I went out with a beautiful girl recently
that I met online. (I got her permission to write this post. I would never want
someone to worry about anything private ending up in my blog). She asked me if
I’ve been on a lot of online dates. I told her a few. She told me that I was
her first. She joined the site 3 days earlier, got 160 emails and decided to go
out with me.
I was flattered. I asked her what made her
choose me. She said my pictures were cute, I seemed adventurous, and I fit the
criteria of what she was looking for. She then said that the methods I
described in my blog had apparently worked on her. She had Googled my name, and found my blog
before going out with me. She was a little spooked when she read it. She said
that I used the same technique with her to set up a date that I described in
the blog. She knows that people need to be strategic in dating but it was scary
to her to see it all laid out like that. It all seemed a little manipulative. It
also felt weird for her to see all my cards lying on the table. She still
wanted to go out with me but reading the blog made her pause.
This got me questioning whether writing to
help other people with their dating would hurt my own dating life. I can see
two potential concerns for women considering dating me. One, it might make a
girl feel uneasy to know that I’m more deliberate and more cognizant of the psychology
at play in the dating process. Fair enough, however I think finding the partner
of your dreams is far too important to not approach it with thought and
purpose. Similarly, it doesn’t mean you can’t balance being mindful with going
with the flow and letting things happen naturally.
The second concern for women might be a
fear of being manipulated. Nobody wants to feel like they’re being worked.
Everyone wants to feel that they like someone because there’s a real connection
and not because they were subjected to psychological ploys. To that end it’s
worth reiterating that I don’t encourage anyone to act in a disingenuous way. Even
if you could trick someone into liking you (which you can’t in the long run),
neither of you would be happy. My whole concept on games and strategy in dating
all revolve around the idea of getting your foot in the door so the other
person will give you a chance to show them the real you.
I think I’ll end this deliberate dating discussion
with a happy and frustrating thought. Games don’t need to be the end of
romance. Once in a blue moon I’ll meet a girl that I’m overwhelmingly drawn
too. It happens very infrequently. I can’t always explain what it is about the
girl but there’s something special and she really stands out to me. I lose
interest in other girls and become fixed on the one girl. When this happens I
get excited, a little bit nervous and I completely lose my ability to play
games. It feels like I’m stripped of all my powers. I can’t act in the way I
know I should be acting in order to get her to give me a chance. I’ve spoken to
a lot of people about dating and most people can identify with this issue.
There’s something unfortunate about this.
Right when you need your game the most, you lose it. You can very well miss out
on a real special girl because you can’t put your best foot forward. The flip
side of this is a magical opportunity. You can’t win the girl over with the
same bullshit you’ve used before and there’s something nice about that. If you can’t behave in the confident, deliberate
way that you ideally would but the girl likes you anyway, now you have a chance
at the fairytale.
Another perhaps more common story but with
an equally happy ending is if you maintain your ability to play the game and
get to know a person. The person’s special qualities sneak up on you. You come
to realize how awesome the person is. Had you realized from the beginning how
great they are you might not have had the confidence to get things started.
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This post was written because a girl's response to my post on games in dating and my posts on online dating: