One of my favorite things about being queer is the knowlegde I have gained about the complexity that is human attraction. Like most things in life, attraction is complicated. But, things that are complicated are usually pretty cool and interesting; hence why I have dedicated an entire blog post to the various levels of attraction. 

Arguably, there are many types of attraction, but for the sake of this blog post (and my sanity) I’ll be talking about the five major types of attraction. Before we get into my definition for each, and how I experience each one, I’ll give the actual definitions. 

First of all, what even is attraction? 

Attraction: the action or power of evoking interest, pleasure, or liking for someone or something. 

Okay, now that we have a somewhat vague definition, here are the different types: 

Romantic attraction: a deep, emotional attraction to someone. 

This could be expressed through: hand holding, cuddling, kissing, showing love, expressing emotions, etc. 

Sexual attraction: attraction on the basis of sexual desire or the quality of arousing such interest.

This could be expressed through: kissing, sex, sexual intimacy, etc. 

Platonic attraction: an interest or desire for a friendship. 

This could be expressed through: time spent together, emotional closeness, trust, etc. 

Sensual attraction: the desire to interact with someone physically in a nonsexual way.

This could be expressed through: hand holding, cuddling, hugging, etc. 

Aesthetic attraction: occurs when someone appreciates the beauty or appearance of another person. 

This could be expressed through nonsexual physical touch, or nothing at all. 

There are obviously many more ways to experience attraction such as…

Emotional: a connection to someone’s mind, spirit, and personality. 

Intellectual: the desire to engage with another in an intellectual manner such as conversation. 

Physical:  the degree to which a person’s physical features are considered aesthetically pleasing or beautiful. The term often implies sexual attractiveness or desirability, but can also be distinct from either. 

*sighs from exhaustion*

Maybe all of these make sense in their own independent ways. Maybe you sense an overlap, but see some distinct differences. Maybe you read this and realized you feel all of these different levels of attraction to your partner or other important people in your life.

Or maybe, you’re like me, and are utterly confused. I will say, there are aspects of attraction that I understand. I have platonic friends, I don’t feel sexual attraction, and I do feel a certain amount of romantic attraction. However, as I scoured the internet searching for definitions of the previously mentioned terms, many of them sounded very similar to me. For example, romantic attraction sounds a lot like platonic attraction. Who’s to say hand holding and cuddling is reserved for a romantic partner? How is romantic attraction different from emotional attraction? But, there is no need for my confusion and questioning to keep us from exploring my (because this is my blog after all) different ways of feeling stuff!

Jadey’s Complex Way Of Feeling Stuff! 

Romantic attraction: Starting off a bit complicated, my romantic attraction is technically labeled as alterous, which I wrote a whole blog post about that you can read here. I do pretty fully understand romantic attraction, but over time I have come to the conclusion that I don’t experience romantic attraction to the same extent that others do. Because of that, I label my romantic attraction as alterous; a desire for emotional closeness with someone that is neither exclusively platonic or romantic. 

When I hear about romantic attraction, it seems quite passionate and intense. Maybe that is because it’s mixed with sexual attraction, and those who experience both can’t articulate the difference in the same way I can’t articulate the difference between platonic and romantic in my relationship. 

Sexual attraction: Yay! This one’s easy. I don’t feel this. At all. In fact, I’m quite opposed to the idea of sex that I consider myself sex-averse (meaning I am opposed to the idea of sex and find it very unappealing).

Platonic: I know for a fact that I feel platonic attraction to my friends. I love them, but obviously feel no sexual or romantic attraction to them. That becomes a touch complicated with the feelings I have for my Queer Platonic Partner, considering platonic is literally in the name, I feel platonic as well as romantic attraction to her, but she is the only exception.

Sensual: Sensual attraction is a relatively new term to me. It’s also a bit ironic, because if you know me, you know there’s one thing I incredibly dislike: physical touch. I am not a fan of hugs, although I will accept hugs from my mother and grandmother when they initiate it. (To my other family and friends possibly reading this, sorry, I probably don’t like to hug you, no offense.) I do appreciate when someone asks for a hug, which gives me a moment to process the fact that I will no longer have personal space. An unannounced extraction of my physical space is the root of my discomfort. I’ll scoot over on the couch if I find my knees touching my sister to be uncomfortable. A hug from someone I’m not incredibly close to makes me feel..icky. I’ll step away when a stranger unknowingly gets too close. This could be due to my asexuality, this could just be my personality. Some people just don’t like touch, however msot of them probably aren’t sex-averse. I’ve always prefered my personal space.

After saying all of this, there is indeed only one person I experience sensual attraction towards; my girlfriend. Interestingly enough, she is the only person I’ll go out of my way to be physically close to. I’ll hold her hand. Rest my head on her shoulder. And, when I hug her, which is quite often, it’s for a comically long period of time. This could be because of my alterous attraction. It could be a different form of expression of love due to my asexuality. It could simply be that she is the only person I’ve ever felt sensually attracted to. 

Aesthetic: I would assume that a majority of the population experiences this. I experienced it heavily with the love of my life Conan Gray. He’s so beautiful. His face. His hair. His physique. His outfits. Everything about him is beautiful. It’s interesting how others experience this mixed with sexual or romantic attraction, and I experience it as simply as possible. All I desire to do is admire a person’s beauty. 

Okay. The complexity of the human experience and sexuality is quite complicated. If you took a shot every time you read the word attraction today you would definitely not have gotten to reading the conclusion of this blog post. 

And on that note, I’ll see you next week. 

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