I was listening to my favorite podcast recently when a guest casually mentioned a fact that made my job drop.
In research for her book This Chair Rocks, author and activist Ashton Applewhite discovered that the people with the best sex lives are “not the thinnest, not the youngest, not the prettiest, but the people who know their lovers are lucky.”[1]
Let me repeat that.
The people with the BEST sex lives are “not the thinnest, not the youngest, not the prettiest, but the people who know their lovers are lucky.”
Are you one of them?
How You Make Him Feel
When you are with your partner, or you’re out on a date, do you know how lucky that man is?
Of course you know how lucky YOU are. That goes without saying!
As women we’ve been trained to prize a man’s love over our own. It’s easy to love him. But it seems to us rather hard for HIM to love US. (So hard, in fact, that we need to help him by giving him reasons to love us!)
I get it. A man’s attention, affection, and desire make us feel so incredibly alive. It’s like a drug. We feel wanted. We feel beautiful. Of course we want more!
But the folks with the best love lives know they have an equivalent effect on men.
They know that their attention, affection, and desire make HIM feel incredibly alive.
It’s a two-way street. As great as his attention feels, they know they’re giving him an equal gift by giving him their attention.
When you know that you are a gift to anyone, and the gifts you bring to his life are priceless, then your relationship has this beautiful equality. It’s like a mutual appreciation society. You feel lucky to have found him, and he feels lucky to have found you.
But maybe you’ve met very few men like that. They don’t act like they’re lucky to have found you. They treat you like one woman among many.
Maybe you even concluded that it’s because you’re not young enough or slim enough or beautiful enough. That’s why men don’t value you.
But can we go back to that quote for a moment?
The people with the best sex lives are “not the thinnest, not the youngest, not the prettiest, but the people who know their lovers are lucky.”
Bring Your Value with You
If you don’t go out on dates and meet men with the bedrock belief that they’re lucky to be spending time with you, then of course they’re not going to see your value.
People tend to believe about you what you believe about yourself.
If you believe you’re awesome, you show up in all your awesomeness. People will assume you have good reason to be that confident; you must know something about yourself that they don’t. They’ll take your word for it.
But what happens more often is that women show up on a date hoping to be liked.
They don’t show up on that date liking themselves and to hell with him if he doesn’t feel the same.
They show up knowing every single one of their flaws, hoping against hope that he won’t notice their age or weight or what-have-you.
They show up hoping that if they just show him what good company they can be, what a good conversationalist they are, how sweet and kind and thoughtful they are, then maybe he’ll want to see them again.
Does that work?
No.
Any time a woman tries to convince a man to give her a chance, she loses.
Because she’s making HIM more important than she is. She’s giving HIM the power of choice. She’s deferring to him.
It’s hard for men to be with a woman who doesn’t love herself. It’s too much pressure to try to convince her she’s lovable when she doesn’t believe it. It’s much easier to be with a woman who loves herself and doesn’t let her self-esteem depend on anyone’s approval.
Fishing for Men
I’m going to use a cheesy metaphor here. 🙂
Too many women believe that he is the catch and they’re the fisherman.
They have to put a shiny lure on the end of their line in hopes of snatching him out of the water, where he’s surrounded by other fish who might tempt him. Once they have him hooked, they plan to lift him up and carry him away where they get to keep him for themselves alone.
That’s how they see their role. They want to become better fishermen of men.
Meanwhile, deep in the ocean depths, mermaids swim effortless through the water. (I told you this would be cheesy!) They attract the attention of every dolphin and sea horse and manta ray.
The mermaid doesn’t bother to catch fish. That’s not her job.
It’s her job simply to be. She enjoys herself. She enjoys being who she is. Any man will have to catch up to her if he wants a chance at sharing her life.
My hope for you is that you stop fishing for men, and instead discover the delights of being the free creature you were born to be.
So what if your body doesn’t match conventional standards of attractiveness? It still FEELS good. It still moves with grace.
How often do you lavish care on your body? How often do you touch your arms and face and legs? How often do you tune into the pleasure of movement?
If you don’t feel lucky to have this body, it will be hard to convince him he’s lucky.
When you feel lucky to be who you are, when you know that any man who gets to be with you is lucky, then you don’t tolerate anyone who treats you carelessly.
No one else gets to determine your value. YOU know your value.
And you bring your value to every encounter with men.
One of the ways I teach women to break free from men’s approval and know their value is by embracing their #InnerBadGirl. You can learn more about her here.
[1] https://momastery.com/blog/we-can-do-hard-things-ep-81/
Let us know what you think!