[ADULT] Is sexual preference malleable?
 

Mod note: split thread from http://www.stevepavlina.com/forums/s...ng-harder.html

This is probably true. I've often felt that way about my heterosexuality. I think if I really cared to, I could learn how to feel lust for men. I just don't care to. No reason to think it can't work the same the other way around.

What on earth? Of all the habits you would have told her to change, you chose the absolute most difficult and possibly impossible one? That's your political agenda, nothing more.

It is not the most difficult habit to change, and it is not impossible. Unless you go at it from guilt. If you think you have to change to please others, you'll resent it and sabotage yourself.


I don't have a political agenda. If I read a post about how gays have it easy and how difficult it is to be straight, I would reply the same way.

Well for some mainly straight people, being bi, or even bi-curious (ie being open to a gay experience, if not relationship) is quite easy. But for many straight people trying to "make themselves" gay just ain't gonna work, -any more than trying to make blue eyes turn brown by sheer force of will.
Same goes for "trying to make yourself straight"
It wouldn't work. :confused:

In my reality tunnel, everyone is somewhere between Absolute Zero and Ultimate Infinity on an omnisexual scale, and something like 90% of the population that I observe around me is in deep denial as to not only the existence of the scale itself, but their own relative position upon it.

This paradigm serves Us well.

Her problem is not that she dislikes the homosexual label. She has not indicated that this causes her any unease.

You're saying some people have this ability, and others do not? That's nonsense. Sexual preference is not a fixed physical attribute. It is the way a person's brain is wired. The brain has plasticity. It can be molded. But first, you have to flip the permission switch. You have to give yourself permission to be sexually attracted to X. This is why it's hard for a lot of straight people, as well as gay people. They think it would be wrong to do so. Gay people, to be specific, think if they give themselves permission to be straight they are "rejecting" their previous gayness, judging themselves, and giving in to the demands/viewpoint of others.


It does once the person stops self-judgement.

I would prefer not to put on the table, the label of the label that was labeled as the base of the trouble, in that, I'm labeling that as such.

I don't think it would work.

More important, they are in denial that their position in the scale is entirely their choice.

For some, it is not. To the hermit chained in a cave, the shadows painted on the walls are real.

Shadows are real. They are just not what they seem to be. That is the nature of illusion. All illusion is conceptual, all experience is real.

Yes, we live in a world where the fear of illusion is real.

From that place of agreement, let's move forward!

You're making a pretty enormous claim. Can you show me evidence, rather than just making claims? Besides trans people, I have only heard of one person who seemed to have genuinely had a complete orientation flip, but I don't know about that either because he, too, had a repulsion against same-sex sexuality. For trans people, the change is not necessarily a conscious one, but comes about during their vast shift in experience as they physiologically transition. Similarly, the development of an orientation in early childhood is not conscious either.

And how many millions of people have tried to turn themselves straight? I tried to do it, even after I accepted my sexual orientation, longer after the shame was gone (not sure I ever was ashamed, or felt any guilt, but perhaps embarrassed). I simply wanted to be bisexual. Explain to me how the hell I'm supposed to "make myself" start being attracted to men.

Then what's with the weird part of your post about politics being "getting around the repulsion most people feel toward homosexuality," and "people feeling guilty and ashamed of judging others for it"? What does that have to do with pyrogen?

Sure. Can you tell me exactly what you tried so I have some reference from which to work with?


That is the reason people don't believe they can change, because they are constantly told it is their "identity", that it's just "who they really are" and to try to be some other way is a type of "faking". Because people believe making the choice to be gay is bad, the way around that was to say it is not a choice. Since society has decided it's not a choice, people's perception of reality conforms to it.

I'm still waiting for you to provide any evidence to back up your claims.

I think the failure of religious strait camps is plenty of evidence to the contrary. These people are trying to not go to hell and many of them can't even keep up the will to fake being strait.

Speaking for myself, when I started accepting I was bisexual, I had not given myself permission to. At all. I was still a f--king homophobe for Christ's sake (yes, I was a homophobe for Christ's sake, that's not an expletive). I was simply attracted, and it wasn't something I could deny if I was being honest with myself.

