Jess lanai

I send my fiction writing in anonymously to sites where people can critique it.

It sounds scary but it’s actually very addicting. It’s like gambling.

When I started out I was one hundred percent blind. I had no idea how I came off. What would be good or what we be bad. What I was even trying to do.

But feedback helps give some vision.

It’s still impossible to know how a person will react to my writing. But with each criticism I can make a goal. From that goal I have something specific to accomplish.

Then I can at least start to get a map of what I’m bad at and what I’m good at and how it all fits together.

I’ve been at this for years and what I’m still blind to can be remarkable.

It’s like Bruce Willis finally noticing he’s dead.

Things that are so obvious I have to stop and wonder if Im maybe stupid.

Dating is a lot like that.

It’s very hard to know what I’m blind to and how much I am deluding myself.

I have this huge cat that used to be totally wild in my neighborhood but very slowly moved into my house.

Most the time the thing just stares off into space and tolerates me petting it. Sometimes it’s bites me for petting it. Other days it’ll have a little confidence and force affection on me by jumping into my lap. If I don’t let it sit in my lap it bites me until I do.

I’m sure I was a lot like this cat.

I know I was porn star so I was good at sex (theoretically) but I have very little experience dating.

I’ve only had two boyfriends.

My poor first boyfriend got the feral version of me.

He got the same yo yo effect my cat puts me through of having to go back and forth between me assuring him I don’t need anything serious to me demanding something serious.

Plus I’d never had feedback. So I as hopelessly unaware of myself.

Just like Bruce Willis I tried so hard at things and it was like I was invisible. But I just didn’t know I was dead. (Interpret that how you will)

My greatest weakness in writing fiction can be context. I often forget to tell people the little basics. Where they are and what’s happening.

I forget that they don’t know. That they have zero information beyond what I tell them.

There is an actual physical pain that comes with losing a connection to a man that I think is what going through withdrawal feels like.

A bond with another person is very addicting. I think the body feels the loss of it as much as the mind.

Part of it is people we like and trust help us do some of our thinking.

When I like a person I start to measure myself by them. I will adjust my behavior, I’ll even modify my thinking for them.

They have a different belief? I’ll become open to that belief.

They think I’m funny? I’ll actually believe I’m funny because they are the measurement that matters.

Someone calls me ugly? Who the fuck cares if the person I like thinks I’m beautiful. I use the person I like to detect reality not the people I don’t.

Losing an attachment is to lose that measurement. We lose our guides to the world and get lost in the void.

That’s why I think attachments can get so thick even when it’s just a crush.

When I admire someone (most especially a man I’m attracted to) that person becomes a way to see.

A way to get feedback from the world. If what I like likes me back it’s a bit of proof I’m not totally insane.

It gives some confidence that I can have the things I want in life.

I’m very careful to only have friends I admire. Because they will do some of my thinking just by my being around them.

Just as I’m careful to only date men I’m extremely attracted to. Because attraction cannot be felt (at least for me) without admiration.

What creates admiration for a man? Not what men think. Men are so often wrong about this.

They think it’s success. I know a lot of successful people that are morons. Men especially try to use success as a cheat code. Like it means they don’t have to develop the real things that ignites admiration.

Some men thinks it’s looks. Looks help. But they don’t last long.

What makes me admire a man then? How quickly I want to do what he tells me to do.

It’s not something I have a conscious control of. But I’ve noticed most men ignite rebellion.

I don’t even know why or what it is that’s making me rebellious. That will require some deep thought and study.

But I know the start of the attraction is when I’m naturally submissive.

Sometimes I’ll be a little more submissive towards a man just because I do care about his feelings. Because he’s a coworker or a friend.

But that’s very different than the kind of submission that comes from attraction. The kind where I’m actually willing to turn off my brain and admire and trust someone enough to let them do some of my thinking for me.

That’s why attraction and attachment can be so devastatingly addicting and all consuming for women, or women like me at least.

The exact nature of what it is that makes me feel submissive towards a man is not something I understand.

It’s very instinctual.