Women Love Me, But Only As A Friend!

Estimated reading time: 16 minutes

Dear Dr. NerdLove:

I have a lot of female friends. Like, a lot. Over the past ten years I have gone on 7 trips with platonic female friends and shared a room in 6/7 cases. I have very close relationships with them all and the joke is very often that I am their “name of club” husband to them (the equivalent of work husband or work wife but relating to whatever organization I’ve met them through).

This is obviously both very sweet and very flattering.

Contrary to what everyone reading this thinks is coming, this isn’t a friendzone question. Some of these women are married, some are in relationships, some are single and I am not secretly harbouring romantic feelings for any of them or hoping their relationships fail so I can step in.

The problem is that I can’t seem to get anywhere in my romantic life. I go on first date after first date after first date and just get absolutely nowhere. I haven’t been with a woman in almost seven years and the endless rejection is really killing my self-esteem.

I know it’s hard to diagnose a problem without like 24/7 video coverage of my dating foibles but there must be something wrong with me if I am capable of having a dozen top notch relationships with women but can’t ever seem to attract one to be in a romantic relationship.

These women all want to wingwoman me (super sweet) but nothing ever really comes of it. Am I just too nice? Am I the straight version of the gay best friend? Every time dating comes up the answers are all “dating sucks” and “numbers game” etc., etc. but never any actionable advice as to what I am doing wrong.

I have been on a stupid number of dates in the past decade and a 2nd date is a rarity, a 3rd date is a miracle. I feel like I am at the point where I am trying to dig through a concrete wall with a plastic spoon so need to divert effort into something that might actually pay dividends (i.e I have to do something different). I just don’t even know what. I try to flirt. I try not to be too nice. I show up on time, ask questions, try to be relaxed and over and over and over get “OMG you’re such an amazing guy but…” and I get that’s part of dating but like fifty in a row?

Help.

Just One Of The Girls

Before I get to the meat of your letter, JOTG, I want to just clarify something that comes up a lot around here: why asking your (the generic “you”) friends for advice keeps resulting in the most cliché, unhelpful pablum in response like “keep at it” or “just be yourself” or all the rest.

There’re two answers to this. The first is simple: they don’t know what to tell you. The problem is that nobody likes to say “fucked if I know”; nobody likes admitting ignorance, nor do we like to tell our friends that we just don’t know how to help them. Part of the problem is that most folks honestly don’t think that much about how they date or connect with folks; they just kinda fall into it and shit works. So, rather than say “sorry, I don’t know what to tell you”, they give the usual clichés because they sound helpful and it feels better than saying nothing.

And honestly, this isn’t that surprising. There’re relatively few people who’ve actually sat down and really dug into the mechanics of what they’re doing and how, outside of very basic and broad brushstrokes like ‘talk to people’, ‘make them laugh’ or ‘keep at it until it works’. And when they do think about it, they’re rarely thinking any deeper than “oh, I should remember to do X” a la Hitch, rather than having thought about the underlying workings of it all or having developed an entire Tao of Steve/Mystery Method/The Game curriculum of philosophy and tactics around what they’re doing.

It’s not that they don’t know what they’re doing, so much as they’re doing something that they’ve done for so long and learned so long ago that they never stop to think about it. I mean, you don’t think about how to walk – the mechanics of shifting your weight, how high and far forward you move your foot in 3D space, and so on – you just do it. The same thing applies here: a lot of people just talk and connect and things work out, because they’re applying lessons they learned so long ago that they don’t remember learning them.

The second answer is… well, they don’t want to tell you what you’re doing wrong. Usually this is out of friendship or an attempt at kindness; they give the answers with the padded corners and rounded edges because they don’t want to make you feel bad because they don’t think it would help, or because they don’t want to be the reason why you spin out. They also know that, most of the time, folks don’t want the harsh truths. It’s a little like when a friend asks you to be unsparing or brutally honest in your opinion about something they’ve put a lot of work into; you know damn good and well that what they want are mild criticisms mixed with a lot of praise, not “look, I don’t know how to tell you this, but I’ve seen dogs vomit up a better result”. Plus, there’s always the risk of sending someone into a cycle of “oh God I’ve been doing $EMBARRASSING/CRINGE/UNPLEASANT_THING this ENTIRE TIME?!?!” and then have to also help try to pull that friend off the downward spiral they asked to be set on.

But – dragging this back to your question – that’s precisely why you’re asking me.

Now to start things off, let’s acknowledge something important: you’ve got a lot of women who love you, trust you and think you’re a great guy. That is awesome, and it says a lot about the quality of man you are and how you treat the people around you. Having a lot of female friends is a lot like being on good terms, if not actively friends with your exes: it tells people a lot about your character and the sort of treatment people can expect from you. It can also be a benefit when it comes to meeting other women: having these women in your life who think you’re great and love spending time with you means that you’ve been vetted and approved. It’s not just social proof, it’s a sign that you’re someone that others can be comfortable around.

