Over the last couple of days an awareness that more than one attractive woman in my world may care for me provides a genuine source of distraction as I go about my business.  I know these women from businesses I patronize or other places where I have contact with them on a regular basis. In every instance I feel personally constrained from approaching them for social reasons.  Today I remembered how I tried to broach that subject with several baristas at this one coffee shop from 2009 to 2012, and how much upheaval getting shot down by them caused for me mentally, emotionally and socially.  I don't want to go through that again.  Again, I don't make this decision out of excessive shyness, but rather because I just want to try a different approach.  I hope that refraining from asking this barista for contact info or inviting that staff member at Austin Clubhouse to see me play an open mike night might possibly bear a brand of fruit that I can live with, even if I never go on even one date with any of these women. 

As it stands, I feel constrained, and they may feel constrained too, if my guesses about their interest me contain some truth.  I think taking care to treat such women with consideration proves just as important a task for me as taking care to treat that young woman I invited to my comic book sale last October with consideration.  I suspected her of coming from some adversarial place in regards to me, and that guardedness from me that governed how I treated her could prove just as handy with these women whom I figure might really care for me.  I don't feel as if any, or, um, either of them will find my reserved stance alienating to them.  I say this with some confidence, because I've refrained from approaching baristas since that era of around the early 2010's, and those baristas I've just left alone, so to speak, seem to like me fine.

A couple of posts ago I wrote that I had no resentment that my gesture towards that young woman last October didn't compel lots of very attractive, young women to openly express a desire to go out with me, and I feel that way about these two women.  I feel good enough speculating that my behavior towards that young woman from the past several years may indeed resonate with more than one attractive woman in my world.  I feel a great amount of gratitude that I've meaningfully addressed my problems with love addiction, and that I did not do anything to undermine or sabotage the positive flavor of my invitation to that young woman last October.   I think the possibility that women in my world whom I find very attractive also like me, even if the circumstances we know each other, and my past frustrations that resulted from efforts to put myself out there for the cause, constrain me from doing anything about it.  I feel very good with entertaining the possibility that these feelings for me from these women in my world may exist at all, even though I don't feel much like trying to cash in.  Will my unwillingness to do anything about it alienate either of them?  We'll see.

I will talk further about the idea that my interactions with young, very attractive women in my world never seem to have anything to do with dates, sex, love, girlfriends, or relationships.  Might as well not sweat any of those issues in regards to such young, very attractive women if they never seem to come up.  Am I right?  The two main issues that seem to come up with such women usually have to do with, 1) Should I leave her alone? and, 2) Should I let go of the idea of getting with her?

I find actual sexual encounters with women, for the most part, seem to have a random, chaotic quality to them in contrast to the fantasy world a lot of these young, very attractive women inhabit.  Or rather, the notion I have of these young, very attractive women.  My tendencies toward love addictive actions and behaviors, the obsessiveness towards this or that individual woman, for example; the behaviors and thought patterns seem to betray a desire for order to what still seems to register as an oftentimes indifferent, random experience of the dating universe.

I've found some of my best chances at negotiating my way around this conundrum to reside in the goal of just kind of forming some friendships with women who prove receptive to such an overture.  If they don't bite at that opportunity, don't push it.  My invitation to that young woman to my comic book show last year represented just about all I wanted to do to try and form some kind of friendship with someone I could just not stop thinking about.  Once it became obvious that she had no interest in that, I bailed on the whole deal soon enough.

The process of forming friendships with women, and accepting many of those who indicate an interest in me, requires a more forgiving standard as to which women I will go out with.  I don't have to have some wild sex time with every woman I go out with.  I think men who only solicit and value friendships with very attractive women don't like women much.  I think such a man's need for validation from very attractive women, in many instances, at least those men who resemble me psychologically, will come across rather readily to these same very attractive women, and these men will experience a seemingly endless stream of rejections.

All of this I just wrote I can sum up as a roundabout way of saying that when it comes to actually having sex with a woman, I just try to make hay where I can, and to not feel as if I have to be in love with the person.  I still try to approach women I really, really care for, as in the case of that young woman in October of last year, but not to the exclusion of all other experiences available to me with women of all types.

I can't help but feel as if my problems with women represent developmental obstacles to overcome.  Whatever tendencies I may still have to chase some hottie to the ends of the earth and back may indicate a stunted growth in regards to the total relationship with women.  I think I have overcome this tendency, even if I still obsess on individual women as if I'm still fifteen years old.  

In my last post, I wrote that I would prioritize intelligent decisions over striving for the happily ever after with whomever I tend to think that way about.  I remember writing tons of entries that covered the notion that every decision I've had to make, these days, in regards to young, very attractive women whom I like never has anything  to do with love, girlfriends, or relationships, yes or no, for or against.  I really emphasized this point in my posts concerning that young woman who remained on my docket from February 2019, to about February, 2022.  Intelligent decision making over happily ever after certainly ruled the day during that whole ordeal.

I can't help but think that such a mindset decisively defined how I conducted myself in regards to that young woman from beginning, to middle, to end.  No doubt.  And, you know what, if I adopt intelligent decision making as the priority mindset in any situation I find myself in with any young, very attractive woman whom I like in the foreseeable future, I have no reason not to think that I will conduct myself in an exemplary manner towards anyone I care for, regardless of where I stand with them. 

