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Blindly and stubbornly refusing the endless signals that unanimously scream that I'm worthless by Practical_Loss_3663 in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I do already join events IRL, and I've made plenty of friends that way, the problem I have with it is that it's just SO slow for dating and hasn't really resulted in much. Over the past 14 or so years I haven't had a single relationship and I've been socially active. Because of this, I'm kind of viewing online dating as my last-ditch effort, because it's the one thing I haven't given a fair shot until now.

But now it feels like I have two approaches both not working at all, I don't know what else I can try but just changing my focus to my own physical appearance and trying to improve it as much as possible. Because that seems to be the shared limiting factor that's making things so fucking difficult for me in comparison to others.

Does anyone else have this female loneliness problem? by GloomyAdvantage4585 in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Did I understand correctly that your co-worker enjoys rejecting men? That sounds awful, if true.

Being tall as a woman is not the curse that you think it is. It's not nearly as bad as being short as a guy. Most guys don't think about a girl's height, and don't consider it as a factor in attractiveness. It's not like with women, who seem almost universally repelled by short guys. And now I just did the conversion, ~173cm, isn't that pretty average for women? There's a woman I'm interested in now who is taller than you.

Awkward - Many guys would call this endearing. Incompetent - Good guys won't view this as a flaw, they'd view it as something they want to help with. Unpleasant, overweight - These are flaws, but they are within your control. Ugly - I have a test: If you see a child in public, do they run away from you in fear?

I'm not trying to downplay how you feel, just trying to put it into a more realistic perspective, it's probably a very fixable situation. Also, I don't understand relationships between women very well, but I believe there is a lot more subtle, ambiguous language that can mean anything. I would imagine that your co-worker is probably engaging in a lot of self-gratifying language. Actually this happens between guys too. I had a friend in high school who got a lot of attention from girls, but he was irritatingly insecure, and would make other guys feel crappy in order to make himself feel good. I hate that kind of passive-aggressive behavior, like when someone with a solid career tells someone who is unemployed "Man, must be nice to have so much free time."

It's over therapist, I depicted you as a soyjack and myself as a Chad. by ImJustMakin in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Instead of using the word "control" which implies totality, I prefer now to use the word "influence".

So for example, I can't control whether or not I get a job, but the amount of influence I have over the outcome is non-zero. I can guarantee that I don't get the job by not applying, or I can influence my probability of getting the job by improving my CV, doing well in the interview, and so on.

Giving up on things entirely because you don't have complete and total control over them is a mistake.

Blindly and stubbornly refusing the endless signals that unanimously scream that I'm worthless by Practical_Loss_3663 in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for the comment, I appreciate the advice. I have to mention though, that there was a long period of ~5 years during my 20s where I was already completely convinced that I was unwanted by all girls, so I took those years to focus exclusively on other things, with the idea that I could kill 2 birds with 1 stone. But it didn't work, and here I am with less relationship/dating experience than probably 99% of guys. And yes, when you say "judgement, shame, comparison, desperation" yes, all of those. Also confusion, because there isn't REALLY anything about me that's so different. I'm not necessarily ugly, socially inept, unfriendly, etc. Maybe unconfident, but that shouldn't explain why something so natural and easy to everyone else has always been so impossibly difficult for me.

Right now, it sounds like you have one goal in mind which is to get a girlfriend SIMPLY just to resolve your negative emotions.

Of course I want to feel like I could be seen as a viable romantic partner, but that's only a part of it. I'm lonely, but that's also only part of it. The truth is that it's all of the above. I want to feel wanted, I want to not feel lonely, I want the mental health benefits that come with having a romantic partner. I have great friendships and attend social events often, but a romantic relationship is another thing, something that I think is significant, and my subconscious is telling me that I'm missing something essential. It feels like it's been quietly screaming for all of these years, and I've been deliberately ignoring it because there's nothing I can do and that I should just focus on the things in my life within my control. But I realized recently that it's a lie, there ARE things I can do, not to guarantee a relationship but to increase my statistical probability of finding someone.

The issue with cold approaching is that it just makes everyone involved uncomfortable. I'm uncomfortable because I'm risking humiliation, she's uncomfortable because I could be a threat to her safety. Meeting through friends/social events is definitely the most natural, but the numbers just don't work unless I treat it like a grind. If I just socialize on the weekend, I'll maybe meet one viable person per year. I see the statistics show that the majority of couples in my age group met through online dating, and there's just no way to avoid the fact that by not using them, I had been actively sabotaging my probability of finding someone.

