I made a similar post a couple of years ago, but I think it’s time again after seeing a few nice-guy/incel posts here. So, guys who have made it to the other side, what would you say to your previous self? I’ll leave my own personal answer in a comment below.
I didn’t fall all the way down the incel rabbit hole. I was a “nice guy” and I was on 4chan around that time. I found the memes making sense, but I had a loving circle of family and friends who were a life line. I was also never as entitled; my take was always if women didn’t want to date me that was something wrong with me. So maybe I do not qualify. But I understand Incels.
-
This is the most important. Not everyone you want to kiss is going to want to kiss you. That’s just normal. It’s part of life. Many people will and many more won’t. Don’t be weird.
-
Ask you friends about the kinds of women they like (I’m assuming Incels are almost all strait guys). I almost guarantee most of them will have different preferences. Look around at the people you know with partners. The whole spectrum of people out there have all different kinds of partners. You don’t have to be a Chris Hemsworth type, or a Taylor Swift type. Most people aren’t professionally hot, and they still date and fuck all the time. Re calibrate your expectations, for you partner sure, but also yourself.
-
Be more interesting. You may not need to be beautiful but you have to have something to demonstrate you’re a complete human being outside; jobs count but not for everything, unless you have an interesting job (for example I was an EMT). It why people try to meet people dancing; you’re demonstrating mastering of useful skills (presumably dance). I’ve taken several writing classes and never fail to get laid. Same goes with my Hebrew classes in college. You demonstrate a skill in an impressive way, and you’re putting youself in the vicinity of new people of might want to kiss you.
-
Learn to talk to people. Honestly, what probably saved me the most was when, when looking for how to talk to girls, instead of going on the internet and finding proto Tates, I went to the library and checked out a self help book by Larry King, How to Talk to People. People are usually quite happy to meet someone. Just introduce yourself. Learn to start conversation. Keep it moving. Find common ground. You can mention someone is attractive but don’t make it sexual right away. Maybe it never get sexual. Thats okay. \
All great advice, thank you for your reply. 4 hits hard for me too, for too long I thought as women as “others”, and I didn’t know how to talk to them. It took me way too long to realize they are literally just people. Combine it with 3 and just have interesting things to talk about. Women like to geek out just as much as men do, and a man who can talk about what is interesting to him is way more interesting then “Ooooh a girl!”
Absolutely. Even if it’s something they don’t understand. A lot of people just like this display of mastery; there is a domain at which you are at complete ease and confidence. I mentioned the hebrew class. I was running a study group. I learned it at a young age, and was mostly just taking it in university for language credits. Watching me take everyone’s questions, simply, and patiently answering them over the course of about ninety minutes was what did it. A similar thing happened when I guided six people in created DnD characters. Yapping about networks. Home repair. When people talk about confidence, its what they mean.
Exactly, now for nice guys reading we aren’t saying that everything is going to be interesting to every girl out there, but some confidence and passion about what you geek out on will be a winning combo for the right person.
My wife and I geeked out for a solid hour on Lord of the Rings when we met.
That’s what people mean when they say ‘be yourself.’ It’s useful advice for someone in their late 20s or early 30s, when your frustrated by jerks and want to find the right person.
But it sounds useless to someone who is 16 and is trying to get the cheerleader to like him.
Yeah, unfortunately remembering what it was like back then the hard truth is I couldn’t find someone to like me before I even know who I was. I had to build my personality and who I was before I could uh, “market” it. But, try telling my greasy faced basement dweller self that I had no personality, I would have been dejected at that. No my man (referring to younger me), there is so much more out there
Ask you friends about the kinds of women they like (I’m assuming Incels are almost all strait guys). I almost guarantee most of them will have different preferences. Look around at the people you know with partners. The whole spectrum of people out there have all different kinds of partners. You don’t have to be a Chris Hemsworth type, or a Taylor Swift type. Most people aren’t professionally hot, and they still date and fuck all the time. Re calibrate your expectations, for you partner sure, but also yourself.
I’ve noticed women seem to fall into the “one ideal body” kind of thinking quite often as well. Obviously, the resulting breakdown takes different forms than inceldom, but they’re still plenty bad.