Last year, after I invited that young woman to my comic book sale, I steeled myself for the aftermath.  I emphasized to myself, time and again, that I did not want to try to cash in, rebound, or otherwise try to find some other love interest to take that young woman's place, and I did not try to do that at all.  I have no resentments at all that the aftermath of that encounter with that young woman did not bring some windfall of young, very attractive women who demonstrably expressed a desire to go out with me.  Instead, I feel very, very grateful that my adaptation of the cognitive behavior therapy techniques that I learned in the David Burns book Feeling Good allow me to live a life almost free of the emotional pain and upheaval that would mark my days in my twenties.  

While I do respond well to psych meds, I think the stability the meds imposed on me allowed me to work on my game and effect a meaningful recovery from love addiction in regards to how it would trigger bad, traumatic episodes with women.  The combination of psych meds and cognitive behavior therapy techniques brought about this place I find myself in now.     

In my last post, I talked about how similar my approach to the right person, romantically speaking, would look to my approach to the wrong person.   I talked about how my approach to that young woman at that business that I invited to my comic book sale last year-she was the wrong person- could possibly carry over to someone who might actually work out somehow.  I emphasized my ability to slow things way down, pick my spots, not engage in sabotage, and display a willingness and ability to let go of that person when the time came.  I proposed that those elements of my approach could carry over to someone who might actually care for me some.

In my grandiose way of looking at the world, I imagined that a lot of young, very attractive women actually "saw," or more accurately, knew about, the level of skill I displayed in dealing with the difficult situation presented to me by this young woman.  After that invitation I offered this young woman to my comic book sale, and how courageous and heartfelt I came off, I wondered if a lot of these young, very attractive women entertained thoughts about putting me behind a similar eight ball, and seeing how that would all shake out.  I speak from an experience I had with "Wanda" in 1987.  For a fuller understanding of how that all shook out, buy Richy Vegas Comics issue number 9 from my store.  I don't want to talk about it now, other than to say I had one of the worst experiences of my life in regards to my relationship with women at the hands of Wanda as a direct consequence of my heartfelt, courageous handling of a very bad episode involving `"Donna," Wanda, and others in 1986.

So, if someone I care for in my world, and this person happened to be a young, very attractive woman, actually came to care for me a bit, and wanted to possibly get to know me better, such a person might want me use the same care in dealing with them that I displayed with that young woman last year. Okay, will do.  But, this person, if they even exist in my world, should take care in what they ask for.  I can deal with a difficult situation presented by a well-intentioned person, probably, but if this person wants that same skill level on display, I might not find myself so focused on riding off into the sunset with her.  Instead I might find myself prioritizing intelligent decision making over happily ever after.   Yep, that's my relationship with women these days: intelligent decisions.  

This time last year, when I found myself in a situation with someone who really didn't seem to care for me romantically, but I cared for them a great deal, I'd come to some conclusions by then.  One conclusion came from debunking any notion that I ever, ever faced a romantic love equivalent of a fight or flight crisis.  I'd done that a number of times with this person by then.  I just sat down on any anxieties about the situation, and any impulse to act decisively, "Now, dammit," proved not at all worth acting on.  She never cared for me, so I could just slow things way, way down to my pace, and make intelligent decisions accordingly.  In so doing, I realized the other conclusion.  I realized that no time clock existed, either.  Our cat and mouse game dragged on for almost three years before I invited her to my comic book sale at my friends' shop last October.  My invite still felt spot on as coming at the right time, the right place, for the right reasons, and for the right occasion after all that time had passed since she'd started in on me in February of 2019.  It didn't work out, but that just proves my point.  She never wanted to go out with me, so I could just slow things way, way down in that regard, and pick my spots, if I so chose to pick any spots.  I really feel as if I did all I could in regards to that whole situation.

Now if, someday, I get the impression that someone out there in my world really cares for me- I'm not saying that's the case now, mind you, but, if I do ever get that impression- I bet the same core elements of the above-mentioned situation would hold true.  i bet that neither a fight or flight crisis nor a time clock would exist.  I seriously doubt someone who really cared for me would ever pressure me in that manner, and that no matter the outcome, she would still care for me. I probably would have to engage in some sort of extremely misguided, deliberate sabotage of our deal to make her not care for me anymore.  I've known people who deliberately sabotage their relationships with those around them in some sort of really fucked-up bid for unconditional love.  I imagine a huge element of my end of it would actually involve refraining from that sort of behavior to the utmost, and hoping that things might shake out favorably in the absence of such behavior.  I'm thinking this stuff up as I go along.  I mean, I know that's not all there is to it, but I bet a willingness to let it all go factors in heavily as well, for example.  Neither of those two things, no sabotage, a willingness to let go, involves coming on like "Johnny on the spot," so to speak.

I've concluded that I'm afraid that I will fall in love with the wrong person sometime in the foreseeable future.  There's someone in my world I care for, and I worry that my unerring instinct to gravitate towards inappropriate love interests will bring upon me yet another epic struggle to keep my head above water and keep from going totally nuts.

The thing is, I conducted myself really well when I fell in love with the wrong person the last time.  I couldn't have done better than I did if I had a hundred more chances to do so.  If I treat all of this drama and bullshit as the symptoms of a chronic illness that I can just take care of and manage, then I have no reason to believe that I won't handle any future situation as well or better than I handled the last one.

I just wish "real" women would take an interest in me at some point.  I guess one of my deepest fears resides in the notion that the women in my world will just want to see a repeat performance from me of all I went through with the last wrong person I fell in love with, and that no one really has any interest in me for more than that.  Well, that would really suck, but that remains to be seen.  If the women in my world just want me to perform in that manner, no matter the toll such a performance would take on my health and well being, then shame on them, and there's no reason to believe that I would not catch wise to that desire on their part sooner rather than later.