that she was rejecting me.  The reality that I as a person was either incompatible with her, and she could see it and acted accordingly, or that I as a person was not enough for her to consider worthy.  The reality that the choice and reasoning are hers, and no amount of tears or shaken fists gives me a right to demand an alternative.

In order to avoid all of this I put up every conceivable barrier.  I asked advice from male and female friends.  I searched for every available escape from reality and eventually chalked it up to my inability to know the truth.  Where this brought me was proper, considering my actions and thoughts.  Drunk, needy, alone, wallowing in self pity.

She rejected me.  The proper response is action, not rationalization and analysis.  If I still want her, I can invest in myself and work my hardest to become worthy both in my own eyes and hers.  If I decide I do not want her, then I can move on.  These are the only proper actions I can take.

Achieving life is not the same as avoiding death.

The title above is quoted from Ayn Rand.

Something about the way that woman thinks and writes just speaks to me on an entirely different level. I get upset every time I find something regarding philosophy that lists any number of philosophers from Aristotle to Kant and they don't even leave a mention of Ayn Rand.  It's a crime.  I feel about her writing how some Christians must feel about the bible - I've read this, there is no need to go further.  Truth has a certain flavor and I find it so much to my liking that the taste of anything else is bitter and forgettable.

I am in the midst of a dry spell.  It's been approximately four months in the making and I'm suffering for it, and this weekend was the most obvious sign of that.  I went out with a group of friends to a "classy" party in downtown Seoul.  A strictly black tie event at a swanky resort.  It was great going into it, I was enjoying my group and having fun.  But when they herded us all into a nightclubish area, I found my social vibe just disappeared.  All around me there were beautiful women who I would have enjoyed talking to (one adorable Korean creature in particular) and I could not muster the state to approach anybody.

The night even seemed to tip me small favors and I still couldn't commit to even a weak interaction (I had been walking around, going to the bathroom again and again, doing whatever I could think of to try and break my mood short of actually talking to somebody).  I went outside at one point and the exact girl I'd been eyeing all night was sitting alone having a cigarette with her shoes off, alone and bored looking.  She clearly wasn't having the best night either (probably because her high heels were making enjoying dancing a serious challenge).  And all I could must was to sit next to her, pretend to check my phone, then ask if she minded if I left my jacket next to her (only implying that it was her job to keep it safe).  Then walked off to have a three minute fake conversation on my cell phone, hoping the time away would give me the state needed to actually speak to her, and also have a more natural approach after I sat next to her in silence for the first couple minutes.  Of course it didn't.  I walked back, picked up my jacket, thanked her, and went back inside.  Later there were more opportunities, perfect approach openings, and I just left it.

I'd realized I had hit rock bottom when the unnattractive female in my group was talking to me about how she felt about how this had turned into a "typical club experience" and how she wasn't into that.  Clearly rationalizing her discomfort with the situation.  Knowing I felt the same, and knowing how I felt about her value, I saw little reason to stick around.  So I said my goodbyes and got out of there.

Today I felt low-self-esteemy almost all day, but managed to quit Skyrim long enough to go for a bike ride and find some food.  It ended up being a good idea, I enjoy biking through the city and I had a good meal.  Then, a girl who is decent looking and I wouldn't have minded banging called me up.  She does that now and then.  I've texted her like once per week, and she never responds, then she'll call me out of the blue and invite me out.  Anyway she asked me to meet her, so I did and she was with another dude.  He ended up being really cool so we all had a good vibe going, but he had to leave around 11.  She gave him a hug and kept saying how he should stay because he could stay with her (clearly wanted to bang him, but I was thinking "yeah but why did she call me then") and it wouldn't be a problem.  But he left.  So I figured, "We've all been talking about sex all night, she knows what I'm about and she's having drinks with me alone now...game on."  So I decided not to waste any time.  About 5 minutes after he left I tried a late game version of the apocolypse opener and asked her what she was doing later.  Then followed with, "want to come home with me instead?"  And she made me clarify that I was talking about hooking up and not just hanging out.  Long story short, she said no.  I felt bummed.  Walked her to the train station then headed home.

I was feeling bad about myself, then something just snapped.  I picked up a pen and a stack of sticky notes and wrote in giant letters, one on each note, "BECOME WORTHY OF A SELF.  EARN IT." And posted it above my door in my apartment.  I debated on my use of the article "a" instead of saying "your".  But I think I made the right choice.  The idea of saying "your" presupposes that I have a self, and that it is worthy and I'm not living up to it.  But the fact of the matter is, the way I've been feeling and behaving is more in line with a person who is lacking in a self.  A firm one, at least.  And so I made my grammar choice.