They absolutely do, maybe even more than men, because sexualization and body image issues are so reinforced among women to almost be completely normalized. The obvious differences are obviously due to the object-holder dynamic. Women are told they are pretty objects to be possessed, while men are told they are owed such objects.
lol I’m not even a philosopher I feel like Im talking out my ass. I hope I’m still making sense. I’m also preeminently unqualified to give advice about to anyone except strait guys.
-
90% of what the TV and society told you doesn’t apply.
You aren’t just weird, you have definable conditions.
Go to therapy.
Your needs are as valid as anyone else’s.
Oh my god I thought rom-coms were pure romance and real. They are not. Breaking down most romcoms the vast majority are stalkerish behavior and refusing to accept no. Not like real life at all. Learning that one was hard for me.
Do mushrooms to snap yourself out of your self pity spiral
Just be a better person
Also become a girl
“Become a girl.”
Unironically being just slightly more feminine helps turn around your life a lot.
Mushrooms have helped me tremendously as well
Wish granted, now creeps are out to fuck you, and you still didn’t find love.
Shortly after the mushrooms and realizing it wasn’t cringe to care about others, I met my now wife of 9 years.
I’ll admit I just got around to becoming a girl last year, but if I didn’t meet someone, I would have transitioned like 8 years ago.
Wow, so this is an actual life story!
Happy for you two, and hope your wife was gentle and welcoming about your transition!
Thanks :3
She’s the best, super supportive.
It gets better, but omg is finding someone hard even 9 years ago.
Just gotta try to be a good person and keep rolling those dice.
I mean, I’m guessing OP eventually actually did it, so maybe or maybe not.
“You’re autistic but won’t find out until you’re 33. Everyone else sees it in you and that isn’t a problem, the problem is you were born in Oklahoma and they will call you gay because they don’t know the slightest real thing about you.”
“Don’t become cruel. People may suck but they’re what makes life worth living.”
“When people tell you who they are, believe them. The good and the bad.”
Ah yes, all nonstandard behavior is gay. What a very intelligent and non-nonsensical way to sort the world. /s
“When people tell you who they are, believe them. The good and the bad.”
Hmm. Good too? I usually take the bragging with a grain of salt.
If you talk about how you’re a cheater, or signal affinity with a hate group, or just are rude to waiters I’m certainly not going to forget that, though.
Don’t get hung up on “tell” meaning “words”
Ah, okay. With the bad stuff people do literally just announce it sometimes.
In high school I was a Nice Guy and resented the fact that I couldn’t have a girlfriend. I was smart, funny, and very caring. Why couldn’t girls see that!? There were a couple times girls showed interest, but they quickly ditched me. Stupid girls!
Then I went to college, angry at women. I’d go to parties, hook up, and then ghost/ignore them. It was really satisfying to have them be on the other side of the situation. Take that, girls!
After college, I continued to go out and try to hook up and keep that mean streak going. Girls in the Real World were having none of that. Sure, an occasional hookup, but by and large the party was over.
Depressed and lonely, I realized that being a dick wasn’t working, and being a Nice Guy didn’t work. This forced some serious introspection. Instead of single-mindedly going for women, I needed to live my life and stop worrying about it. The world is big and I’m a small part of it.
Once I stopped caring about all that and released my own tiny ego, something magical happened: women wanted me! They would sometimes go out of their way to talk to me! And by treating them as people and not objects, they stuck around. My future wife approached me, we dated as equals, and we’ve now been married 22 years.
Don’t get me wrong, I still had a lot to work on mentally. We all do and always will need to. But the evolution of mentality is essential to shedding the Nice Guy/incel disease. I feel significant guilt for the people I hurt along the way. The best I can do now is to be kind to people, empathize, and try to leave things better than I found them.
I see now that a big reason for my behavior was that I actually wanted to be a girl. I’ve always been jealous that girls were usually the ones being picked up. I wanted to be complimented, I wanted to be cute and I imagined myself as girls I liked… However, I thought at the time that transfems always ended up as ugly beings who look neither feminine nor masculine. Well, now I know that not only beauty is highly subjective, but also there are also non-binary people. And that many trans people are virtually undistinguishable from cis people, but they receive the last media attention… guess why.
