Dating : A 2 Year Personal Perspective on Dating from an Amateur Dating Coach
Dating is draining, long, and a numbers game. It’s emotionally and financially draining, and creates a lot of depression, self-deprecative thoughts, and all-around slams the self-esteem something fierce.
**Some perspective about me:** I have been dating for the past 2 years. I would guess I have gone out with over 60 woman. I am looking for marriage and children. I am educated, I have a good job, I’m fit, high morals, intelligent, have a lot of interests and skills, I’m socially adept (I’d like to think, anyway), kind and compassionate (I’d like to think), 5’10 », so not short, and I’m not that bad to look at, yet the kinds of woman I generally meet are low value, or almost always have major issues.
You hear often how men are always looking for hookups, even on women’s dating profiles you constantly see so many of them feel the need to call out that they’re not looking for hookups, yet I have had SO MANY woman meet me, hook up with me, then ghost or slow fade that it’s insane. I’ve had woman invite me to their place, tell me that I’m not getting laid, then have sex with me. I’ve had woman tell me so many times that I am not getting laid (like it’s their gift to give me, instead of something reciprocally given/shared) only to have sex with me. I’ve turned women down for sex and had them become belligerent, and I’ve been sexually assaulted by women in a way that made me very uncomfortable, though I was always physically not at risk.
The number of woman who are interested in dating and then come up with a wishy-washy excuse later is crazy. Woman who are rude about it, passive about it, and just down right lie about it is insane. On the flip side, I’ve had women tell me they love me a few weeks into dating. I’ve dated women who were bi-polar (clinically diagnosed), and more. I do most of my dating from online dating apps, and sometimes wonder if you just meet a lot of the wrong kinds of people there, but it’s just so toxic for men that it’s no wonder women are getting inundated with messages, many of which are sexual, and are only looking for hookups–men are sick of dealing with the game, and it’s finally making me feel disillusioned and disenchanted.
I sometimes question/wonder if I want a women anymore. The toll it takes emotionally is huge. I give dating advice, and have done so for a while now, so through that I also come across many men (some women, but mostly men) who are having so many problems with females that it almost makes you wonder if the problem isn’t actually just women and hypergamy conflicting with the modern world.
And when I date these girls, their story is scary in that it’s ALWAYS THE SAME STORY: She was with some guy or guys who were abusive in some way. They cheated, or pushed her to cheat (it wasn’t her fault, he pushed her to cheat). He is ALWAYS considered a narcissist. I have heard women on dates I’ve been on call their ex’s narcissists almost 100% of the time. It seriously blows me away. True narcissism (according to Psychology Today) represents 1% of the population. That means I should date 100 women before I meet one who’s ex was an actual narcissist. I hear these girls almost always bash their ex’s, and they all tell me they were abused! If not physically, then sexually/emotionally. It’s almost a 100%!
I can’t help it anymore. I’ve read so much of the psychological and dating literature from some of the top-known relationship coaches out there. I’ve watched seminars, I’ve put it into practice and I’ve seen results. I’ve given advice to people who have seen results, yet after everything I believe and all that I know, I can’t help but just become jaded. I hear these girls talk about how all they want is a good guy–someone with their life in order who will treat them well (unlike their narcissistic, abusive ex), then they lie about wanting a relationship, tell you how much of a connection they feel, have sex with you, then ghost.
You’ll see them a week later with another guy, then you’ll notice them back on the dating sites again because that didn’t work out either.
I’m almost at a loss these days. There are amazing men out there. I talk to them. I coach them (my services by the way are completely free, though I have been considering starting a small business on it). I listen to their woes and problems and perspectives, and the problem seems more and more clear–hypergamy in the modern age isn’t set up for modern day technology. It isn’t set up for populations this high, communication mediums this broad, or online dating. I really believe that.
So I’ll keep trying because I really want to find the love of my life. I have never even proposed to a girl because I wanted to find that perfect someone, and I’ve spend so much of my life self-reflecting and trying to become a better person so I could be the best husband and father ever, but finding a great women seems nigh impossible.
Give me your perspectives, gentlemen. And I wouldn’t mind the female perspective too. I am not a women hater–not even in the least–I just understand the human sexual selection paradigm, and because woman sexually select, it all falls to their shoulders.
You must have gotten an insane amount of requests in your inbox from this post. Lol
This is interesting to read, thank you. I am a 30m who isn’t having much success with dating and the problem seems to be a combination of (1) People (men and women) do not prioritize relationships and dating. They prioritize career and materialism instead and don’t want to make compromises. (2) Everyone is picky and wants to date up. Like you, I get annoyed whenever a woman complains there are « no good men » out there. I know plenty of « good men » that are still single.
I’m not sure what the solution is, because how do you change what people value? Best thing I can think of is to encourage more in-person events (speed dating and such) where personality can shine through more. I would also love a dating-support-group to deal with the frustration and demoralization.
is this a humblebrag? 60/24= 2.5 a month? how good looking are you?????
As a woman I can only say the experience of dating is not much different for me. There only seem to be men that are looking for hookups, even when they claim to want a relationship they can only talk sex, which screams hookup to me. And yeah, ghosting is quite annoying, but I consider it a bullet dodged. Apparently those people cannot communicate as well as I’d like to see in a future partner.
Professing love after a single date feels completely fake to me. How can anyone know me well enough to love me after a single date.
Another thing that happens quite often is men turning controlling and possessive,even before meeting in real life.
