Romantic Fiction, Reality Shaping and The Work

[John G]

I'll jump in if you don't mind. There's nothing wrong in itself to comfort someone with sex as long as both participants are consenting and both adults. But I suspect you don't understand the female psyche that well if you think a woman will confort a man who's not her partner with sex without expecting this man to become her partner. You don't give so much of yourself for nothing. In such a case, one is giving everything and the other takes without giving back. That's creepy.

A grown man who's depressed and asking for sex, overtly or covertly comes off as immature, needy, weak and that's not attractive at all. But in itself you're right, it's not wrong. It's just not the best a man can do. Sex doesn't mend a broken heart, it doesn't right the wrongs of the past, and while it can give a boost, the only way to heal is to face what is wounded inside you.

The purpose of these books is to show what a man and a woman can be at their best, they show how hard it is to get there, and the joy that can be found when one overcomes obstacles. They show how a couple can help each other overcome these obstacles. Sex has is part, because it is an expression of love.

As for Silent Melody, I am siding with @hlat and advise you to read again.

SPOILERS
Emily and Ashley love each other, and that's a not a small difference. Althought Ashley has a more brotherly love toward Emily at the beginning, and suffers when he crosses the line. Because Emily gave everything and he took without giving back. Because he was so immersed in his problems, that he didn't saw all the wrong he was doing to her until the deed was done.
Emily proves to be a hell of a woman when she refuses to marry Ashley, the man she loved for years, when it is presented on a silver plate, because at that moment, it isn't right, because at that moment Ashley proposes out of guilt, not out of love. The book is all about how Ashley realising his love as morphed into a more mature love, he learns to give back, to let go of the past.

Yes I don't think anybody (including the woman when she's the hurt one) is actually asking for sex of any kind either in any kind of way, covert or overt. Just when there's a love growing (but not at the ideal love state yet), that possibility exists since both sides either have been before or are heading in that direction.

In my case the girl came to me (who was actually the one via whom I got hurt via her having a boyfriend) thus I wasn't covertly or overtly doing anything, in fact I was in a room she never went anywhere near but either she went and found me or was told about me by someone who found me. The girl even though she had a steady boyfriend put her face inches away from me and played with her lips with her fingers in a way she knew drove me wild because we had done this in German class (it was an independent learning class from tapes). She obviously didn't overly mind being my partner in this way since it had happened before though it had to be somewhat of a strain on her since she now had a steady boyfriend. There in my case was the addition that she knew she was the one over whom I was hurting. By pre-existing sexual tension I mean either a growing love or a past relationship or both. I had originally phrased this as true love/obsession/good friends possibilities (good friends being a past relationship that had stopped via separation and obsession being mostly one sided like with my situation).

 

[Redrock12]

I'll jump in if you don't mind. There's nothing wrong in itself to comfort someone with sex as long as both participants are consenting and both adults. But I suspect you don't understand the female psyche that well if you think a woman will confort a man who's not her partner with sex without expecting this man to become her partner. You don't give so much of yourself for nothing. In such a case, one is giving everything and the other takes without giving back. That's creepy.

A grown man who's depressed and asking for sex, overtly or covertly comes off as immature, needy, weak and that's not attractive at all. But in itself you're right, it's not wrong. It's just not the best a man can do. Sex doesn't mend a broken heart, it doesn't right the wrongs of the past, and while it can give a boost, the only way to heal is to face what is wounded inside you.

The purpose of these books is to show what a man and a woman can be at their best, they show how hard it is to get there, and the joy that can be found when one overcomes obstacles. They show how a couple can help each other overcome these obstacles. Sex has is part, because it is an expression of love.

As for Silent Melody, I am siding with @hlat and advise you to read again.

SPOILERS
Emily and Ashley love each other, and that's a not a small difference. Although Ashley has a more brotherly love toward Emily at the beginning, and suffers when he crosses the line. Because Emily gave everything and he took without giving back. Because he was so immersed in his problems, that he didn't saw all the wrong he was doing to her until the deed was done.
Emily proves to be a hell of a woman when she refuses to marry Ashley, the man she loved for years, when it is presented on a silver plate, because at that moment, it isn't right, because at that moment Ashley proposes out of guilt, not out of love. The book is all about how Ashley realising his love as morphed into a more mature love, he learns to give back, to let go of the past.

