anyone else see it this way?

[humiliator]

I've made a ton of progress in the past couple years and now I've had sex with four girls.

The girl I'm currently with is the only one I've liked for something more than sex. We're not into anything serious - we've only been together a couple weeks. All I'm saying is that I think she's pretty cool and I like spending time with her outside the bedroom.

Now, this got me thinking about LTR's. Since I'm young (19) and didn't date anybody in high school, I think it's unlikely I'll be getting into an LTR anytime soon. But I realized that when I do want to get into an LTR, it will be hard to take any girls seriously.

Let's pretend I've been with a girl for a while and she wants to be in an LTR with me. I would have my doubts as to how much she actually likes me. A few years ago, she wouldn't have given me the time of day. What's the difference between then and now? Better social skills, dressing better, no desperation, having some self respect. But all of these things are learned skills or knowledge.

These are the things that cause girls to be attracted to me, but that seems very superficial to me. I'm still the same guy I was as an AFC. So that's why it seems like I would have a hard time believing that a girl's feelings for me were sincere.

Of course, my views may change when I am actually facing an LTR, and I will be more mature by that time too.

Does anybody else see it this way?

 

[Casino]

The thing is you aren't that same AFC you were back in HS. You've morphed into a more confident and fun loving guy.

You have changed. It's not like you were giving some Microsoft update. You took the challenge on to improve yourself and you accomplished some goals.

You now appear to be morphing back into AFCville

 

[MetalFortress]

That's why you can't just fake change. You can't pretend to be self-confident; you actually have to BE self-confident.

 

[Donald Kaufman]

I do understand what you are talking about. "I am the same guy. How can I trust someone who wouldn't have noticed me before?"

You took control of your life and learned new skills to make your life better. You applied them and got better results. So you are different.

People are constantly changing. Sometimes people on this board are a little too quick to advise others to "NEXT" people. One of the most important ways to know whether a person is worth more time or not is are they trying to better themselves or are they happy to slowly decompose.

As an example, someone will write in, "This girl was abused in a previous relationship, should I dump her?" A bunch of people will write in, "NEXT." This implies that no one can ever be considered acceptable if they have made a mistake in their life.

It's important to remember that if all you write about her is the one line people assume it is amongst the first things you found out about her and it comes up all the time. The learning curve is important.

If you say "Hi." and she says, "I was in an abusive relationship 3 years ago and I'm still wary of men." You are probably right to assume she is not ready for a relationship. Perhaps this would be a good time to next someone.

If you go out a few times and you find out she was in a bad relationship in the past. You discover she's a great person you can have fun with and see she is doing all sorts of things to make her life better. Then a few weeks later you discover the relationship was also abusive but she's dealing with it and wants you to be understanding at times, I don't think next is good advice.

When you were socially awkward and did little productive work to change yourself you might have been a great guy with a problem. Doesn't mean you weren't a great guy, just means you weren't successfully challenging your weaknesses.

In challenging yourself you became someone else, a little. The change just happened to be in a specific area that made you way more visible to the ladies.

If you go back to accepting whatever life hands you and quietly wait for death or struggle internally without ever stepping outside your comfort zone, you will find people will lose interest and stop noticing you again.

Don't do that.

Instead enjoy the new opportunities you have created for yourself.