Don't Understand the Obsession with Being Approached

[AD1980]

Furthermore, that still doesn't explain the logic of why guys think NOT approaching will be better. If they don't want a relationship, sure. But why is there this idea that if women just approached, everything would suddenly be rainbows and sunshine for their romantic life?

 

The only Men it would make it easier for would be good looking guys who would get approached but they are probably getting approached anyway and for mostly shy good looking guys who might be afraid to approach women

 

I do agree that unattractive or average looking shy guys it wouldnt be any easier for

[xxoo]

So you admit women find less men good looking then vice versa?

 

I agree with that. But it isn't all about looks. Two men may be equally physically attractive, and one will be will be very sexually attractive to me, while the other is completely neutral.

[ThaWholigan]

If men want to be desired, they need to learn how to be desirable enough to be approached.

 

Even if it's hard - nothing is impossible.

[AD1980]

I agree with that.

 

Makes sense women in my socal circle even the marired ones act like my good looking friend is the last good looking guy on earth the way they flirt with him:laugh:

[verhrzn]

The thing is. Women say doing the aproaching is better. But since women don't want to do it themselves the only logical explanation as to why they don't do it is because they don't desire men all that much. I mean if it IS better to do the approaching then why not do it?

 

The truth is it isn't better. It's worse. Men never get to feel what it's like to be desired. Women in effect tell us that we should only desire them, not vice versa, and thats that.

 

You guys really need to decide what you want; you can't have your cake and eat it too. If you want to be desired, then you have to be desireABLE. A lot of women, even the non-princess ones, go to enormous lengths to maintain their good looks and be "desirable." Uncomfortable underwear (thongs), uncomfortable shoes (heels), uncomfortable clothes (can't breath in that dress, can't bend over in that one), expensive make-up (foundation, eye-liner, blush, lip gloss, and mascara are the bare minimums), expensive hair products (blow dryers, hair styling products, specific shampoos)....

 

Tell me this: when's the last time you got your hair dyed? When is the last time you got anything waxed? Would you shave your leg hair, chest hair and crotch hair every week? How often do you go tanning?

 

I could go on. This is why I find the argument of "women don't do any work" ridiculous. Women do work.... it's called "being attractive." If you aren't attractive, you aren't getting approached. You aren't being desired.

 

So if men want to be desired, then they need to put just as much work into their physical appearance as women do.

 

As to why women don't approach men.... as I've explained before, it's the one-two hit of having to deal with rejection as well, AND breaking social norms. Think of going out into public in a dress. A really fluffy pink dress. And you don't get to act goofy while wearing it-it is totally serious. Feels uncomfortable, doesn't it? That's what breaking gender norms feels like. It's pretty self explanatory why girls do it.... because society tells them for the most part, NOT to.

[somedude81]

Too much outcome dependence.

If you ever end up as "successful" with women as I do at 31, lets see if you can keep singing that tune.

Because girls can be won over with personality even if you aren't a stellar human specimen.

Based on my current experiences, that couldn't be further from the truth.

 

I have yet to meet a girl that I was able to win over with my sense of humor or common interests / hobbies. They never wanted anything more than friendship.

At the last con I attended, there was a guy who was decently attractive but not that "OMG Adonis" handsome. (He was nerdy-cute.) One of the panelists pointed out that he was knitting a scarf. He IMMEDIATELY got flooded with girls, because the girls thought it was so freaking cool that he knit.

Eh, I think they were more into the novelty of it.

 

Approaching a girl means you give her a chance to see your personality and interact with you. How could you have this opportunity if you were waiting for her to approach?

Why should I have to chose between them?

 

When guys say that want women to start approaching, it doesn't mean that guy will stop.

 

I'm in a salsa class that has about 20-25 girls. It would be great if one or more of those girls let know that she was interested in getting to know and I would do the rest.

 

Right now I have no what any of them think of me and all I can do is ask out the ones I like the most and hope that they might want to get to know me better.

 

The fact of the matter is, approaching is much easier for girls simply because more guys are open for something.

 

Basically I'd be happy to go on a date with 2/3rds of the girls in that class. It wouldn't surprise me if a lot of the guys in that class thought the same way. So all a girl has to do is give some sign.

 

I really thinks it comes to down is that if a guy is asked out, most likely his default answer is yes. If a girl is asked out, her default answer is no.

[xxoo]

Makes sense women in my socal circle even the marired ones act like my good looking friend is the last good looking guy on earth the way they flirt with him:laugh:

 

That sounds just like men. Not different from men.

 

Not sure I understand your point

[Anela]

Women desire men just as much but they know how much it sucks to be coldly shot down for daring to speak to somebody and would rather not take the blow to their ego. They know how mean they are to certain men that approach and don't to be on the receiving end. Not all women but this is a main reason why a woman would be against approaching.

