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Becoming Ideal Is Still Waiting

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Confidence & Self-Concept Relationships Discipline
Neo W.
Author
Neo W.
Writing about things that intrigue me.
Table of Contents

Becoming Ideal Is Still Waiting
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45% of men aged 18–25 have never approached a woman in person. 62% of Gen Z men have stepped out of dating altogether. Underneath that is a strategy that feels like effort but isn’t: become impressive enough that the thing you want arrives on its own.

The passive fantasy
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Jack Reacher is the clean example. Hugely capable, obviously masculine, and romantically completely passive — the women in those books make the first move, and the second, and the third.

That’s the fantasy, and it’s a comfortable one: get good enough and you never have to risk being turned down. But it leaves you in the passenger seat of your own life, waiting to be picked rather than picking.

The same shape shows up well outside dating. A lot of what gets sold to men — get lean, get rich, get status — is the identical bet. Become ideal, then wait. It’s not that the self-improvement is bad. It’s that on its own it’s still waiting, just with better arms.

Direct, but reading the room
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The alternative isn’t charging at things. Matt Murdock is the counterexample worth borrowing from — he initiates, but he’s paying attention the whole time.

Attraction doesn’t jump from stranger to kissing. The zoologist Desmond Morris laid out something like twelve steps in Intimate Behavior — hand, shoulder, face, and so on, in order. Going a step at a time means you’re reading her continuously. She leans in, you go forward. She pulls back, you hold. Nothing feels like a leap because nothing is one.

Practically that means:

  • Skip sitting across a table on a first date. Somewhere with movement — a walk, dancing — lets early contact happen naturally
  • If it is dinner, sit catty-corner rather than opposite
  • When she’s reaching toward you, don’t just receive it. Match it and take one step more

Playful and forward, both
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Flirting needs two ingredients and most people only bring one.

Playfulness is lightness, teasing, making it fun. Forwardness is being clear you’re interested.

Only playful and you become the funny friend who she never realises was interested. Only forward and it lands as intense, or oddly humourless. The mix is what works — a direct compliment, then something self-deprecating right after to take the pressure back out. Craig Ferguson does this constantly. The compliment lands, and then nobody has to sit in the tension it created.

What it actually rests on
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The part I keep coming back to: none of this works without knowing what you want.

Direct action needs a direction. If you’re not clear on what you’re actually after, you can’t take a step toward it — all that’s left is making yourself generally impressive and hoping something finds you.

So the useful question is probably less “how do I approach” and more “what do I actually want here.” The first one has techniques. The second one is the bottleneck.

A few small things to try
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  • Ask what you actually want from a situation before working out how to act in it
  • Take one small direct step toward something you’ve been positioning yourself for
  • On a date, pick somewhere with movement instead of a table
  • Notice if you’re always playful and never forward — or the reverse — and add the missing half

Related

Self-Respect Comes From Hard Things

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Discipline Confidence & Self-Concept Cognitive Bias
Self-Respect Comes From Hard Things # You can’t buy self-respect, and you can’t rest your way into it. It seems to show up mostly as a byproduct of doing things that were genuinely difficult. Happy and satisfied aren’t the same feeling # There’s a useful split here between happiness and satisfaction. Happiness is fairly passive — it doesn’t ask much of you. Satisfaction needs novelty and challenge, and you only really get it from getting good at something you couldn’t do before.

Carry the Thing Nobody Else Has

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Watches & Accessories Etiquette Relationships
Carry the Thing Nobody Else Has # Most men carry a phone, keys and a wallet. The interesting thing about the five additions below is that almost none of them are for you — they’re for the moment when someone nearby needs something and nobody has it. The five # A handkerchief. Not a pocket square, which is decoration. A plain one, in a trouser or jacket pocket, for actual use. The moment it matters is never scheduled — a funeral, a spill, someone upset. Being able to hand one over is a small act of care people tend to remember for a long time. Two rules: it isn’t for blowing your nose, and it goes in the wash immediately after. Buy five so there’s always a clean one. A decent pen. Phones were supposed to kill this and didn’t — “does anyone have a pen?” still happens constantly, and the usual answer is a chewed biro or a blank look. A Parker is inexpensive and does the job; spend more if you want to. Once you own a pen you actually like you stop losing it, which is its own small surprise. A refillable fragrance atomiser. Most scent is gone by mid-afternoon. A small refill in your bag means you can top up before an evening without carrying a full bottle around. Genuinely overlooked — most men have never thought about it despite the obvious use. Cash. Unglamorous and repeatedly necessary. Cash-only bars exist. Valets sometimes can’t take a card. Amex isn’t accepted everywhere. A small spread of notes covers parking, a round, or a tip without a fuss, and bar staff would rather have a cash tip than wait on card processing. A lighter. Even if you don’t smoke. “Got a light?” is one of the oldest openers there is, and if you don’t have one the moment simply goes to whoever does. A Zippo costs very little and is more distinctive than a plastic one. What they’ve got in common # Four of the five are things you’re carrying for other people.

Assume You Already Belong

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Confidence & Self-Concept Presence Conversation
Assume You Already Belong # Most social nerves come down to one quiet belief: that you don’t quite belong here. Fix that and the techniques stop mattering, because there’s nothing left for them to paper over. Conditional belonging is the problem # Almost everyone belongs somewhere. With old friends, in familiar rooms, around people at roughly your level you’re relaxed and funny and fine.