Harnessing your animal instincts

Keep it simple, stupid. That’s how the saying goes, but if we follow this advice and really examine our everyday human interactions, you’ll realize that as intellectual as we are, no matter how beautifully complex we are, when it comes down to it, we really are just intelligent animals.

Our urges, impulses, wants, and needs trump distractions (think careers, technology, MONEY) that are both self-imposed and imposed on us. One of my philosophies that I can share after a few beers among friends is simply this; In the physical sense, we are located on this planet for one reason only: to have sex. We are programmed to want and need it, and most of what we do can come back to that.

Although Sigmund Freud is the most recognizable psychological mind in history, he is heavily criticized by some for his theories. I won’t bore you with a lecture on it, but basically it says that from birth, we develop in psychosexual stages. Through these five stages, we satisfy our sexual urges. To be clear, this doesn’t mean your baby has a stash of “child porn” (I’m worried the feds will knock on my door after I type that sentence), but rather that we’re born with a libido, and it manifests itself in different ways to as we mature. You basically go from having an oral fixation and manipulating attention by being cute (baby), to falling in love with your parents through Oedipus and Electra complexes (toddler) to having actual sexual feelings, expressed with genital awareness and masturbation to real relationships. and have sex.

You can look at these theories and choose how literal you want to take things, but the fact is, at our core, sex and “animal” urges dominate every part of our lives. We intellectualize things a lot and try to be politically correct, which is good in one way, but in another way I think we’re kidding ourselves.

I had a beer with my co-workers recently, and those of us who are married get into the inevitable “How did you meet?” stories. Without fail, each and every story started with strong physical feelings (I guess you can call it lust), which happened unplanned and opened the door to meet that person. Many people have lists of what they want in a partner (height, weight, hair color, number of degrees, salary, etc.) stashed in their back pocket, and they go out into the world with that list and start looking for love. It doesn’t happen that way.

Now, just to be clear, I’m not saying you should dig in and expect love to happen. Mainly I’m saying that you’re likely to find love in a more animalistic or primal way than you think, even if there’s no immediate sex involved. The attraction comes first, and then they make the decision to act or not as they get to know each other. Even though my ideal woman is smart, funny, and attractive, her resume listing her titles and comedy credits won’t even make it to my desk if she looks like Precious. Just being real.

Now folks, this goes both ways. Pop culture tries to sell us this PC notion that the ideal guy cries as much as his wife, shares his feelings endlessly, and doesn’t prioritize sex. In fact, the 2011 man is taught that having sexual urges makes him one of “those guys” and that all of his friends and acquaintances are “good girls” who would be repulsed by such thoughts or actions. This breeds a large number of men who can provide the comfortable feelings that women enjoy, without the carnal urges that are needed for a healthy union between a woman and a man.

To be honest, the “friend zone” is nothing more than a guy who wants more but is afraid to make a move. SHE doesn’t get you into it, you get into it. While you’re being the All-American friend, she allows you to be her soft, cuddly shoulder to cry on, as she, um, satisfies her need for the boy she inevitably ends up crying over with you. Why? Because you ignored the animal in you and made fun of yourself by thinking you’re above that kind of thing. Because you have become a man of the new millennium and you are above those primitive things.

OK, enough of the sex talk. In times of natural disasters, when our infrastructure collapses and the distractions we’ve created fade away, you’ll notice our primary needs come to the fore. All that matters is collecting food and water and feeding your family. I’m not talking about the NBA or NFL player “needing” a bigger contract because “I have to feed my family.” No, I mean REALLY feed your family. Wayne said it best on one of his mixtapes a few years ago: “Nobody’s safe when it’s for the good of the kids.” I’m not an advocate of crime, but if the system crashes and you’re in survival mode, well, things tend to get PC less quickly.

We buy our food in nice little packages at Wal-Mart, but we’re still buying raw, sometimes bloody meat that needs to be heated and eaten. We’ve come a long way so that instead of going out and looking for the catch of the day, we can use our Kroger card and get gas discounts while we buy the catch of the day and eat it in our comfortable condos.

We’ve evolved (as we should), but don’t think for a second that those traits that got cavemen through tough times still don’t ring true today. When things get real in your workplace, relationship, home, or ANY situation in your daily life, think about the ways the animal in you could beat the smart, well-rounded human and help you get ahead in that situation. You would be surprised.