Posted: Jun 28, 08 8:50am
Overcoming Cyber-Seduction Through Psychology
By Jael Speg
I’ve read Robert Greene’s book, "The Art of Seduction." I understand the role of pheromones in sexual attraction. I’ve reviewed the studies detailing what types of facial features women select in a prospective mate as opposed to which men’s facial features they select for an exciting date. I know first-hand how some guys deep, resonant voices can really light a woman’s fire. None of the above begins to explain how a simple photo without a voice and typed messages on a computer screen can potentially cause a relatively moral, intelligent woman to think and behave like a horny barn cat. The closest I can come to understanding this is through Gestalt psychology.
“Gestalt psychology (also Gestalt of the Berlin School) is a theory of mind and brain that proposes that the operational principle of the brain is holistic, parallel, and analog, with self-organizing tendencies; or, that the whole is different than the sum of its parts. The classic Gestalt example is a soap bubble, whose spherical shape is not defined by a rigid template, or a mathematical formula, but rather it emerges spontaneously by the parallel action of surface tension acting at all points in the surface simultaneously.” (Wikipedia)
In other words, Gestalt psychology is concerned with the ‘fill-in-the-blanks’ tendencies of human perception and thinking. It’s individualized enough to appear random, but there surely exists a set of pre-existing needs and desires, likely based in early childhood experiences, firmly embedded in her subconscious. Something that he says, or maybe the way he says it, just trips her trigger and suddenly her brain chemicals resemble a pin-ball in play. It’s like an algorithm is suddenly recognized that causes her brain to spontaneously ooze and clog with oxytocin, short-circuiting the evaluation and judgment operations of her pre-frontal cortex.
The resulting emotions are so powerful as to be profoundly tangible; gastric butterflies and jolts of electricity accompany warm and fuzzy sensations in nether regions. Without ever seeing, touching or hearing this man, she suddenly associates him with scintillating desire and uncommon satisfaction. He overwhelms her thoughts. She is inexplicably yielding and deferential toward him. She vacillates between shy and brazen responses while her superego stands, bound and gagged in the corner of her mind. Even if conscious reasoning streams through her mind like a freight train bearing witness against her, she will deftly dodge and defy its path.
This is NOT a woman in love; this is a woman under siege, being hijacked and hustled by her the mechanisms of her own existence. Her only hope is to somehow shatter the illusions induced by her Gestalt perceptions. To see him as he truly is, she must learn to view this man with the cold scrutiny of an IRS tax reviewer, or even better, as his wife sees him! Only then can she begin to defeat the destructive undermining of her reason and dignity. If this is not possible, her best recourse is to attack the computer directly with a heavy, blunt object and/or cancel her internet service.
