There seems to be a very wrong impression about the value of vetting. Vetting is looking at a man or woman’s past and identifying behavior that are potential yellow or red flags. These tend to be moderate to high risk factors for divorce.
Vetting does not ensure any guarantee on future behavior, although it can show trends. For instance, one of my oft used examples is this: if a woman had sex with some men before coming to Christ, but once she came to Christ she was devoted to Christ by following Him in her behavior and chaste for several years she would generally be a better choice than a woman who claims to be a Christian but has done everything but sex (while continuing to claim to be a Christian) with the same number of men the now chaste woman is.
The way Jesus said it in terms of behavior/vows was: let your yes be yes and your no be no. Your behavior should be congruent with what you are saying. This is similar to one of the RP maxims: watch what they do, not what they say.
Future behavior
The thing that I see in real life that most Christian husbands who are in marital trouble aren’t doing is something that is straight out of the Bible that I’ve covered dozens of times on this blog.
Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, 26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.
Obviously, the Church currently does not do any favors to husbands by claiming this love that Christ has for the Church is to make his wife happy (e.g. happy wife, happy life). Instead, the real meaning of the verse is one of the keys to help influence future behavior of your wife.
How many Christians husbands are taking responsibility for sanctifying their wife — pointing out when they sin and helping them to repent. That number is probably very few. This ideally needs to be started BEFORE marriage to ensure that you don’t marry a wife that is contentious to Christian teaching, rebuke, correction and training.
Yes, this is basically akin to discipling your wife in the faith.
This command for husbands to obey is critical for influencing a wife to become more like Christ. The act of repentance means a wife has to be humble enough to admit she’s sinning and change her behavior. This also likely means she’s humble enough to submit to her husband and follow His lead.
It is entirely possible that a Christian husband could be doing this from the start of his marriage and a wife is rebellious and contentious anyway, but that seems to be rare.
Cameron listed three commonalities with successful marriages (even those that started in sin and without proper screening or planning). 1-The marriage is open to (better if enthusiastic for) having children. 2-The woman wants to be (primarily) a wife and mother rather than a careerist. 3-There was evident attraction from the woman directed towards the man from the get-go. (i.e. Scott’s axiom).
This mirrors conclusions I have made in the past, that marriage is (or should be) about sex (largely dependent on point 3, since women are “gatekeepers” of sex) and having children (point 1), and that it needs to have a Headship structure (implied in the combination of points 2 and 3). Also, point 2 requires the woman’s decided rejection of any self-centered personal ambitions, such as the Feminist Life Script or riding the CC. Point 3 and early marriage discourages the latter. Also, a woman’s N count sharply erodes point 3 and could affect point 1 (e.g. extended family, paternity fraud, etc.), which is why virginity and chastity are important.
This also explains why many non-Christians have successful marriages and many Christians do not, as I wrote about in Friday’s post.
I am coming to the conclusion that there is a misconception about what “Christian” truly means in regard to dating and marriage. To wit, we have the notion that a Christian marriage requires two chaste, professing Christians being properly married in a certain kind of church, complete with public vows and golden rings and the rubber stamps of the church and state. You may choose between lillies or roses, and rice or confetti. But all these things are rather superficial. In reality, the collection of factors I listed above (Cameron’s 3 points with my extensions) is what truly constitutes a “Christian” marriage (or what should be touted as a Christian marriage). Here, the adjective “Christian” in front of “marriage” carries the meaning that it glorifies God, fulfills His purposes for marriage, and establishes a sanctified home environment that is conducive to the emotional security and spiritual vitality of the family.
This is what determines whether the marriage is successful, and not the mere absence of divorce.
Basically, Jesus indicates in Matthew 22 when He is trying to be trapped by the Saducees/Pharisees that there’s no marriage in heaven. This means marriage is an earthly institution, and that we can learn a lot about it for the purposes God created it.
Genesis 1 and 2 are two different accounts of creation. Genesis 1 is an overview of creation, while Genesis 2 more of the human view of creation. Both have components that indicate why marriage was created. For instance, Genesis 1 indicates that God created male and female and commanded them to “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” (e.g. (1) be fruitful and multiply and (2) take dominion over all the earth).
