You met each other in the second half of your life and the thought of upcoming intimacy is a little scary: will your partner like everything? Why do we connect feelings and external attractiveness so strongly, and can physical imperfections cool the ardor?
“I have always been ashamed of my body. Now, after three pregnancies, I understand that I don’t look perfect at all, Olga (45 years old) admits. — After the divorce, I met a new love and was worried about how our first intimacy would pass. However, my fears were not justified — I was happy as never before.
“Beauty, which many consider necessary for sexual arousal, turns out to be very subjective,” says Jungian analyst Lev Khegai. — Initially, sexual attraction is a projection of an imaginary image onto a partner. This collective image, which the subconscious mind draws for us, includes associations from childhood associated with loved ones of the opposite sex (mother, father, siblings), and later experiences. Therefore, it can be very different from beauty stereotypes.”
“Physical attraction, emotional attachment and the idea of beauty are regulated by different mechanisms,” explains Gestalt therapist Maria Lekareva. “You can recognize a person as beautiful, but not erotically attractive, and vice versa.”
We instinctively want to please as many sexually attractive people as possible.
This increases social status and increases the chances of finding the best partner. That is why we associate physical love so strongly with the beauty of the body.
At the same time, any comparison with ourselves, but younger, healthier, more athletic, makes us sad, because we are afraid of losing in competition with other people for attractiveness.
“These fears are just as relevant in youth and youth and are not very dependent on age,” says Maria Lekareva. “It’s just that with age, other existential experiences are superimposed on them: time is running out, no one is getting younger.”
“Until the 90th century, XNUMX% of people born did not live to be forty years old,” says Lev Khegay. — It is no coincidence that in Russian the words forty and term have the same root. At this age, a person begins to think about the inevitability of death.
For some, this fear takes on the character of a special hypochondriacal preoccupation with their bodies. External factors are also added to this: the mass media, social networks, which plant certain ideals of appearance, which are becoming increasingly difficult to comply with. This raises additional concerns.»
What do we (not) see in each other?
“When I confessed to a friend that I didn’t like my hips and stomach, he joked, asking me never to offend the body that he loves so much,” recalls Ksenia (48). “He said it was unpleasant for him to hear that someone speaks of his beloved without admiration.”
“The reaction of this woman’s partner is quite understandable,” says Maria Lekareva. — We look at our body in the mirror with an alienated look. We do not rejoice in ourselves, we do not have inspiration and special plasticity, which appear in the presence of someone we like. A person in love with us looks holistically and sees both appearance, and emotions, and our reactions.
The intoxication of the first love allows you to accept a partner with all his shortcomings.
“Attention clings to some detail — a smile, a manner of straightening hair — and a fire of feelings begins, the partner seems irresistible,” says gestalt therapist Natalia Artsybasheva. “Women also have a tendency to be more attentive to detail, and it is a discovery for them that they can be liked with excess weight and without careful grooming.”
The saying «love is blind» perfectly captures the fact that we fall in love with a dream. And the ideal parameters of the body have nothing to do with it. What is important is the feeling of finding your other half. However, complexes due to imaginary imperfections can play a cruel joke on us.
Ease of self-feeling and self-acceptance are involuntarily reflected in movement and behavior, and we become especially attractive.
“If a person considers himself ugly, constantly speaks and acts as if everyone sees him that way, sooner or later they begin to treat him that way,” explains Lev Khegay. “There is a conscious or unconscious suggestion.”
Internal complexes can over time not only affect the attitude of a partner towards us, but also our own attitude towards him.
“At first, his appearance is unconsciously idealized, and then devalued in a protective way,” says the analyst. “And we gradually begin to inspire him that he is not so good.”
If the partner has sufficient internal maturity and self-respect, then most likely he will resist this manipulation, and the relationship will be in jeopardy.
“Now I do more with my body than twenty years ago,” admits Marina (50 years old). — I do it for the general tone and mood. I noticed that if I feel attractive, then this is how I begin to behave. On days like this, I get a lot of compliments.”
The body works in unison with our mental state. Ease of self-feeling and self-acceptance are involuntarily reflected in movement and behavior, and we become especially attractive to others.
body, age, love
How justified are our worries due to the fact that the imperfections of the figure can repel a partner whom we meet no longer at a young age?
“Overcoming fears about aging largely depends on the influence of the myth of beauty as a commodity on our lives,” Lev Khegay is convinced. — The culture of mass media and social networks inspires us that appearance is of paramount importance. It is inextricably linked in our minds with success. If we stop living in accordance with these attitudes, then we will become freer in relationships, regardless of age.
“Corporeality turns out to be significant in isolation from a person’s personality only if we are perceived through the prism of social standards,” says Maria Lekareva. — Then the conquest of a partner becomes a trophy. It depends little on age and is connected only with internal infantilism.
Some retain it until old age, and then the perception of the body — both their own and that of another person — falls under critical evaluation and undermines self-confidence.
“The life lived not only leaves traces on our body,” says Natalia Artsybasheva. “She gives invaluable knowledge about how difficult it is to find your man, what a rare gift it is and how to protect it.”