how important is attractiveness for men in a relationship?

[LoveandPurpose]

I'm in my first relationship since about 2 months, being 20 years old.

Since the beginning something is nagging me: I don't find her extremly beautiful and I find other girls prettier. 

Yet, I absolutely love her personality. She's perfect in that way. But since I feel like I'm a perfectionist I also want my girlfriend to be very pretty.

@Leo Gura said in his video "Why men cheat" that looks are the most important thing for men and the personality is just the cherry on top. That made me feel very depressed because I felt like I would lose her because of some lack of attraction (only her face, I love her body), something outside of my control.

 

Is what Leo said true? Can I save my realtionship? I really want to because i feel like it's just my ego wanting perfectionism and deep down I genuinely love her.

[Sirius Orion]

1. Focus on finding your higher purpose, your hero's calling (that may take a couple of years if not a small decade): a man is defined by his purpose, it should come before anything else. Relationship is feminine energy, a man (let alone a 20 yo one) should never bring this topic first nor make it his priority. When you have a deep, clear and strong sense of purpose women will be almost magnetically drown to you, I guarantee ! (and the irony is that at this point you won't even care !)

2. Build yourself up, Build yourself up, Build yourself up ...

3.Read/listen (with a humble but critic mind) to :

>David Deida

>the RSD guys (Owen mostly)

>Corey Wayne 

 

Answer to your question will come by itself ... good luck !

Edited September 20, 2019 by Sirius Orion

[Ananta]

6 hours ago, LoveandPurpose said:

I absolutely love her personality. She's perfect in that way. But since I feel like I'm a perfectionist I also want my girlfriend to be very pretty.

Looks fade... personality doesnt.

You need to decide what's more important to you. If its looks, then let her go find someone that "will" think she's very pretty and love her the way she deserves to be loved.

...she probably wouldn't want to be with someone that doesnt think she is good enough for them or should I say, I wouldn't.

 

[LordFall]

I mean, biology is a real thing. I'd say figure out if your partial lack of attraction to her is authentic or it's just insecurity on your part(deep down you find her cute and you know there's nothing wrong with her but you feel like you have an image imposed on you of what a girl is supposed to look like or you think your friends are gonna judge you type thing.) 

If it's the latter and you really feel like you're settling in your attraction, then do you and her both a favor and break up with her. A clear feeling of settling leads to resentment on both sides really and probably cheating and micro toxic behaviors that ruin relationships. 

 

@Anna1

 

 

 

 

2

19 minutes ago, Anna1 said:

Looks fade... personality doesnt.

You need to decide what's more important to you. If its looks, then let her go find someone that "will" think she's very pretty and love her the way she deserves to be loved.

...she probably wouldn't want to be with someone that doesnt think she is good enough for them or should I say, I wouldn't.

 

You're right but also wrong. There is nothing that says that these things are mutually exclusive. You can value looks and personality highly and frankly, you should. I don't believe it to be a superficial thing, it's a beautiful thing to be wildly primally attracted to your partner and want to jump their bones every time you see them and also be able to have deep conversations for hours on end and just have a good time enjoying your presence because you're in love with their personality. 

I think a big part of what ruins relationships is, weirdly enough, lack of standards. It's fine to expect a lot out of a romantic partner and in fact, you should. Just be confident in what you bring to the table and make sure it matches your expectations. If you expect the world out of a girl, you better be providing the world straight back to her. If you're gonna commit such a big part of your life to them, don't pick someone you're wishy-washy about. Pick someone you admire, respect and could list endless qualities too and someone that you find attractive in almost every aspect is definitely part of that. 

[Ananta]

@LordFall I meant, if looks "over-ride" everything else, then....let her go 

She deserves a guy that will love her as a total package! If it's not him, so be it.

Edited September 20, 2019 by Anna1

[Ananta]

And, what I think would be really wrong would be for you to string her along for months, because you love her personality, then eventually end it, because of something regarding her looks. 

Just my female 2 cents!

 

 

 

 

[LordFall]

I'm 100% with you on that. This could just be me though but I feel like you're being a bit judgemental of someone having looks(which really just means biological attraction) as a high priority on their list. Would you personally settle on a partner that doesn't meet your personal criteria of attractiveness for the sake of personality? 

To me, both are almost as important. If the poster had said that he finds his partner really attractive but he doesn't connect with her much intellectually, my advice would've been the same just in reverse. 

