maybe this is jarring for me to say in context here because i inhabit a different vocabulary entirely but i think of all relationships as sexual to some degree. hanging out with the bros? sexual. drinking coffee? sexual. having a toothache? sexual. paying your taxes? sexual
the issue is when you have a monogamous commitment to someone and then you behave in ways that violate the boundaries of your partner – which is something you have to discuss and negotiate together
stoya wrote about this 10 years ago and it mostly holds up imo: “to me, the thing we describe as cheating is lack of respect for boundaries that have been discussed and agreed on, or disregard for a partner’s needs that have been perceived or expressed”
(the oof-y yikes-y part i think is that she then wrote about her relationship with a partner who would then go on to violate her boundaries in the most terrible ways, which is hideous, but i dont think that’s something you can necessarily anticipate before getting into a relationship)
there’s this lady who gave a tedx talk a long time ago about flirting culture in cuba, how everyone flirts with everyone, and it doesn’t have to ~mean~ anything, it doesn’t have to threaten your existing relationships or upend the social order
and i find myself thinking about that in relation to what taleb talks about re: small conflicts vs big ones. like a little silly flirting with friends and strangers that doesn’t escalate, might maybe discharge some of the erotic tension that might otherwise build up and explode?
the important thing though is to be secure in yourself and your attachments and your commitments.
might not seem obviously related but i think this is also the issue with “distractions”. i used to be so anxious about getting distracted, and blame the distractions, n blame myself, but after like 15+ years of beating myself up about it, i came to see that actually “the problem of distraction” is itself a distraction. the real problem is a lack of focus, a lack of security, a lack of confidence, lack of self-knowledge. (mariocastleproblems)
these days i hardly worry about distractions at all, because i know myself better now, I know what I want, I know what’s important to me, I know how I want to live my life. and this clarity keeps me from getting swept up in ‘distractions’, n allows me to enjoy them w/o spiraling
i’ve alluded to this a few times elsewhere, i’m taking my time with it so i dont rush into it erroneously: i think this is also the problem with addictions. IMO its all the same thing, and it’s all so misdiagnosed, misframed, misunderstood, mistreated
the tricky thing about insecurity is that it’s not helpful to point at an insecure person and go “look at you, you’re so insecure”. it’s like telling an anxious person to relax. it typically makes things worse. so oblique strategies are needed
generally speaking we are very bad at dealing with insecurities, both our own and each other’s, and this causes all sorts of spiralling, cascading failures that we have come to take for granted as natural features of the social environment. but they don’t have to be.
(ah man I love it when I encounter past-visa saying the same thing from a different angle in different words, it really strengthens my conviction that i’m on to something here and can make a serious dent in the problem if i persist at it for decades)
circling back to “everything is sexual” i’m reminded of guruka singh saying “look how the flower is horny for the sun!” it’s not sexual energy or horniness that maims people and relationships. it’s neediness. the problem is that many people can’t differentiate the two at all. (“love the way you lie” type mutually destructive patterns)
so yeah if one can’t separate their grabby, desperate neediness from their abundant, cheerful eroticism then it makes sense that one might want some really hard boundaries between themselves and the objects of their needy desire.
here’s the problem: that only makes it worse
if locking yourself up and tying yourself up and refusing to look at the opposite sex (or same if u queer) etc would extinguish the neediness-desire then it would just be done and we wouldn’t have a problem. but the problem persists because it only makes people needier-hornier!!
you cannot win a war with yourself. (self destructive behavior? oh you mean you have violent anarchist rebels protesting the tyranny of the authoritarian tyrant self?) the more u try to impose authoritarian tyranny over yourself, the more vicious and violent the guerrilla rebels of your subconscious will become. they might not act immediately but they will lie in wait for opportunity.
read 100 biographies of a bunch of different people from a bunch of different contexts and eras and you’ll come to see that all of humanity has always struggled with these questions. it’s funny that we never learn.