From: jcarroll@bach.udel.edu (Royal J Carroll)
Newsgroups: soc.bi
Subject: Re: A nagging question
Date: 15 Sep 92 15:36:56 GMT
Organization: University of Delaware

In article <1992Sep15.105629.1464@dsg.cs.tcd.ie> cjmchale@dsg.cs.tcd.ie (Ciaran McHale) writes:
>Being scared about entering relationships... I don't think you're alone
>in that. Usually when I am attracted to a woman (I'm low on the Kinsey
>scale) I make up a whole list of reasons why I *don't* fancy her or why
>I shouldn't get involved with her even if I do fancy her. The list
>usually includes things such as:
>
>	o I have to study for exams so I can't spare the time for a
>	  relationship.
>	o Dating involves spending money (it shouldn't but it does). I'm
>	  not sure if I can afford it.
>	o She lives too far away from me for us to see each other
>	  often. (Not necessariarly that she lives in another town;
>	  usually that she lives a few miles away and I can't drive,
>	  don't have a bicycle and there is a crap bus service
>	  connecting us.)
>
Funny, those are the same reasons I use.  (Except money and distance
usually come first. :-) )

>Leaving the internalised homophobia inside and instead going back to
>discussing my potential relationships with women... I think it boils
>down to (i) fear of rejection, (ii) fear of becomming emotionally close
>to somebody, and (iii) not looking forward to all the baggage which
>inevitably gets lumped in with relationships. Examples of (iii) are
>as follows:
>
>	o When I date a woman, I'll meet her friends and I'll have to
>	  pretend to like them even if we don't have anything in common.
>	o If a guy I vaguely know happens to be going out with a friend
>	  of my potential SO then we'll probably end up going on
>	  double-dates and I'll have to pretend that I like this other
>	  guy even though I have nothing in common with him.
>	o She probably has different interests to me and I'll end up
>	  going along with her to things that I am bored with.
>
>
I used to let fear of rejection prevent me from starting a relationship.
However, recently I've been able to get past this fear by realizing that
relationships by their very nature are "risky".  Unless the relationship
lasts forever, there will be rejection at some point in time.  When
starting the relationship there is no way of knowing how long it will
last.  I used to think "well, this relationship won't last, so there's
no point in starting it." (or even, "well I'm not going to marry this
person, so it's not going to last."  I now realize how stupid this is.  
I've probably missed many wonderful moments.  Now, I think "if I can spend
even just three days with this person, I will have an enjoyable three
days."  The point is, it could be three days, three months or three
years -- I don't know.  Why spend time worrying about when things might
end.  Now I simply enjoy the all the time I spend with someone and, when
it's over, I know I got the most I could from the relationship and I
have moments I can treasure.

However, I have yet to "cure" myself of a tendency to "overthink" about
things; that is, I often times think too much about things.  I'm trying
to think less and act more, but when you have insommnia (and you're
alone) you tend to spend too many hours thinking about things.  

Well, before anyone misinterprets the intentions of my post :-) I was
just starting a tangent discussion by adding my $.02.

-James 
-- 
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
If I could only reach you/If I could make you smile
If I could only reach you/That would really be a breakthough
-Queen, "Breakthru"=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=jcarroll@brahms.udel.edu-