[Ananta]

@LordFall your not understanding that what I'm saying is going off what HE said about her looks. Why is she his GF if he doesnt think shes very pretty and looks are that important.

See? 

I don't make looks equal to personality. I had a BF in junior high that was not very attractive (lol), but his personality was the bomb, so it didnt matter much to me.

 

Edited September 20, 2019 by Anna1

[DrewNows]

6 minutes ago, Anna1 said:

your not understanding that what I'm saying is going off what HE said about her looks. Why is she his GF if he doesnt think shes very pretty. 

Perhaps she’s insecure (shy and needy). This is the other side of the coin 

Looks and personality compliment eachothee in such a way, they actually grow off each other 

Edited September 20, 2019 by DrewNows

[Ananta]

3 minutes ago, DrewNows said:

Perhaps she’s insecure (shy and needy). This is the other side of the coin 

Well, he said, "I absolutely love her personality. She's perfect in that way."

[DrewNows]

21 minutes ago, Anna1 said:

Well, he said, "I absolutely love her personality. She's perfect in that way."

Right im just saying the focus is wrong as said beautifully by @Sirius Orion

But He’s young, personally, I think experience is good and helps one learn about who they really are and want. Life is full of sacrifices, the key is learning how to make the right ones rather than following the herd 

[Ananta]

@DrewNows Oh, okay

 

[Emerald]

9 hours ago, LoveandPurpose said:

I'm in my first relationship since about 2 months, being 20 years old.

Since the beginning something is nagging me: I don't find her extremly beautiful and I find other girls prettier. 

Yet, I absolutely love her personality. She's perfect in that way. But since I feel like I'm a perfectionist I also want my girlfriend to be very pretty.

@Leo Gura said in his video "Why men cheat" that looks are the most important thing for men and the personality is just the cherry on top. That made me feel very depressed because I felt like I would lose her because of some lack of attraction (only her face, I love her body), something outside of my control.

Is what Leo said true? Can I save my realtionship? I really want to because i feel like it's just my ego wanting perfectionism and deep down I genuinely love her.

The thing to understand here is that the initial stages of attraction and the deeper aspect of the relationship are very different. But since you're very young you've likely only experienced the former and not the latter. And that's normal.

So, when Leo spoke about looks being the most important thing and the personality being the cherry on top, he's talking about relative to the initial attraction phase. Men are attracted primarily by physical signifiers primarily, and are attracted to lots of women. Women are attracted primarily by their feelings of chemistry with the man, which is heavily contingent upon his personality.

But if the relationship is to become real and fulfilling, it must evolve past that initial phase. And the concern for looks must (and will naturally) fade gradually into the background the more real it becomes.

As far as the deepening of a relationship goes, intimacy is the number one thing. It's about growing the relationship deeper and deeper and holding space for one another.

So, if you have a relationship based primarily on looks, all women will eventually lose their good looks. You're 20 now, and you're probably feeling that forever youngness vibe of dating in your early 20s. And you may not be aware of this because you're around a lot of women your age. But for women, looks will always depreciate. For men, they will depreciate too... but a little bit slower.

So, if you base a relationship on looks as the primary thing, be prepared for a life of swapping out your girlfriend every five or ten years or so for the younger model just to recapture a relationship with that aesthetic drug of female beauty. And be prepared for the relationships to be shallow and unfulfilling, as a woman's looks will never sustain a relationship. The Coolidge effect will set it and the limerence phase will end. And even if she's the hottest chick on the planet, you will grow used to her and other women will look hotter.

Now, you're very young. So, it may be the case that you're not ready yet to move on to the deepening phase of a relationship. You may be more interested in getting new and exciting experiences with many women, which is perfectly valid. Most young men are not ready to really open their hearts until their mid twenties. It's all about the penis before that, and it's just a developmental stage to grow through. And it's important to get it out of your system, as you will likely have a harder time giving up what you've never had when it's time to settle down with someone.

So, it's important to really know what it is that you want. If you're focused toward a deeper relationship, you'll go with a woman that you're drawn to in both regards (attraction and compatibility)... and you wouldn't be focusing elsewhere. If you're focused toward excitement and experience with many women, you'll always be looking elsewhere in any case.

Now, potentially what happened is that you got into a relationship with someone you weren't attracted to and didn't have chemistry with in the first place.

