My friend Hot Alpha Female sent me a message today saying that she thought that I’d get more hits on this blog if I posted a message saying I Love Being Naked!!!
Personally, I think she’s completely crazy. But she does know what she’s talking about when it comes to what men can do to become more attractive and successful with women. You can hear me pick her brains on the topic in one of the bonus interviews that comes with How to Became a Chick Magnet.
PS: Double dare!
When I start hearing the same message coming at me from multiple independent sources, that usually gets my attention. Last year I had several sources giving me the message that women want men with backbone who they can “push up against”. They get tired and ultimately resentful of Nice Guys who always yield powerlessly to them, and everyone else.
I listened to an interview recently where Robert Glover described what is wrong with Nice Guys most succinctly by quoting a comment from his ex-wife, who said “How would I know that you could ever stand up for me, if you can’t even stand up to me?”. Robert calls it Nice Guy Syndrome in his book titled No More Mr. Nice Guy! He points out that while Nice Guys think that what they are doing will please other people, ultimately it just leads to resentment. In short, it really pisses women off.
At Passionately Alive, Nicholas talked about the importance of having relationships with people who meet us where we are at, with a similar level of passion. Women want guys who don’t just collapse or run away in the face of strong emotions, whether they be the pleasant or unpleasant variety. When a woman pushes up against a man emotionally, she’s testing his boundaries and his resilience; she wants to know that he’s up to it, and that he’s not going to just walk away or act all pathetic in the face of what’s real for her.
In an anger management workshop, Denise Cook talked of the importance of being able to express our anger, and there’s a chapter about this in my book. But she also talked about being prepared to stand our ground and listen to another person’s anger without collapsing, running away or becoming defensive. Women particularly want men who are prepared to listen to what they have to say, even when it isn’t all sugary and sweet.
When I’m dancing, girls often comment that when I’m providing a strong, firm lead, they enjoy dancing with me more. They want to be led strongly; they don’t want a weak, noncommittal lead. It works the other way too; when a girl has no “tension” and her arm just flops around and yields when I push against it, I feel no connection with her. I want a strong connection, not a weak one. When I push against a girl, I want her to push back because that makes the partnership feel more connected and ultimately more fun. It’s the same in the rest of life too.
I’m still recovering from Nice Guy Syndrome. I was brought up to be polite and respectful, and thought that if I was “nice” to other people, I’d avoid conflict and get through life relatively unscathed. But another way of looking at it is that I adopted the nice guy persona because I mistakenly thought it was the best way to get my needs met. Being a Nice Guy is a lazy way of trying to be happy by seeking other people’s approval and validation, rather than having to learn how to love and validate ourselves.
Some of the symptoms that have affected me are:
Nowadays, I’m starting to look at things differently. I recognize that Nice Guy Syndrome not only doesn’t get me what I really want, but it also tends to piss people off. Especially women I want to relate too. They want a man that’s his own real self with them, not a compliant wuss that’s trying to seek their approval all the time. That sort of thing just isn’t attractive to women.
I’m working on finding my own validation internally instead of seeking it from other people. I’m learning to accept that when people are upset or angry with me, that’s about them rather than about me. I can take it. I’m learning to question and challenge the misguided things that I have been taught about basic human nature which made me feel shameful about myself.
I’m standing up for myself and speaking my truth, whether other people like it or not, and I’m learning to handle the uncomfortable feelings that I get when I do so. Ultimately, I’m learning to be more authentic by stripping away the act that I misguidedly played in the hope that it would make other people like me.
The first step in recovering from Nice Guy Syndrome is to stop trying to make people like you. To do this effectively, you also need to ditch the emotional baggage that makes you seek other people’s approval in the first place. Both these things are key steps to changing your mindset which I describe in How to Become a Chick Magnet, so you’ll want to grab a copy and start the transition from Nice Guy to Chick Magnet right away. Grab a copy of Robert Glover’s excellent book No More Mr Nice Guy too. Love Systems also have a great interview on No More Mr Nice Guy, with more tips on how to be a more attractive man around women by dropping the Nice Guy act.
I have a friend whose flatmate Frank is a “natural” when it comes to women. Frank often has multiple women an the go at the one time, and his record is having sex with five different women in the one day; all consensual. The guy is simply a magnet for women. So I got together with Frank and my friend to see what insights I could gain into the mind of the natural when it comes to dating and attracting women.
When I turned up to my friend’s house, Frank and rather cute girl were hanging out in the kitchen. “Do you want a sandwich?” he asked her. “I don’t know”, she said. “Well, I don’t care whether you want a fucking sandwich or not; I’m having one anyway.”, he joked around. Frank had a really bad sunburn from being outside working on his motorbike without a shirt on, so once again he had no shirt. She seemed rather besotted as Frank joked and teased her. “Are you in a hurry?”, he asked me. “No”, I sort of lied. It was true that I didn’t have to be anywhere, but I did want to get onto the purpose of my visit: to talk about women and dating. Frank led the girl upstairs for a quickie. “He won’t be long”, my friend remarked. Half an hour later, after Frank had walked the girl to the bus stop, we were at the pub delving into Frank’s mind.