So yeah, I would try to tell myself in the most gentle way possible to research the topic
This is all going to sound super dumb and obvious, but I think that underlines how delusional young straight men can become about themselves and the world. The first step was sloooowly coming to the realization that:
A) I’m not unique, special, important, and/or entitled to anything. Ever.
B) I’m not nearly as fucking smart as I think I am, and everyone else is much smarter than I think they are. Which is the perfect combination to make me incredibly stupid.
After it took me embarrassingly far into my 20’s to come to terms with all that, I literally had to start from scratch on retraining how I thought about how I interacted with/viewed everything and everyone.
I had no empathy, respect, or regard. I spent years blaming my lack of quality relationships on other people and “society.” Whatever the fuck that means.
I was living in a vacuum. All I could do was judge people on whether or not they were worth my time, while having zero understanding that I absolutely wasn’t worth anyone’s time.
I thought being funny, knowing things, and being good at stuff made me a real catch and, sadly, better than everybody.
My father is a massive selfish pile of shit, and I spent my youth hating him for all of those exact same behaviors. I dunno what finally let me see it, but it took way too long to get there.
Years later I would read a quote from (I think) Sylvia Plath about how “women are not machines you put the nice coins in until the sex comes out” (paraphrasing, didn’t Google) and that exactly defines how I thought about women.
By my late 20s I had begun correcting my perspective. I spent a lot of time working on what I have to offer, rather than what others can offer me. It improved the quality of all my relationships. I’m in my early 40s now, ten years into a wonderful relationship. I look back at myself and think about how small and fragile I was. Now I think a lot about time. How precious it is, and you can’t get it back. My partner now loves me so much, I want to try every day to return that love and be worth her time.
I see other guys at all ages living in the same sad little world I lived in. I wish I could run a seminar teaching dudes they aren’t that fucking great.
How did you managed to find time to work?
Wow, congratulation on coming all the way back from that!
My experience echos yours. Bad examples of manliness, seeing things as transactional, and being so focused only on myself.
Making friends with some really great people and getting treated for depression helped me break free from the cycle and start putting others first and understanding myself more had really helped me be a person that other people can enjoy being around.
Can you elaborate on your second sentence some? Trying to understand better where this comes from
Bad examples of manliness, seeing things as transactional, and being so focused only on myself.
My dad has a narcissistic type of personality. I’m going to just insert this bit from Mayo Clinic to save me a ton of time.
Symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder and how severe they are can vary. People with the disorder can:
- Have an unreasonably high sense of self-importance and require constant, excessive admiration.
- Feel that they deserve privileges and special treatment.
- Expect to be recognized as superior even without achievements.
- Make achievements and talents seem bigger than they are.
- Be preoccupied with fantasies about success, power, brilliance, beauty or the perfect mate.
- Believe they are superior to others and can only spend time with or be understood by equally special people.
- Be critical of and look down on people they feel are not important.
- Expect special favors and expect other people to do what they want without questioning them.
- Take advantage of others to get what they want.
- Have an inability or unwillingness to recognize the needs and feelings of others.
- Be envious of others and believe others envy them.
- Behave in an arrogant way, brag a lot and come across as conceited.
- Insist on having the best of everything — for instance, the best car or office.
At the same time, people with narcissistic personality disorder have trouble handling anything they view as criticism. They can:
- Become impatient or angry when they don’t receive special recognition or treatment.
- Have major problems interacting with others and easily feel slighted.
- React with rage or contempt and try to belittle other people to make themselves appear superior.
- Have difficulty managing their emotions and behavior.
- Experience major problems dealing with stress and adapting to change.
- Withdraw from or avoid situations in which they might fail.
- Feel depressed and moody because they fall short of perfection.
- Have secret feelings of insecurity, shame, humiliation and fear of being exposed as a failure.
When to see a doctor
People with narcissistic personality disorder may not want to think that anything could be wrong, so they usually don’t seek treatment. If they do seek treatment, it’s more likely to be for symptoms of depression, drug or alcohol misuse, or another mental health problem. What they view as insults to self-esteem may make it difficult to accept and follow through with treatment.
So long story short, a lot of treating the world like it owes you something and being an asshole to people when they don’t live up to your unreasonable expectations. Everything had to revolve around him, and that is the example I got, as I wasn’t around many other adults.
