Why I Spent 2 Years Being An Asshole

This girl was my kryptonite.

I was SO into her it wasn’t even funny.

She was a beautiful, unpredictable 19-year-old, and I was an inexperienced 25-year-old.

This was no love story. It wasn’t even much of a relationship.

For months, we would hook up every once and again – when she felt like it.

Nothing serious.

But, I couldn’t get her out of my mind. I was thinking about her non-stop.

Thinking of the bad moments hurt.

One time I texted her at 2am and woke her up. She sent back an annoyed text the following morning. It felt like a punch to the stomach. I was down for days.

But then… thinking of the good moments felt so good.

One time, we made out so outrageously in a club the bouncer had to peel us off of each other.

Remembering that little moment was like a hit of heroin. I was on cloud number-fucking-nine.

It was all too powerful, physical, visceral.

And unpredictable.

With her, it was nothing but mixed signals. Her behavior was erratic.
She was often flaky or late.

She would too busy to hang out for every day of the week, and then bootie-call me out of the blue on a Tuesday night.

Good moments followed bad moments in rapid succession.

One cute text message made me think she was finally starting to get attached. But then I would call and leave a voicemail and not hear from her for days.

I was going crazy trying to figure out if she was into me or not – but there was no answer to be found.

What made everything stronger was trying to hide how I felt from her.

I was trying to play it cool, when inside I was anything but.

It’s Over

Bit by bit over 2 months, I could tell she was losing interest. She never answered when I called and consistently replying to my text messages late.

After about a week of her not communicating, I suddenly realized – whatever it was we had – it was over.

It hurt like hell.

In an attempt to maintain some sanity, I decided I would go for 3 weeks without writing her, calling her or visiting her.

I lasted 2 weeks. Probably some of the most painful time of my life.

It felt like I was going cold turkey off of the most powerful drug ever. I never felt like that before, or since.

She was the first thing I thought about when I woke up and the last thing that was going through my brain when I went to sleep.

Daydreaming about her took over my days. Resisting those thoughts only made them come back more often. It was one punch to the gut after another.

I became the cliché of a breakup guy.

I wrote an embarrassingly emo poem, listened to countless songs like this one and this one and felt like the lyrics were talking about me.

It was bad.

Even worse, I couldn’t even be angry with her.

She was just being herself, and I brain-fucked and heart-fucked myself into this situation… Feeling completely out of control of my own mind, my emotions and my fucking happiness.

Looking back, it was a classic case of a broken heart.

But at that moment, it rocked my entire psyche.

I was determined to learn my lesson.

I made a decision that seemed right at the time.

“I’m never going to let anyone hurt me again.”

I got here by dropping my guard, letting someone in too close, and losing all of my personal power.

I figured that doing the opposite of that – whatever it was – would surely be better.

An “Alpha” Male

Around the same time, I found a community of guys interested in improving their dating, attraction and seduction skills.

Coming from that recent dating failure and eager to improve, I went all in.

I devoured books about what makes men attractive.

The main concept they espoused was the pervasive idea of “Being an Alpha Male” – the confident dude who leads others, is always in control and calls all the shots.

I can’t say for sure whether I made the connection or not, but it’s obvious why I was so drawn to this idea back then. Someone who is in complete control of all his relationships can’t get hurt.

Either way, my dating life seemed to improve.

For the first time in my life, I was approaching girls, getting phone numbers and going on dates.

I was so proud of myself the first time I slept with a girl I approached. It was so different than every other hookup I had before.

It felt a like a victory. Like I won some kind of dating chess game versus a top-notch adversary.

I also found myself in relationships with radically different dynamics.

The tables have turned, and I had the power this time around.

In a mirror image of how I was a few months before, girls would find weird excuses to text me all the time, not sure if I liked them or not.

And this time around, I was the one sending out mixed messages. And I was doing it on purpose… Always keeping them on edge.

Needy Relationships

They say that the people you attract into your life are a reflection of who you are at that moment in time.
Well, I was attracting needy girls into my life. Because I was an asshole.

In a fucked up way, a needy person and an asshole give each other what they need in a relationship.

