An Open Letter

This Halloween, I am doing a group costume for the first time, and I had the idea of doing the biblical sins. I ended up choosing to be lust, and I feel like I find myself victim to the sin fairly often. Today, for example I was supposed to leave work a little bit early so that I would have time at the powerlifting training before a concert with a friend. But I got derailed when I checked Hinge and I found someone who had a very suggestive profile linked with something else. Out of curiosity, I looked at the other thing and since then I have been in this weird limbo of wanting to go to the gym, and also wanting to have sex or do something like that. And especially because I know that I should not do something like that before the gym because it will negatively affect me in several different ways, but because of that I end up kind of just depleting all of my dopamine stores for the day, chasing some kind of relief. And I think about how the commodification of sex through dating apps has gotten so easily accessible, almost similar to how gambling is now with you everywhere at the touch of a finger compared to going to a casino. Instead, I can scroll through a near infinite pool of possible people through several different dating apps, I can message people, and I have the option to go and do any of these things with these people. And because they’re so little friction to it, my brain loves it so much, and I can find myself falling victim to my libido and wasting hours. And I think with as little judgment and shame towards myself as I can, I wonder why I am so lustful. That’s the better way to use honestly, the first thing that came to my mind was horny. And I feel like it is both a mixture of just naturally My biology, but also I do think that I grew up in a pretty over sexualized way due to having to socialize myself online. I think, especially during this formative years that did said a lot of the wiring for me to have this high drive. But another thing I was thinking about was how having a relationship is really nice for several different reasons of course but also just because you end up having access to someone that is available, you are attracted to, you enjoy their company with, you feel safe with, you can trust, etc, and the list goes on. And the thought of how when I am in a relationship, especially with one where sex drives are fairly well matched, I am able to indulge in this lust in arguably one of the healthiest ways as much as I would. And I remember having situations like this a couple times in my life with different people. I remember what it is like to go to the gym with my partner, and then especially with the endorphins and all that both of us being horny and then going home and having sex pretty often. And that is honestly a really nice thing to have, at least in the immediate gratification sense. I think with a lot of things about sex. I feel like it is stigmatized or seen as a negative thing in my mind, like there has always been a little bit of emptiness after masturbation for example, if I’m speaking really candidly, like the feeling that you are tricking your brain and gaming the system, and you don’t really get those happy warm bonding chemicals that make you feel closer to someone. And I think with any sort of casual sex or relationship like that, it is less preferable than a relationship, in a sense that the ideal friends with benefits situation does not compare to the ideal relationship situation. But I also know that comparing ideals is kind of impossible, I guess I feel like I’m a little bit back to wishing that I somehow found this perfect person for me right now. And I understand that that’s not necessarily feasible or realistic, and the same way that I have felt going into every relationship that I have done the sufficient work and I am now ready and I come out again learning that there were more lessons for me to learn, maybe there is still more to go. But at least for now this lust kind of does plague me.