Ask Lemmy

Girls want guys who are happy on their own first. Nobody wants to be responsible for someone else's entire happiness.

That's why they tell you to get a hobby with a community, it's to be happy on your own. It isn't so you can meet girls who like the same things you do (although that can happen), it's so that girls can be attracted to the fact that you go get what you want and enjoy your life.

It's hard if you're depressed and it feels pointless at first. Do it anyway, and don't do it to meet women. Do it to be happier.

When you drop the bitterness of being an incel and fill your life with friends and hobbies, you'll immediately become more attractive.

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.

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.

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.

1. 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.

2. 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.

3. 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.

4. 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. \

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.

"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."

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.

Do mushrooms to snap yourself out of your self pity spiral

Just be a better person

Also become a girl

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.

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.

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

I'm here proud of everyones growth arc. Good on you all!!

I used to be like that too but have grown out of it for years now. Main focus besides getting into Software Engineer, Linux, Open Source, and making Fangames is looking to make friends/community now with plenty of all kinds of people from all over the world for all kinds of interests.

My Origin Story could not be any closer to what a villain would have gone through to become what they are now. Yet I still made the realization that they just didn't want me as part of their family and not everyone are like them. I shortened it a huge amount removing a lot more but gave a good rundown on some core stuff of what happened and how it changed me:

I was the definition of a person trapped inside and never learning how to be a person much less a human being. Think Tarzan but indoors and if he was treated like a maximum security prisoner since he was a kid just for being a completely misunderstood child nobody wanted. As I grew older I was treated like garbage by being blamed for a lot out of misunderstandings, little bad things turned into humongous problems, good things done flipped as a bad thing, and nothing at all turned into something. Resulting in solitary confinement up to adulthood. By then I believed you had to be a complete non-listening badass asshole that will get anything they want by being like that including getting women.

I was never taught how to speak to others and was never listened to by older family members who just never wanted to hear me out at all. So I did the same to others. They value money as a hierarchy for who gets treated well. So I did the same to others even though I had none just to feel better about being at the bottom of the totem pole.

Outcasting me from everybody else in the family because they thought I would cause harm when really I was staring at people because I wanted to interact/play/have fun with them. Just like that one kid spirit from Dandadan. Then just like Gaara from Naruto you accidentally broke a persons arm and then everyone fears you and what you will do.

Mother, Brother, and Father not wanting me only caring for me because they have to not because they wanted to. My separated parents both wanting daughters instead of a son. Brother surveillancing me since he hated me so I searched all kinds of things just to mess with him for decades. No grandparents. No role models. Like being stuck inside with multiple snakes that keep biting you and filling you with venom turning you into the monster they want you/ believe you to be over the years.

Hate to admit it but I almost became a complete villain. I truly thought for so many years everyone was garbage fake selfish trash from elementary school up to mid-20's. Where everything was handed to you by being worse than everybody else. But I realized with the internet of all things overtime that it was just my family who have their own trauma that they inflicted on me and that there are many awesome people out there just by being themselves who want to have fun with others. Not everyone was like them. It was such a huge thing to realize. The thing that sucks is I do have decades of not living life since I was inside all the time gaining multiple Complex PTSD's surviving my own family. That is a lot of catching up to do but it has made me who I am today. That I am super proud of and glad I get to have opportunities to make life better for all of us. Treating others like people and being treated like one as well which feels very new to me since I thought everyone was faking being kind.

Now the Good Part:

One thing I have come to realize now is how important what you surround yourself with transforms who you are consciously and subconsiously overtime. If anyone truly wants to change their own life then take note of everything in your life and then choose to change all of it that is not working or bad. Do not be around shitty people. Do not consume complete brain rot. Do not sit so much because it makes you lazy or at least do asian squats as that is a healthy default. Do not let others say who you are but do tell yourself who you are with affirmations.

Do care about people who will actually appreciate it and they will do the same. Do treat and love a woman like a person and she will love you as a person and as a man. Do therapy in multiple ways to see what works for you since there are all kinds of ways to do that are also free and low-cost. Do seek out community not just in-person but online too to be helpful. Do fulfill that need to belong but also leave room for others to belong as well. Do listen genuinely to others and go deeper on what gets them to wake up every day. Do love life and the ability to enjoy this planet with everybody else. That is the ultimate gift not having to be alone on this planet

Note: You want a woman/women then become your best self for you not influenced negatively by others and be someone that the community and your interest groups can be proud of.

Do reading as well and read goodgoodgood.co's article about hope. It is the foundation for what everyone needs for an amazing life based on science

Stop trying so hard. And be a better version of yourself instead of someone you're not.

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

What is considered incel? I did not have sex until my late twenties and I would have been totally fine having it earlier but I did not consider it awful that I had not. Honestly I was not looking for relationships much per se in high school but if I hit it off with someone would start dating.