Genesis 2 indicates the other various duties — Gen 2:15 “…put him in the Garden of Eden to cultivate it and tend it. 16 The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “… but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat from it you will certainly die.” “18 Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.”
In effect, God’s commands of marriage as an earthly institution first with Adam and then as a helper with Eve are to:
Take dominion over all the earth
Multiply and fill the earth
Cultivate and tend to the garden
Obey God
Eve as a helper
So what are men attracted to? Men are generally attracted to physical beauty (e.g. .6-.8 waist to hip ratio), healthy bodies, beauty, etc which tend to indicate that she is fertile and has a good capacity to bear children — thus fulfilling God’s command to multiply and fill the earth. Femininity is generally nurturing and kind, much like a good helper would be.
So what are women attracted to? Women are generally attracted to PSALM – power, status, athleticism, looks (muscle, etc.), and money and similar things. Power and status? Those tend to correlate with taking dominion. Athleticism and looks/muscle? Those tend to be correlated with protecting and caring for things like the garden and her and her children. Money? Provisioning for her and her children. Masculine traits are helpful for improving all of these to varying degrees.
To circle back around…
These obviously look familiar to Cameron’s and Jack’s assessment of godly successful marriages.
Marriage is open and/or enthusiastic about having children. Check. Be fruitful and multiply.
The woman wants to be a wife and mother instead of a careerist. Check. Helper to her man (wife) and be fruitful and multiply (mother).
Evident sexual attraction. Check. Obviously, a man fulfilling God’s mandate to take dominion, protect and provide for himself (and by extension a wife and children) and obey God (e.g. not put his wife on a pedestal — or in Heartiste’s rule ‘you shall make your mission, not women, your priority’) is going to be attractive to women. Likewise, a woman that is generally beautiful and feminine will tend to best fulfill the be fruitful and multiply and helper commands and duties respectively.
It’s there all along. We just didn’t want to dig through Genesis 1-3 to understand fulfilling God’s purpose for marriage means that men and women will be attracted to each other and successful at it.
Like Andy, who could not believe the things he was capable of while trying to escape to freedom, men today descend into a cesspool of fluid exchange and all other manner of things they know are wrong, (even they aren’t Christian don’t feel right) hoping to find one that will bond to him and say “yes” to marriage. All the while, the Sheila Gregoires of the world shame him for the way is built, and the most strident married men in the manosphere offer him no quarter, or even the opportunity to discuss alternatives. How easy it is for us who have stable loving marriages to look down our noses at those left behind because they weren’t “alpha” (or self-disciplined) enough to succeed at this retarded game.
Myself, fortunate enough to have a decent sized helping of these traits, dove in, swam around in the mud and found mine, and now live like the Eloi, pretending that there is nothing to see here.
I think this has become a larger point of contention given that some people regard me as perhaps much too optimistic/unrealistic.
I’m curious as to all of my commenters thoughts on objectively the percentage of the male population you think has a chance at a godly marriage in this current situation. Make an optimistic, normal, and pessimistic prediction.
I’ll go first.
First, let me ignore the top 10-20% of men with the understanding that most of them will have some relative success at finding a solid godly marriage if they tried. I think most people here would agree on this. There’s certainly a few marriages in most every Church where you can see this is a reasonable assumption.
Thus, now I am talking about the population of 80-90% of men below the top 10-20%.
I think any man within this bottom 80-90% of men can get a top 10-20% body within a year or two. This does not mean he will be in the top 10-20% of all men though given other potential traits, but it sure will help given that 60-70% of the entire population are overweight or obese both men and women. This is not including a wardrobe overhaul, good grooming and styling, and such.
All men have the capacity to do this just like all men look better in a fitted suit as opposed to baggy clothes. How many men will have the commitment to do this? I’m not quite sure. I’m always making the assumption that all these men can do this, but realistically I’d say probably at least half of men or more won’t do this even if they knew it would help.
Give the same man another 1-2 years concurrent practice with pursuing his mission for God, excellence in all aspects of his life (spiritual, physical, emotional/mental), evangelism and discipleship practice, get him in the Word everyday and possible starting to lead Bible studies. This man would at least be prepared to potentially lead a relationship. Maybe not be married effectively, but he has most of the tool to be effective and hopefully a surrounding cast of men to help him.
