Sasza Lohrey

Hello, hello, thanks for tuning in to this new series of the BBXX podcast. We wanted to bring you more content, specifically more BBXX original content. And we’re using this as a chance to experiment with different topics, different formats, short format, longer format, casual interviews, more formal interviews, and a bit more fun stuff. So this new series will bring you mainly content from what I am referring to as the food for thought series, which explores different terms and terminology, or questions that might be particularly relevant to now, it might elaborate on something specific from one of our main interviews. Or it might just dive deeper into question that people have been asking me or that I’ve been wondering about myself. But we’ll also include things from fun ratings and reviews for books, movies, other podcasts, etc. To live interviews, and informal interviews with more people, perhaps such as yourself, talking more about personal narrative, and personal experiences that have shaped ourselves, our lives and our relationships. Because as much as there is to be learned from us from bx sex, or any expert, we have just as much that can be learned from all of you, and from each other. Excellent, excellent food for thought, is a concept I love, and I love asking people about. And that’s the concept of operational definitions. So operational definitions come from research. 

And when people are running studies, they need to have a way to standardize a certain variable. So that if you want to run a study, you know exactly what I was referring to, when I talked about some variable in the experiment. But unless you know how I measured it, for example, if it was a study of measuring happiness, if you don’t know what my operational definition of happiness is, and how I measured it, we could be running completely different studies, maybe one person is measuring dopamine in the brain, and the other person is measuring talkativeness, or energy levels. They’re just completely different things. And so I don’t remember exactly when this concept was introduced to me, but I often refer to it as operating definitions. I don’t know if that’s as correct. But since it’s a slightly different concept, I almost wonder if maybe it’s better to refer to that. But it’s just so incredibly fascinating, because basically, if you extrapolate what I just referred to with research studies, and you and I are having a conversation, and we’re talking about, again, happiness, what do you need to be happy? or How happy are you right now?

What are we talking about? We could be doing completely different things. How much intimacy do you have in your life? What is your definition of intimacy? What is my definition of intimacy? Do they have a healthy relationship? It’s just mind boggling. How so so often, unless we really sit to think about this, we could be and probably are, having a conversation with another person where we are talking about totally different things. And maybe sometimes it doesn’t matter quite as much, but probably a lot of times one, the conversation would be a lot more valuable. There would be a lot less misunderstanding, and we’d really get to know the person a lot better if we weren’t just assuming we knew and understood what they were talking about. But if we actually actually ask them actually didn’t know. And so I would just really encourage you all to try and incorporate this into your conversations a lot more. And there’s so many so many opportunities that will pop up. Somebody might be talking about, they had a bad date, or they’re feeling sad or tired. You know, it’s with certain social norms, especially things we assume those aren’t the best examples, but with things that we really where there’s room to make assumptions, that is when we should really try and ask people well, Oh, that’s so interesting. I’d love to know what your operational or operating definition is. I’d love to know how you define that. Because the truth is, for a lot of these things, it’s subjective. 

If you Google, how do you measure happiness? I’m not even sure that there is an answer. And so particularly for these things, loneliness, happiness, intimacy, what not these interpersonal dynamics, these inner personal dynamics that we have with ourselves. Pleasure? How do you define pleasure? How do you measure pleasure? What does that even mean? Perfect example. One of my guy friends was once talking, we were having a conversation about sex, and he said something about great sex. And I said, What’s your operating definition? And he had an amazing answer. It was a lot about laughing, incorporating humor, exploration and vulnerability. There was no mention of, of orgasm of whatever other stereotypical things we often presume. 

And so it really led the conversation in a completely different direction versus if I just nodded, acknowledging, okay, great sex. And to me, maybe, you know, somebody else that could be having multiple orgasms, or somebody just groaning a lot. Great sex means the other person looks like they enjoyed it. But how do you even know how do you measure that? So I would just really invite you all to try and incorporate this into your interactions with other people. And I really, really think it’s going to allow you to better understand them to better understand the topic you’re talking about, and to really open the door for much more interesting, deeper conversations, better connection and better understanding of everything, if not much more insight that you’ll be able to get as a result. So homework for the week, and for ever, is to really ask people. Oh, that’s so interesting. I’d love to know what your operating definition is. or operational definition.What’s the operating definition of an operational definition?