Relationships were transactional. I did this, this, and this, so now you owe me this, no excuse. It’s like grinding in a game. Complete these objectives, earn this reward. But that isn’t how life is. You can do as you please, as nice or rude as you want, but so can everyone else. If I did something nice for someone, that should be out of wanting to be nice to them, not to make them owe me something and being rude if they don’t see it that way.
In the OP’s nice guy scenario, guys will compliment someone, do them a favor, listen to them when they need someone to talk to, and not see that as being a friend or supportive person, but basically as points. I helped you, so now you should owe me a date, for instance. You see the boyfriend thing not as a partner, but a business relationship. I did this, so why aren’t you doing that? You aren’t thinking of building an equal partnership with someone, you are being selfish and inconsiderate of them as their own person. It’s totally hollow, because even though another person is there, they’re not really actively involved in the relationship, they are basically a game piece in your eyes when you think that way. You don’t care what they want or feel, you see it as they owe you something. And who would want to be with someone like that? But a person with that mindset can’t place themselves in the other person’s shoes and they lash out of anger instead. The other person will usually just WTF on out of there, and I don’t blame them.
So much of my life has been me losing friendships for having an egocentric view like this. Everyone tires of it eventually. Some last longer, others see how you are right away. I am constantly reminded of such cringe stuff I’ve done, and now that I understand it after getting medicine for my depression, I was able to see what I was doing and fix it. I found better examples of how to be a respectable person, and made friends with women instead of trying to “win” them. Now I’m able to be an interesting and well rounded person that people will naturally like…usually. Some people will still dislike you, not want to date you, or be rude to you for no apparent reason, but that’s just how it goes, and I can handle that now.
I’ll shut up now, since that’s a lot, but if you want to hear more about anything else, or if I’ve missed the mark on what you’re looking for, I can talk more.
This right here. Exact same thing for me.
Your first line of how it all seems stupidly obvious now is so true. But that’s the thing about being self-centered, that you can’t get any other perspective on it.
I’m glad you were able to get out of that cycle!
And it was depression that was keeping you in that mindset?
After getting my depression treated, I was able to really work on myself better and have lasting results. With the untreated depression, it was like trying to rebuild a house while it was still on fire. I’d try to fix one part of my while the other stuff was still actively messing me up. Getting treated let me let go of a lot of things that were just a byproduct of my own mind and focus on what the root causes of things were. I wasn’t reliving slices of all my previous bad days every day. I could come to terms with things in my past, see what I did that was cringe/jerky/etc and understand it and see better ways to go through life.
It was far from a quick fix, and I still have to live with that part of me, ala The Babbadook. This year in particular has been very hard on me. Medication just lets me manage it, it does nothing to fix core problems. That’s why many people go to therapy in addition to medication. Meds do just enough so I can sweep away the bad crap my mind tries to trick me with before it causes trouble.
What it feels like and how people react to it is different for everyone because we all have different brain chemisty and different underlying and associated issues. For me, a quick visit to my GP and a cheap Rx for Lexapro gave me what I needed. My partner had a much harder time and it took a few years to get sorted out. She also talks to the therapist and has done DBT programs and group therapy to get where she is, while I usually do ok on my own or just talking things out to her or friends.
It can be a real struggle, but it really sucks being your own worst enemy and is far, far worth it to talk to a medical professional if you think you are having problems. No matter where you try to hide from things, you can’t escape your own mind, and it knows every way to really mess you up if it wants to. It isn’t being weak and it doesn’t mean you are a bad person, it’s taking personal responsibility for yourself. You wouldn’t try to heal a broken leg yourself, and a mind is no different. Some things are best left to the pros.
Huh. So the depression was using up so much mental bandwidth it made the difference between being able to reflect and improve and not being able to. Interesting. I’m glad you’ve figured it out.
Parents modeling shitty behavior definitely happens, but usually kids gravitate towards or away from it pretty continuously, depending on their own personality.
I always knew he was a bad example, but having to grow up in that environment gave me a crappy set of social skills for when I was in the outside world from my family. I had to play the transactional game to stay out of trouble, and worry about my own well-being for most things. From spending my whole development years that way, I knew his behaviors were bad, but without any other context, I couldn’t grasp that I was doing much the same things. I was just being me and what I felt I had to do.
