regularly with many non-homosexuals, oftentimes close friends. Once you’ve learned to accept your homosexuality, and adopted a few rules for social behavior, you can do the same.
As for the other areas in which you need improvement, it’s safe to say that there’s a solution to nearly every problem. If you’re too heavy, or too thin, it’s almost certain that you can do something about it—I’ll go into this a little further subsequently.
If you’re hiding lovely eyes behind owlish glasses, look into contact lenses. If you walk like Carmen Miranda with an overwound spring, fencing lessons or a membership in a gym will help. Voice lessons can do wonders as far as lowering a piercing talk. These are the sort of things which can be detriments for you, and there’s just no excuse for not correcting them. In later chapters I’ll go into more detail about improving your appearance, and your chances. But by now you should have singled out some of the most pressing shortcomings, and started to work on them right off.
Very well, once you’ve reached the point where you can start liking yourself, you’re ready to see if you can persuade others to like you. There’s only one way of accomplishing that goal, and every self-help book, psychiatric journal, or philosophical writing will tell you exactly the same thing—you have to start liking others. You’re going to have to be a friend if you want to have friends.
Now that may or may not sound difficult to you, depending upon your attitude toward others around you. But personally, I find it easiest to use the same approach you’ve been using on yourself—try looking for the good points, not just concentrating on the faults.
There’s another little trick that I learned years ago, and which has served me well. It’s called Warm Regard and you build it up just as you would a muscle, through practice and exercise.
Start with someone you do like, in fact the most likable person you can think of. When you call him to mind, you’ll feel a—well, nice feeling, sort of a glow. Mind you, I’m not referring to lust, or anything so earthy as that. I’m talking about the feeling of liking. And don’t kid me that you don’t know the difference.
Now, keeping that feeling fixed firmly in your mind, switch to someone else. Be sensible, don’t pick the most obnoxious person you can think of, but someone about whom you feel pretty neutral. Transfer your feeling of “liking” to this person. At first it will dim a little, but with practice, you’ll find that you really can think nicely about this person.
Of course, you don’t stop with mental pictures. The difficult part will be to put this new attitude into practice, the very next time you meet this person. Call to mind your Warm regard, and let it show; be just as friendly toward Mr. Mouse as you always have been toward that most likable person. As I said, this is just like building a muscle—the more you use it, the better it will be. And needless to say, once you’ve succeeded with this individual, you’ll go on to someone else, someone a little more difficult to like. Before you know it, you’ll have made friends of some people who were your enemies in the past. Believe me, it’s a very nice feeling.
Now I know you can’t expect everyone to love you; from time to time, you’ll experience some failures, but they aren’t too important as long as you’re also experiencing some success. If you’re not, I’m afraid that the fault can’t all lie with the other people.
As for criticism, I know it can occasionally make you sound very witty, but that kind of wit may end up leaving you laughing alone. The best—in fact the only —time to offer criticism is when it’s asked for. In that case, be nice about it, be honest, and radiate a lot of Warm Regard.
* * * *
Well, now things are looking up for you. You’re hard at work correcting some of your major shortcomings, and you are rapidly acquiring all sorts of new friends.
But I’m still homosexual, you say. Won’t those new friends, the straight ones, change their minds if they find out?
They might, or then again, they might not. There’s one important fact in your favor, however—they don’t want to find out.
Peculiar though it may seem, people who like you (and by now all sorts of people are beginning to like you) will go far out of their way to avoid admitting the obvious to themselves. They’ll do much better than you at inventing excuses for you, and eat their tongues before asking the wrong question. I have seen perfectly sophisticated, otherwise bright people behave like morons rather than recognize the truth about a homosexual friend. Of course, it’s your job to make this just as easy as possible for them, which means following a few basic guidelines.
In the first place, you behave naturally. By now I’m sure you’ve begun eliminating some of the more obvious affectations you’ve displayed in the past. You weren’t born with them, so forget the lame excuse. You learned them, as a child probably, but it’s not too late to replace them with better ones.
Now, as I said before, I’m inclined to be effeminate, but don’t fool yourself, that’s still not the same as being screamy. You don’t have to turn yourself into a booted, leather-jacketed oaf, or wander about with a pipe between your teeth. But you can observe some of the men you know, the pleasantly masculine ones, and try learning some of their traits.
The homosexual faces another problem too, the fact that it’s too often necessary to be dishonest. Regrettably, this becomes a habit. Many homosexuals call attention to their way of life by putting up too much of a front. For instance—while you’re entertaining straight friends, your lover, roommate, or what have you, answers the phone. “For you,” he announces, and while you take the call, he goes to the kitchen, where he does not hear the act you are putting on.
“Of course, sexy,” you purr into the phone, although it’s only your best friend calling. Knowing that he’ll understand, you work hard to make it sound as though this were one of many women who pursues you. When it’s finished, you give your straight guests a smug grin and explain that it’s just an old girl friend.
At this point, your roommate returns to the room and, ignorant of your deception, asks, “What did Charlie want on the phone?” Result, you’re left looking like an ass. What’s more, your friends certainly will wonder why the deception was considered necessary.
The simplest way to get by with dishonesty is to cover it up with as much of the truth as possible, at the same time keeping the dishonest part to the bare essentials.
Furthermore, you’ll have to learn when to be discreet. In other words, you don’t rub your straight friend’s noses in your business—figuratively speaking, that is. If you run around wearing lace shirts with jeweled buttons, and such garb, you can hardly wonder why straight folk shun your company. After all, they may be forgiving themselves, but they have their friends to consider too, and they don’t want to constantly apologize for you.
Tragically, you’ll be called on from time to time to make certain sacrifices. The time for cruising is not when you’re out with the boys from the office. You might convince them that the sweet young thing you end up leaving with is an old friend, but they’re likely to wonder why you didn’t recognize him until you saw him in the rest room.
Well, so far we’ve concentrated mostly on the inside, helping you to improve your outlook and some of your actions. Now of course I realize that you aren’t doing all of this just to insure your entry into paradise. Our motives are downright earthy, and I really am getting around to the all-important goal—MAN. But there’s still a lot of work to be done.
Remember the Mounties (that’s a police outfit, not a sex club) and their motto for getting their men. They do it all with a plan, and they have to go through training first to be certain they’re really prepared. So before we send you out on the trail, I want to make sure you have all the right equipment, inside and out, and that you know how to use it. Don’t despair, when you end up taking home your prey and properly stuffing him, or mounting him, or whatever you plan, you’ll see that it was worth all the effort.
Shall we go on now to the rest of you—the outside?
CHAPTER TWO
MIRROR,