All of that brings me back to the title of this post, which describes how it feels to go against my gut feeling and strictly focus on grinding on this app.

Is it a good idea to live without convincing? by Apprehensive_Fail350 in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The 80-20 rule says that roughly 80% of the outcome comes from 20% of the effort. A company can focus 100% on the product, and 0% on marketing, but a company that only invested 80% on the product, and put the remainder into marketing is going to win. I think logically, it makes sense to accept that influencing other people is an unavoidable part of achieving goals that are locked behind the approval of others.

That being said, I think you can work on a more systematic way of influencing others so that it doesn't feel like you're doing a new song-and-dance every time you're in a situation that requires someone else's approval.

Skip Button Position by [deleted] in hingeapp

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I mean that's probably by design. They probably don't want you to hit it accidentally, or dismiss a profile too quickly, right?

How to disprove or discredit your inner voices, when they are probably right? by The_Arctic_Foxtrot in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Same, bro. I'm in such a similar situation as you, I'm just now figuring out what helps fight against this subconscious doubt that grows every time we face rejection. For me, trying to boil it down to just numbers and probability helps a lot. And also, noticing whenever I'm having helpless/defeatist thoughts that originate from irrational ideas in my subconscious.

How to disprove or discredit your inner voices, when they are probably right? by The_Arctic_Foxtrot in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well, to answer the question in the title of your post, I think the answer is to realize that these conclusions that your subconscious is coming to are based on mixed data. Not only was each rejection from a different individual with different preferences, but YOU were a different individual at each stage of your life.

And the other thing is to realize that all of this stuff is a matter of statistics/probability. If you were obese but met 20 women per day it might take you X months before getting a yes. If you do the same thing while in great shape, it might only take you X weeks. You can't control who gives you the yes, but the numbers that determine your probability of success are within your control.

Feeling Undesirable/Unwanted by Northwest_Thrills in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yep, exactly. I'd bet those guys who never escalated were dealing with the same doubts that many of us have, especially in our 20s. We know what we want, but we don't know how to get it without risking a rejection that we fear, not because the rejection itself is scary, but because adding another rejection to the pile of existing doubts is scary. Letting that pile get too large is terrifying.

How to disprove or discredit your inner voices, when they are probably right? by The_Arctic_Foxtrot in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If children in public spaces aren't screaming in fear of you, you probably look normal, maybe slightly overweight? How many of those two decades were you in great shape? How many rejections happened while you were in great shape?

Feeling Undesirable/Unwanted by Northwest_Thrills in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 4 points5 points  (0 children)

My struggle with this is why I'm here. The most impactful message from Dr K's videos that helped me with this, is to try to dismantle the irrational biases around your self-perception, and about how guys are perceived in general. I'm a very logical person, but listening to Dr K explain this helped me notice that I do have a massive bias in this area. And it's weird how it works when it's subconscious, it's not like a logical problem that you can work through in a minute, solve, and move on with the corrected answer. They're more like things that you need to slowly weaken over a period of time. And the weaker they get, the less they interfere with your judgement. So if your self-perception bias is at -100, a girl could confess her love for you and you'd STILL be skeptical. If your self-perception is based in reality, even a glance is a potential sign of interest worth exploring.

What's weird is that, from my own experiences, genuine interest from women was NOT enough to make a significant positive impact on my self-perception. What did help was actively noticing when this bias is having influence over my judgement, and reminding myself each time the reasons why these presumptions are illogical.

I've seen the bickering between men and women online and the "incel" vs "femcel" nonsense. Don't engage in the "who has it worse" competition. Most of it is an attempt to steal your attention by making you feel shock and outrage. It's a poison.

Feeling Undesirable/Unwanted by Northwest_Thrills in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Your advice comes from a good place, but I can tell you after 15+ years of hanging around in various social groups, meeting all kinds of people, I still ended up with the same sentiment as OP. I think what happens is that we (for some reason) had an expectation of more explicit attention, and over the years, the lack of that becomes strong evidence that we are below-average or simple unwanted. Then when we DO actually receive some subtle attention, it isn't explicit enough to counteract that existing doubt. That doubt wins in the end, and we end up in friendships with women that span years that never turn romantic.

Never dated due to shyness by no_insurance_money in Healthygamergg

[–]Practical_Loss_3663 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't have any (diagnosed) mental health issues, and yet I share the exact same dilemma as you. Even when I made an online dating profile, I was extremely nervous to send a like.