Onward and Upward… (1-2) – Commentary

If you’ve read Onward and Upward…, you’ve watched me walk straight into one of the oldest questions in the online sex / kink marketplace:

“I’m he/him. I want connection.”
“How the hell do I stand out?”

And instead of handing you a dating-app checklist, I run the question through:

  • market logic,
  • gender imbalance,
  • and then quietly flip the value system in the last line.

What this piece is actually doing

On the surface, it looks like a throwaway musing:

  • a joke about “peacocks,”
  • a line about breasts vs penises as currency,
  • and a closing sentence about what I would seek.

Underneath, it’s doing three things:

  1. Naming the skewed marketplace
    There’s an asymmetry in how attention flows:

    • feminine-coded bodies get flooded with options,
    • masculine-coded bodies are often pitching.

    When I write:

    “breasts are usually worth gold coins while penises might be worth a wooden nickel or two,”

    I’m not whining; I’m saying:

    “Let’s at least admit the starting math is not neutral.”

  2. Mocking surface-level competition
    “Peacocks” is deliberate.Most advice for he/him people boils down to:

    • brighter feathers,
    • louder displays,
    • more “alpha” posturing.

    This piece shrugs and goes:

    “You can strut all you want.
    You’re still one of a hundred birds yelling ‘pick me.’”

  3. Pivoting from “How do I stand out?” to “Who is actually worth my time?”
    The last line shifts the lens:

    “At any rate, I would seek Experience and/or Commitment to the lifestyle above all.”

    That’s the quiet thesis:

    • stop obsessing over how to be chosen,
    • start getting ruthless about who you choose.

Breasts, coins, and wooden nickels

The “gold coins vs wooden nickel” line is provocative on purpose.

It’s saying:

  • yes, visual currency exists,
  • yes, some bodies get a louder starting bid,
  • no, that doesn’t mean worth is fixed.

Lizard-brain math says:

“More boobs = more value.”

But actual lived experience says:

  • some of the shiniest profiles are chaos underneath,
  • some of the “undervalued” people are the ones who will actually show up,
  • and no amount of peacocking against bad odds will fix a misaligned target.

This piece doesn’t tell you to stop wanting beauty or appeal.

It just nudges you toward:

“Okay, and after the first dopamine spike… what’s left?”

Why it ends on Experience & Commitment

The closing sentence is the real payload:

“At any rate, I would seek Experience and/or Commitment to the lifestyle above all.”

That’s me tipping my hand about what I value, especially in kink:

  • Experience = not “I’ve read ten blogs,” but “I’ve lived this, learned from it, bled a little, adjusted.”
  • Commitment = not “I’m obsessed this week,” but “I keep showing up even when it’s not novel.”

The subtext is:

  • the marketplace can stay superficial,
  • you don’t have to.

Instead of:

  • “How do I make my plumage more interesting than every other he/him here?”

it becomes:

  • “Who is serious about this life?”
  • “Who has actually done anything beyond fantasy chat?”
  • “Who treats this as more than a temporary costume?”

That shift—from performance to discernment—is what most of Cycle I is training you to do, gently and repeatedly.

Beyond the lizard brain

The tag at the end:

Musings, Beyond The Lizard Brain – RD-10086

isn’t a throwaway subtitle.

The lizard brain cares about:

  • being chosen,
  • being seen,
  • being validated by numbers and attention.

“Beyond” is where you start asking:

  • “What are their patterns like when the high wears off?”
  • “Are they consistent, or only charming at the start?”
  • “Do they know anything about the lifestyle beyond hashtags?”

This mini-piece is basically me tapping you on the forehead and saying:

“Yes, the visuals and imbalance are real.
No, that’s not the final metric.”

When you read it and feel a little sting as a peacock and a small spark of relief that someone is talking about experience / commitment as actual currency—

that’s exactly where it’s aimed.

Cycle I – Coming on Strong · 02 · Commentary (v1.00)

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