I remembered a blogger/musician/artist I had discovered some time ago and was inspired enough to look her up.  Sarah Saturday.  On her archive of short posts I ran across one from Ayn Rand, "Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises.  You will find that one of them is wrong."  It wasn't so much that quote that brought me around to feeling good, but the fact that somewhere out there is a mind that appreciates something I appreciate.  Somebody who sees the value in something I value.  And knowing that that person exists, and that that person also believes in taking care of herself and in EARNING IT HERSELF, gives me the strength I need to stop being such a bitch.

I bitch and moan that I haven't been with a woman for awhile, and I realize that it's becoming a self esteem issue - I need somebody, not just to fuck, but to appreciate me (and this is easiest to find after sex).  But what have I done in the last four months that's worthy of appreciation, apart from being?  Pussies and shit philosophers say that's enough, but Ayn rand tells it true.  Achieving life is NOT the equivalent of avoiding death, and all I've been doing is avoiding death.  Living day to day, decently but not well and certainly not doing anything worthy of being called achieving life.

I dearly hope that this feeling will stay with me.  I know it won't. I'll have to go after it, grab it by the hair and drag it back to my man cave.  But the most insidious thing about this challenge, this enemy, is that it isn't an enemy.  Fighting an enemy who wants to destroy me is the easiest thing in the world.  Even in losing, I feel pleasure and pride in having fought.  But fighting one, that wants nothing of me, that desires nothing bigger of me than that I make it to work on time.  That is a hard enemy to take issue with, to summon the courage to destroy this day and every day.

I promise I shall do what I must.

Life Doesn't Draw to a Close

I'm uncertain where exactly I want to take this post, but the inspiration comes from a conversation I was having with a co-worker on the way to the office today.

His view on life was, in essence, "I'm young now, so I can have fun and do what I want. But as I get older, I'm going to have more and more responsibilities, and less and less of my life will be enjoyable until there's little left but duty and obligation." Further, in regard to marriage, he said he could see himself in a couple years wanting to get married, and most likely to a woman who "probably isn't hot but who I get along with in pretty much everything." God. I'll tackle that in a moment.

I was appalled. It was written all over my face. I could not comprehend how a person could resign themselves to a life of diminishing gain, a life of gradually increased torture. A slow death, starting (implying from his reasoning) around the age of 27, and ending gratefully around 75 or so. What the hell could he be living for in an existence like that? Who the hell could he live for, because it clearly wouldn't be himself.

This view of life is so absurdly common. It's implicit nearly every time you hear the phrase, "Well, you're young, do it while you can" or some such derivative. How can a person wake each day and face that their life is drawing inevitably closer to a monotonous slow death, like water torture as an accepted norm of existence?

I don't understand people who say they want to travel while they're young, as if growing older could somehow stop a true desire. I'm young, and I've traveled, and I've enjoyed it. But I've also learned that I don't really know yet what I want to get out of my wanderlust - that I'll understand more of what I want WITH AGE. All I know for certain now is that I prefer living in a foreign country to visiting one for a week or longer. There isn't some imaginary manager of my life, hovering over me and threatening to throw out my sick days if I don't use them before I've reached 30, but most people believe that.

Pook said it best, paraphrasing, the difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is the former invests his time, while the latter spends it. The successful person plants the seeds of talent, of wealth, and grows them over time making their life easier and more fun as they grow older. The unsuccessful person spends it all and has nothing in what should be the glorious twilight of their lives.

Nearly any person I've ever come to know fantasizes about their final days and nights. The final day in college, the final night at home before leaving on a trip or joining the military, the last time you see your love. But nobody fantasizes about their final years as a joyous conclusion to a life spent moving toward your highest values and desires. They see it like the plot of a movie that peaks to early, and drags you with it to the end, leaving only a sigh of relief when the credits finally roll.

Disgusting.

About his view on marriage. I asked him, sincerely, if his is a view that many other share. I truly believed that nearly every person who makes the colossal mistake of getting married does so with honest intentions and as a true error in judgement. Not willfully stepping into mediocrity or worse. He said he doesn't know, but I suspect it isn't so uncommon. Seriously. I can't even bring myself to tear this apart any further than it does itself. It's just so fucking stupid.

I don't claim to live an ideal life. I do claim to desire one, and I do claim to be making decisions in that direction. And it is an upward direction.