 

I was nice to a man who approached me recently, even though I wasn't at all attracted to him. I responded to guys the other night, on a site, even though I wasn't interested - I was being polite. One guy, eight years younger than me, laughed and sounded surprised - he wrote to me months ago, but I hadn't been checking the messages, and he asked if what he'd heard was true, that being patient was the right thing to do. I stopped responding to another one who became lecherous within three quick messages.

 

I've been rejected. I was "that girl" who the guys teased each other about, when I was a teenager - I've been rejected on dating sites, when approaching, and they seemed to have no problem being the one who rejects someone else. I haven't approached in person, because I rarely come across anyone I'm attracted to, just as xxoo pointed out.

 

 

The truth is it isn't better. It's worse. Men never get to feel what it's like to be desired. Women in effect tell us that we should only desire them, not vice versa, and thats that.

 

I've been desired in a creepy way. There's a difference between someone being attracted to your figure, or being to that figure and to you, as a person. Men who want to use you are a dime a dozen - intimacy, to me, is more than sex. Much more. I also know that whilst my body or my accent might draw them in, the rest of me - me, as a person - could be a turn-off. Rejection is involved there, too.

[verhrzn]

I have yet to meet a girl that I was able to win over with my sense of humor or common interests / hobbies. They never wanted anything more than friendship.

 

Could it be they weren't interested in your hobbies of making uncomfortable jokes about boobs and interests of how you badly want a skinny, long-haired girlfriend? Strange they didn't react well to your personality...

[ThaWholigan]

If you ever end up as "successful" with women as I do at 31, lets see if you can keep singing that tune.

 

I'll be singing till I'm dead

 

I really thinks it comes to down is that if a guy is asked out, most likely his default answer is yes. If a girl is asked out, her default answer is no.

 

Dat dere faulty thinking

[verhrzn]

 

Dat dere faulty thinking

 

Yeah somedude would be happy with 2/3rd of the girls.... but what if the 1/3rd of girls asked? And what if they were *gasp* fat? I don't have a whole lot of confidence in your ability to turn her down gently. "No you see, you're just not considered a human being to me. You're so fat I don't even consider you female. If you lost some weight and grew your hair and got implants, maybe..."

[Mrlonelyone]

Not taking anything away from Jennifer (Connelly), it is ironic that the real Alicia Nash in her younger years doesn't appear much different than the OP. Further irony was that she was a science geek (physics major) a lot like the OP is. She asked out her professor, a general no-no. Gutsy lady. Hard to believe it was the early 1950's. The horrors.

 

Exactly.

 

I heard on the news that in the USA there are single 89 marriage age men for every 100 marriage age single women. There simply are not enough men to go around.* (About equal numbers are born,

 

So if a woman wants to be selected she's gotta put it out there. Or relax their standards from finding a knight in shining armor or a perfect ideal man to an attainable man.

 

My example, Alicia De Larde, asked out a man who while brilliant had significant flaws. She loved him anyway. In real life it was not all smooth sailing, they were divorced for a good while, she almost remarried, he traveled Europe but in the end they are back together (the prototypical second chance). If Alicia had not had the guts to ask him out* the world would not have one of it's best real love stories.

 

*That number probably does not exclude LGBT people. So the balance may be more skewed.

[Lonely Ronin]

Based on my current experiences, that couldn't be further from the truth.

 

I have yet to meet a girl that I was able to win over with my sense of humor or common interests / hobbies. They never wanted anything more than friendship.

That's your problem. For every guy like you, I can come up with 20 that it did work for. In fact, It's pretty common knowledge that it does work that way.

 

 

 

I'm in a salsa class that has about 20-25 girls. It would be great if one or more of those girls let know that she was interested in getting to know and I would do the rest.

 

Right now I have no what any of them think of me and all I can do is ask out the ones I like the most and hope that they might want to get to know me better.

If a normal woman is into you, they let you know. Thus you don't know what to look for, or none of them are into you.

 

The fact of the matter is, approaching is much easier for girls simply because more guys are open for something.

Says the guy with no real experience with women. It never ceases to amaze me how it's only the guys with little or no experience (the desperate ones) with women think guys have no standards.

[Imported]

 

 

 

Dat dere faulty thinking

 

 

Women are horrible at being told no. If she is not so attractive, than it is " what, think you're too good for me..", if she is attractive, than you must be gay. It is even worse when their friends are involved and knew she had a crush on you and you had the audacity to gently tell her no or kindly ignore her passive advances. Those friends hold grudges for a long time and I didn't do **** to them lol

[ThaWholigan]

Women are horrible at being told no. If she is not so attractive, than it is " what, think you're too good for me..", if she is attractive, than you must be gay. It is even worse when their friends are involved and knew she had a crush on you and you had the audacity to gently tell her no or kindly ignore her passive advances. Those friends hold grudges for a long time and I didn't do **** to them lol

Having occasionally had to turn girls down before, I know this first hand. I wouldn't say it's all women though, I have known a lot of women to be very gracious despite rejection - I have become a keen social observer over the years.