An asshole validates their inflated self-image by being with people who make him feel superior. And needy people feel better about themselves by having someone who they feel is better than them giving them the time of day.

All of this started feeling really weird after a while. I had girls confess to being in love with me – when I had barely told them anything about my life.

They were in love with the image and mask I created.

And in a strange way, it felt great.

Before I was completely out of control of my relationships but occasionally I made real deep connections and felt deeply intimate with girls I dated.

Now I had full control in empty relationships with girls who knew nothing about me.

But I wasn’t going to start opening my heart to these girls. I convinced myself I wasn’t that guy anymore.

Anything that came out of my mouth was carefully crafted to create and maintain a certain image of myself.

Me talk about my weaknesses? Bah.

I remembered what happens to people who put their heart on their sleeve – they get hurt.

I wasn’t going to let that happen.

Warming up

Throughout all this period there were a few warning signals about the person I’ve become.

Thinking deeply and controlling my behaviour was responsible for my so-called dating success. I thought I was selling that image perfectly.

But I still remember the girl that looked up at me during sex, saying, “Just stop thinking!”

My face must have given up my overactive mind.

In another example, I found some coaches for an American dating company I was doing an internship with were talking shit about me behind my back.

They said that I had a dark, bitter side. That I was a megalomaniac. A sociopath. A manipulative misogynist.

I had no idea what they were talking about. I was just behaving like an attractive man is supposed to. Right?!

Direct Approach

The way out of all of this interestingly started out of another dating concept – the “Direct Approach”.

It was the idea of approaching a girl – during day or night – and starting the conversation by letting her know you find her attractive.

This was in total contrast to the aloof persona I took on.

Back when I first heard about it, my dating community friends assured me that doing this was just “not Alpha” and so there’s no way it would work.

But I read over and over that it worked for some guys, and I found myself terrified of doing it.

And generally speaking, every time I find myself have an irrational fear of doing something, I try to conquer it.

There was a dating coach advocating the direct approach, and he suggested just going up to a girl and telling her something you liked about her. And if you can’t think of anything on the spot just say something like:

“Hey, I just saw you and I had to tell you… you’re really cute.” (Or something like that)

An effective line! I thought. Let’s try it out.

So I would go out with a friend to a busy shopping street every day after work, and we each approached at least one girl.

And, it didn’t work at ALL.

I would deliver my compliment, and they would usually give me a confused look, follow it with a polite “Thank you” and promptly leave.

I had no idea what was going on, but I was committed to keep trying.

Vulnerable

One day after work, I met my friend at the regular spot just at the bottom of the shopping street.

But something was different that day. I couldn’t approach at all.

For a reason I don’t know – perhaps a stressful day at work – I just didn’t have the energy to put on my mask. I felt vulnerable. Approaching seemed impossible.

There were cute girls everywhere, but I just couldn’t go talk with them.

I was close to going home without approaching at all that day, but my friend kept pushing me.

Eventually, I forced myself to go say hi. It was a girl with pretty green eyes and she was with 2 of her friends.

I could hear my heartbeat in my ears as I took steps in her direction.

I stopped close of the three girls, made eye contact with them and said:
“Hey guys… I know this is random…”

I locked eyes with the girl I wanted to chat with:
“… But I just walked by and wanted to say… You. Have. The. NICEST. Eyes.”

I felt like I was melting as the words came out of my mouth.

She blushed, and a huge smile exploded on her face.
“Thank you!”

Her friends were also excited: “She does, doesn’t she?!”

I honestly felt so overwhelmed by this positive response, and was still feeling so vulnerable that I had to leave.

“OK… Stay beautiful!” I said and ran off.

I’m… Full of Shit?

I felt like I finally cracked direct approaching, and decided to take my friend out to dinner and celebrate.

After the waitress took my order, I decided to try my luck again.
“… Oh and by the way. You have the nicest eyes.”

Even though she was really nice up to this point, her entire demeanor changed. She squinted her eyes looking at me, everything about her saying “you are full of shit”.

This lasted for a long, silent 2 seconds.

