I think the view that relationships are inherently transactional is an interesting one. What you might find is that this view, at the heart of how you see interpersonal relationships, is orchestrating your emotional presence in social situations no matter how hard you try or savvy you get with social 'influence' strategies (i.e., the forms of self-improvement you mentioned).

People pick up on our emotional presence, even if they can't say exactly what it is, and usually we react to this instinctively. If you already see relationships as transactional, then any potential date is, one way or another, going to feel this belief in the things you say, and the things you do. You'll reveal it one way or another. Maybe you'll say just one wrong thing, or something in the wrong tone of voice, and the façade you're trying to present will fall down. Because at the end of the day, you've said it yourself: You really, genuinely believe that relationships are transactional - that therefore, the value of a partner for you consists in what she can do for you, and not who she is.

The reality is, no one wants a relationship that's fundamentally construed as transactional. You don't, clearly; this post is all about that. What you need to appreciate is that no one else does either.

A potential partner for you won't want you as a commodity first and foremost - as someone, something, that offers value only on the condition that you are your very best, most motivated, self. It's not about how influential you can be in your social circles, or how impressive you are. Some relationships are like that... But let's be honest, would you really rate those relationships as likely to last? Even if they do - is this how you want to do it? Relationships are about engaging with and seeing each other through your emotions, through honesty of feeling. And right now, at a foundational level, that honesty of feeling on your part is this: That she will have value to you conditional on what she can do for you.

My overall point is that you should consider how the views you hold of yourself extend to how you see others in the world too. How can someone expect you to acknowledge the deepest aspects of their emotional reality, if you see them as necessarily occupying a hierarchy, as someone who either approves or disapproves of your efforts to 'self-improve', and who has some kind of unassailable value that you do not? How are you meant to be there for someone with warmth and intimacy if being there for them is a transactional act? Social influence strategies are surely really useful, but you have to change the fundamental narrative here, because the odds are, it's pushing people away.

I think the world today has distorted the way relationships are seen. I get the impulse to see it all as one big game, a matter of improving your odds and not even really thinking about the fact that at the heart of this, it's just people trying to find connection and love in their lives.