This can be a problem as primal sexual attraction has the function of bonding two lovers together in the initial phase, which is the seed of the relationship that everything grows from. The heat of the initial phase of a relationship certainly has a bonding function, even though it cools down rather quickly by its nature.

You have to be able to read your sexual and platonic chemistry with a woman before dating if you want a deep relationship for this reason. You must integrate your feminine side to open your heart and access your intuition which will tell you clearly who you fit with. And be in touch with your animal instincts to know who you have sexual chemistry with. 

But this is a maturity process. So, don't expect yourself to be older than you are. You're 20, and it's probably healthiest for you to experience a lot of what sexuality has to offer. Do it all now, so that you can see the emptiness in it and lack of fulfillment. And you can easily let it go when you're ready to settle down with a woman in 5 to 10 years. That's my 2 cents.

 

 

[Leo Gura]

11 hours ago, LoveandPurpose said:

Since the beginning something is nagging me: I don't find her extremly beautiful and I find other girls prettier. 

In practice you're gonna have to settle for some compromise. You're never going to find the perfect package. Try to make a list of everything you want in a girl, then rank it from most to least important, and then be prepared to only get 60-80% of that list (if you're lucky).

There will always be hotter girls. Attracting and maintaining 9s and 10s is very difficult in practice. The chances of attracting a 9 with a great and suitable personality is very low. And of course looks will fade too.

Perfectionism here will be disastrous.

But also, you gonna determine if she meets your basic quality standards. Otherwise you will never be satisfied with her and she will sense that off you, and it's not fair to her.

So ask yourself this question very honestly: "Is she good enough for me to settle down with? Or would I regret it in the back of my mind?"

In general you need to get very clear with yourself about what is and isn't good enough for you. You need to be clear so that you can better screen girls in the future. So you don't end up settling for something that isn't right for you. This problem is not with her, but with your lack of knowing what you want. So get more clear about that. What are the things with a girl that you're not willing to negotiate on? Make a list.

For example, I have a few basic rules that are deal-breakers: like if she smokes, drinks, likes to get tattoos, or is overweight. I just know that I will never be satisfied with that. So it's best to not even continue down that road. Physical attractiveness is more tricky because there are so many degrees of it. Sometimes a girl is right on the edge where it's not clear. Ideally you want her to be at least 30% over the edge. Any lower and you'll probably be too luke-warm about her.

I've actually invested quite a bit of time simply training my eye for physical attractiveness. You can go to the local mall and just walk around looking at random girls and asking yourself, "Would I fuck her? Yes or no?" And force yourself to quickly make that determination within a few seconds. Do this a thousand times. As you practice this more you'll get better and better at quickly determining if a girl is right for you on the level of physical attractiveness. Obviously there are many other factors beyond that. But since looks is the first screen, it's important to get clear about that screen. Self-clarity is the key.

As you become more conscious, looks will matter to you less and less and your ability to love will increase exponentially.

Determine which features of physical attractiveness matter to you and which ones don't: tits, face, ass, height, hair, legs, weight, skin color, teeth, eyes, nose, race, etc. Get clear about what your deal-breakers are. It's a lot easier when you can screen for this stuff up front. It's very painful to do it once you know her. This screening needs to be done as early as possible.

[bazera]

@Leo Gura So, do girls also walk around the mall thinking whether they would fuck that guy or not too? 

If not, than what is the thing they do? And generally, how important are looks for women in a relationship compared to men?

[ajasatya]

@LoveandPurpose If you're too young to make solid plans for the future with your partner, there will be always another prettier girl that would be worth more regardless of how pretty your current partner is. It's an endless struggle as long as you're not mature enough.

It gets even worse because society is sick and we have extremely scarce instances of happy/stable couples and families. Youngsters have virtually nobody to inspire them in this field of intimate relationships. And many times, their own parents screw up due to lack of wisdom, which adds up some unnecessary difficulties.

[Leo Gura]

13 hours ago, bazera said:

@Leo Gura So, do girls also walk around the mall thinking whether they would fuck that guy or not too? 

Of course not.

Male and female attraction is asymmetrical.

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If not, than what is the thing they do?

They fantasize about some knight in shining armor whisking them away. Read some cheap romance novels from Walmart to understand how women think about sex/relationships. That cheap romance novel from Walmart is a woman's version of porn.

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And generally, how important are looks for women in a relationship compared to men?

Much less important. A woman is looking for strength and leadership qualities, not looks.

