I've had a bit of change of mindset lately, and it's come mostly from getting out of the fucking house and socializing more. I have definitely spent time in the porn/internet mindset I think a lot of guys find themselves in these days.

I've mentioned in the past that when a hookup or something happens, it can ruin aspects of porn for a little while for me. Blowjobs look amazing, but if you just got a blowjob that was bad and awkward, that's reality setting in.

More recently, I've felt a bigger change. A lot of real-world socializing with people I connect with, it makes all the cynical, exchange variation, guys-care-about-this stuff feel really stupid, and even a tad gross.

What the hell was I thinking? Of course personal dynamics matter, of course connection is major, of course (gasp) making love can be a thing, not just horny thoughts about someone bending over and showing you their holes.

And of course looks aren't everything. And of course some cute 18yo I have nothing to talk about with and have nothing in common with is not the pinnacle of relationship success.

Basically...I'm thinking more like a woman. At least I think so. Certainly, all the complaints about male behavior and mindset you hear seems to be less of a thing, and all the confusion I hear from women about what men go for is less of a thing too. So, this is good in a way, right?

But, thinking about it, here's a problem: 'Friendzone' makes even less sense to me in this mindset.

I certainly had that happen to me in the past. And thinking about it now, it was rarely some underhanded plot to fuck my female friends. I was into them more because I liked them, because we got along, because they became familiar. The older I get, the more I realize just how much those things don't come along every day. It's a really finite amount of people you're going to share those connections with, and even smaller group where large lengths of time get to happen to grow familiarity.

We're all searching for that connection, so if you get along really well, it seems like it's at least a reasonable notion that you would at least want to try and see if something works between you, right? But, of course, that's not what happened at all. I'm currently reminded of a time a female friend of mine seriously wanted to date my brother after meeting him for 10 minutes, instead of me, who she had known, and presumably enjoyed the company of, for much longer.

It's not that I don't get being 'just not that into' someone who was into me. That's happened. But it happened with women I only knew for a short time, where a couple days in we're already starting to run out of conversation, and there was nothing else keeping me there. Who was she to me? Not much, and it makes sense that she wasn't much, because we shared nothing - not time, or connection, or anything. Of course that's small and forgettable in my head. There's no scenario, zero, where I would wind up spending large amounts of free time hanging out with this person, because I wouldn't want to...because I'm not into her.

So, men are supposed to be the shallow ones, right? I kind of always accepted that, even embraced and defended it, but in my thinking now, I'm not so sure. You reject someone you got along well with over big stretches of time, where, even on my end, looks started to matter less, in favor of what I assume is the equivalent of how I feel about a girl with a nice ass I see walking down the street?

I kinda came to accept the whole paradigm of needing to be someone who hit the turn-on buttons harder, and that that is maybe why I failed with some of these women in the past, but now I'm questioning that. To get me in the door, sure, it makes sense to have that, but in these other situations, I'm realizing how little sense it makes...unless much of what we're assuming about men and women with these things is completely fucking wrong.

EDIT: This turned out way longer than I thought. Thanks for reading if you got through it.