But, I suspect this is also, in its way, the source of your problems. Not that you have so many female friends but rather why you have so many female friends – you’re so safe and respectful that I’m willing to bet that you have a hard time expressing actual attraction or sexual interest in the people you’re meeting.

Regular readers of my column know how often the “I respect women so much I avoid interacting with them altogether” trope comes up – guys who are worried about creeping women out or coming across as pushy, sleezy or just all-around scumbags, and so avoid anything that might give someone the wiggins. In and of itself this isn’t a bad thing, especially when there’re so many guys whose general philosophy is “What? Women are things”, but it’s counterproductive when it comes to romance and relationships. Love, as the sage once said, isn’t brains, children, it’s blood, blood screaming at you to work its will. Or to put it another way: the goal of dating is to find someone who loves you for your mind but wants you for your ass. The key is finding the right balance of being both considerate and chivalrous, but also making it clear that you wanna bang like a screen door in a hurricane.

One of the questions I think you should ask yourself is how often you express actual sexual attraction and interest to the people you’re dating. How much do you flirt, how much do you make any sort of physical contact and how much of an indication do you ever give that you think they’re hot in a way that isn’t seen as “don’t worry, I’m not remotely serious.” I’m willing to bet cash money that your first dates are very sweet, thought out and very, very chaste, to the point of making characters in a Regency-era romance say “fucking hell, make a goddamn move already!” You don’t need to (and really don’t want to) go full-bore Pepe Le Pew, but you do need to show folks that you’d like more than polite conversation and a firm handshake at the end of the night.

There’re a lot of ways of expressing this interest, but one of the most common ways is through flirting. Flirting is, at its core, the art of telling someone you’re hot for them in a way that’s fun and engaging for the both of you. It’s an invitation to say “let’s both admit we think the other’s a smokeshow” and build a connection between the two of you in the process.

One of the best ways to understand the mechanics of flirting is to think of it like this: you’re in a pool on a hot summer day. The water’s the perfect temperature: not so cold that you’re turning blue, but just cold enough that the initial shock turns into a delicious, refreshing sensation. Your date is sitting in a lounge chair and isn’t sure that they want to get in. You know they want to get in, but aren’t sure if they’re ready or if it’s going to be too cold or what? How do you convince them to join you in the pool with you? Do you tease them about being too scared to get their suit wet? Do you play reverse psychology and tell them that it’s better to stay out where it’s dry? Do you splash a little and encourage them to splash you back?

If your response is “well, if they don’t want to get in the pool, I’m going to respect that until they change their mind”, then you’ve both demonstrated your problem while also missing the point of the exercise. They want to get in; you’re just encouraging them to do the thing they already want to do. If someone’s on a date with you, they want to feel that connection with someone. They want to be desired and feel desire themselves. But if the other person is giving no indication of interest, then they’re far less likely to show interest on their part. And since someone’s gotta make the first move, it may as well be you.

As I said: part of the reason why you’ve got so many women as friends is that you’re very safe and very comfortable to be around, which is great. But being that safe comes with drawbacks, and one of them is that safe is the opposite of exciting. It’s not that being safe is inherently bad or unattractive; it’s that there’s safe as in “people can trust you and let their guard down around you” and then there’s “taking no risks, ever”. Desire is exciting and a little dangerous; when expressing (or giving in to) desire, you’re making yourself vulnerable to a certain degree. It can be scary to do that because hey, you don’t know what could happen. But there’s no reward without risk, and you have to be willing to risk a little bit of that safety in order to reap the reward. The goal is that you want to be fun-scary, like a horror movie or a roller-coaster; there’s the illusion of danger paired with the knowledge that no, you’re actually very safe. And like with movies or theme park rides, there’re levels of attendant scares. Some people like Space Mountain or Big Thunder Railroad and some people like El Topo or Kingda Ka. Some folks like the Universal monster movies or classic Hammer flicks and some people want Wolf Creek or The Grudge. Part of successful flirting is calibrating your style of flirting and the level of intensity to both your personality and your date’s.

So my suggestion is that you need to start being willing to take some risks and express more interest in your dates – enough to know that you’re seeing them as more than another potential new platonic friend. To be sure, this is going to require a little trial and error on your part as you try to calibrate, and so you’re going to have to be willing to risk blowing it at times. But, seeing as you’re already dealing with dates that go nowhere, you don’t exactly have anything to lose. Start with some light flirting – like one sonar ping from a Russian submarine – and see what comes back. If they respond positively or flirt back, you can dial things up a bit and see. If they’re neutral, then they may have missed it; you can try a similar ping a bit later and see, or you might move the dial one notch higher and see if maybe you were too cautious. But I’m willing to bet that once you start expressing non-platonic interest and give more than just “really good friend” energy on your dates, you’ll start getting better results.

Oh, and one more thing: ask your friends about how some of their partners caught their interest or their favorite ways to be flirted with. I’ll bet you get a lot of inspiration to work with for when you go out and meet some sexy singles.

Good luck.