There’s obviously a lot left out of the story, it’s 40+ years of life. I started making progress acting like a decent human in my later 20s / early 30s as I moved out and started meeting better people and being able to spend more time around them. After my wife divorced me, I spent a lot of time by myself reflecting and that was when I went to the doctor about depression as I was completely humbled and ready to face up to having problems I couldn’t fix on my own.
After getting medicine, it was the last boost I needed, as I was able to let go of a lot of things holding me back. Whenever something would go bad, it would feel like it would drag every memory of me screwing up or people “screwing me over” back up to the surface and it would just swallow me whole. I couldn’t get anywhere because I’d just go into survival mode and shut down. Medicated me can tell those memories to shut up because I need to tend to the current thing that needs my attention. Which at that time was for me to stop being a jerk.
I still get mad at myself for all the bad things I did to people and to myself, but now they moreso serve as a reminder to stay being my best than something that really haunts me. Everything is just more manageable is about all I can say. It’s hard for me to really accurately verbalize my feelings through all these time periods without really taking a ton of time. I just think a lot of people, especially men these days, suffer with a lot of this stuff, and I’d rather rehash my worst times than see people get sucked down deeper into manosphere and incel crap. I haven’t forgotten for a second how bad and lonely those feelings are, and I don’t want to see other people go through it feeling alone.
Interesting answer. Would you mind trying to explain a bit how you think you got that way in the first place? Where do you think that early mindset came from?
If you wouldn’t want to date yourself, then why would anyone else? That might not help someone who feels doomed to be alone, but that’s really what it comes down to. The way out isn’t resenting others for not liking you - it’s becoming the kind of person people would want to like.
I also think there’s a lot of confusion around the idea of “nice guys.” It’s not that women love jerks - it’s that being a jerk can act as a proxy for confidence and perceived high value. It can work in the short term, but it’s not sustainable. What most people really want is someone who can stand up for themselves without constantly posturing. Being nice isn’t virtuous if it’s all you’ve got. Being capable but choosing to be kind - that’s the ideal. People want someone with boundaries, not a doormat.
Back in my incel years, a “female me” would’ve been a dream lol. I still lacked self-steem, but had a disproportionate view on my self worth despite being unremarkable in just about everything.
You sound like a regular person to me.
For me, the best advice I ever heard was “Being nice isn’t a personality, it’s literally the bare minimum”.
I always thought of myself as the “Nice Guy”, who just couldn’t ever find a girl to be with me. I didn’t understand it, I was funny, I was nice to girls, I did things like read books and watch intellectual movies, and so many stereotypes. I was single for most of high school and college and all the while I thought this.
It got worse with message boards/Reddit, where I had other people convincing me that yeah, I’m right, it’s the women who are wrong. They don’t want nice guys anymore, they want bad guys, they don’t know what is best for them. This caused resentment and anger in me.
In college I was lucky enough to meet some new friends that brought me out of this mindset, who sternly but lovingly told me that hey, maybe I wasn’t actually as nice as I thought I was. Maybe thinking that women only want bad guys and being upset no one wanted to date me was much more obvious then I let on, and the biggest gut punch that I think most nice guys need to here: Everyone knows you’re not being nice, you’re trying to manipulate them. Looking back, yeah I was, I was trying to be nice so they would want to be with me, not because I wanted to be nice.
After that I worked on myself. Not the cliche hit the gym or anything, but just worked on being more pleasant to be around. Being more self aware. My sarcasm is funny - to people who I know get it and understand I’m being sarcastic, otherwise they probably think I’m an asshole. Just be nice to people and don’t expect anything, just be a good person. Work on my personality, nice isn’t a personality, build hobbies and things to talk about, and show interest in other people’s hobbies - genuinely.
Which worked. By being less self absorbed and focused on getting a girlfriend, I became someone who was attractive, and not because I was buff or attractive physically, but because I was not exhausting to be around. I came out the other side a better person, and I hope others can too. Looking inward and having those hard conversations with yourself are not fun, but that’s life. Nothing in life comes easy, and working on yourself emotionally is one of the hardest, but also rewarding things you can do.
Wholesome. Good on you for getting out of the women love bad guys mindset. It makes no sense and it’s very toxic.