The most obvious thing that struck me about Frank’s outlook that distinguishes him from guys who are less successful with women is his lack of fear and shame when it comes to women, sex, and having what he wants. Frank appears to have missed the societal and/or religious indoctrination that many of us guys go through which teaches us that what we naturally desire is bad and wrong.
I suspect one reason he has no fear when it comes to women is that he has had so much success over the years that he knows for sure if things don’t work out with one woman, another will come along soon anyway. He doesn’t have to tell himself that “there are plenty of fish in the sea” because he knows it deep down through personal experience. As a result, he doesn’t get attached to the outcome of hooking any particular woman. Sure he likes to, but if it doesn’t happen, that’s no drama. It’s not like he’s sexually frustrated or desperate or anything.
Frank doesn’t spend any time at all dwelling on his “failures”; he ridicules the idea. He doesn’t even consider it a failure if one woman isn’t interested in him; he just moves onto the next. So he doesn’t take women and dating seriously at all. “I’m a flow-er.”, he said, “I go with the flow.” He never sits around at home lamenting that some woman doesn’t want to see him; a seemingly rare occurrence anyway given how successful he is. In any area of life, success breeds success; and this seems particularly true when it comes to women and dating. It makes me think that there’s a certain threshold for success with women, above which more success is just a given; but below which frustration keeps us stuck.
Another thing about Frank is that he has no sense of shame. Whether you like him or not, he just doesn’t care; he speaks his mind freely and you either like it or you don’t. That’s not his problem; he’s just being himself. He doesn’t appear to indulge in the sort of rabid self-censoring that most of us guys do, thinking it will get other people to like us by not offending them. He jokes around with his mates and plays games with them like making up outrageous “pick-up lines” for each other to walk up to women with and attempt to start conversations. Meeting women is all a big joke, and good fun, for Frank. It’s not a terrifying ordeal like it is for many guys. He just says whatever is on his mind at the time, and it generally works. He seems narcissistic, yet authentic all at the same time.
A lot of the things many of us guys believe will make us successful with women, actually don’t. Frank doesn’t work hard at organizing fancy dinner dates or anything like that. He simply invites women around to “hang out”, and then lets nature take its course. He figures that if a guy goes to a heap of trouble to woo a woman, she knows straight away that he’s just after sex; and backs off. So instead he just goes about his daily business and invites women to join him. He treats them just like his mates, and calls them “mate”. They’ll come around while he’s tinkering with his motorbikes or whatever, and he just does what he wants to do while they hang out together. This puts the woman at ease because he appears to have no agenda; but also seems to make them feel a tiny bit out-of-place like they need to get his attention, and attracted to him all at the same time. He also teases them. Mercilessly. Most guys are trying too hard to set up artificial date scenarios and be super-nice in the hope that the girl will like them, while Frank is just hanging around building trust with women.
A friend once remarked that Frank “had a remarkable ability to make a woman feel special”, and I’m sure this is key to his success too. It’s just something that seems innate in him. I suspect it might be innate in all of us, but we’ve just been taught to suppress it by being polite and “nice” around women. The secret seems to be for a man to have stuff that he’s passionate about, and invite women to join in. Not in a way that’s trying to impress them all the time; just to include them. Being courteous and charming helps too, but not at the expense of being yourself.
Frank reckons there are pro’s and con’s to his remarkable ability. Being good with women means not being so good with other things in life. He doesn’t earn a great deal of money or have a job that he loves. Men often assume that we need a stack of cash, a great career, and to be better than the competition in order to woo women; but it turns out not to be the case. His mother once told him “There will always be someone else taller, stronger or smarter than you; so don’t compare yourself to other people”. He has other friends who he says are even more successful with women. But he doesn’t care… he’s having too much fun himself.
The cute girl turned out to be Frank’s ex-girlfriend. They’re not dating any more, and he’s looking forward to having sex with several other women too. Whether it’s multiple partners, hot women or threesomes; it all comes naturally to Frank. So how does he handle having more than one partner at a time? He says the line “Why ask a question you don’t want to know the answer to?” has saved his skin many times. He doesn’t lie to them, but he doesn’t rub it in their faces either. And they seem happy enough to go along with it anyway, given that he makes whatever woman he’s with at the time feel special just through his natural charm.
Getting information out of Frank was difficult. The conversation didn’t flow particularly easily. Perhaps that mystery which makes him so appealing to women gets in the way when you just want a straight answer. He has considered coaching other guys on being more successful with women. I think he’d suffer from being such a natural that he can’t easily explain what it is that he’s doing to make it all work. To him, it’s just being himself. I don’t think he even really knows where it stems from; which is why he’s a natural at it. I couldn’t help feeling inspired and a little jealous of his success and how it all just seems so, so easy and natural.