Some years ago, when I was in high school, I posted here under the username Nocturnal (some posts of mine were linked here http://www.sosuave.net/forum/showthread.php?t=33715). Eventually this site was no longer something I felt I needed as I began to realize what I wanted and what approaches were best suited toward obtaining what I wanted.
I happened to wander back here out of curiosity, and I'm not surprised to see that things are more or less how they were as I remember them
I thought I might share my perspective now in contrast to what it was in the past.
Originally, I was here for primarily one reason--I was insecure and lacked confidence. And just like every other guy on the planet, no matter how inside-out or lacking my life was, I was quite interested in girls (there really is no escaping hormones).
At first, my goal was to learn whatever I needed to start dating girls I was interested in. There was a lot of distance to make, and I knew that. What I now find somewhat frightening is that I didn't realize that I had serious issues to overcome, which is why there was so much distance in the first place.
As I read and wrote posts over time, and started thinking more about what changes I needed to make in order to get closer to the finish line, it became less about changing myself to obtain something and more about changing myself for my own sake. This paradigm shift was the only way I now have respect for myself and the only way I could have gotten what I wanted anyway.
In fact, my one piece of advice for someone who wants something in life that they don't have, is this: if you don't respect yourself more than you care about whatever you want, you will probably never get it.
The beauty of this concept, though, is that in order to succeed at almost anything notable, you must fundamentally become a person who will be driven to live a fulfilling life. Success will follow naturally after that, and the sort of helpless wandering that I started in will be a non-issue.
The obvious truth is that this site is about picking up girls. I have a friend who more or less embodies what a lot of guys here strive to transform themselves into--he is comfortable talking to girls in more or less any situation and hooks up with different ones, always very attractive, all the time. There is nothing severely wrong with his life, he seems like a happy person and is successful for the most part with his career, social life, etc. I don't share his ambitions when it comes to the other sex but I also don't think there's anything inherently wrong with them. I have, however, always sensed a sort of irony just below the surface of what is appropriately referred to by many as "the game." Some people often just want to sleep with another attractive person, but because of societal norms, it gets really complicated for no good reason and hence some guys take up strategy and analysis in order to overcome the barriers. I get the impression that the sexual revolution has made it socially acceptable to pursue no-strings attached hooking up, but hasn't made it socially acceptable to be honest about what it is.
When it comes to strings-attached dating, however, the "game" and all of the associated shortcuts are really only counter-productive (in my opinion). For any sort of relationship to be emotionally meaningful, be it a friendship, serious relationship, casual dating relationship, etc, an appropriate level of transparency is important. Everyone has personal flaws, and I think most people innately consider it to be more virtuous to openly accept your flaws than hide them. Hiding them with any sort of strategy or tactics as a way of obscuring them is really just a coping mechanism, and people pick up on that.
In the end, if you want to be happy, successful, enjoy life, it comes down to one thing: self-respect. For most people, there is the person they want to be, and the person they are, with a gap in between. The essence to achieving whatever it is you think you want is, in my opinion, bridging that gap. I don't think there is anything else worth spending time on. That is what I believe I've learned since I first joined this site almost 10 years ago.
Cheers.
I happened to wander back here out of curiosity, and I'm not surprised to see that things are more or less how they were as I remember them
I thought I might share my perspective now in contrast to what it was in the past.
Originally, I was here for primarily one reason--I was insecure and lacked confidence. And just like every other guy on the planet, no matter how inside-out or lacking my life was, I was quite interested in girls (there really is no escaping hormones
).At first, my goal was to learn whatever I needed to start dating girls I was interested in. There was a lot of distance to make, and I knew that. What I now find somewhat frightening is that I didn't realize that I had serious issues to overcome, which is why there was so much distance in the first place.
As I read and wrote posts over time, and started thinking more about what changes I needed to make in order to get closer to the finish line, it became less about changing myself to obtain something and more about changing myself for my own sake. This paradigm shift was the only way I now have respect for myself and the only way I could have gotten what I wanted anyway.
In fact, my one piece of advice for someone who wants something in life that they don't have, is this: if you don't respect yourself more than you care about whatever you want, you will probably never get it.
The beauty of this concept, though, is that in order to succeed at almost anything notable, you must fundamentally become a person who will be driven to live a fulfilling life. Success will follow naturally after that, and the sort of helpless wandering that I started in will be a non-issue.
The obvious truth is that this site is about picking up girls. I have a friend who more or less embodies what a lot of guys here strive to transform themselves into--he is comfortable talking to girls in more or less any situation and hooks up with different ones, always very attractive, all the time. There is nothing severely wrong with his life, he seems like a happy person and is successful for the most part with his career, social life, etc. I don't share his ambitions when it comes to the other sex but I also don't think there's anything inherently wrong with them. I have, however, always sensed a sort of irony just below the surface of what is appropriately referred to by many as "the game." Some people often just want to sleep with another attractive person, but because of societal norms, it gets really complicated for no good reason and hence some guys take up strategy and analysis in order to overcome the barriers. I get the impression that the sexual revolution has made it socially acceptable to pursue no-strings attached hooking up, but hasn't made it socially acceptable to be honest about what it is.
When it comes to strings-attached dating, however, the "game" and all of the associated shortcuts are really only counter-productive (in my opinion). For any sort of relationship to be emotionally meaningful, be it a friendship, serious relationship, casual dating relationship, etc, an appropriate level of transparency is important. Everyone has personal flaws, and I think most people innately consider it to be more virtuous to openly accept your flaws than hide them. Hiding them with any sort of strategy or tactics as a way of obscuring them is really just a coping mechanism, and people pick up on that.
In the end, if you want to be happy, successful, enjoy life, it comes down to one thing: self-respect. For most people, there is the person they want to be, and the person they are, with a gap in between. The essence to achieving whatever it is you think you want is, in my opinion, bridging that gap. I don't think there is anything else worth spending time on. That is what I believe I've learned since I first joined this site almost 10 years ago.
Cheers.