And, here, in this thread, we've seen many strait women professing to relate to her problems. I don't think that's the issue to try to change. But pyro knows that.

Right. Well, lycan is claiming that if the straight camps happened out of some other desire than guilt, then supposedly this will yield completely the opposite results that are seen from religious straight camps. That's why I'm asking, where's the evidence? Even were lycan correct, it seems pretty arrogant to me to be throwing out this claim without evidence. Like how the hell do you know? Epistemological philosophy is not evidence, for the record.

Nevermind whether or not it's possible to change one's orientation, it's like trying to reach the other side of a mountain by traversing the globe in the opposite direction. If she could switch to straight it is very likely her belief would shift to, "all of my friends are finding these awesome men, why can't I?" It's the "why isn't it happening for me" which is the core of it, not her orientation.

Throwing a Herculean task onto your plate never moves you forward when it's entirely arbitrary and goes against your natural inclinations, all it does is keep you busy enough to satisfy your ego need to prove you are a "good" person. (You can sub out good with disciplined, diligent, persistent, whatever, the point is that it's positive self-perception, and when it's used like that it masks self-loathing.)

Let's keep ourselves on the topic at hand, hm?

Bisexuals are proof that it is a choice. Just what do you think makes a straight person different from a gay person and both different from a bisexual? Absolutely nothing but habit. I've heard many time people say "I used to like X, but now I like Y... I thought this wasn't possible... am I really Z now or am I delusional?". While intoxicated, people play with these things. Then they sober up and all the walls, the reasons why their identity is Z come back up. Jail mythology is evidence (not proof, just evidence) that this choice can be exercised late in life, given enough incentive. Both homo and hetero sexuality are developed in childhood. Associations are made that make it easy to trigger one or the other. Sort of like an accent. Except it's easier to rewire the brain into a new sexual orientation than to change accent. Maybe bisexuals are the equivalent of people who are really good with languages? If you want more evidence, you'll need to experiment appropriately with yourself.

Yes, let's.

This is very much the topic. For one, she now knows that there are no straight/gay women. All women are potential partners. That should help open up her mind. She expressed her thoughts on this aspect of her problem. So it's part of her problem as she sees it. She seems to feel trapped in a role she doesn't really enjoy.

Ditto. I only see the legitimacy in continuing this line of discussion if Pyrogen expresses interest in it. Otherwise, go start your own thread if you want to discuss whether orientation can change.

I can see how it might be on topic. However, knowing pyrogen and knowing some of her romantic history, I'm not sure it's relevant. I don't know for sure, of course; as Zephyrus pointed out, we'll have to wait for her to weigh in.

I do think that since this thread is about a personal situation, it's up to the OP to decide whether a tangential discussion that doesn't answer her original question is relevant. If she doesn't want it here, I'd be happy to split the thread so that interested parties may continue to discuss the matter. But since she's not online right now, we'll have to wait for her opinion.

Since the discussion about sexuality is derailing the thread from what I see as its intended purpose -- answering the question "What can I do to attract people whose sex and heart chakras aren't shut down?" -- I was making a moderation call when I agreed with Cado: please keep the thread on topic as stated in the original post until we can determine whether a wider discussion about sexuality is relevant. Thank you!

For the record, I have no interest in discussing the matter as some theoretical concept. Cocho stated her personal interest in exploring this, but it doesn't seem genuine. If pyrogen is not interested either, there is no need to expand on what was said. It is however a sincere answer to the question she posed.

It is complete, utter, BS to suggest that someone can change their sexual orientation!!! OMG...that's just... ignorant and stupid.

Yes, some people's sexuality is a little more "fluid" but that isn't the case for EVERYONE.

Gosh I even thought I was a bit weird for never ever having any sexual thoughts about females (given that sooo many women I speak to have experienced some attraction for the opposite sex) but seriously... I have realised that I could never become lesbian or bisexual. I just DO NOT feel sexual attraction to women. AT ALL. Thinking about it just...leaves me totally cold.