[Mrlonelyone]

sumdude

 

I find it really hard to believe that women never come on to you. Maybe you are just missing their passive little signals?

 

Another good historical example.

 

Robert de Brus, 6th Lord of Annandale - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(You know the one in braveheart who's all crusty and rotting while alive?)

 

Legend tells that the 27-year-old Robert de Brus was a handsome young man participating in the Ninth Crusade. When Adam de Kilconquhar, one of his companions-in-arms, fell in 1270, at Acre, Robert was obliged to travel to tell the sad news to Adam's widow Marjorie of Carrick. The story continues that Marjorie was so taken with the messenger that she had him held captive until he agreed to marry her, which he did in 1271

[ThaWholigan]

sumdude

 

I find it really hard to believe that women never come on to you. Maybe you are just missing their passive little signals?

 

Another good historical example.

 

Robert de Brus, 6th Lord of Annandale - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(You know the one in braveheart who's all crusty and rotting while alive?)

I think the same - I think Somedude is probably quite crap at clocking signals from girls. However, there are 2 things:

 

1) That isn't necessarily his fault - a lot of guys cannot read signals, sometimes it's sheer pot luck, sometimes it's perseverance, among other things.

 

2) Sometimes, the signals aren't the clearest indicator. He could get tons of them from girls, and then when he makes the move she's already changed her mind, or she was just flirting. That happens quite a few times.

[todreaminblue]

Never being approached never being set up..nwver beign told i was good looking..

 

Whenever sinlge women were out they would ask about my friends becasue they thought they were good looking but never asked about me

 

At 32 if i was even halfway decent looking one of these things should have happened by now even by accident

 

 

1.when you say set up do you mean you haven't been set up on a blind date or that a woman has set you up for a date? please explain this for me

2.Being told you are good looking or not being told you are good looking is not a sign if you are desirable to others or all others everybody has different ideals

3.you cannot possible know if women have asked about you or not it is possible they have and you are not aware.

4. i have been told by lots of men i am attractive sexy desirable my voice is sexy etc etc doesn't mean i feel halfway decent looking at the best of times I have also been put down by other men called ugly, too big, mannish because my shoulders are broad.... i have been cheated on and abused verbally and otherwise.So i have major issues i deal with

 

i am tempted to ask you to pm me a picture and i will tell you what i find ........from first looks....i dont go on first looks though but i bet you though i could find something that you are missing.....probably many....do you know what is harder than finding something in yourself that is great........believing it to be true that others find those qualities in you......i would like your reply on some of my questions please......deb

[Anela]

Women are horrible at being told no. If she is not so attractive, than it is " what, think you're too good for me..", if she is attractive, than you must be gay. It is even worse when their friends are involved and knew she had a crush on you and you had the audacity to gently tell her no or kindly ignore her passive advances. Those friends hold grudges for a long time and I didn't do **** to them lol

 

I've been told "no," and not responded with rudeness. Men can be rude, too - just as rude as you assume women are, and those men do tend to think that they deserve better - the tall blonde who is paying them no attention, and flirting with a man they're jealous of. If only that girl could see that he's the best man for her...

[Necris]

While they're busy complaining venomously, more positive guys are out there taking the risk of asking women out and sometimes being accepted, and sometimes getting approached themselves.

 

Guys begin to complain when they feel it just seems impossible, when you have approached women but you are always rejected literally all the time. Now if you are complaining and never approach then obviously you just need to get out there and talk to some women then come back. I personally don't complain about women not approaching me since it is rare for a woman to approach any guy anyway unless he's the cream of the crop physically. But it is frustrating that no woman has ever shown any interest in me (okay well there was this one time when I was 14 a girl was acting flirty but then again she flirted with basically every guy she met and that was so many years ago it doesn't matter), that I'm always rejected and no I'm not approaching only the hottest girls around my physical standards aren't high but I'm still always rejected by every girl I approach.

[jakelongot]

Verhrzn, your posts on this thread have been nothing short of...AMAZING!

 

As much as this guys vs girls topic in dating has been done to death is slightly different words, I have never heard it put so clear as I have seen it here.

 

You thoughts on approaching vs being approach are so very true. There are probably 5% of super beautiful attractive people walking around that will always be the object of attention...for both guys and girls. It is the girl that spends hours getting dressed and doing hair and makeup etc (and probably spends a lot of her spare time thinking about and buying that stuff). Plenty of guys like that too...buying expensive name brand stuff, crazy hair gel...the guys that look like a total douche bag when you see them out.

