The Satisfaction Aspect
Simply being attracted to someone, even in cases where there are no outside impediments thwarting your being together, does not insure that they and their actions will bring you any happiness or satisfaction. In fact, in far too many cases quite the opposite is the result. One of the hardest kinds of relationships to end or endure is that which hangs on because the two people have some sort of attraction for each other even though whenever they are together one or both make the other thoroughly miserable.
Equally but opposite, finding someone unattracting does not necessarily dispose you to find all their actions unpleasant, disappointing, or dissatisfying. You may, for example, enjoy playing tennis with someone you have no feelings for one way or the other, or even with someone you do not like. (In fact, when you play well against someone you dislike, win, and have to work very hard to do so because they are a good player, it might be a rather exhilarating experience.)
I wish to call the aspect of a relationship in which you find the other person's behavior on the one hand agreeable, fun, pleasant, satisfying, heart-warming, engaging, heavenly, ecstatic, etc., or, on the other hand, unpleasant, disagreeable, irritating, offensive, nauseating, heartbreaking, tormenting, etc., the satisfaction-dissatisfaction aspect, or for short, the satisfaction aspect.
In a sense this is really a number of aspects which often, but not always, coincide. It is a number of aspects because we can have satisfactions and/or dissatisfactions in different areas and because our satisfactions and dissatisfactions, being feelings, can often both occur without their being any overriding feeling of either satisfaction or of dissatisfaction; that is, neither feeling takes precedence. For example, in the over- simple case of the person who finds his or her partner sexually gratifying but intellectually stultifying, or vice verse, an evening may be spent alternating between the sublime and the intolerable, without any sort of average able to be felt, calculated, or, for any meaningfully informative purpose, given. There may be nothing one can say in terms of one point on one satisfaction-dissatisfaction scale about the entire evening, but only point out that during the evening there were times with much satisfaction (of certain sorts), other times with much dissatisfaction (of certain sorts), and still other times with some of each (of whatever sorts).
Sometimes, of course, we feel that we can put an entire period of time on one point on one scale, simply because we actually feel that the annoyances were totally overridden by the pleasantries (or vice versa) and that on the whole the occasion was quite satisfactory. Or we can demarcate such a point on one scale because the time in question was either wholly pleasant or wholly unpleasant. It is important to remember though that this is not always the case -- that sometimes our feelings are mixed, and there is no point, and often no sense, in trying to "average" them on one point of one satisfaction-dissatisfaction scale.
Now there may be times and areas when one is neither particularly satisfied nor dissatisfied. If it is general or overall, one might call this a state of the blahs. I do not call it that however, because I consider a state of lethargy, bored inactivity, doldrums, or the blahs as being distinctly dissatisfying. But whatever it might be called then, if there is (are) such a middle state(s), I would put it (them) on the "center" of any satisfaction-dissatisfaction scale that runs from one end of most intense dissatisfaction to the other end of most intense satisfaction, centered between weakest satisfaction and weakest dissatisfaction. What matters is to be able to recognize the condition and to be able to discuss it in application to relationships if it should occur. It is not important that we discuss relationships in the fewest number of terms, distinctions, or depictions, but it is important that we make distinctions which are accurate and which reflect the significant things we want and need to consider in relationships.
Similarly, with regard to feelings, it is not important how exactly we may want to describe the case where we have no particular feelings about someone in terms ofthe attraction-aversion scale(s); whether it is in between attraction and aversion or at one end of either side, or to consider such indifference as something altogether different. I myself tend to think of attractions and aversions as being able to be depicted on one, or a number, of continuous scales, from intense repugnance or aversion (in general, or in one or more specific areas -- physical, sexual, intellectual, artistic, etc.) to intense attraction (in general, or in one or more areas), with "having no feelings", or feeling indifferent, about someone, lying "in the middle" between the mildest attraction and the mildest aversion. But the point is simply to be able to recognize such a state of having no attraction or aversion to someone should it occur and to be able to think about it's significance, if any, for your relationship with that person.
When I said at the beginning of chapter 3 that all relationships have the potential to involve emotional, satisfaction-dissatisfaction, and ethical aspects, I was including cases where those emotions, satisfactions, and benefits (or dissatisfactions or harms) were zero or non-existent. The categories apply to every relationship, whatever the contents, or the lack of contents, of those categories. It can be just as important to know there are no feelings, no benefits, or no joys in (areas of) a relationship (and no harms or dissatisfactions) as to know there are and to know what they are (and in what areas).
