Matthew Hussey explores whether casual sex with someone who's rarely around serves genuine pleasure or numbing loneliness. He draws on Brené Brown's framework to show how these encounters can shift from enjoyment to emotional coping, creating attachment and tunnel vision that keeps you from meeting other people.
Matthew Hussey here from Love Life. I'm gonna pose a question to you today. It can be a tough one. I'm gonna put it crudely. If you have someone that you like, that is in and out of town all the time, you know, they have that kind of lifestyle where sometimes they're around, sometimes they're not. You see them sporadically, but you like them. Do you? screw them every time they're in town. Now, the reason I ask is because this is an incredibly common scenario in the day and age that we live in. It's very, very common. Someone decides to come into town and they call you up and they say, hey, I'm back in town. Why don't we catch up? And of course, they want to see you. That's why they're calling. But then there's also an intimacy there where they arrive in town, they want that intimacy and you're the person they call because you're either the most comfortable or you're the person they we're doing that with, but they're not really moving towards anything more with you. But you want more with them, should you do it each time they're around? It's a tough one, isn't it? Because you may say to me, well, Matt, okay, fair enough. They're not giving me what I want long term. But who is this really hurting? If this, satisfies a need for me in the short term while I look for somebody long term. Where's the harm in that? That's a very good question, and it can be a difficult point to refute. But here's the thing. You have to be honest with yourself about whether it's hurting you. There's a A great book called Daring Greatly by Brené Brown. And in it, she talks about the difference between numbing and pleasure. Numbing is something we do to numb some sort of pain that we have. Pleasure is something we go for to actually get some enjoyment from something. Now, she describes pleasure as a healthy thing and numbing as a detrimental thing. And an easy example would be, you know, having a glass of wine at the end of a night with my dinner because I've had a really good day at work and I feel like relaxing with some good friends and we're all having a dinner party and drinking and having a good time. That might be pleasure. But having a glass of wine every night, because when I go home, I feel so stressed, I need to find a way to release all of this tension. she would describe as a form of numbing. Now, you see where I'm going with this. When someone comes into town and you like them and you're lonely and you have this need to have this intimate part of you satiated or at least satisfied momentarily, and that need for, because it's not all about sex, it's the need for connection, the need to feel like there's someone that cares about us or who knows us. Is this moment where you say, Yes, come over. Yes, let's see each other. Is it going for pleasure or is it a form of numbing ourselves from these emotions that are difficult to deal with, that I do feel lonely, that I don't want to be alone, that I do want to feel like I have some form of connection, even if I know I'm settling right now? Are you going for pleasure or numbing. Now, the trouble is when you really do like someone, it can quickly stray into numbing instead of pleasure. Because it's one thing to say, oh, you know what? There's this person I kind of like and yeah, we have sex sometimes and we have a good time. And, you know, I know I don't really want anything more with them or I know we're not really right for each other, but we really do have some fun together right now. That might be pleasure. But if you have someone where it pains you every time you see them, because really when they leave, you're miserable that you can't have more with them. You start missing them, you feel dissatisfied, maybe even slightly used, but you still say yes because in the moment when you do get that person, it numbs all of those feelings of loneliness and lack of connection, then you might have something that you want to avoid. You may not want to do that with this person. Not only that, but of course, if you find that seeing this person on a semi-regular basis or even sporadically creates a kind of emotional tunnel vision where all you can think about is them and it doesn't allow you the freedom to go and be with somebody else because you're so caught up with them. I know that happens to so many people. They stop seeing everyone else because they're emotionally invested in this person once again. This is a form of settling. And don't kid yourself that you can sleep with this person and have fun in an unattached way and then go back to your normal life and still progress with your relationship goals even when that person is not around because it's much more complex than that. So, I'm interested in your opinions on this because it's truly difficult. And it's very easy to give advice on this and to draw that line and say, if this is getting you too attached, you should remove yourself from the situation so that you can really do the business of going out and finding someone great, it's easy to say that. But of course, when you do like someone and they are in town and they are calling you up and saying, I'd like to see you, I miss you, that's a much harder thing to refuse in real life. So I'm interested to know your thoughts. Come join me for this discussion on Facebook. Let me know your opinions. I would love to hear them. It's facebook.com/real-life Coach Matthew Hussey. Let me know what you think or you can tweet me @MatthewHussey. Thanks guys. I'll speak to you soon.