In particular, evangelism and discipleship practice is very important because learning to talk about and be open with your faith and be effective in communicating and leading makes things like asking out women pale in comparison. These conversations have eternal consequences whereas asking out a girl has very little. You can just shrug and be on your way if a girl doesn’t want to go out with you. You want someone who is interested in you anyway not ambivalent or not interested.
If he still has issues with improving social communication, get a people job where you have to interact with men and women of all ages and/or take up some toastmaster speaking to improve comfort with public speaking. The more you do these types of things the less scary and sensitive you will be able them. I improved mine substantially by having a people job and then TAing college courses.
There was a study I can’t find at the moment, but the only thing they changed was how much a man made on his dating profile. The ones who made less were rated less attractive than men who made more even with the same photos. The same thing applies to having other physical traits like a muscular body to potentially compensate for below average height or face.
Most men like most women are not min/max either; it’s fairly rare you’re going to find someone who is short, fat, ugly, no style, bad grooming, zero social skills, crappy job, etc. Usually he may be short but is around average or maybe even above average on other things. Maybe fat but not short, ugly, or have zero social skills. It’s uncommon to have 3 or more of these, so the majority of men aren’t fighting an extremely hard uphill battle.
Given all these avenues of potential improvement, this is why I think it’s possible for most men improve enough avenues to where they’re overall above average in most categories which on average would rate them at least above 50% of men if not more. A physical body may be say top 10-20%, but maybe his face is average or slightly below average, his style is top 20%, and grooming is top 20%. On average, excellence in most of these areas will pull up his overall attractiveness even if his face is average or below average.
Obviously, improvement is fairly relative. A man starting out at obese and poor style, grooming, and other physical traits along with poor social skills may not improve as much as someone who is average on all of those already. On average, I’d say most men can gain at least 2-4 points on the 10 scale of attractiveness. Some men can get more than that, but most can get at least that much.
I’m not sure a standard bell curve distribution would work based on the 1-10 scale, but if it did then each standard deviation would probably be about 2 points of improvement. You’d have 68% of men between a 3-7 range and 95% of men between a 1-9 range. This means that about 13.5%+2.5%=16% of men are rated 7 or higher which is approximately in line with the fact that about 20% of men are rated as attractive by women. Maybe it’s a bit more left skewed at the moment where the average is closer to 4. Your average man who is a “4” could gain 2-4 points to the 6-8 range.
Now to skate back to the original question. What percentage of the male population has an objective chance at a godly marriage?
Unfortunately, this question is mired in the fact that most Christian men and women find it hard to obey Biblical marital roles and responsibilities if their spouse is not attractive. Theoretically, the answer is 100% if people were committed to Christ. Objectively and realistically though the answer is a lot less than that. I certainly know of some godly and happy marriages where the husband and wife are probably 2-3/10 to most people, but this is not the norm. One could argue that it would be questionable or weak faith and trust in God if you aren’t able to follow God despite your circumstances.
Given the stats and assessment on attractiveness playing a role in husbands and wives obedience to God (sadly), it’s likely given the statistics of the improvement of a “4” to the 6-8 range that about only 50% of the 80-90% under the top 10-20% could do this. That means you have about 10-20% + 40-50% which is 50-70% of the Christian population could do this.
Optimistically, I think it could be more than that, but we have to understand that the Christian population is a subset of the actual total population. It’s theoretically possible that we can have most of the Christian men be above average compared to the rest of the population if we had all of them focused on being excellent in all areas of life (spiritually, physically, mentally/emotionally).
Pessimistically, given the apathy of most “Christians” in the Church to actually following God, I think it’s more along the lines of similar to the top 10-20% range itself. We must remember that pretty much about 10-20% of people are likely true Christians in the Church given that this 10-20% are the ones doing most of the serving and loving others. The others are just “attenders” to varying frequencies. It’s probably about 10-20% higher than this, at least according to those who “take their faith seriously” even if they are not involved with serving in Church.
To summarize:
Optimistically — 80-90% of Christian men
Realistic — 50-70% of Christian men, if you build Church communities of men that take their faith seriously.