Some women like excitement, I imagine. Some “bad guys” might bring that. But most people just want to be with someone genuine who can take care of themselves and care about them. And people want to laugh. Be seen. Be heard.
I was very shy growing up but I cracked after I realized that people just want to be treated like I want to be treated. With respect, and the other things I mentioned. Once I realized I had the ability to give those things, I grew out of my shell. Also getting over the fear of unsuccessfully attempting to be someone’s friend. We don’t have to be friends with everyone. Not everyone will like you, and that’s okay. I don’t like everyone either.
Once you find someone who likes you, latch on. Whether it’s a friend or a romantic partner. 😊
I like how you said that. Women just want you to be interesting. Some women like excitement like you said, but almost all women just want you to show interest in things. I think a lot of nice guys see “jocks” and sports bros as annoying but they have women so there is resentment there too - but they wrongly put the blame on appearances and their views of “they’re jerks” so women must like jerks. No, in all honesty the thing is that those bros probably have more of a personality than you do right now, or at least can express it better. Sure they like sports, I bet they talk passionately about them too, and have conversations, ask follow up questions of their partners about them.
For me, eh sports they’re fine, but I do have other passions that I can talk about and ask others about. Now I have a wife who does drag me to games every once in a while, but she also goes and watches trains with me, and we play video games, and we share passions like that. Nice guys think they need to “worship” women or something. No, just be interesting.
just be interesting
And like, “jocks” in high school or college don’t even have to be that nice, or good at conversation or whatever, because being good at sports—being good at anything—can be interesting enough. Add to that a good physique… 😙👌 More than a good enough catalyst for a (quick) romance. Especially with young people who confuse love and infatuation. Been there.
Everyone knows you’re not being nice, you’re trying to manipulate them.
I was trying to be nice so they would want to be with me, not because I wanted to be nice.
After that I worked on myself.
worked on being more pleasant to be around.
Just be nice to people and don’t expect anything
show interest in other people’s hobbies - genuinely.
Which worked. By being less self absorbed and focused on getting a girlfriend, I became someone who was attractive
I see, so rather than trying to make people want to be with you by being nice, you should be nice to people and then they’ll be attracted to you. Uhh… wut? Sounds like you haven’t changed at all.
trying to manipulate
Which worked
How is what you did “after” different from what you did “before”?
No, over text they might sound similar, but in person it’s easier to see that the difference is between being performative in his niceness as a means to have friends/a girlfriend versus being nice as a means toward being his better self, with friends following naturally from that.
Thanks, yeah it’s hard to state over text. The big thing was realizing I wasn’t being nice - I was acting nice so that a girl would like me. Huge difference. You have to just be a good person, and many other things. Acting nice is very transparent. Being nice is a completely separate thing.
deleted by creator
versus being nice as a means toward being his better self
No, OP said “which worked”, which implies that his being nice was not just a means toward being his better self but also a means to get what he wanted from other people. Like before.
I think I can forgive someone using the language of their past self when reflecting upon that past. In the context of the paragraph, I think it’s fair to say that “which worked” means something more along the lines of “and things did get better.” Maybe he could have improved his word choice in that instance, but I don’t think that negates everything else said.
I can already hear you saying “but that’s not what he said, and that was his choice of words.” And to that, I point to one of the key lessons I learned in college philosophy: questions of meaning come before questions of truth. In this case where one short two word sentence does not fit the rest of what he is saying, I think it’s best to ask what they could mean that would fit.
One Key difference is that you are nice because you think it is good. Not because it will gain you something. The mindset is different. You don’t complain when you are nice and get nothing in return. Because you just did the right thing. Like you also don’t expect people to thank you for not punching them in their face when you walk by. Not punching them is simply the right thing to do. So now you are a baseline decent human.
Not because it will gain you something.
OP saying “which worked” implies he hoped it would gain him something.
sadly I don’t have much advice. I’ve just gotten used to loneliness
Are you still angry at women for it?
does an answer here even matter? Whatever I place the blame of my situation on will not magically fix it.
That’s true. Or at least, it won’t directly. There are other people in the thread that had better luck as soon as they changed their attitude a bit, but I don’t know your situation and can’t guarantee anything.