Visit the Official Atlas Shrugged Movie Web Site!

Gawd

I read my old posts and can hardly recognize that it's me. Wow. Got to get back some of that, and combine it with the good stuff I've got going now.

Becoming Your Parents - an ode to me?

A quick update on me and my situation.

I've been dating Umma for the last few months (Umma means mom, by the way, not older sister. She claims she said Nuna that first night in the club. Whatever.) She's a great girl and I like her a lot, and I'm still enjoying sex with her which is uncommon for me this late in the game. It could be because we can only see each other on weekends, so the lack of being together all the time keeps things fresh, or it could be for any other number of reasons.

I'm not dating her exclusively, however (much to her chagrin), which brings me to the reason for writing today and the topic I want to explore a bit.

I was talking with my mom on Skype, and found myself completely uninterested in what she had to say - I was browsing facebook while she talked and basically ignoring her. This happens almost every time she talks to me, about almost any topic. Then my dad, while I'm interested in talking to him, very rarely has anything to say that isn't unasked for advice and I find myself not wanting to hear that either (the difference, I think, is my dad now strives to find topics other than advice on which to speak, while my mom still does the same things that bore/annoy me).

It isn't that I don't love or appreciate them, far from it, I'm just having trouble with them as of the last year or so. Perhaps because I'm moving on and becoming my own man. But I digress.

Looking at their relationship, my dad barely even fakes patience with my mom anymore if she tries to get in on one of our conversations. He gets a look in his eye like "Oh gawd.." and then proceeds with an "anyway" once my mom finishes her say. Their relationship is, in short, everything I don't want in my life.

In my experience in the world and almost everything I do, my strongest motivator for self improvement or in changing or shaping the direction of my life has been to see models of what I hate in other people or their behavior, as well as having powerfully painful experiences.

I really like Umma, but there are a few factors that keep me from involving myself in an exclusive relationship with her. In high school, a friend of mine had the most codependent, needy, insecure, explosive and unhealthy relationship with a girl that I could ever imagine. In it I discovered some of my many rules by which I govern my life - never apologize for something over which you have no control, as an example. I held such ire for the relationship that I molded ways to shape my life and future relationships that would never allow me to enter into such an awful, and as I saw it soul destroying situation. To this day I have not had anything near to that level of chaos.

Another factor was my break up with my first girlfriend. Using my newly acquired rules and model for everything I hated in my friend's relationship, I molded my first relationship into something more desirable. We never fought, rarely argued, never -until the end - had any "emotional talks" which my friends were constantly mired in and hated (the talks being the girl complaining about how the man doesn't care enough and needs to do more, or bitching about trivial things). But as I drew toward the end, I realized I needed more.

Emotionally I wanted nobody else but my girlfriend, but sexually I wanted everybody but her. I could not be in a relationship with her any longer and not cheat or make her miserable with my constant icy lack of desire for her. I broke up with her, and it was the single most emotionally painful experience of my life. Since then, I have not had a breakup of that magnitude, and often times the girl and I just drift or go different ways in life, and come back to find there is still some spark for each other, some piece we can still play with if we desire.

The final factor is my parents. In asking my dad why he chose my mom to marry, one valentines day a couple of years ago, among many words carefully chosen to disguise meaning and bland acceptance, I remember these in particular, "One day, you'll find a woman with...enough of the values and qualities that you appreciate." I couldn't believe it. He had actually said 'enough.' My father, veteran of an over 30 year marriage, had just confessed to settling instead of striving for what he really wanted.

The result of that kind of attitude? As much as I love and respect him, and as far as he has come in life (wealthy, occupationally successful, viewed as successful in family for having a seemingly stable marriage and three children, big house, a few cars, etc.) if I gauge his success by happiness, he has failed. His life consists of going to a job he hates, facing again each Monday like he's going into a battle he never wanted to be part of, coming home in the evening, having dinner, maybe watching a movie rental or some TV, then going to sleep and doing it all over again. He spends the large amounts of money he makes on home improvement projects. New furniture, a remodeled staircase and fireplace, etc. and only gets pleasure from those when other people admire them or notice they've changed (gone in a year when every friend has seen it and new people don't always comment).

His greatest happiness, outside of his pride for his children which I see glow more strongly in him and am thankful for, is going to some family owned land out in the mountains and being in nature. Hiking, fishing, hunting, etc. The problem? He can't share it with my mother because she gets bored out there. As she ages and continues to eat body destroying food (a sin I'm guilty of as well) and dogmatically holding to the idea that pilates is superior to HIT as exercise, her body degrades and as basically falling apart. She constantly has knee and joint pain so any sort of demanding outdoor physical activity, demanding beyond walking a short distance, causes her pain. She enjoys theater and dancing (though I wonder how much dancing she could do in her state) and things of that nature. She and my dad are complete opposites, interest wise.