Pessimistic — 20-40% of Christian men. What it appears to currently be.
I’m curious as to what others will say are their ranges, and what can be done to start helping men.
Since some people are having issues with me stating that it’s not hard for someone to get into the top 10-20% of men, let’s actually go over some scenarios. My comment.
This post looked at attraction to men’s musculature. Reliably, if you can get to the 10-12% body fat range for men and you have some musculature you’re likely to get some women who want to feel up your muscles and/or “ohh” and “ahh” as they see a transformation. Of course, if you’re wearing baggy shirts that cover up your muscles that’s a net negative. Fitted shirts that emphasize transformations are generally the most helpful.
For men, visually emphasizing femininity and a woman’s waist to hip ratio (.6-.8 seems to be the good range to really get a man going) is what tends to be most attractive which is why women are (or should be?) encouraged to wear skirts and dresses. Likewise, the things that tend to emphasize a fit man to women seems to be something along the lines of the ‘greek god’ type of physique where you have the illusion of wider shoulders and smaller waist (V-taper) as well as at least some muscle definition in most of the muscles of the upper body.
Overall, both men and women who have weight to lose — as a 5’9″ 200 lbs man does — can generally reliably drop about 1 lbs per week with a disciplined diet. This is why you see so many transformations in the 6-12 month range dropping 30-50 lbs or so. Some of the very heavy men and women (200-300+ lbs range) reliably will lose 2 lbs per week, so they can lose upwards of 80-120 lbs in a year. Not all of this is dropping fat but also some non-muscle lean body mass (e.g. non-muscle other stuff to support the weight gain like water weight, connective tissue, blood vessels, etc.).
How much muscle mass can you gain in a year? The articles generally vary, but most of them suggest reliably 10-15 lbs per year with possible upper limits of about 15-25 depending on genetics and other optimizations such as diet and sleep. Bulking and cutting cycles are more efficient than trying to stay the same weight and add muscle (strict same weight body recomposition).
In my own case, when I got into strength training and didn’t even care about adding muscle, I added approximately 10 lbs my first year, 10 lbs my second year, and 7 lbs my third year, and 5 lbs my 4th year. If I had reliably ate for and trained for hypertrophy (slightly different than pure strength training), it would be likely to add probably about 15-20 the first year, and 10-15 the second year.
So let’s say your average dude at 5’9″ and 200 lbs decides to lose weight and gain muscle in the first year. Since he’s losing weight, the amount of muscle won’t be added as optimal (as it’s not a bulk) but with newbie gains he’ll still probably add around 10-15ish lbs of muscle of reliable gains. Thus, he can drop down from 5’9″ 200 lbs to approximately 160 lbs but add say 10-15 lbs of muscles to be at 170-175 lbs.
Your average man is dropping from about the 30% BF range and losing about 40 lbs to get to 160 lbs and adding 10-15 lbs of muscle. If all of that was fat loss, it would be like dropping from 30% to 10% body fat. So what likely happens is you lose about 30-25 lbs of fat and 5-10 lbs of LBM but add about 10-15 lbs of muscle on top of that. That gets you approximately into the 13-18% body fat range of these photos after 1 year.
Add in 6-12 months of disciplined diet and lifting will easily get you into the 10-13% range as exemplified on the photos. Most women from what I’ve seen don’t really prefer the < 10% photos anyway. That’s more along the lines of Hugh Jackman, whereas most women tend to prefer Chris Hemsworth or Chris Adams musculature:
As you can see, these physiques are fairly comparable to the 10-13% range from the photos above.
If you use google search (or duck duck go if you prefer) for 1 year lifting transformations and look at the images, you typically see most of the “skinnier guys” get similar to the 10-13% range after 1 year. It’s a bit slower if you’re overweight and close to obese to start, but you can still get there within a 1-2 year time frame.
I stick by my assertion that your average man can get a top 10-20% body in 1-2 years. Faster if you’re skinnier and < 27-30% BF to start. Possibly slower if you’re more obese. Most people would classify the bodies above as probably top 5-10% and not top 10-20%, so maybe you could get there quicker if you were just aiming for top 20%.
