Last night,
after the kids went to bed, my wife and I got into this conversation about the
SMV (Sexual Market Value) curve. She is turning 39 soon and is worried that her
value as a wife is diminishing as she is aging. She was not s*** testing me,
this was a real concern.
It got me
thinking. The SMV curve is not totally accurate for our situation. It is based
mostly on the things we have little control over, age and looks for women,
money and looks for men. While this is primarily the driving force on the open
dating market, it is not wholly adequate to describe our situation. As a
married couple, there are other things that play a huge part, and our desire
for these other traits change over time. For the sake of the length of this
article, I will focus on three traits; ambition, trustworthiness, and
personality. One extremely important thing to note, unlike looks or money,
ambition, trustworthiness, and personality are all more controllable.
Ambition
When dating,
just for a short term fling, a guy really does not care if the woman he wants
to get in the sack keeps a clean house, helps out in charitable ways, or exercises
regularly. From what I seen in school, in their younger years, women have the
upper hand on this. Praise and encouragement throughout their teen years boost
a girl’s drive to be the best. Once she is married, she has responsibilities
with the kids, keeping the house, and all too often, holding down a job at the
same time. While in their early years,
the princess complex drives a girl to show up the boys in her class, the media
tells older women that they can slack off, and taking care of the house is not
a worthy pursuit. As they age, however maturity will help them understand that
a strong family life is a worthwhile pursuit after all in the retirement years.
I see many grandmas baking cookies.
Unlike girls,
young boys are demonized in our modern schools for being boys. Young and
impressionable, many just give up and resort to video games. However, when boys
enter into their mid 20’s, a typical shift takes place. They realize nobody
else is going to do it for them, on top of that, maturity sets in and the
message put out by society that guys are no good means less. This is when guys
really go out and start to make something of themselves. Sometime in their
later stages of life, the importance of free time is realized, so older men
will pull back on the throttle a tad and enjoy life.
Trustworthiness
Trustworthiness is all over the
map as far as people go, and I do not feel that there is a big difference
between the sexes in this department. Generally, trustworthiness goes up over
time, but will level off at a certain point. It can, go down suddenly, or
crash, as in the case of some digression or adultery. This graph is not
typical, but it goes to show what I am trying to convey. If a person lives a
clean life, their trustworthiness will continue to grow. Oddly enough, the
higher someone’s trustworthiness is, the harder it will crash for the same
offense. If a televangelist gets caught embezzling money, it has a huge effect,
more so than a gangster will feel.
What is important to note is your
trustworthiness is a direct result of your actions, albeit day to day, or the
major sins in life. The decisions you make are entirely up to you.
Personality and Social Skills
People can be warm and bubbly, or absolute grouches to be around. A
good sense of humor will go a long way in being attractive. There is not a
strong trend over a person’s life, it can vary widely from person to person.
But like ambition, it follows a person’s desire to be around others. Guys tend
to be more flat, although it goes on an upward trend as they gain more life
experiences, until they reach their 70’s and geriatrics cause them to be
grouchy. Guys tend to be quieter than women, with less social interaction,
causing a shallower gain than women experience. When I go to visit older
couples for church assignments, it is usually the woman who dominates the
conversation (for good or bad) while the guy will just hang out and listen.
Like men, women overall have a wide variance when it comes to
personality over a lifetime. Status negatively affects many women, and during
their 20’s many are crabby and entitled because they can. If they marry off,
they become more pleasant to have a conversation with. However, a single woman
will become depressed or bitter when they reach their 40’s, until they can
accept their status in life. There is a very bimodal trend among women
depending on if they are married or not.
Like
trustworthiness, personality is a direct result of day to day actions. Do we
choose to interact with people? Do we crab at people or act entitled because we
can, or do we put on out best face and be kind to those around us? Aside from
mental illness, this aspect is under the control of each one of us.
Putting it all together
Putting these
trends together is tougher than simply adding them up to find the score. The
emphasis on what the opposite sex finds attractive also varies with time. There
is a phrase “when the big head overtakes the little head”, which means a guy
starts thinking with his brain, rather than his (libido) where he still likes
an attractive girl, but ambition, trustworthiness and personality play a much bigger role in his decision
making on whether she is worthy to commit to
.
Women tend to
be pickier during their 20’s when their SMV is very high, because they can.
This leads to the trends on OK Cupid and elsewhere which shows women are
pickier on looks than men.
In the end,
this will hurt women and men looking for a committed relationship. Listening to
our reptilian portion of our brain and only focusing on looks will neglect the
aspects we find more important later in life.
Coming full
circle, my wife showed concern about not being as attractive as she once was.
That may be true, but looks are hardly the full picture. What is lost in looks
is overcame with ambition, trustworthiness, personality, and other qualities I
did not mention in this article. In my stage in life I would prefer to be with
her than any gorgeous 22 year old. The reason being is she has proven herself
trustworthy, ambitious, and we get along well. We have spent time building a
life together with our six children. Having to do all that again, I may not end
up so lucky.
The SMV curve
has a huge effect on singles. The first impression is looks, and for those not
looking for any long term relationship, is most important. Once in a committed
relationship, or looking for a committed relationship, it is not everything.
What It Means For Women
Age and looks
are very important to attract a guy for the short term, but if she wants to
find someone that wants to marry her, she better do what she can to show that
she is trustworthy, ambitious, and is a pleasure to get along with. Work on
developing those traits, and the man you marry will be more likely to stick
around when you age and your looks fade.
Also, your time
of having a high attractive appearance is short. You may be the most warm,
caring, trustworthy, and ambitious woman out there, but if you are old and fell
off the ugly tree too many times, guys will not give you the time necessary for
you to prove your worth. If you spend too many years garnering short term
attention, not only does that show a lack of trustworthiness (whether deserved
or not) it eats up valuable time. A guy looking to have kids will want a young wife as well.
What It Means For Men
I totally
understand the appeal for the hottest girls around, but those qualities fade in
time. If you are looking for a long term, solid marriage and family, look for
the woman who has the appealing internal qualities that do not fade. Build up
those traits yourself to gain the favor from the women you want to attract.
Comments
Post a Comment