And yet, people always say, "As much as you try not to, you're going to be like your parents." Perhaps repeated patterns like that of my parents' relationship are what is thought of when the phrase "sins of the father" is used.

I think that's a crock of shit, in my case. Of course I'm like everybody in saying "I'm not going to make that mistake! durp dee durp dee dee!" but I'm the only person, the ONLY person who I've grown up with and met (other than through some mutual area like the PUA community which has a number of guys like me) in my travels through life who has changed his behavior and reshaped his life when I've come into contact with things that come close to destroying me or that I despise.

When it comes to marriage, I avoid it like the plague while more and more of my friends get married or engaged. Everytime I bring this up with people who talk of marriage, if they're older it's always the same response, "You're just young, you'll get to an age where you're ready to settle down, blah blah blah." I'm 23 and I hear this from 25 year olds, as if being 20-30 out of a hopefully 70-90 year life (18 or more of which spent in the shelter of your parents) is enough to experience and drink in all that life has to offer.

As a side note, the most recent of those seasoned life livers (25 years old) left Korea to get married and has now broken up with her then-fiancée.

I need also to take myself down a notch. The predominant purpose of my philosophy and guiding principles in my life has been the avoidance of pain, but very few of my major decisions have been in the pursuit of pleasure.

From this point forward, I have a new life goal and guiding principle.

My goal is to continually ramp up my effort to make decisions that are based on the pursuit of pleasure, and not the avoidance of pain.

Of course I'll still recognize that the avoidance of pain has brought me a long way, and there are decisions that ought to be made in that way, but the goal stands.

It is vague for now, but I'll tweak it.

First Korean Date

I've been in South Korea for the last month and a half, and will be for the next 11 months. It's lovely, so far.

Last night I had my first date with a Korean girl.

From what I've gathered from talking with Koreans, doing a little research on the side, and my own observations, the dating culture here is nothing like it is back home in the States. Well, it's similar, but moves a pace that is MUCH SLOWER than everything back home. That isn't to say that an extremely gifted lady's man couldn't make things happen fast, but it's going to be a different, perhaps harder road.

First off, Korea is a very patriarchal culture. Despite what feminists want us all to believe, the United States is nothing like this. Women are actually treated differently by the boss than men, they have different social rules applied to them (e.g. women who smoke in public are looked at with scorn, the girl I took out was rejected by a man because she told him it was OK if he smoked because she smoked too), and have a completely different mindset when it comes to sex and dating. The family is very important, and so many women are genuinely dating to find a husband, and it is considered shameful in some circles to not be married by your late twenties. Marriage is a major life goal of many women.

In regard to sex, any sort of touching or kissing before several dates have passed (I've heard tons of different numbers, from a couple dates to a couple months before it's OK) is considered, for lack of a better word, slutty. A Korean friend of mine explained it in limited English by saying the girl just does not know until then if your feelings for her are genuine.

Enough on culture. I met this woman, "Um-ma," in a night club in down town Seoul. She looks perhaps 23-25, very petite, short hair, and has a set of girly adorable mannerisms juxtaposed along side a genuine "don't give a fuck what you say" attitude that I'm drawn to irresistibly. However, when we asked each other's age (common in Korea because it helps people decide how much respect to speak to you with - Confucian culture) she told me she is 32. Whoa! She said, jokingly, that I should call her Um-ma, which means older sister.

I approached her while looking for my friend's glasses, and discovering that she spoke good English, started talking to her in what way I could in the loud night club. I asked her for a mint, and then moved us to a less loud area of the club. I was surprised she was so willing to follow me after such a short interaction. We talked quite some time, at one point I left the club not intending to come back after we exchanged facebooks (I only just got a phone), but I did come back and we talked some more. I was the only person who had commented on her rain boots as "ridiculous" and she seemed willing to let me touch, move and rearrange her posture to fit what I wanted.

After awhile, I convinced her we should talk some place else and we left the club together. We held hands and walked around in downtown Seoul, just talking and getting to know each other. That night I told her I would call her as soon as I got a phone, and would send her an e-mail asking for her number. When we parted, I hugged her and gave her a kiss on the cheek. She only weakly hugged me back and did not kiss me. I took this as a sign of Korean culture and not any sort of disinterest.

I called her up later that week, we made plans, and we met up last night in Seoul at about 7. We did not hug when we met, it felt like it would have been forced and somewhat awkward. We walked around a really neat district, just talking to each other and enjoying each other's company. Then stopped at this restaurant to eat some of this ( http://lorencz.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/800px-korean_chicken_soup-samgyetang-01.jpg ). Very delicious, if a bit expensive. She offered to pay her share, but I told her she could pay for the next place. I was told it was bad manners not to pay for your date in Korea, but much of what this girl said to me seemed very disillusioned by much of Korean culture, especially in regard to dating customs and social norms (she smokes in public!).

We walked around a bit more, talking and talking. A lot of my humor was lost on her because it just doesn't translate so well, and she would often respond logically to some of my jokes - One thing I do sometimes back home when somebody talks about a weird quirk or fear is to assume a faux Freud accent and look at them seriously and say, "Tell me about your mother!" but Um-ma responded by actually telling me about her mother. She has such adorable mannerisms, like when something excites her, or if she finds her way when looking for something, she will skip one step, or the pitch of her voice gets higher. Such a cutie.

She took me to the waterfront and we went up into a cafe for a waffle and a milkshake. It's adorable watching any Korean use a knife because they don't ever do it (if they have long noodles or a big piece of meat, they cut it with scissors. Seriously). So after she struggled enough cutting the waffle, I took the knife from her and showed her how to use the teeth and saw through the food, busting on her a little, and then I forked a piece and tried to feed it to her. She refused and got embarassed, playfully, but I persisted, treating her like she was the young one of the two of us. She conceded at last and held my hand while I delivered the food. When there was only one bite left, she told me when she was young her parents used to tell her "the last bite is for the youngest" and so she forked it and tried to feed me, laughing at my age. It was probably the best few moments of the night.

We were out too long for me to catch the subway home, but I have a friend who lives near where she does, so she said I could come with her to meet her friends while I waited for my friend to call me back. He didn't call back for a couple hours, so I ended up at a bar having drinks and talking with Um-ma and her two cute female friends, who were already well drunk by the time they showed up. I got a hold of my buddy and he said I could stay, but i wasn't ready to head to his place. The friends insisted that Um-ma and I sit next to each other, which in Korea is what couples do, and at one point one of the friends said I could go home with Um-ma and she wouldn't mind at all. The two friends talked to each other in Korean, and Um-ma and I sat close, touching each other and listening to a shared pair of headphones while talking. She ended up pretty tipsy (extreme light weight) and was ready to get out of there.

I got up with her and took her downstairs to get a taxi, and she said "It's OK if you come home with me, tonight." Normally I would take this as a surefire invitation for sex, but this is Korea, and nothing is as it seems. She took me to her place and told me just before we got there that she had a roommate, but she works the nightshift and wouldn't be home. More good signs?

We walked in to her apartment, which was spotless and yet she still apologized for the mess, and there was her roommate, flopped over on her bed, passed out with her bedroom door wide open. No matter, we went into Um-ma's room and got ready for bed. She wanted to shower before getting into bed so I waited for her to return (again, I'm made somewhat unsure by Korean customs of how I should behave, and decided this was not a green light). She did, with nothing but a towel on, then put on a long night shirt that made her look like a little girl, with no panties on underneath. She put on some boots of hers and did a short model walk for me, which got me very excited. Then she took them off and climbed into bed with me.

We cuddled a few moments, me deciding if I should just act on my desire and relieve her of any responsibility, before her phone rang. It was the roommate. PISSED OFF that Um-ma had brought home a guy. They texted a few times before Um-ma got up saying "she had to do something about this" and went out to talk to the roommate. 10 minutes later, after some heated argument in Korean, Um-ma came back and told me that I had to leave. She apologized profusely, but would only explain her roommate's agitation as "a Korean thing" and started ranting about how sometimes she hates and doesn't understand Koreans.

I pulled her into my lap and held her for a few moments, told her everything was OK and I could call my friend, and that she need not be sorry. I had told her about being into Jujitsu earlier in the night, and I held her close and pulled her down onto the bed and whispered "this is Jujitsu" jokingly. I pointed to my cheek, she went to kiss it and I turned to steal a kiss on the lips. She caught me and pulled away coyly, and I gently pulled her in for a kiss on the lips. We hugged again, I dressed, hugged her again and kissed her cheek at the door, and left.

