“I Can’t Show a Woman Who I Really Am.”
When it comes to love, sex and intimate relationships, men are often taught to pretend like we have it all together. We are supposed to be polished, passionate, comfortable, confident, smooth and to always know what to do. Awkwardness or being confused is not acceptable.
It doesn’t matter if you are dating, in a relationship, or have been married for 30 years. The story I share below applies to you. All of us are hedging or hiding something when it comes to love.
I recently asked the question “What do you lose when you are trying to avoid looking bad?”
The impact and meaning of this question will be different for each person and will depend on the situation. Although there are some things that we all universally lose when we are oriented towards the optics of success.
When trying not to look bad you will almost always lose the following;
Growth
Joy
Peace
Flow
Opportunity
Learning
Connection
Intuition
Relaxation
Full expression
When we are stuck in a performance mindset we can never relax and our tightness keeps us from so much of who we are and so much of what we want to experience. We are often taught that we must hide, perform and “play it cool” on dates.
In that act, we make our current experience or current personality unwelcomed on a date. Unless you are actually cool, calm, confident, passionate, polished and smooth at all times. And if you are, chances are it’s time to become a real boy and grow a personality.
So that’s the lie. We must be perfect to be attractive and desired by a date.
It’s not true at all and trying to live this lie is what keeps us from being attractive and desired.
About a year ago a client had hired me to help him with confidence in dating and career. He had always considered himself a nerdy kind of guy. Science, philosophy, yoga and meditation have been passions of his since he was young. He hasn’t placed as much emphasis on being social and so at the age of 29 he still did not have the most confidence in his social skills. This led to him avoiding dating for much of his life. Thinking he was nerdy and awkward kept him from taking the risks with women that lead to dating and relationships.
When we first started working together, he felt shy around women and dates weren’t going very well.
Over time, I helped him gain an appreciation for how amazingly smart, kind, compassionate and wise he is. He began to see traits, that he once thought made him unattractive, as traits that actually make him uniquely attractive. One session he started sharing how passionate he is about a specific kind of statistics, that he is an expert in, and that even other statisticians don’t know much about.
He lit up! In those moments he was so endearing and personable. When I reflected how he completely came to life, he could also see it and feel it. I challenged him to talk about that segment of statistics on his next date.
He resisted!
“Even people in my field don’t want to hear me geek out about this”
“Won’t she just think I’m a total nerd?”
“I don’t want to look selfish, talking about something that she isn’t interested in”
Eventually, he took the challenge. Something amazing happened. The date went well, really well!
More importantly, he learned that he could actually be himself on a date and still be attractive. Dating became much easier at that point. He realized he could drop the performance, show his passions and connect more deeply.
Within weeks, he found himself in a new connection with a woman that he admired and was very attracted to. It was platonic but after a few weeks, he decided he had to take the risk and let her know how he felt. With his new found skill at connecting with women, he finally realized that connection isn’t scarce, so taking a risk with this woman was far less…risky.
Soon, they were in a wild, passionate and inspiring relationship together. One that was far beyond what he had imagined he’d find himself in.
He had believed that who he is, wasn’t going to attract a woman. What he found was that allowing himself to show up as he is, was exactly what made him attractive to the right woman.
Avoidance might keep us from what we are afraid of but it will always keep us from the things we really want. You can’t avoid making mistakes, being human, feeling awkward or your own personality. It’s time to allow who you are to attract the people you want in your life.
It’s your turn.