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Return To ShopIntimacy With Unloved Partners: Excitement And Inner Fear Explained
Q: Why can’t I control myself even though I don’t want to have casual sex?
I went on another hookup today. It’s shameless of me. I always initiate hookups because I’m afraid the men who ask me out have infectious diseases. So I always take the initiative.
The guy I met this time was perfectly normal; he just wanted to find a girlfriend. I went to see him with the mindset of a blind date. But he happened to be staying at a hotel, and I surprisingly asked him if he wanted me to come upstairs. He hesitated for a moment, then led me up. During the meeting, he asked if I was employed. I’ve been so bored lately I’m practically contemplating suicide; I’m unemployed. I quit my previous job because of the immense pressure. Then he accused me of being unfaithful. I know I’m about to prey on innocent people again.
I’ve hooked up with four people before. The first one was after I broke up with my first love. I don’t know why I went to meet them. It was a one-night stand. Besides the excitement, having sex with someone I didn’t love also brought fear and dread. I was so scared, but I still couldn’t control myself. I kept reminding myself of the various possibilities of sexually transmitted diseases, but I still couldn’t control myself from hooking up with people.
The second, the third, the fourth—every time I went out for casual sex, I felt like an emotionless walking corpse. I don’t know why I did it. The fear inside me made me want to commit suicide, but when I cut my wrist with a razor blade, it hurt so much. My mind instantly became clear and I felt the pain. I didn’t want to die, but how could I live like this? I was really scared.
After I resigned, my family wanted me to stay home and take the civil service exam, but the thought of the boring life of a civil servant makes me feel hopeless. I can’t handle the pressure of going out to work, and I can’t stand the loneliness of staying at home. Am I being too greedy? What should I do? I really hate myself right now. Every time I go out, I feel incredibly guilty and even disgusted with myself.
Of the five people I’ve hooked up with, three were one-night stands, one was a two-time affair, and another lasted a month. Each time, I felt terrible afterward, but I still couldn’t resist hooking up again. I’ve read many articles about this, but they only offer temporary solutions. Given the chance, I still hook up. What should I do? Please help me.
The forbidden zones of love fascinate me, while the boundaries of morality fill me with dread.
Text by Bluesea
Why can’t I control myself even though I don’t want to hook up? Why is that? I can’t tell you why either, but maybe it doesn’t matter.
Sometimes, living a happy and fulfilling life is like a panacea, so trying to change yourself in a reasonable way to improve your life is more important than figuring out all the “whys”.
All I can do here is write down my three thoughts on the above questions with pen and paper, hoping that they can ultimately accompany you to explore these questions more deeply and help you gain some insights.
It seems that casual sex is sinful to you, and it is the same for many others.
As society becomes more open, casual sex is no longer unfamiliar to us, and it has even happened in our lives, leading to a variety of problems.
Because our mainstream culture demands that partners be monogamous and approves of chastity for single people , people in intimate relationships may argue because one partner cheats, and single people may feel varying degrees of guilt because of casual sex.
Where does this sense of guilt come from?
This is a very broad topic. Based on my knowledge and experience, my simple summary is that “guilt stems from the stigma of sex in human society.”
From childhood, we are very sensitive to topics related to sex. The information we get from our elders is mostly negative about sex: dirty and sinful. This has subtly shaped our views on sex.
Why do our elders stigmatize sex? Because their elders, their great-great …
There are at least two cultural sources of such stigmatization:
Firstly, in order to ensure that a woman’s child is his offspring, men would restrict that woman from having sexual relations with other men. Over time, this evolved into a cultural constraint that required women to “remain chaste before marriage.”
Secondly, women need to carry a pregnancy for 10 months to give birth, while men only need to ejaculate once to complete their work. In the era when contraception technology was not advanced, women paid a higher price for sexual intercourse, so they were more cautious in their choice of sexual intercourse.
These two factors have evolved over the long course of human evolution into a culture that “demands, especially from women, to be chaste and monogamous,” and denies, in particular, the right of women to pursue sexual pleasure in sexual activity.
Most people unconsciously internalize such norms, letting them take root in their minds, which in turn influences their thoughts and decisions at all times. This is probably how everything about sex has gradually been given an aura of sin and filth, while people often think without thinking that “sex is inherently bad.”
When the pleasurable function of sex is ignored or even denied, casual sex, which is not for the purpose of reproduction, is naturally labeled as dirty and sinful . This is similar to how people in medieval Western society considered masturbation a disease, becoming a kind of collective unconsciousness.
I may seem to be spouting profound truths, because in our real lives, it is difficult for any of us to completely escape the long-standing shaping influence of social culture. Therefore, simply understanding such a simple principle will not allow us to break free from all cultural constraints and do whatever we want.
However, when we sometimes can’t help but cross the line and feel guilty, these principles can at least help us deepen our understanding of this guilt in our own inner world, so that we can take the first step to better deal with it.
