A short one for /u/OsmiumZulu. This is a filler because I obviously can't count to 7 correctly. Nevertheless, it's a massively important concept I realized about a year ago, which often goes unnoticed. Even though I haven't heard it said directly in TRP/MRP, I doubt anyone would disagree:

AXIOM: If it wouldn't make a single person want to sleep with you, it's not going to make your spouse want to sleep with you.

Someone on another sub was complaining:

I have argued, pleaded, cried, begged, demanded

... and then concluded that divorce was the only option. I once tried these things too. Know what I learned? If it doesn't work with single people, it probably won't work on your spouse either. Imagine going to the bar ...

  • Argue: I'm really mad that you haven't had sex with me yet. I know we just met, but here's a list of 7 reasons why your actions have upset me ...

  • Pleading: Please, please, please have sex with me! I just need to get laid. I'll do anything!

  • Crying: <Sob, sob, sob> ... I'm so sorry, I'm just pathetic and miserable. If you'd have sex with me, ... maybe I wouldn't be so sad right now ...

  • Begging: Come on. Please? You know you want to. DO IT! Come on. It'll be fun. Stop looking at that hot guy, I'll take you home. I don't have any STDs. C'mon. C'moooon. Pleeeassssee! C'mon!

  • Demanding: The Bible says you must submit and have sex with me! I know we're not married yet, but you're just a woman and I'm a man, so you'd better do what I say.

These don't come from a place of cultivating desire; rather, they're from self-entitlement. To add a few that aren't on that guy's list:

  • Chore Play: Hey, I see you spilled some beer on your skirt. How about we go back to your place, I'll do your laundry, wash your windows, vacuum the carpet, and organize your fridge, and if I do all of that you'll have sex with me, right?

  • Bragging: Hey, I just bench-pressed 250lbs at the gym. I also got a pretty good bonus. Do you want to sleep with me now?

  • Gift-Giving: I bought you some flowers and chocolates. These are pretty romantic things and I didn't skimp on the cheap stuff. Is that enough to buy some sex for the night?

  • Flattery: You're looking really good tonight. You're pretty much the hottest girl I've ever seen. How do you get your hair so silky? You're so out of my league, it's amazing you're even talking to me.

  • Unwanted Touch: Oh, I'm sorry, was that your boob I just grabbed? Hmm, let me feel the other one too. Are you getting turned on now?

My efforts in these areas with my wife in the past haven't necessarily been this extreme, but you get the point. It always boggles my mind that people (including myself!) by default try to use different tactics to try to get their spouse to sleep with them than they would employ with trying to get together with a single person.

A couple key verses:

  • 2 Thess. 3:10 - "If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat." By extension: if you're not willing to put in the work to improve yourself and flirt with your wife, don't expect the benefit of what that work would have gotten you. Lift. Sidebar. Etc.

  • James 4:1-12 - (in part) "What causes quarrels and fights among you? Is it not this: that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions." This is self-entitlement mentality. We do this to God and we do it to our spouses. Don't do that. God doesn't respond to it. She won't either.

Also, go back to Song of Solomon. He had a great body and he knew how to flirt. He was a high quality man worthy of her desire. He had a mission from God apart from her and was pursuing it and this attracted her to him. He was surrounded by other men - armed guards even. Other maidens took notice of him. Be a high quality man. Period.

High quality men do get chores done, buy their women gifts, flirt through flattery, and grope their wives - but they can get away with these things because, like Solomon, they're not using them as manipulative tactics. They do it because they want to. The first list? I don't know any high quality men who do those things at all, nor does Solomon model them for us.