On relationship, self-help books, et al...

I always find it annoying, reading all those self-help or relationship guru disecting what went through in someone else's relationship, what they should do, etc. It's even more maddening to see how popular these kinds of articles or publications sell.

I'm not in Australia anymore, so I can only read its newspapers online. For some reason, Sydney Morning Herald has loads on this topic on offer. First, there's this discussion about this so-called "Notting Hill" effect, on how movies set unrealistic expectations on real-life relationships. And then, there is this discussion on real-life "application" of the book It's Just Not That Into You.

The fact that so many women, in particular, are in such dire needs to have someone else psycho-analyze them and their lives, says volume about what's wrong with the situation. Ok, the younger ones, like the teens or young adults might be a bit more excusable since one could argue that they don't have enough life experience. But women in their 30s, 40s and beyond, needing relationship help? I would think these groups are a bit beyond help, if they don't know what they know, who they are, what their needs are, and the like.

Perhaps, part of us always enjoy reading about someone else's misery, make some self-comparison, and our own misery doesn't look too bad or pathetic.

A recurring theme in all these books (and movies and all) is the desperate need for men and women alike to have great sex, great steamy, passionate sex, like those you would find in movies and Jackie Collins books. While it's undeniable that sex is part and parcel of a long-term relationship, all these nonsense conditioning that any couple would need steamy sex over some designated frequency is totally bogus to me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It's perhaps ironic too, that there're so many "light" reads in Sydney Morning Herald. I sure hope that my fellow Australians' needs to follow religious on the British Royal family, and all celebrity gossips, is a reflection of a lack of (often very sad) hard-core news happening in the country (which can be a good thing, cuz no news is good news), versus the fact that they're just more used to sticking their heads in the clouds.