Then she turned to my friend to take his order.

Thoughts were racing through my mind.

How did she know I was full of it?

Why would one line work so well one time and so badly another time?!

Could people tell if I was being genuine or not?!?

That night, I couldn’t sleep. I wrote this realization in my journal:

“I’m trying to get something out of girls. I treat them as objects to fulfil my desires, rather than real people. Canned lines that I find myself using lack authenticity, genuine interest and the emotions of love and caring I give to people who are close to me. In short, I am not myself when communicating with girls. The game has taught me many things, but has also suppressed my genuine self.”

This was startling to say the least.

The years I spent crafting my “confident self” were just an act I used to hide my real self. To avoid getting hurt.

But this clever act didn’t change anything. I was still a fool with serious self-esteem issues.

I suddenly felt the weight of all the girls I kept at arm’s length.

Apologies

It was around the time of Yom Kippur – the most important holiday in the Jewish calendar. The Day of Atonement for your sins.

I don’t celebrate Jewish holidays, but there’s one Yom Kippur tradition I always liked – apologizing to everyone I think I may have hurt that year.

So, I made a list of all the girls I dated in the previous 2 years.

I wrote each an e-mail apologizing for my behavior, taking responsibility for it and explaining what was going on in my mind back then.

One girl stood out. We were dating for a while and I really hurt her. The last time I saw her she was leaving my apartment saying, “I wish I never met you”.

That was 3 months prior and we hadn’t spoken since.

I invited her to meet me for a drink. “There’s something I need to talk with you about” I wrote.

In a cold and reluctant e-mail, she agreed.

When we met, I proceeded to tell her something I hadn’t told any girl – how I ended up the way I was with her.

How I used to be a 15-year-old kid nerding around on the net, looking for stuff like ‘romance’ and ‘what do women want’ and not finding anything useful.

About falling in love with my best friend, who used me to drive her all around town.

About trying to romance a girl from my high school class sending her “secret admirer” gifts and getting nothing in return.

About the terrible heart-wrenching crushes that I got for girls who I liked, and how I got disgusted by girls who got the same crushes for me.

About how I lied to get sex the first time.

About how I found out about the dating community, from an article in Marie Claire magazine.

And about all the wrong turns I made on my way to where I was then.

I apologized, deeply and sincerely. I felt like I owed it to her.

This was especially harrowing for me, after almost 2 years of carefully telling people only what I thought were powerful, attractive stories about myself.

I thought she would laugh at me, if not spit on me. That she would be disgusted by who I was and what I had done. By my weakness. By not being a man.

Her reaction was the exact opposite.

“Thank you”, she said, “I understand now”.

We finished the night in bed, in each other’s arms. It felt so good to feel again, to not act.

It was as if someone turned my life’s volume button all the way back up.

We continued dating for a while after that, in a very different, honest and loving relationship.

And when we both moved to other sides of the planet and broke up, we stayed very good friends.

Conclusion

Where does that leave me now?

I let go of the idea of never being hurt. The only way you can ensure you’re never hurt is to avoid all real connections.

I’ve tried that. A life devoid of real connections is sad, hollow and boring.

“The truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for.” Bob Marley

Instead, my current philosophy regarding meeting people can be summarized by the following 56 words:

I do my thing and you do your thing.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectations,
And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you, and I am I.
And if by chance we find each other, it’s beautiful.
If not, it can’t be helped.
The Gestalt Prayer by Fritz Perls

To expand on that…

I stopped trying to control people’s behaviours. Not only is it impossible to do, it’s also exhausting.

Instead, when I meet someone – girl or guy – I consciously try to not impress, and rather be genuinely myself. The good and the bad. Warts and all.

Some people like what they see and some don’t. There are girls who reject me and guys don’t want to hang out with me.

That’s cool.

Because the people who I do end up having in my life now like me for who I am, and vice versa.

I went back to having real connections and deep conversations that can change the course of my life.

I went back to having intimacy and love in my dating life.

I went back to having real friends who are there for me and have me there for them.

And those are worth so much more to me than trying to make the world think I’m perfect.