Pardon my cynicism, but chances are if any grown man is claiming he's 'depressed' and asking for sex to help him not be depressed, he's more than likely conning his potential target because, in plain old layman's terms, he's just horny (looking to satisfy a biological urge, (sorta like having to go to the bathroom). Plain and simple.
Needy, weak, immature, meh, these words are just bait for for the potential victim. I'm sorry to be so direct, but I've been around the block a few times and I find these kind of guys personally disgusting. They usually take advantage of women with low self-esteem, are drunk or stoned, or vulnerable for whatever reason.
Imho, maybe I'm wrong, but a little more realism is necessary here.

 

[Charade]

As I was reading these books I‘ve noticed the same pattern; people were hurt on both sides, but not love was the key to happy ending - it was honesty, courage, understanding, opened conversation and compassion. Those were the keys to that unlocked all problems.

Yes, I agree. As I am getting to the third book in a series ( currently Anna Campbell, The Highlander’s Lost Lady). I find myself highlighting those very words. The love making is not as prominently featured in this book as in the first two. It is partly because sexual abuse is being worked through so it handles that more gently. But as you say, these qualities are what allows a conclusion in a happy ending.

Honesty really stands out for me. I keep yelling at characters to just speak up and tell their true thoughts and feelings. Get honesty out in the open. But the learning process seems to have steps and takes time to absorb the new perspectives and behaviors. So I tell myself to be patient because it makes for better storytelling.

 

[ryu]

Pardon my cynicism, but chances are if any grown man is claiming he's 'depressed' and asking for sex to help him not be depressed, he's more than likely conning his potential target because, in plain old layman's terms, he's just horny (looking to satisfy a biological urge, (sorta like having to go to the bathroom). Plain and simple.
Needy, weak, immature, meh, these words are just bait for for the potential victim. I'm sorry to be so direct, but I've been around the block a few times and I find these kind of guys personally disgusting. They usually take advantage of women with low self-esteem, are drunk or stoned, or vulnerable for whatever reason.
Imho, maybe I'm wrong, but a little more realism is necessary here.

I don't think you're wrong in most cases, I thought it wouldn't hurt to be diplomatic though. Trying to be a lady and all that.

 

[NewEngland Seeker]

That was an amazing performance!

I have not seen Les Miserables on stage, but the book is one the best that I have ever read. As it happens, it's setting overlaps with the regency era in England.

Ruthie Henshall performance as Fantine is a very high act to compete with. I forgot to mention in my first post that Fantine is a prostitute with a child that she had to give up and the song I dreamed a dream is sung before her death by suicide. Such a gripping performance for a tragic character. This emotional display of a women's pain in an unbearable life helped me to fully immerse into the Chance Sisters Series. This song helped to connect with the subtile emotions of Abby's, Jane's, Damaris's, and Daisy's fears of a potential tragic life.

 

[Redrock12]

I don't think you're wrong in most cases, I thought it wouldn't hurt to be diplomatic though. Trying to be a lady and all that.

That's understandable ryu. Let us guys handle the rough stuff and you ladies can keep on being, well, the delicate, polite little creatures the universe meant you to be.
Us guys are so blessed by you lovely female creations of the DCM. We gotta look after our little treasures.
I Think

 

[Lan8r]

Laura posted:
"I read a very moving statement by one character in a book I read recently (unfortunately, can say which one). After trials and troubles that get settled, the man says to the woman something like: "I love and will make love to you as long as my body has strength; and when I am old and unable, I will still be making love to you in my heart and mind." I cried when I read that because it was so true and deeply meaningful."

These words... "I love and will make love to you as long as my body has strength; and when I am old and unable, I will still be making love to you in my heart and mind." Brought me to tears. I had to walk away from the book and go do laundry while I cried. I want to say that is was one of Elisa Bradens' Rescued from Ruin series, but I could be mistaken.

In any event, I can't express in words what this reading has done for me. I've composed so many posts in my mid after reading a book About how I have seen so many of my own programs and personal issues played out. But, every post I read on this thread puts my words to shame.

Some of you have posted about the sexually intimate scenes in these books. OMG, at first reading some of them, I was like WOW!. However, I have come to see them in terms of ...."I love and will make love to you as long as my body has strength; and when I am old and unable, I will still be making love to you in my heart and mind." It seems to me that this is what these authoresses are trying to bring to us readers. A love that is so spiritually deep, that transcends the physical.