 

There are probably another 10-15% of people that are just natural beauties/studs with minimal work. They just look good even in the most simple stuff. Good genes...nothing you can do. These are probably the people you think about when you get jealous, but they are still pretty far and few between.

 

The majority of us are in the middle. We can clean up nice and look better than we do most of the time in spots, but for the most part we are not obsessed with how we look. We dress comfortable, we go out, we try to have fun. You are probably not turning a lot of heads by looks alone but need to develop other parts of your personality to compensate...no big deal.

 

I think we all get obsessed with ideals in our head, but generally these are one-off cases. Not everyone of your friends that has a significant other is a super model, you probably only have 1 or 2 great looking friends. The rest are average. And that's ok!

[jobaba]

That's your problem. For every guy like you, I can come up with 20 that it did work for. In fact, It's pretty common knowledge that it does work that way.

 

I thought that way when I was 20 years old too. But the few women I've showed my very best to, they wouldn't go for it. That has made me bitter, no question.

 

The women I've dated, I had physical contact with them within no more than 1-3 one on one meetings.

 

It makes me think women either think you're cute or there's an emotional component that snaps on, and then it's on. If not, then it's not.

 

The 5 second rule...

 

Because girls can be won over with personality even if you aren't a stellar human specimen. Let's say I see a guy across the room that isn't attractive enough for me to approach, because he's not that physically hot to me. But then later I overhear him make some reference to my favorite book, or how he loves knitting, or something that piques my interest. Boom, he is immediately more attractive.

 

At the last con I attended, there was a guy who was decently attractive but not that "OMG Adonis" handsome. (He was nerdy-cute.) One of the panelists pointed out that he was knitting a scarf. He IMMEDIATELY got flooded with girls, because the girls thought it was so freaking cool that he knit.

 

Approaching a girl means you give her a chance to see your personality and interact with you. How could you have this opportunity if you were waiting for her to approach?

 

Men can be won over this way too. Two of the best looking guys I know married women who are physically much less attractive than they could get. People always say, "I thought _____ would have married a much hotter woman." And it's usually WOMEN who make that comment.

[verhrzn]

Verhrzn, your posts on this thread have been nothing short of...AMAZING!

 

As much as this guys vs girls topic in dating has been done to death is slightly different words, I have never heard it put so clear as I have seen it here.

 

You thoughts on approaching vs being approach are so very true. There are probably 5% of super beautiful attractive people walking around that will always be the object of attention...for both guys and girls. It is the girl that spends hours getting dressed and doing hair and makeup etc (and probably spends a lot of her spare time thinking about and buying that stuff). Plenty of guys like that too...buying expensive name brand stuff, crazy hair gel...the guys that look like a total douche bag when you see them out.

 

There are probably another 10-15% of people that are just natural beauties/studs with minimal work. They just look good even in the most simple stuff. Good genes...nothing you can do. These are probably the people you think about when you get jealous, but they are still pretty far and few between.

 

The majority of us are in the middle. We can clean up nice and look better than we do most of the time in spots, but for the most part we are not obsessed with how we look. We dress comfortable, we go out, we try to have fun. You are probably not turning a lot of heads by looks alone but need to develop other parts of your personality to compensate...no big deal.

 

I think we all get obsessed with ideals in our head, but generally these are one-off cases. Not everyone of your friends that has a significant other is a super model, you probably only have 1 or 2 great looking friends. The rest are average. And that's ok!

 

I have..... absolutely no idea what you are referring to. What exactly is your point, and how does it relate to anything of what I was saying?...

[jakelongot]

I have..... absolutely no idea what you are referring to. What exactly is your point, and how does it relate to anything of what I was saying?...

 

First off, I was not being sarcastic. Genuine

 

I suppose I could go back and pick out some of the posts you made on this thread, but just a lot about what you said with stuff like "ok you want to be desired? Go spend a ton of time on hair and clothes and looks etc...They maybe someone will approach you"

 

It really isn't fair to complain about women being approached when she puts in 10x more effort to how she looks and you just show up in a tshirt and jeans and go "wtf...why aren't i being approached? That girl just has to show up and do nothing." Meanwhile she took the time to think about her look, go shopping, get ready, etc...All which takes time and effort.

 

And I also agree that if roles were reversed and women approached then most guys would probably feel 10x worse if they weren't being approached rather than just not worrying about going up to girls because they don't want to be rejected that night. At least when you don't approach you can have some excuse like "girls have it easy" to keep you comfort. If you expected to be approached and it didn't happen then it would confirm rejection/failure.

 

I have seen the light! I am seeing the world through new eyes!

[GirlontheLam]

So you admit women find less men good looking then vice versa?

 

I am never entirely sure, if I were to approach someone, I am really his type. So I am only going to make an attempt on the man that just epitomizes my type. Instead of approaching anyone I find good looking.

 

And then hope for the best.