The unattainable ideal: Is that what we want?

The unattainable ideal: Is that what we want?

As i engulf myself inside the chatroom and while i wander the gay district of metro manila i feel a very strong sense of wanting and craving not only from me but also coming from all of the gay people around me. There is so much wanting.

It is clear that when gays cluster together in bunches, they like to look good. Sometimes, they like to look pretty, with perfect teeth, good hair and no wrinkles. Other times they like to look hot, with good teeth, perfectly mussed hair and just the right amount of rumple or abs perhaps. However they express themselves, they are usually going for the best possible presentation of self. In fact, it often seems that they are more interested in how they look than who they are. Not surprisingly, shallow behavior begets more shallow behavior, and the hotter a guy is, the more gay society encourages his extreme notions of preening.

I will be the first to admit that I have been party to such behavior. One night, I was out with friends at a popular gay club after work for happy hour. The ex of one of my friends casually dropped by on his way home from kickboxing class, his hands still taped up. He looked as hot as I remembered the DLSU Gymnastics Team being. As the work-weary drunks drooled over him, I too joined in the ogling. The guy was hot. That being said, the whole thing was an act. Sure, he had been kickboxing, but did he really need to come to the hottest weeknight bar in town wearing his masturbation-fantasy outfit? In order to feel attractive to a room full of men, sometimes it is hard to stop at just an outfit.

Now, I know this hot guy reasonably well, and he is a decent, interesting and humorous guy. He really has no reason to go to such extremes to meet a nice, handsome man. We do go to those extremes, though, because in a way, we are looking for those extremes in other people. While on the surface, millions of single gay men insist that they are just looking for a nice man to settle down with, the reality is that they are looking for an unbelievably hot guy to experience nonstop bliss with. Our hot kickboxing friend was a catch without taping up his hands, but who would have bothered to find out if he wasn't showing off his hot arms in a tank top?

This leads me to my concern about an unattainable ideal. Whether we look for it in others or in ourselves, it just slows us down. A guy can go kickboxing or save a kitten from a burning house, but that doesn't mean he is going to be a good boyfriend or rock your world in the sack. The more we try to be someone we think other people will be interested in, the further we get away from who we really are. The more we look for shallow attributes in other people, the harder it is to make good, lasting choices. Don't discount the good-looking people just because they look good. Just make sure there is more going on for you than just something nice to look at. It doesn't take any courage at all to give people what they want and not be yourself. The real you is always the best ideal.