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Hello DNL,

In light of the articles you wrote on not needing to be perfect to date, this leads me to an important question: how do I carry myself with confidence when I’m a work in progress? I’ll be honest, due to early life abuse and autism I haven’t really developed the confidence and life I want to have at 28 years old. I only just realized I WAS a survivor of abuse a few years ago. It’s been a game of playing catch-up ever since. And while I understand nobody is looking for perfection, how do I feel confident when I feel so behind everyone else?

I don’t want to give off “goofy side-character” energy. Like the incompetent guy in a piece of media that is clearly a bumbling fool who still needs to find himself but everyone still likes him (though nobody would date or have a relationship with him).

The only way I could ever frame this is through self-deprecating jokes-though-not-really-jokes about how I don’t have my life together. I feel this is not the best way to present myself as a potential date. I also don’t want to come across as some faux-inspirational TED talker like “My life is a journey of beauty and curiosity, I can’t wait for the destination!TM.” That whole spiel just feels super unnatural to say.

I’m trying to let go of the “not good enough” swamp I find myself stuck in and I think learning how to like and be confident in myself as I am NOW would be helpful.

Watch This Space

You’re right, WTS: that “joking-but-not-really” approach of “no, really, I suck” is far less than attractive. People are looking for partners, not weekend projects or fixer-uppers; they don’t expect perfection, but they also don’t want to end up with the dating equivalent of a money pit. This is why self-deprecating jokes don’t work when it’s pretty clear that you’re not actually joking; it comes across as you saying “no, seriously, I’m a fucking mess, please help me,” and that’s just not appealing to anyone.

Self-deprecating jokey-jokes work best when it’s clear that you’re not being serious. Craig Ferguson is a king of these; when he talks about having low standards because he’s Scottish, it’s pretty obvious that he doesn’t mean it. He’s using those jokes when paired with the compliments or flirting signals he sends to attractive women. The compliment followed by the “and here’s why you shouldn’t take the compliment seriously” is part of the bait-hook-reel-release school of flirting; it’s building up tension, then releasing tension. When there’s no tension being built up, then it’s just deflating everything.

The thing about being a work in progress is that everyone is a work in progress. One of the most important lessons I learned from martial arts came after I received my black belt: this wasn’t the end of my study, it was the end of the beginning.  Nobody is at the finish line; there’s always something to improve on, something to build on or something new to learn. That’s just life; we’re all imperfect, we all have things we’d like to be different or better and really, a man’s ambition should exceed his reach or what’s Heaven for?  

You’re not “behind” everyone else because there’s no race here. You’re not in competition with anyone, there’s no universal schedule or list of milestones that says “you should be HERE by X date”, there’s just life and everyone muddles through it at their own pace and their own time. The only way you could be behind someone else is if you were living their exact same life, at the exactsame time and being presented with the exact same choices, opportunities, drawbacks and obstacles. But you’re not. So quit paying attention to where the folks who are supposedly “ahead of you” are, except as inspiration and motivation. They’re not outpacing you, they’re showing you some of the potential that awaits you as you grow and improve.

This is, say it with me now, why confidence doesn’t come from success, it comes from effort. This is why so-called gifted kids spin out so often and so early; the first time they run into something that they can’t do or overcome easily, they lose their goddamn minds. Why? Because they thought that everything was supposed to be this easy; they’re unused to the friction that comes with not being immediately good at something and having to overcome it.

Confidence isn’t about “I’m guaranteed to win”, it’s “I know what I’m capable of, I know what I can achieve when I put my mind to it, I know failure can’t stop me, and I know I’ve got the capacity in me for greatness”. It’s about looking around and saying “Yup, I can figure this out.” Confidence isn’t a lack of struggle, it’s being comfortable with the struggle, even loving it. It’s about being willing to meet the challenge over and over again until you overcome it.

In your case, carrying yourself with confidence means looking at how far you’ve made it and looking at what you’ve overcome to get here. It means realizing that, even with odds stacked against you, you’ve improved and progressed and letting that inform your desire to keep moving forward. Yeah, it sucks at times, and it’s easy to envious of folks who haven’t had to struggle the way you have. But their journey is not your journey and their trials are not your trials.

It also means understanding and embracing the zen Buddhist belief of “I’m perfect, and there’s plenty of room to improve.” Where you are is great, and there’s lots more to do, and isn’t that awesome? You don’t need to apologize for yourself, nor should you; you take it as a mark of pride that you’ve come this far and you still have the capacity to keep at it. You don’t have to be super-upbeat or toxically positive about it; you can acknowledge how much it sucked to get to this point, just like how celebrities will acknowledge what a fucking nightmare it is to get into Marvel superhero shape (which, like perfection, is also unnecessary and often a distraction from the real needs at hand). But you should be proud that you’re there, proud of what it took to get there and proud of knowing that you’ve got it in you to keep going.

It’s great to look to the future, but sometimes you need to stop and look at the past and say “damn, that was a long fucking slog, go me!”

Everyone’s a work in progress. It’s the confident people that say “damn right I am, look at what I’ve done so far!”

That could be you, WTS, if you let it. So let it.

Good luck.