At the core of a person’s emotional makeup is self-awareness: How he or she manages their emotions, whether they are calm and collected or they panic quickly, their level of empathy towards others, whether they simply focus on themselves and expect others to follow and the level of humour, talent and depth they each possess. These are all part of our emotional appeal and they illustrate visibly the sociology of emotion.
The easiest form of attraction is thus for someone to laugh with us, no doom and gloom. Look at any lonely heart advert and the key word in it will be the need to find someone with ‘GSOH’ (good sense of humour). One with a fun personality to enhance a person’s own, but it has to be reciprocal to work. There are many grumpy, gloomy pessimists who believe that mainly finding someone with a good sense of humour to cheer them up will make them happier. But people who actively seek happiness, seek humour, or seek other things which they lack tend to be hard work themselves. They are likely to emphasise what they want from a partner rather than what they too have to give, making the relationship rather one-sided.
This could be because happiness and a sense of humour are not end goals people strive towards. They are interactive states of being, in use every day, which a person can develop for their benefit. If you leave your emotional state to others you will be forever seeking an elusive goal. When you are too selfish to give, too busy to think of others, you feel reluctant to open yourself to others or feel inadequate in yourself. You then look for people to ‘make’ you happy, to provide that essential spark to bring out your personality. But only you can achieve that state. No one else can do it for you. They can momentarily make you feel pleasure but you cannot maintain that pleasurable feeling without self-acceptance, confidence and self-love. Others merely enhance, or add to, your happiness, they do not create or generate it. If you have none in the first place, your partner’s consistent extroversion and positivity will only make you feel more inadequate and resentful after a while when the novelty begins to wear off.
That is why the biggest asset you have is your smile. A smile is warm, welcoming and suggests you are approachable. It gives the green light of confirmation to other forms of interaction. This ability to laugh dictates your emotional side and how you react. It makes you more positive in your approach to others, as you are likely to feel more confident to laugh off life’s obstacles and see the good side instead. The pleasurable sensations that come from laughter help couples weather many difficult times. If you see the funny side of life easily, and don’t take yourself too seriously, you will laugh more. Your smile will draw others to you, embracing them in a warm glow of approval and acceptance which makes you even more attractive as an individual. If you have no smile, you will repel others because they won’t be quite sure how you will act towards them. Thus, finding someone who has a good sense of humour is desirable, but it only works if you can appreciate the humour too, or already have the happiness within yourself to align with that humour.
The ability to be more optimistic, in general, not only makes you a more attractive person in looks and personality, as you smile more and seem to care more, but it is also associated with your level of spirituality and longevity. Finally, a sense of mystery helps to spark romance and is part of the emotional side of attraction. Your partner’s life experiences are likely to be different from yours, ones which become a breath of fresh air that challenges you to expand your horizons, to widen your perspectives and to grow as an individual. For example, an international traveller who has visited and lived in many different cultures may exhibit a greater confidence in her knowledge and dealings with people, which would have a special fascination and mystery for someone who has never left his native country.
Emotions dictate the quality of our life and influence social behaviour to the greatest degree. As someone once said, “We seldom remember what someone has said, but we seldom forget how they make us feel.”