And I've come to see that this spiritual love doesn't necessarily have to come from a sexually intimate relationship, it can come from any relationship. A sister who I love, a Father who I love, a Mother who I love, a brother who I love. A Friend, any loved one. Even though the most dearest love would be the one who "I love and will make love to you as long as my body has strength; and when I am old and unable, I will still be making love to you in my heart and mind" OMG that is my One True Love! I will find him. If not in this lifetime, then another!

Having said all that, I have been observing changes in myself. My exchanges with others, my patience and ability to suffer the most egregious comments. And to stifle the desire to flay them from stem to stern!! I have found that I have more understanding of people. Funny that because I thought that I was understanding. But reading these books, I realize my definition of understanding was lacking. These characters see and endure so much of life. Even though these trials and tribulations could actually be equated to what so many of us endure in our lifetimes. It just looks different it can be hard to see the similarities, but it is still the same.

Anyway, I love this reading experiment. I love Laura and the C's. And all of you who help me understand who I might become. Thank you All.

 

[iamthatis]

A person can certainly want to comfort another person and there's nothing wrong with that.

In The Wave series, we can discover exactly why there can be something wrong with that, no?

Consider two false personalities who seem to support and care for one another, but in reality are simply enabling each other's baser drives, unable to even distinguish what the other Soul is truly asking, let alone truly give - and as such are engaged in a mutual dynamic of energetic feeding. There is no real Knowledge at work in these kinda dynamics. No cognizance of free will, let alone respect for it. Believe me, I've been there.

I wonder about your understanding of pity (or wanting to help, empathy, and the genuine urge to care) and how it plays a key function in psychopathy? How would you take this Knowledge and use it as a lens to look at this past attraction you've shared with us?

From where I sit, it seems like a lingering obsession. If you haven't already read it, read Masquerade of Angels for a crazy example of how an entire life can be meticulously scripted by nefarious actors - including attractions. Yours, mine - everyone's.

 

[John G]

John G said: A person can certainly want to comfort another person and there's nothing wrong with that.

In The Wave series, we can discover exactly why there can be something wrong with that, no?

Consider two false personalities who seem to support and care for one another, but in reality are simply enabling each other's baser drives, unable to even distinguish what the other Soul is truly asking, let alone truly give - and as such are engaged in a mutual dynamic of energetic feeding. There is no real Knowledge at work in these kinda dynamics. No cognizance of free will, let alone respect for it. Believe me, I've been there.

I wonder about your understanding of pity (or wanting to help, empathy, and the genuine urge to care) and how it plays a key function in psychopathy? How would you take this Knowledge and use it as a lens to look at this past attraction you've shared with us?

From where I sit, it seems like a lingering obsession. If you haven't already read it, read Masquerade of Angels for a crazy example of how an entire life can be meticulously scripted by nefarious actors - including attractions. Yours, mine - everyone's.

Well I personally never comforted her or had any back and forth talking dynamic. I never talked to her in person, I just looked at her but could never say a word. I was just too introverted. In college, I wrote a couple love letters to the girl I liked and her friends pushed her into me after the first one but I still could never say a word. It wasn't until my 30s when the online world showed up, where I could have back and forth romancing conversations. I got laid off at 40 and never worked again (one interviewer mentioned I was painfully shy). My problem is more communicating at all more than any problem with particular kinds of communicating. I don't think there was any problem at all with the girl in high school doing a one time comforting to leave me with something warm (she was rather ruthlessly cold on the phone when I did my only desperate communicating on the phone to make sure she really had a serious boyfriend). It was I admit oddly nice to have her treat me like a regular guy who could actually be going after a girl instead of a painfully shy guy who needed to be let down gently. It was horribly painful though; it's still sad to see the street sign of the street she lived on but of course no longer horribly painful just a dull ache as Balogh called it in the Precious Jewel (when the heroine thought about the long term effects after leaving the hero which though of course eventually had the happy ending).

 

[Candice]

I never talked to her in person, I just looked at her

If you never spoke to her, then how can you know that anything you observed her doing was for your benefit?

You’ve created sexual fantasies in your head about a teenage girl and you’re still obsessing over them as a grown adult man. You basically said that this incident of her sitting next to you, when she “played with her lips” was some form of sexual favor for rejecting you for another. This is a complete delusion. You just admitted she never spoke to you.

Quite frankly the entire account of this one sided incident is rather disturbing.