I had an hour and a half to kill before the subway opened (it was 4 am) so I just walked around her neighborhood till I could leave.

What a fuckin' night.

The Experiment With Celibacy

This is all old news for me, but I wanted to put it down here for posterity.

Back in September, I was laying on my bed reading when a sudden idea came to me. What would my life be like if I wasn't always trying to get laid? I was shocked to discover that this notion was revelatory and I had never once considered it before. It filled me with a sense of excitement like at the prospect of a serious but surmountable challenge, and strangely, a sense of an almost erotic calm.

I slept on it, and then decided to enter into what I have been referring to as "The Experiment."

I wrote myself a list of rules. No chasing women, in any sense of the word, no sex, no kissing, no spanking girls as they walk by, no sexual contact of any sort. I defined all of these rigidly and left no loopholes for what I knew later would be my rationalizing mind getting a hold of The Experiment and inventing ways to get out without failing. I was also to keep The Experiment entirely to myself. I wasn't doing this for attention or for other people in any way, so they need not know.

I wrote a series of things I would have to do in order to demonstrate my commitment to the Experiment. Among them: deleting girls I had been aching for from facebook and myspace, removing all female contacts from my cell with whom I had any sexual interest or could ever see myself having interest in, and deleting my long cherished folder of naked pictures and video of various girls I've been with.

Clearly, I was serious.

The night before I began, I was having a conversation with the girl in this post and she said to me, after hearing all I had to say on whatever it was we were chatting about, "Maybe you should just take a break from women." I almost cried hearing it. I felt visible in a way that I've rarely experienced. That night we slept together.

The following day I signed my contract. The Experiment was to take shape over three phases and I was supposed to keep a journal each week, chronicling my progress. The first phase was the total celibacy described above, which would last from September to Thanksgiving. The second phase was to forbid myself to chase, but to allow hookups - no sex. If a woman made it clear she wanted me, or threw herself at me, I was permitted to have her provided we didn't sleep together. That would last until spring break, at which point I would enter the final phase, where the only rule was that I couldn't chase.

In my first stint of celibacy, a lot changed. I found myself less anxious overall, less worried about women, less worried about how I looked or presented myself (which isn't to say I became a slob, I just didn't fret over a wrinkle in my shirt before going to a party as I might have before). It was liberating. And then I failed for the first time.

My contract stipulated that if I failed, I was to withdraw from the experiment. One night I was at a friends, drinking with him and his attractive and interesting roommate. The time wore on, we all got more and more drunk, and finally, as I was leaving and my friend had already gone to bed, his roommate came down from her bedroom and said, "Dasani...you want to come upstairs and...talk?" I pondered for only a moment before telling her yes, I would like that. I wanted to see if I could hold out against temptation, which made for a differently sexy experience, of her trying to get me and me saying no and her apologizing for broaching my barriers. Interesting.

However, I relented, and we slept together. I decided to stay in The Experiment.

I failed a second time. Going to an old FBs house to drop off some books I had borrowed, I had to come in through her unlocked side door because she had not answered her phone. I found her, asleep on her bed at noon - she works the night shift - and so I crawled in next to her. She turned to me and I got a view of her near perfect breasts in a tight gray undershirt and couldn't resist. I started feeling her up, and as she got excited I told her we couldn't do anything but touch a little. And then I convinced her to get in the shower with me.

What followed was one of the most erotic, sensual experiences of my life. While my experiment had started out with celibacy, I was learning more in the realm of sexuality than I had imagined possible. I would pull her to me, roughly grabbing her breasts and whispering in her ear. She would thrust back into me and beg for me to fuck her, but in my twisted sense of loyalty to my promise to celibacy, I told her that we could only touch like this.

We showered for what must have been an hour and a half, washing each other, feeling each other. Wanting. Unable to sleep with or fool around with her, I experimented with other halfway options. I had her lie in the tub in front of me and finger herself while I watched. I tried talking dirty in a loud voice instead of my usual throaty whispers. We were both spectacularly turned on. And ultimately, I couldn't resist pushing a little further. I had her kneel in front of me while I jerked off and blew an enormous load on her face. She didn't even flinch.

I went the rest of the way to Thanksgiving without breaking again, and shortly into the second phase of The Experiment, I quit. I decided I had nothing to learn from simply denying myself sex but allowing hook ups.

As I write this and see it all in front of me, thoughts put to words, I realize just how much I did learn, and how little I know of sexuality. I'm too often complacent with just having sex, getting it over with and adding a notch to my belt. There's so much more to be enjoyed and experienced.