If it were me, I would diagnose one of three problems.
Unreasonably high standards, high standards and low incidence, or standards and unrecognized fear of intimacy.
I have trouble with the last two. My solution to both is to talk to new people I am attracted to physically more often. First impressions don’t always go anywhere, but I need to increase my number of attempts.
Have you considered an upper limit to your number of experiments, to settle for some optimal stopping point? Or some method to increase the quality of experimental subjects?
Neither of these will resolve a fear of intimacy issue, of course! And I do hate to suggest someone alter their standards without knowing for myself that they are unreasonable.
I don’t know. For me, most of my life, I think I have been irrationally afraid of harm from the people I am interested in. In a PTSD sort of way, without any really traumatic experiences, that I know of.
And for most of this time I have been very interested in having an intimate relationship. (I’ve had a few, all ‘serious’.) And at the same time rarely attracted on a physical level, to anyone. Which is a problem that may resolve itself, for me, now that I acknowledge and work on the irrational parts of my fears, or it may not.
I think this physical level is essential, and that my awareness of it has been hampered by my fears. Is this clear?
I am absolutely not sure! And if my strategy for correcting my behavior in order to achieve my goals matches the optimal strategy for the actual problem, and achieved positive results, would it matter?
I can see the advantage to a correct diagnosis if the optimal strategy had no positive benefits.
I am not very familiar with the diagnostic criteria for sub-clinical OCD, but it would not surprise me to find out that I used to qualify, and may still. But it’s not a big worry for me right now.
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If it were me, I would diagnose one of three problems. Unreasonably high standards, high standards and low incidence, or standards and unrecognized fear of intimacy.
I have trouble with the last two. My solution to both is to talk to new people I am attracted to physically more often. First impressions don’t always go anywhere, but I need to increase my number of attempts.
.
Have you considered an upper limit to your number of experiments, to settle for some optimal stopping point? Or some method to increase the quality of experimental subjects?
Neither of these will resolve a fear of intimacy issue, of course! And I do hate to suggest someone alter their standards without knowing for myself that they are unreasonable.
.
I don’t know. For me, most of my life, I think I have been irrationally afraid of harm from the people I am interested in. In a PTSD sort of way, without any really traumatic experiences, that I know of.
And for most of this time I have been very interested in having an intimate relationship. (I’ve had a few, all ‘serious’.) And at the same time rarely attracted on a physical level, to anyone. Which is a problem that may resolve itself, for me, now that I acknowledge and work on the irrational parts of my fears, or it may not.
I think this physical level is essential, and that my awareness of it has been hampered by my fears. Is this clear?
.
I am absolutely not sure! And if my strategy for correcting my behavior in order to achieve my goals matches the optimal strategy for the actual problem, and achieved positive results, would it matter?
I can see the advantage to a correct diagnosis if the optimal strategy had no positive benefits.
I am not very familiar with the diagnostic criteria for sub-clinical OCD, but it would not surprise me to find out that I used to qualify, and may still. But it’s not a big worry for me right now.
Wow, I totally didn’t spot the second possible meaning there!