In fact, I always say that the only way I could become gay would be to turn into a man :D. Yup, I reckon if I was a guy I'd be a raging homosexual!!

That being said, I think the same is true for lesbians and gays... if you are 100% lesbian you can't just change to be something you are not!! You may be able to have a sexual relationship with a man, but that doesn't mean you'll automatically be straight :rolleyes:.

Now just because one individual person has a more flexible sexuality, doesn't mean others do... you can't, and shouldn't, ever assume to know more about what one person is capable of doing than they do!!

Just...ugh...

Also...I might point out... don't you think that a lot of gay people haven't actually TRIED to convince themselves that they're not gay?? It's gotta be a heck of a lot harder being gay in our society than straight!! I've known people who have tried to delude themselves for years...have lived in hetero relationships blah blah blah... but one thing they've never actually managed is to actually change their orientation!! I mean if it was possible for gays to become straight, I'm pretty sure there would be a heck of a lot fewer gays out there, as most people would choose to be straight rather than deal with all the rubbish that growing up in a mostly-straight society, surrounded by judgemental people, entails.

Well-said, votoshka. :)

I think for the most part its genetics but not all. Because environment plays a part. people sometime feel they can not express there true self because its wrong and therefore when they change there thinking there behaviour because malleable to because in line with there genetics.

Scott

With all the talk of fluidity and bisexuality and malleability, people have forgotten one basic thing...

Sexual fluidity is not malleability. It just means that women -are more likely- to shift sexual orientation over the course of their life span, than are men. This is not a process of conscious will. And this does not mean all women. Some women will remain relatively stable throughout their life. And the women who are "fluid" were probably originally bi to begin with, not totally straight (like Votoshka).

Even being bi does not mean you get a choice in who you find attractive on any given day. I used to exclusively find men attractive for about a week out of the month (biological realities!) and exclusively find women attractive for about one week, and then it would be pot luck the rest of the time. Ive spoken with some bi women in the past and discovered that Im not the only one who experienced my "dominant leaning" as being tied to my fertility cycle. I recently found out that I may already be in perimenopause, so this makes a -lot- of sense as to why I stopped being attracted to men. It also makes sense as to why some women (who were previously pretty straight) shift and come out as gay in their 40s or even 50s.

I don't think that female sexuality can be measured by the same yardstick as male sexuality. We have different biological realities with which to grapple.

Speaking only for myself, there have been moments where I've felt a -slight- attraction for someone of the same gender-nothing earth shattering or truly lust-inducing, just an urge to kiss or something like that.

I've theorized that it would be possible for me to cultivate a same-sex attraction if I really wanted to do it, I'd just have a lot more hoops to jump through than someone who's wired that way. As there is no natural physical attraction, I'd most likely have to install a mental program which heightens the right emotions in response to male attention, and I'd probably need to immerse myself in same-sex romance for a while until it became mundane. I doubt I'd ever be able to create the same kind of magnetism that exists between me and the opposite sex but I'd wager with enough time and focus I could make it so that I couldn't tell the difference.

This is assuming that I could remain detached from the outcome and I had enough positive motivation to stay with it. If I had programming which stigmatized relationships with the female gender-ie, I was only attempting to become attracted to men out of guilt-it would never work.

I'm just thinking out loud with all of this, but speaking purely in the realm of possibility I can see an orientation switch being possible, if only on a functional level. Human beings are capable of some pretty amazing things when they're motivated and lots of things can change that you'd figure are 100% set in stone. The question is whether it's worth it to make a particular change.

No matter how curious I am, I'm not gonna **** a dude. The only time I'd be at all tempted is if I felt the same kind of love as I've had with women and that's not happening in this lifetime. In other words, I don't think it really matters whether it's malleable, it doesn't mean it -should- be changed and it'd be difficult enough that I'd wager only the most dedicated of self-experimenters would find it worth the trouble.

Well, your theory isn't scientific. It's pure speculation. Who would put that much effort into pure speculation?