With most people whom we know over a period of time, we come to have a good idea of which kinds of activities we enjoy with them and which we do not. Cards or golf with Jones might be enjoyable, but he is not the person with whom to discuss serious personal problems or anxieties. Sally may be good company when you feel lighthearted and want to kid around or just have some small talk for a few hours without having to be serious; she may not be the person with whom you want to play chess or discuss serious matters about work. Mary may be a great chess opponent for you and may enjoy the same kind of movies you do, but she may not be very good company at a basketball game or fashion show. Martin may be someone you want to build your house or repair your car, but not to have over for a dinner party. We generally do not set out to pigeonhole our friends and acquaintances but we do often find out that we don't enjoy doing the same things with all of them. Sometimes, as with regard to sports and games, they may simply not be close enough to your level of (in)competence to enjoy playing with them, unless you are in the mood for giving or taking lessons rather than simply playing. Likewise with regard to specialized areas of interest such as your field of work or one of your hobbies.
Sometimes people's personalities or general abilities tend to cause you to avoid or include whole kinds of areas with them. A know-it-all, argumentative type is generally not much fun to talk politics, religion, social criticism, etc. with even though participating in sports with him or her might be quite enjoyable, as long as the sport does not allow much time for lectures. Some people are not very introspective, so introspective persons might tend to avoid areas of discourse with them they would love to discuss with someone sensitive to such matters. Devout liberals and devout conservatives may have difficulty discussing certain matters without getting one another upset, and yet still be the best of friends. In fact, sometimes it is because they are otherwise the best of friends that they find it so unnerving that the other person is so ignorant, stubborn, blind, unreasonable, and insensitive about such matters.
And though whether one is attracted to the other person or not sometimes influences what one likes to do with them, generally it does not. Kissing, making love, etc. for most people most of the time in our culture often depend in part for their satisfaction on one's being at least somewhat attracted to the other person. But one can enjoy doing many things with people one is not attracted to. One certainly can enjoy talking or playing tennis with a relative without having incestuous motives; or with a person of the same sex, without thereby being homosexual. One can enjoy the company of one's friends without having any particular attractions or feelings other than feelings of friendship and enjoyable companionship with them. One might even sometimes enjoy an activity with, or the company of, strangers one has no particular attractions for. One may prefer, in fact, to discuss certain problems with a stranger rather than a friend, or may prefer to play tennis, when in a very aggressive mood, with someone he does not much like at all.
And on the opposite side, having strong feelings of attraction for someone does not in any way assure that you will enjoy doing some particular activity with them. Having a strong sexual or physical attraction for someone else certainly does not insure they will be able to discuss in any interesting way, issues of interest to you nor be much fun at the tennis court, bowling alley, art museum or some particular movie. It may not even guaranty finding them enjoyable in bed. Even having strong emotional and physical attractions for each other does not guaranty that there will not be some activities that one would prefer doing with someone else, or alone. Many men who love their wives would just rather play golf with other men; and often their golfing wives equally prefer playing their golf with other women. I generally prefer to watch serious television productions alone rather than with most people I am very close to because I find if we watch together we often tend to interrupt each others' reveries with comments at the wrong times.
There are people though who, it seems, are very happy doing about anything with someone they like just because they are with that person. They enjoy being at otherwise boring or deplorable movies, conventions, sports events, concerts, whatever, as long as they are spending time with a loved one or one for whom they have strong feelings of attachment.
From informal surveys I have taken on this matter, it appears most often to be single girls and young women who fall into this category, and whether their views will change as they get older, I do not know. But it remains that for such people, what they will most often find satisfying about activities they share in a relationship will have less to do with their abilities or interests in those activities, or with how well the activities go, than it will with the fact they are sharing them with the one for whom they have strong feelings of attraction. Hence, it will be important for them that their loved ones be able and willing to spend time with them, more time perhaps than most couples might tend to want to share just for the sake of being together, rather than doing something together that is interesting to both.
I am talking here about general tendencies, since most people find they want simply to be around a loved one at times even though they really have nothing they particularly want to say or to do. Most people will periodically enjoy sharing an activity with a loved one more for the sake of the sharing than of the activity. For example, a championship bowler who loves the competition of the sport might go bowling with a less competent friend or loved one just for the sake of their company, not even feeling compelled to give lessons, rather than for any exhilaration that might come from competition. And conversely, I would suspect that even the most companion-loving people find times that their partner's or opponent's ability, or their own (lack of) interest, in some activity is more important than whether they have strong feelings for them or not. There must be times, I would think, when they want to talk with someone who understands something better than a loved one might, or want to go somewhere or do something with someone else whose interests and/or abilities might be closer to their own--at least in that particular area.
It is easy to see how dissatisfaction could easily creep in to a relationship between a "company lover" (who wants a loved one's companionship regardless of activity) and an "activity lover" (who wants a particular satisfying activity and the proper companion
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