It’s more a question of if you’ve actually left the movement, or actually were in it in the first place. It’s called “incel”, but it’s specifically about blaming women for said celibacy. And it makes a world of difference to other people if you blame them, or maybe even wish them harm.
Nah, I saw a contra points vid on incels, it was a bit of empathy that veered me away from that movement, even thought I really didn’t go deep in it in the first place.
Link, for anyone else curious. I’m actually learning some things.
Empathy is good, I’m glad you found it. And I hope you “ascend” (one of the things I learnt), because few people can’t.
Dont, work out, make money, get hobbies IRL. You can do it.
Rather then work out and make money, I would rather say have fun, do something interesting and stay healthy.
I don’t have so much advice around this because around the time I heard about incels I looked at the subreddit and the thought occurred to me "if I want to have any relationship with a woman, of any kind, if I wanted to relate and communicate with them, then investing time with a group of people who self professed an inability to do so would be a waste of time.
And like I dodged a huge bullet. At the time I was in a college dorm and around a lot of men my age. It was a stark difference in how they viewed relationships with women. It was girlfriend or nothing to them. Friendship was failure. Zero interest. That really weirded me out. I didn’t want to have that attitude.
And yeah it took me a while to fully learn good social habits, and there were missteps that I made along the way. But the basic concept of think and care about women as people and valuing friendship as it’s own thing, not as a failure to date, really works to avoid falling into the hopeless rage of inceldom.
I don’t have so much advice around this because around the time I heard about incels I looked at the subreddit and the thought occurred to me "if I want to have any relationship with a woman, of any kind, if I wanted to relate and communicate with them, then investing time with a group of people who self professed an inability to do so would be a waste of time.
Brilliant observation. I wish more people made it.
Stop trying so hard. And be a better version of yourself instead of someone you’re not.
Simple and sweet :)
Nice guys don’t get shit from my experience
if you’re only positive quality is being surface level nice, you need to work on yourself before dating
I’m good not nice
See my comment in here.
Being nice isn’t a personality, it’s literally the bare minimum.
Way too long a read. All ik is being nice will get a man no where with these so called “women”to sugar coat what they really should be called
Well, I can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped.
Maybe summarize it to a paragraph or two and not a whole text book page
imagine thinking a slightly long post is too much
I already did for you above. If you can’t read a few paragraphs then you obviously don’t want to be helped.
I promise it has a good turn
Not me so its a complete outsiders perspective:
A guy i know had long time the mindset that if someone would like to be in a relationship or “available” they could be “assigned” to each other.
(i dont really know if the wording is right but i am sure about the concept)
As in: i had contact with him and when he was gone from school for 2 months i managed to get into a relationship even tho i was like very anti relationship.So when he came back he was dissappointed that i did not choose him as he was “obviously available” and he would have tried to ask me out if i didnt had the “no relationship” stance.
I told him then that i am sure that i would not wanted to be in a relationship with him anyway but the feeling, that he would try to ask me out the moment my relationship breaks he would ask me out.
He also tried to ask like every other girl out to the point where he got thrown out the school twice (second was final)
At some public monthly meetup event he also did that and the girls started avoiding him but he d5d nothing more than asking.
At my last visit at the meetup before moving cities i tried to give him my unfiltered, less comfortable opinion about his behavior which he later dismissed completly as i heard from others.
But thankfully months or few years later (too distant for accurate data) he started therapy and with it he started pausing trying to date everything that looks like a woman and from the few instances i saw he got a lot better, less stressed, happier and has more energy
Its awesome too see and i hope next time we meet he got even better (+ that he gets stable enough that i can tease him with a “told u so” because i am still a menace)
Sorry for wall of text
Understanding that I never progressed beyond the meaning of the original forum in terms of “involuntarily celibate”, my biggest advice would be to keep going. Keep doing the things that draw in the community and cause people to want to be around me.
I’d also give myself a few hundred massive warnings about the pandemic, and how not to judge my actions by those of others during a global crisis.
The reigning champion from this thread is “be someone other people want to be around”, which is admittedly a hard thing because it requires a lot of introspection.
I mean, I don’t expect people to want to be around me, because by and large I don’t like being around them in non-structured environments. So boardgames and RPGs help. Hence, bring the community.
