Validation feels good. Validation also kills relationships.
Most people won’t admit it, but they like knowing they’re still desirable — even after they’ve chosen a partner.
A smile from a stranger, a flirty DM, a lingering look across the room — it’s a shot of dopamine that makes you feel alive.
But here’s the truth: that buzz is overrated, and if you feed it too often, it becomes dangerous.
This is a two part post, one for single folks, one for couples.
The dynamics of feeling desirable by other people are experienced from different perspectives based upon whether you are single (even in a committed relationship) or married.
Part 1: Singles — Stop Treating Attention as Currency
Attention feels like a win — until it becomes your personality.
When you’re single, it’s easy to treat attention as proof of your worth.
Likes, matches, stares, compliments — they can feel like oxygen.
However, the habit of seeking or desiring validation from strangers is the very thing that will sabotage your future relationship.
1. It Makes You a Collector, Not a Connector
When you start collecting attention like trophies, you stop connecting deeply with anyone.
You want the next ping, the next match, the next follower — not the person.
2. It Creates an Entitlement Loop
When you’re used to constant validation, you start believing you deserve it all the time.
The second your partner isn’t gushing over you 24/7, you’ll feel deprived — and go looking for someone else to fill that gap.
3. It Rewards Surface Over Substance
Chasing attention trains you to optimize for what gets the most likes, not what builds the most character.
You end up curating a persona instead of becoming a person worth loving.
4. It Turns Desire Into a Drug
The more attention you get, the more you need to feel “okay.”
Instead of enjoying attention when it comes, you start craving it — and panic when it doesn’t.
5. It Delays Real Commitment
Why settle down with one person when there’s always another match, another admirer, another chance to be desired?
Constant validation makes every good partner feel replaceable — until you’re left with no one worthy of you.
The Bottom Line
Attention is cheap. Commitment is rare.
Build a life that makes you proud, not just one that makes you swipeable.
Stop collecting admirers. Start becoming someone worth admiring.
Part 2: Couples — Build Desire Inside Your Relationship
Outside attention is a test. Inner desire (read: inside the relationship and/or the individual) is a choice.
If you want to stay out of trouble, the answer isn’t to police every stranger who looks at your partner — it’s to build so much intimacy inside your relationship that outside attention feels like noise.
Remember, a woman’s loyalty is tested when her man has nothing; a man’s loyalty is tested when he has everything.
1. Choose Each Other Daily
Desire is like a flame — it requires regular tending.
Flirt with each other. Compliment each other. Make each other feel seen.
If you ignore the fire at home, don’t be surprised when someone starts looking for warmth somewhere else.
2. Create Space for Novelty
Routine kills desire if you let it.
However, routine is a good thing. Consistency keeps the rhythm of the relationship in harmony.
That said, changing up your environment, your routines, your date nights, etc., keeps routine from feeling like boredom.
A little unpredictability keeps things exciting — and reminds your partner that you still have mysteries yet to explore.
3. Make Respect the Baseline
You can’t feel sexy with someone who dismisses or belittles you.
Remember, without respect, love can’t flourish.
Respect creates emotional safety, and emotional safety is what allows passion to thrive without fear.
4. Protect Your Boundaries
Don’t play with fire by entertaining DMs, “work spouse” banter, or emotional oversharing with someone outside the relationship.
Desire grows in the spaces where you focus — and if you feed it outside of the relationship, you starve it inside the relationship.
Real, long-term love thrives when there are clear guardrails that both partners honor and stay within.
5. Be Someone Your Partner Still Wants
Attraction isn’t static, it’s dynamic.
Age, health, children, responsibilities. LIFE, changes relationship dynamics.
Whether life changes enables your relationship to thrive, survive, or die rely heavily upon how you and your partner deal with the challenges life brings. Both together and individually.
Keep taking care of your body, your mind, your ambition — not out of fear of losing your partner, but because you value being a desirable, fully-alive human being.
The Bottom Line
Desire doesn’t just happen — it’s cultivated.
Stop chasing the thrill outside your relationship, and start co-creating it inside the relationship.
Anyone can get attention from strangers. It takes real work — and real love — to keep turning your partner’s head.
-The Rational Ram
The Rational Ram 