What Do You Want?

Terrance Thames — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:39:44 +0000

Well this is a post motivated from a good friend named Sonja, but in reality I have been experimenting with this for quite a while now; since about May of this year. This is my experience with the application of chivalry in my interactions with women. Most of my life I have always considered myself as a nice guy. When I was younger this nice-ness became very beneficial to have an abundance of female friends, but a detriment to my ability to attract and keep women sexually. As I got older my reputation with men grew more important to me as social pressure started to shape my ego and personality, but my reputation with women remained important as well. So through college I remained respectful towards women and also started going after what I wanted sexually more and created a lot of wonderful sexual experiences. However, this process rarely included chivalry and an extreme respect of boundaries that women put in front of me.

So after becoming an active member of Rori’s blog I became aware of how sought after this quality was from the women on there. So I decided to see what kind of effect it would have on my interactions with women for me to become very consciously chivalrous with both women and people in general. I got some interesting results.

Important disclaimer: If anybody decides to do this, which I do recommend, there is a fine line of how to do it. You need to do it from a place of not wanting anything in return for acting this way. You have to do it because you really want to do it for yourself not for anybody else. But pay attention to your feelings. If you start to harbor feelings of resentment for not getting anything in return other than appreciation, then you know that you are doing this for the wrong reasons and women will sense this act accordingly. Otherwise you are effectively screening out women who don’t show appreciation for your actions. This was my experience, anyways.

These are the chivalrous acts that I would do for women:

Opening doors- any kind of doors

Walking on the outside of a women on the sidewalk or in front of traffic

Ordering for women at restaurants after figuring out what they want

Testing wine at dinner

Pulling out chairs and tucking them in

Pressing the floor button on elevator for a woman

Dropping off at their front door and waiting for them to get in before leaving

If eating sushi, breaking apart the chopsticks and smoothing them out for her

And here are my results:

When I was chivalrous, I made a lot of really strong connections. I was able to build some strong attraction and sexual tension. If I was able to create a strong connection and sexual attraction in the past, I was able to easily move it to the bedroom whenever I felt the time was right. Ironically when I practiced this, it made it more difficult for me to actually move the interaction where I wanted it to go when I wanted to move it. It would also typically take much longer for sex to occur. And that was OK because the interactions were actually extremely enjoyable. Something about me being chivalrous made a woman’s boundaries much stronger. I can only guess why, but if I were to make an educated guess, I would say that it was because I showed so much respect, and they were not afraid to tell me what they really wanted; also, there was such a strong connection that they didn’t want to screw it up by having sex and me potentially losing interest before I invested myself a little more. Also, I believe that maybe by being more chivalrous, I was actually not pushing their boundaries as I normally would. That was really interesting to me since I figured that it would be the opposite. I was able to screen way better here as well. The women often wanted to be the girlfriend/wife, not the passionate fling, one night stand, or casual partner.

If I took the majority of the chivalry out of the equation with the exception of just being nice and respectable (if I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be authentic with myself) it was actually easier for me to create very sexually charged interactions with women and it happened much faster than if I was chivalrous. I could make strong connections but they weren’t as deep as if I was chivalrous; still very enjoyable but in a different way. I could lead the interaction to embody whatever type of relationship I chose, but had much more trouble at screening women.

From my experience I took the following:

-To me chivalry is a form of investment. Most women are extremely attracted to it because it embodies your ability as a man to provide security and protection.

-Some women look and screen for that up front and will actually not be attracted to you if you don’t display a certain “level” of chivalry right away. That “level” is relative to each woman.

-This can be used as a screening tool for both men and women if used correctly. Men can use it as a means to screen for a woman that appreciates them or simply just expect this treatment without acknowledgement. For me, the latter made me feel as though she had too strong of a sense of entitlement and I would respond by having feelings of resentment and lack of appreciation. Women can use this as a means to screen guys who don’t want what you want in a relationship, whatever it may be.

-Women that reponded well to chivalry did not always equal a higher level of self-esteem, although it is more likely than not. I have met plenty of women that responded well to chivalry that I felt to be very insecure and vice-versa. At first I thought chivalry was only expected by women that had a much higher level of self-esteem. I don’t think that is the case anymore as I saw both here. I need to examine this a little more.

-It is just as easy to be put in the friend zone when you are overly chivalrous than when you are inconsiderate. There is a balance here as with all things. If you are overly chivalrous then it can come off as inauthentic and therefore make you look like you are needy or have a hidden agenda. If you are inconsiderate…well this one’s obvious. A healthy balance is key for me. I do it when I am inspired to do it and that’s it. Any more would be overkill.

-It varies drastically what some women perceive as chivalrous behavior versus others. Also, there is often a blend between what I would believe to be chivalry and what I would consider behaviors aimed at trying to impress women. Some of them seemed like pet peeves for particular women. Out of curiosity I asked several women what chivalry meant to them and the answers ranged from the usual stuff like opening up doors, being a knight in shining armor, and paying for meals to cleaning out your car and calling instead of texting for particular situations. Talk about a wide range! This showed me that there is even confusion among women about what chivalry really is.

In conclusion, I don’t feel that chivalry is dead by any means, but too much or too little can definitely effect the relationship/interaction for better or for worse. If you learn to be chivalrous only if you are doing it for yourself and not to please her then that’s the healthy balance that you are looking for. For some this might be a lot of chivalrous behavior while for others it may not be at all. Whatever feels right for you is what you should do, after trying everything out of course.

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The Authentic Dating Arts » sexual attraction

What Do You Want?