So yeah, I think dating sucks for both sexes, and there are enough weird people on the dating scene irrespective of gender…
Woman here. I have been single for 4 years. My ex is a lovely man and never abused me, we just wanted different things and have different priorities. However, I have tried online dating the last 4 years, and it has been nothing but a disaster. I used to meet wonderful men in my daily life, but now I am left thinking every man online is a player, user, abuser, etc. I just dated a man for 4 months who did nothing but say horrible things about his ex wife and family, and pressured me into sex before I was truly ready. I want a relationship, so I stayed with him until I just couldn’t take his poor treatment of me anymore.
I HAVE been interacting with a man I went to school with recently. He seems very different from anyone that I have met online. Perhaps just the wrong people are on dating sites and apps.
Since you asked for male perspective, here is my perspective:
1) This thing would fit well into the r/niceguys subreddit
2) Stop following « dating coach advice » and giving « lessons » to other people. That stuff is bs and will just transform you in a caricature, rather than a person people would want to date.
3) Most importantly: there are times in which you will meet shitty persons. It happens to everyone and it sucks. But the assumption that your lack of success in dating is due to other people or external circumstances is often an excuse to avoid working on the only thing you can change: yourself. Start thinking what you can do to be a better person and a potential partner. There is no guarantee that it will work (I kinda know myself) but the point is to do something different than being resentful and bitter. THAT alone will make you a better dater and a better human being overall. Good luck!
You don’t keep looking for perfection, it doesn’t exist. You make it work with someone who is 90% perfect.
Men and women both sexually select. Men are just the ones to try to ask for/initiate sex more.
I’ve received PMs on this topic, and I asked permission from one of those individuals to post the PM here without using his Reddit handle. I thought it was pretty good, and it shows that even on Reddit, there are many people who feel either uncomfortable posting certain things that they actually think are valid, or they feel like the discussion here won’t be fruitful enough to warrant the energy. Anyway, here is the post:
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Hi there,
I saw your post on the [/r/dating](https://www.reddit.com/r/dating) subreddit (« A 2 Year Personal Perspective on Dating from an Amateur Dating Coach »), and saw you didn’t really get that great of a response. You made a lot of good points, and I wanted to talk to you about some of them much more in depth; but given the demographics of reddit these days thought it’d be more productive to simply PM you. I recently ended up on the dating market again after being in an LTR for 3 years, and it hasn’t been going well (Not helped by the fact I’m now 31)
>I’ve turned women down for sex and had them become belligerent I’ve done this a few times by accident (OK, to be frank, I suck at reading signals, and escalation is another topic); and usually it ended up with the girl becoming complete irate / irrational; or at best just sulking horribly. I think it’s a major ego blow for a women to be rejected, and given that women don’t get rejected often in society, coping mechanisms aren’t going to be often present.
I hear these girls talk about how all they want is a good guy–someone with their life in order who will treat them well (unlike their narcissistic, abusive ex), then they lie about wanting a relationship, tell you how much of a connection they feel, have sex with you, then ghost.
I have two views to this. The simplest? explanation is that girls like how guys like that make them feel, and the resulting emotional toying can be addictive. There is an overlap between Machiavellian / Narcissistic traits and the « attractive », « alpha » behaviors which attract women, meaning that the men that display these traits will necessarily have women rotating in and out of their life, easy come easy go, leaving a trail of damage in their wake. Given the low *actual* numbers of psychopathic males in society though, It doesn’t explain how « nearly all » women in dating have a « terrible » ex-boyfriend, unless it too is a coping mechanism for their own failings in an attempted relationship.
The second hypothesis is much more controversial. There seems to be an optimal window for finding a partner and having offspring. It is slightly smaller for women, but in general ranges from 18-35ish, coinciding with the prime reproductive years of most humans. All my experiences with this are anecdotal, but can be summed up as bullet points:
* Most people with a secure attachment style will have paired off and found relationships by the end of this « window »
* Behaviors of dating partners near the end of the window become more desperate. Women I have interacted with seem to eschew organic relationship development in lieu of a « shopping list », and unless you tick all the boxes you’re simply dismissed. I have seen this even in my early 20s, being told FAR too many times that « I would have dated you, if it weren’t for finding <Insert Perfect guy> ». I’m still not sure if that’s meant to be an insult or some twisted form of comforting, but I digress.
* « Damaged goods » are a real problem. As people remove themselves from the dating market, what is leftover seems to be that way for a reason. This can be any potential partner which would normally be at the bottom of the dating list- the lifelong « players », single moms, people with psychological / attachment issues, etc. This is really just a statistical problem, but the concept of a human being « damaged » in some form isn’t socially acceptable, despite the biological and social mechanisms which decide sexual selection still operating under the facade.
This is actually exemplified even further by quotes in the pua community, « She’s not yours, it’s just your turn »; « You can be the best thing that ever happened to a girl and they will still dump you for chad »- effectively someone choosing to continuing to roll the dice to get a 100, even if you have a 99.
I know this has been long, but I’d actually appreciate your input, and see if anything I’ve experienced seems to line up on your end. You’re clearly very well read, and good luck having long discussions like this in the open, without having someone claim « you have the wrong tone », or some other dismissal of the general argument. I do have *one* small thing I can share for you, though.
>So I’ll keep trying because I really want to find the love of my life. I have never even proposed to a girl because I wanted to find that perfect someone
Perfect doesn’t exist. No relationship is perfect, and I’m not sure a man can be truly « loved » as they desire to be loved. You are dealing with another person, who has their own wants, need, desires, and ability/inability to understand themselves and the world. Love is very much a choice, and both sides need to decide to « want » to grow with each other. Sometimes that means relationships run their course and you grow apart, other times you find a lifelong companion and partner. But even finding a diamond in the rough seems unnecessarily difficult these days, I very much feel you there.