The Five Rings of Attractiveness
So I was trying to explain how attraction works to someone the other day, and he just could not get the fact that there are layers to attracting someone and they are tied to your senses. He kept on about some vague bullshit about personality and I was like “that’s cool, but its also bullshit”. Let me tell you what I told him.
Imagine 5 rings — actually, don’t imagine. Here:
- The outermost ring: Looks
This is the first thing people notice about you. From your clothes, to your stature, to your posture, to the way you walk, to the way you sit, breathe, chew…people use their eyes to make an initial determination of you. A man in a suit will be better received than a man in a burlap sack. Call it superficial, but people will always use their ocular senses to make initial determinations of everything from mates, to food, to environmental threats. That is literally why we have eyes.
This is the first area you should improve if you want to improve your dating opportunities. You can learn how to dress better, you can hit the gym, do something. People will not want to get to know you unless you pass this level first.
2. The next ring: Sound
Oh how many men and women have absolutely messed up a sure thing by what has come out of their mouth? It isn’t enough to be pretty — you have to have something worth saying or hearing and you have to be able to say it well. The inability to communicate can be a deal-breaker, especially among higher value men and women. As someone with an advanced academic degree and a firm command of English, I am immediately disinterested when a woman is unable to enunciate or cannot find adequate words to express her ideas.
3. The 3rd ring: Smell
Do not stink. Please do not stink. Men, this will ruin every chance you have with a woman…forever. Women will remember more about how a man smells than about what he said or what he looked like. Women, men are somewhat more forgiving but it is still a show-stopper. My recommendation? Find a soap (a soap, not this body detergent crap) that works for you and a matching deodorant. If you use cologne/perfume, use it sparsely. Excess can be worse than stinking because it seems like you’re covering up something.
4. The 4th ring: Touch
Women actually do better here than men do. Their skin is usually well cared for and men are too distracted to even think about it by this point. Really, it is only men who fuck this part up.
Men, for fuck’s sake, moisturize. Please do not think its “gay” or “femme” to get manicures and pedicures. Your skin, nails, hair, and personal grooming say more to a woman than you know. You have dirty nails and rough skin? Good luck getting a repeat invite to the bedroom ballet. You know how many times a woman has swooned over the smoothness of my skin? Lots. Shower oil for the win baby.
5. The inner ring: Taste
This is not literally about how a person tastes. We are not cannibals. We live in a society!!!
No, this is about personal taste and preferences…the things that form the core of who we are as people. We have to understand and accept that there will always be people who we just cannot vibe with no matter how much we may want to. A friend of mine (black male) was dating a woman (Irish female) and one day the female came back from her black theatre class complaining about how hard it was to be the only white person in a room full of black people discussing things she couldn’t relate to. My friend and I just stared at her like “u wot m8 — you taking the piss?” She could not grasp that we felt that way every single day of our professional black lives. I saw the look on his face at that point…he could no longer fuck with her. I don’t blame him either.
Not everyone will want to be with you after getting to know you.
To conclude, attraction is a process that involves all the senses and can be improved upon every step of the way.