If you have even a semblance of said body above, you’ll easily stand out in Church with all of the feminized men.
Is it hard? Well, I suppose that’s relative of what you think is “hard.” The information it out there. Often for free. You have to be disciplined with training and nutrition though. For most people they just don’t want to do it or don’t care to.
Apparently, this post needs some caveats:
No, you shouldn’t be aiming to improve your physique for women. It makes you more effective for mission especially in people-person things like leadership, evangelism, and discipleship. For instance, it is more attractive and credible — think of a slobby vs fit fitness trainer or a slobby vs fit pastor. Who would seemingly give more credible advice even if they were saying the same thing? Yeah, the fit muscular man. It has the nice side effect of being attractive to women.
Most points are based on general statements about preferences. For instance, attraction likely works on a bell curve distribution. A majority of women would like a ‘greek god’ physique, while some would like a bear (muscle + some fat) or swimmer (lean, some muscle) physique. Fewer women than those would like a thin or fat man. When talking about the dating market a wide net is better than a narrow one.
Use your brains people. I’m not here to make absolute statements. Take things with a grain of salt. Yes, it’s “harder” for some men and “easier” for others depending on your starting point. There’s variation just like some men prefer fit/athletic women and some prefer more curvy and softer women.
[The book] has clarified and brought together a lot of things in a very helpful way. Unfortunately, it’s pretty much too late for me (I grew up with the blue pill, especially Evangelical variety, and now have a marriage that is de facto separation, due to a lot of my mistakes based on that perspective), but I’m going to work through it with my 17-year-old son.
I don’t think it’s too late. The PUAs got a couple things right in the context of women, and “You shall make your mission, not your woman, your priority” of Chateau Heartiste’s commandments of poon is one of them. Again, this stems from the fact that the PUAs/RP do have a decently accurate understanding of women’s nature (from observations about how God made man and woman).
What I am getting at here is that you should have your own mission for God. How are you carrying out the Great Commission in Matthew 28 for Jesus (‘Go and make disciples of all nations, teaching everything that Jesus commanded’). How are you utilizing your spiritual gifts to love and serve others? Are you involved with the Church to love and serve others? How are you exemplifying these things and living out your faith in all areas of your life? How are you loving God in all aspects of your life — mental/emotional, physical, spiritual? This includes being faithful to your own Biblical marital roles and responsibilities. Physical especially lifting and putting on muscles, is probably the easiest low hanging fruit that builds up good credibility.
Generally, once you start to put God first and start to be more effective in all that you do for God you start to develop the traits that women are attracted to as a by-product. The ambition, the leadership, the confidence, and the masculine nature of excellence and doing. Then you actually have something that your wife can follow and be a helper to you with (e.g. Genesis 1-3). As you can see, all things start to fall into alignment with God’s purpose for your life, and the right frame for the marriage: you are guiding your family being faithful (as a leader of one first commissioned to God’s mission and in marriage) so there is no hypocrisy and you are a man she can respect. Not that she should be rebellious anyway as the Biblical marital roles and responsibilities are unconditional, but many wives are… need to get out of that tit-for-tat mindset.
Will all marriages be turned around? No. Just as many of Jesus’ disciples left Him (John 6 if I remember correctly), not all wives would decide to end up following their husbands even if they were perfect like Jesus. But I would say many can be. There is hope.
I’m wondering about the BMB view of classic RedPill stuff, especially as it is put forth on the RPC podcast. Particularly, does the RPC focus on game run counter to BMB’s focus on the man’s self-development?
Generally, I take the approach that most ‘game’ in terms of trying to act in a more attractive way is unproductive. It’s dancing monkey syndrome. You’re basically trying to ape attractive traits so women will like you. Does it work sometimes or occasionally? Sure. But it’s virtually impossible to be a long term solution so I find it useless and a waste of time and energy you could be used to developing your mission for God.
Or do the different types of game approaches (e.g., in the RPC episode you recently posted) have a role in the BMB? For example, should a young man practice cold approaches at the store, just to practice getting comfortable talking to women, reading them, etc., so that he can have confidence when he decides to approach a young woman at church or college (since those latter groups are going to be a lot smaller, and if word can quickly get around there if he’s rejected even a couple times)?