2. Why do we want to hook up?
When you say, “I don’t want to hook up,” do you really not want to hook up? You might say, “Hooking up makes me feel guilty, so why would I do it?”
What benefits do we get from casual sex? Do we enjoy it?
First, we must acknowledge that most sexual experiences bring pleasure . This pleasurable experience is a gift from nature to humankind, giving humans a stronger desire to engage in sexual activity and thus ensuring the continuation of the human race.
However, we cannot answer our doubts solely based on the reason of “pleasure,” or rather, the purely physiological pleasure is not enough to be a sufficient reason for us to want to have casual sex, because we can achieve the same goal through masturbation.
We also need psychological “pleasure ,” and this pleasure can be better satisfied in the process of interpersonal contact. Eye contact and the stimulation of breathing can make our inner pleasure more intense. Therefore, we are not satisfied with being intimate with ourselves alone.
Humans are inherently creatures that crave novelty . In relationships with a fixed partner, we all demand exclusivity and loyalty from each other. We try to give each other a sense of novelty by improving, enhancing, and changing ourselves, and this tendency to crave novelty may be satisfied to some extent.
However, not everyone can strictly adhere to the constraints of morality and culture due to our greed; many people cannot love only one person for their entire lives. For example, after seven years of marriage, when the world of two becomes like a glass of tasteless water, nothing brings fresh excitement faster than “finding a new sexual partner.” Therefore, to some extent, our need for casual sex is also “at work” by our inherent tendency to seek novelty and get bored.
Of course, some people choose casual sex because they are frustrated in their current intimate relationships , and such examples are not uncommon in our lives. Firstly, it can help some people alleviate the pain of heartbreak to a certain extent, and secondly, it can help some people who can’t stand being “alone” to obtain brief intimacy more quickly.
So sometimes we see people in life who start hooking up after a breakup. We might use words like “a drastic change in personality” or “being stimulated” to describe them. In reality, they are using this to stop feeling “unbearably lonely.” This seems to be the same reason why some people smoke to relieve anxiety when they encounter troubles.
Contemporary women have more reasons to engage in casual sex than women in the past: with social development and the improvement of women’s education levels, women’s awareness of sexual rights has been enhanced, and their sexuality has been liberated to a certain extent; with technological progress and improved medical standards, human reproduction can be better controlled, and the costs that women pay for sexual activity have been greatly reduced.
As a result, women who have more and more autonomy over their bodies and consciousness have gradually abandoned the traditional concept of “chastity and fidelity.” From this perspective, casual sex, especially among women, seems to be an inevitable result of social progress.
3. “Addressing the root cause” requires continuous self-understanding.
You described many other problems, all of which seem to be closely related to casual sex. You’ve read many articles (including this one), but they only provide temporary relief. Why is that? Have you considered that the root cause might not lie in casual sex? The answer to this question requires you to continue exploring. If you can gain new insights and discoveries, perhaps you can gradually move closer to a “root cause solution.”
If you are really struggling with this problem and it is even affecting your life, you can actively seek help from others, because everyone’s abilities are limited, and everyone’s help may bring you different insights and discoveries.
Actually, as someone who can help you, I hope you can share more of your feelings and insights. Perhaps you also need to think more about these things yourself, such as what factors prompted you to engage in casual sex, what your specific fears and anxieties about casual sex are, and whether the pain you mentioned is caused by casual sex. These three questions are also worth your continued in-depth thinking and exploration.
This is the little bit of help I’m offering you in the form of a short article. If you can gain even a little bit of new insight from it, I will be happy for you, because everyone relies on continuous understanding to correct their behavior, make themselves more resilient and mature, and thus live a better life.
When we feel that we are not doing well, the first thing we need to do is believe in our ability to solve problems, confirm our desire to change, and then grow continuously with the support of others to get out of the predicament.
This is written for everyone:
Whether something is reasonable or not needs to be analyzed from many perspectives. What is unreasonable to me may be reasonable to you. What is unreasonable at the social level may be reasonable at the personal level.
The same applies to casual sex. When we discuss the motives for casual sex, we cannot conclude that casual sex is 100% reasonable. Similarly, when we discuss the guilt associated with casual sex, we cannot conclude that casual sex is completely unreasonable.
Therefore, when we are anxious about something, we should not try to eliminate our confusion by judging “right and wrong,” nor should we impose other people’s standards of judgment on ourselves who are anxious and confused about something. Instead, we should make a responsible decision for ourselves after careful consideration, on the premise of voluntariness and without causing any form of harm to others or ourselves .
Please remember that the most important thing about any choice is to avoid causing harm to yourself and others. Harm here refers to harm in a broad sense, including physical and psychological harm. When there is a potential danger to yourself or others at the physical or psychological level, we need to adjust our behavior.
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