Of course if all else is equal, she will pick the guy with better looks. But in practice all else is never equal. This is why a guy with below average looks can attract girls with above average looks. He compensates for it with strong inner qualities. The nice thing about this is that it's possible to cultivate these strong inner qualities. The bad thing is, this involves serious emotional labor.

In a sense being a hot girl is easy because you don't have do anything. You wear your value on your sleeve. The downside of this is that if you're not a hot girl (and definition most girls aren't), it's almost impossible to change that. So men have more flexibility in this department. But in practice very few men actualize this possibility.

Most people end up settling for someone at roughly their level of reproductive value.

[mandyjw]

@LoveandPurpose Are you really about love and purpose or are you about appearances and perfectionism?

Men may inherently put a lot of value on looks but do you want to become a adept critic of women's looks or would you rather spend your time and energy on something else? 

[bazera]

@Leo Gura

4 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Much less important. A woman is looking for strength and leadership qualities, not looks.

What do you mean by strength and leadership qualities? How do I know if I have them or not? Because, obviously some men do have them by default (considering their life experience).

What does being strong and a good leader look like in practice?

Can your work help men develop these qualities? I mean the stuff you teach, for example: mindfulness, love, ability to let go, ability to look at a situation from a different perspectice, having multiple perspectives on a thing, importance of having nondual experiences, importance of being more egoless than selfish, etc, etc. 

Can a man, who doesn't even know that self-reflection is a thing, be a strong leader?

Edited September 21, 2019 by bazera

[Emerald]

5 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

They fantasize about some knight in shining armor whisking them away. Read some cheap romance novels from Walmart to understand how women think about sex/relationships. That cheap romance novel from Walmart is a woman's version of porn.

I've found that it's very difficult to fantasize in the abstract about an ideal man. Like I can't imagine a random attractive, knight in shining armor kind of guy and really have it hit the arousal button. I'm bi-sexual and can fantasize about random attractive women, and that works... though it's very surface level. But it doesn't work toward men the same way.

I have to fantasize about a real man that actually exists in life, that I already have an attraction to, to get aroused by a fantasy about him. And the fantasy must be laden in the context that we already exist within. Otherwise, it's very dead and platonic feeling. And porn doesn't work. And erotica doesn't work. It's all too abstract and it doesn't stimulate my heart center in the way I need to actually feel the rising up of the erotic emotions that give way to attraction.

The only way to get those feelings through a fantasy is to paint an entire scenario where some kind of intimacy and emotional tension happens. Of course, that's very hard to get through a fantasy.

So, it's not an active process and there is never a decision made with the conscious mind as to whether I am attracted to a guy or not. It just blooms at random. So, if I'm walking around a mall, I will register an attractive man my age and a little old woman with the same degree of platonic feeling. It's all so very neutral.

I feel like men kind of scan and strategically figure out if a woman is above or below a certain line for them in a very mind-based laundry list kind of way. And I feel like this logical scanning process is going on constantly. But it seems that the more mature a guy gets, the less neurotic this tendency gets and it becomes more subtle. And when a man matures, he integrates his feminine side, which means he can lean into more his intuitions to make relationship decisions like women generally do.

That's my impression anyway. You can definitely tell the difference between a head guy and a heart guy, and with the head guy, your intuition will lead you away from him if you've developed your intuition woman. They have an essence about them that's very unappealing, and you can see it in how they talk and how they move. 

For me (and I wager for most women), there is no rhyme or reason to when an attraction will come about. It's very much like you're in the middle of a still lake, and then suddenly (once every couple years or so for me) something interesting suddenly surfaces to be explored.

Now, when I was like 12-15, I would consciously scan and focus toward guys based on looks and style. But once I hit like 16, I was much more picky and not so focused on being in a relationship. By 16 you pretty much discover that there's no scarcity of men in the world... the problem is really to keep them away as most of them are wrong for you and the majority are just lonely or looking for sex. They don't want you in particular. They just want a woman. So, attention from them feels no more special than an acknowledgement of gender.

So, at that point when the novelty of male attention wore off and I became more disillusioned with it and wise to the tricks, I started leaning much more into my intuition to decide for me who I'm interested in and being very open-handed about. And I've never had the problem of being luke-warm or finding guys who were luke-warm about me. 

Yet again, everyone will attract what mirrors them. So, even though I don't have issues attracting luke-warm guys, I have other things that I do attract. So, the intuition isn't always perfect as it also reflects past traumas and problems as well.