I personally don’t see a point to doing this. Instead, what you should be doing as a Christian is learning to talk to everyone — male and female, old and young, and so on — and be comfortable talking about and sharing your faith. Once you can do that, asking out a woman is of very little consequence in the grand scheme of things.
The decision to follow Jesus or not has eternal consequence. A woman rejecting you is good because you found someone who doesn’t want to follow you or would only be partially interested in you. You want your wife to be all in on you. Even if you take it poorly, so what? You’ll probably almost never talk to her again, unless she’s in the same friends circle but it’s just pleasantries after that. It’s just something that passes in the wind and you move on.
This is not to say that RPC or I am trying to find “Christian versions” of anything. Rather, we are looking at the Bible on how to live our lives, and we understand that some of these scenarios on how we are supposed to be living for God are things that can also help in terms of male-female relationships and marriage.
This is important to understand. We are focused on taking off the feminized lenses that we are wearing having grown up in a culture like this and being obedient to God. The fact that God made His creation in a particular way means we can take observations about how He made that creation and be wise in our applications. Sadly, at times it has taken the PUAs/secular RP to cut through the feminized BS since many in the Church have fallen prey to their own is-ought delusions (e.g. “godliness is attractive”) or downplay what is attractive to men and women.
If you have posts on this already, that would be great. On a similar note, would there be any way you could have a discussion forum for guys who are reading your book? Maybe a weekly open thread for that specific purpose? Thanks again for the great work!
Yup, this can be the first post to ask any questions. Have at it.
This is actually not my original opinion. Novaseeker had a post over at Sigma, and he linked to a sexologist’s interview in regard to “sexual styles” compatibility. I ended up listening to the whole thing. The one comment that she made that stood out to me the most from the interview is that women’s sexual desire is narcissistic. Upon further analysis I find it to be generally true.
This actually makes sense from an uncontrolled hypergamy perspective. Women want to marry up. This leads to several conclusions.
They could generally give 0 craps about men who aren’t attractive and who don’t benefit them (narcissism) outside of the sexual hierarchy (e.g. they still care about family).
Woman want attractive men to desire them, and will go out of their way to get that attention (narcissism). Sex sells. Instagram, facebook, and the recent surge to places like OnlyFans.
When a woman is with an attractive man, the thing that turns her on the most is being the object of his desire (narcissism). The sexologist even made the comment about why 50 Shades of Gray was so popular being that women wanted to be the object of desire (e.g. of a rich, handsome, muscular, successful leader).
Ironically, the thing that often turns women on the most is being the object of desire but having the (attractive) man have his way with her. Perhaps this is part of being so attractive that a man can’t help himself by ravish her (again, narcissism).
However, the woman in 50SoG also has the power to control or change that man… but only her (narcissism).
The reason why women with uncontrolled hypergamy are attracted to men with dark triad (including narcissistic traits) is because like attracts like. In addition, narcissistic men value themselves above any woman who is with them (e.g. stimulates the illusion of hypergamy in that she’s possibly marrying up).
Women with BPD who are often touted as crazy and promiscuous but really good in bed have their hypergamy turned up on overdrive. They live in their own bubble of narcissism which means they often can’t see the consequences of their actions.
Christian values and virtues aim at combating narcissism. For example, #1 is combated by kindness especially to those who in no way benefit you, #2 is combated by modesty, #3 is combated by sex within marriage and headship-submission and love-respect Biblical marital roles and responsibilities, #4 is a husband asserts his headship by having his way with her but having enough self control that he doesn’t succumb to potential ONEitis or being a slave to her feelings, etc.
This is a pretty good episode discussing initiating dating and relationships inside the Church. The cover a bunch of what I’ve covered before with some unique insight. Check it out.
I’m not going to summarize it, but I will add some structural insight on things from my point of view.
Recall the SNL skit: “Be attractive. Don’t be unattractive.”
This summarizes the main two things to look for if getting dates are an issue.
Be attractive
Mission is attractive — you’re driven to succeed and you have goals that you’re working hard to meet.
