
For every girl that you unfairly appoint as your “one”, you lose her before you even had her.
For every girl you spill your guts out to, you lose a small shred of respect she might have had for you.
For every girl you let drive the bus, the more contempt she’ll have for you.
For every girl that you show you’re much too eager to please, she’ll resent you more and more.
For every girl you put on a pedestal, she’ll put you on the chopping block.
You don’t have to explain yourself all the time. You don’t have to justify everything to her. It’s a dance, and you’re doing the Seinfeld Elaine Benes “little kicks” and she’s cringing with every jive.
In the relationship world, one of the hardest things for men to do is to understand that she isn’t the goal, she’s merely a piece of the whole puzzle.
Too many times, myself most definitely included, we jump the gun with the girl who we want, we get too excited, we over-commit, over-engage, and over-explain.
When I was deep into dating in 2016-2019, at the beginning, I was outcome dependent. Each date with a girl would be the setup I needed to get back into a relationship. I put too much pressure on her. I said and did too much.
Three months. Poof. 6 months. Gone. Too eager to start a life she didn’t want me in. Too ready to say “I love you”. Too much jumping the gun. Too much romance and too little mystery. I was an open book, and she didn’t want to read me.
When I became a bit jaded after failing relationship after failing relationship, I stopped and just started fucking.
And it became easier because I didn’t have to care about the woman I was dating. I didn’t have to care because I knew it wasn’t going anywhere.
But after nearly two years of strange bedfellows, I had resigned myself to be a better person. So I worked and fought, and the class of women I met and dated improved. But with that, the clingy, cringey old me started to show his face again, overdoing everything.
Can there be a fucking middle ground here? Why, when a potential life partner comes into play, do I start my word salad, mouth breathing, full court press of said woman? Because of many things. But mostly because of scarcity. You worry that this girl might be someone you can have as a woman, as we hear, someone who “completes” you.
So what’s the play?
It’s Not About Her
My job has always been, and always will be, developing a life of success and happiness for myself.
Full stop.
Notice, if you will, that I didn’t say having a woman is required. It’s not a barometer for success. And yet, we try so hard to do it, get the house, the car, the girl, the kids, the white picket fence.
But we really, really, really don’t get at the guts of what we want from a partner, but more importantly, who the hell we are and what we represent to a potential love interest.
It’s not about her.
It’s about you. Who you are. What your life goals are. What you want out of your life.
Have you truly thought about these questions?
What do you want? Who are you? What are your life goals? What do you want to do with your life? How do you want to build your world?
Again, none of these poignant questions have anything about a woman or significant other in them.
This is ultimately about you, who you are, what you do, what your world is and dreams are, convictions, motives, beliefs, and purpose.
But men, especially modern men, fall into the trap of being too flexible on the above questions.
Scarcity mindset drives this. They’re too anxious to get into relationship mode. They feel like they have to push because they won’t get another woman who checks the boxes they need.
And this is why we say “You Are the Prize”. It’s not someone’s value in a relationship superseding someone else.
It’s you cultivating value in yourself through self esteem and confidence. Confidence in you and who you are. Confidence in what you provide as a partner. Confidence knowing that whoever gets you, gets the full you, the real you, the complete person for which healthy relationships are built off of.
If any woman or possible love interest is going to feel satisfied and content in a relationship, you need to have your shit on point. That means holding true to the person you are, regardless of missteps, screw-ups or falls in your past. That means working everyday to be the man you want to be, not the man a woman wants you to be.
She decides if she wants to be a part of your world. This is too important not to mention again.
She decides if she wants to be a part of your world.
If she doesn’t want to join your world, i.e. she wants her world, then she will have to find a partner that wants to submit to her world. That may be a man who wants to join her and take on a more submissive state. If it works, it works.
But for this conversation, and in general, my goal and men’s goals should be to build the life, and invite her to it.
If she declines, fine. It takes a special woman to want to join your world. She has to align with you on the important things. It doesn’t mean she has to align on all things, just the big ones. But it will ultimately be you inviting her to your life, and her accepting that role. For a man who wants to lead, it can’t and won’t work any other way.
If you build it, she will come.
But you also have to do the work to vet her and make sure she is worthy to be a part of your life. This is where men miss the boat, and where I’ve missed the boat dozens of times. You can’t just let her in because she makes your dick hard.
Is she supportive to your mission?
Is she a teammate that brings you joy over grief?
Is she dedicated to you and what you’re doing?
Is she aligned with your core values, your goals, your beliefs, your convictions?
Look for red flags. Always keep in mind that if you are consistently showing up, she needs to as well.
You lead, she follows. If a man decides to follow a strong woman and it works, then fine. But for this and other examples, a strong, leading man is an attractive trait for many women looking to secure their feminine.
And patience, wonderful, agonizing patience, is the key in setting up a long term relationship with anyone.
Rushing anything, especially when you are trying very hard to vet and get to know someone intimately, is relationship suicide. Pushing doesn’t help at all, in fact, it only exacerbates the situation and guarantees death by a thousand cuts through anxiety, worry, questioning, and general uncertainty about a relationship.
If you have to wonder if she’s into you, then she’s not into you.
If you don’t know where she stands, she’s not standing with you.
This is potentially months of vetting and getting to know her to find out where she stands. And she’ll be very clear when the time comes on where she stands and if she truly wants to be a part of your life.
And that’s the rub here. You, as a man, must maintain unshakeable patience, resolve, and drive when it comes to making your life what you need it to be, and only then can you invite a woman in. If there is any semblance of chaos or disorder, especially when dealing with when the shit hits the fan (and it will in one for or another), she’ll not truly be ready to let you lead.
And that is what she wants. For you to take charge and lead so she can play to her feminine strengths. That bubble she is in must be unbreakable, a FRAME, for her to paint a beautiful picture.
The “ME” Factor
I’ve failed many times in the past with relationships because I haven’t been rock solid on my life and what I wanted, what I was doing, and what my frame was. I’ve had to learn the hard way that things must be settled in my life, be it career, fatherhood, beliefs or fitness to truly attract a woman who wants to be a part of it.
But I must also be clearer on setting my convictions and not letting boundaries slide because I want something to work. I waffled so much when it came to things that I needed to be solid on that it’s been an ongoing problem with potential relationships.
So, I fall back to square one again, but this time, I MUST be honest with myself about who I am, what I want, and who I intend to share it with.
I’m a good man. I know this with all my heart.
It’s just time for me to accept that, smile in the mirror, and realize that my world is worth sharing with someone, but that someone needs to be a person who can fulfill what I need, not just because it feels good.
So I have to be honest with who I am, what I want, and what I’m willing to work with.
And, especially in many of these writings, I’ve stated that time and time again, but when the chips are down, with a chance at commitment staring me in the face, I buckle like a belt. The beta I’ve tried so hard to kill sees a chance for love and falls face first into it.
So it’s time.
And only time will tell if I can recover from these spin outs.