 

[John G]

If you never spoke to her, then how can you know that anything you observed her doing was for your benefit?

You’ve created sexual fantasies in your head about a teenage girl and you’re still obsessing over them as a grown adult man. You basically said that this incident of her sitting next to you, when she “played with her lips” was some form of sexual favor for rejecting you for another. This is a complete delusion. You just admitted she never spoke to you.

Quite frankly the entire account of this one sided incident is rather disturbing.

Well she had her face six inches away from me for 40 some minutes and had to kind of contort herself from the desk next to mine to do that. I was hiding from her in a very little used resource room (it was when we both had free periods and I used to see her elsewhere at that time before the phone call). I have no memory of ever seeing other people in that room but I'm sure there must have been a person or two or else why would they have the room plus I have a memory of her looking towards the front of the room before leaving out the door at the end of the period so I figure someone might have been there. I was a little worried about this novel reading exercise bringing this back up; I was never thinking of her before except for something like my Mom driving us past her street on the way to church when we visit.

 

[ryu]

Well she had her face six inches away from me for 40 some minutes and had to kind of contort herself from the desk next to mine to do that. I was hiding from her in a very little used resource room (it was when we both had free periods and I used to see her elsewhere at that time before the phone call). I have no memory of ever seeing other people in that room but I'm sure there must have been a person or two or else why would they have the room plus I have a memory of her looking towards the front of the room before leaving out the door at the end of the period so I figure someone might have been there. I was a little worried about this novel reading exercise bringing this back up; I was never thinking of her before except for something like my Mom driving us past her street on the way to church when we visit.

Then she was toying with you. She was discovering that her beauty gave her power over men and boys, and you took the bait. There's nothing beautiful about that, it baffles me you fail to see it now that you're grown. You can turn around the bushes and make this experience more than there really was (at the beginning you were implying the two of you had sex and had a kind of friendship). But there was no love, no friendship, no meaningful exchange or sex in this situation, just power-play and obsession.

We've been several members to point out that this experience is not what you made it out to be in your mind, I hope you realize we did it with your best interest at heart. I'm sure a part of you knows you've been had, otherwise why made us all believe in your previous posts that the two of you were close, when in fact, you never spoke a word to her?!

 

[ryu]

That's understandable ryu. Let us guys handle the rough stuff and you ladies can keep on being, well, the delicate, polite little creatures the universe meant you to be.
Us guys are so blessed by you lovely female creations of the DCM. We gotta look after our little treasures.
I Think

Thanks! But you know women need to be able to handle the rough stuff too and have some spine. Men can't be always around to save the day.

 

[genero81]

So, Phaedra was maddening with her insistence on going against social norms, but in the next book Rose was equally maddening in enabling her alcoholic brother with a criminal mind. The last request he made of her made me angry, and she tried to oblige him to the near detriment of all! Unbelievable.

I've made a start on book four. The "half mad" Lord Easterbrook will no doubt prove to be most interesting indeed.

 

[iamthatis]

Well I personally never comforted her or had any back and forth talking dynamic. I never talked to her in person, I just looked at her but could never say a word. I was just too introverted. In college, I wrote a couple love letters to the girl I liked and her friends pushed her into me after the first one but I still could never say a word. It wasn't until my 30s when the online world showed up, where I could have back and forth romancing conversations. I got laid off at 40 and never worked again (one interviewer mentioned I was painfully shy). My problem is more communicating at all more than any problem with particular kinds of communicating. I don't think there was any problem at all with the girl in high school doing a one time comforting to leave me with something warm (she was rather ruthlessly cold on the phone when I did my only desperate communicating on the phone to make sure she really had a serious boyfriend). It was I admit oddly nice to have her treat me like a regular guy who could actually be going after a girl instead of a painfully shy guy who needed to be let down gently. It was horribly painful though; it's still sad to see the street sign of the street she lived on but of course no longer horribly painful just a dull ache as Balogh called it in the Precious Jewel (when the heroine thought about the long term effects after leaving the hero which though of course eventually had the happy ending).

You still seem to be 'inside' this memory, with all of its feelings and associations, and have yet to take the step 'outside' of it, and take a broader objective look at yourself, your current relationship to the memory, and the unseen dynamics at play, which appear to have left a very significant mark on you. I don't see you making good use of the recommended psychological literature (or The Wave for that matter) as your guide here.

To ask a more pointed question, have you read Masquerade of Angels?