PSALMs – Power, status, athleticism, looks (muscular / Greek god look), money are all attractive to women
Masculinity and the various traits associated with masculinity is attractive
Generally, this can be summarized as being a confident, well-dressed, successful, charismatic, muscular and masculine leader.
Don’t be unattractive
Typically, this involves eliminating various factors that are turn offs.
Eliminating bad hygiene
Eliminating bad posture
Eliminating poor eye contact
Fixing poor social and communication skills
Understanding context and nuance when talking with women
Removing fear of talking with and asking women out
Most of these can be summarized as removing low hanging fruit like bad smells and actually getting out and talking with a lot of people (not just women) and learning how to be interested in others and hold good conversations. Realize that you will fail, but the only way to learn and grow is to fail and keep on going.
Mission is paramount. Evangelizing and discipleship cover many of these categories — both in the “be attractive” and “don’t be unattractive” — as you’re approaching and talking with many people (again, not just women) and learning to talk about your faith and ask them about theirs and have deep meaningful conversations with others and planting seeds that God can use.
As the “be attractive” and “don’t be unattractive” things improve your usually the success rate of dating will improve. It’s a process. It takes time.
There are obvious things that are hindrances that aren’t changeable like factors in your past, your height, your age, and so on that can make things more difficult but not impossible.
Haven’t been able to get the time to post much with some family issues and work. Will try to get back into things as I am able.
A reader asks:
I’ve read your post on your advice to a young man on how he should do in developing Godly masculinity, but I don’t know how to adapt it to my personal situation. I am currently studying for my master’s degree, but I found that I do not want to work in that particular industry, though the content studied in my degree is interesting.
I wouldn’t look at it like this. It’s more of a lie of secular culture and American values – you can do anything you want to do and you should only do things you love. It’s a very romanticized and ungodly view of the world.
There’s nothing in Scripture that says you have to like something to do it as a career or trade. In fact, Paul worked as a tentmaker to support his full time ministry even though it was clear that he really wanted to be doing full time ministry all the time.
Having a job that pays the bills so to speak is never a bad thing. In fact, it may be the thing that is most useful because it can enable to you to have good money to do what you were called to do on the side. Someone who wants to be an artist or sculptor is great, but I’m sure that not many of these people would be able to make money doing what they love.
And what I discovered is that, I want to set some personal goals, but it’s very hard for me. I just know what I ‘don’t want to do’ instead of what I ‘want to do’. I have some very short-term ones, like devoting my time in Bible study, to at least go through the whole Bible once (I didn’t do so in the past 10 years since baptism). But how about other long-term ones? I have no idea.
Start with the basics from the RPChristians that go a long way toward loving God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength (e.g. physical, mental/emotional, spiritual):
PHYSICAL: How are you doing with lifting? Losing weight? Where’s your body fat %? What have you been eating lately? How about your porn/alcohol/drug/cigarette/whatever use? Are you employing kino on your wife properly? Are you going too far with your girlfriend? How’s your fashion sense? Are you still lounging around the house in gym shorts and using your ratty flip flops when you go out? How are you spending your time? How’s your income doing? Your body is God’s temple: are you reflecting that appropriately? For married men: how’s your sex life?
MENTAL/EMOTIONAL: How have you been doing reading and learning new things? How’s your frame? Do you still struggle with living up to someone else’s expectations? Have you mastered the ability to respond appropriately as a leader without getting butthurt or arguing? How are you leading your wife/girlfriend this week? Do you feel pressure from any sources to do something or to act/not act a certain way? Are you depressed or lonely? Are you secure in your heart/mind that God’s will is good, even if it’s not what you want?
SPIRITUAL: How are you doing on the 7 basics? Rank yourself: Assurance of Salvation, Quiet Time/Devotional, Bible Study, Scripture Memory, Prayer, Evangelism, Fellowship. Have you solidified your mission – and does it have eternal consequences or does it only affect this world? Does your mission extend beyond the home? Do you have someone discipling you? Are you discipling anyone else? Have you talked with your non-Christian friends about Christ recently? Are there parts of the Bible you’re just not understanding? How are things going with your church or small group?
Focusing on developing the basics and your mission for Christ is what we’re here on earth to do, so it’s important to be focusing time and effort into these to be effective for Christ.
I know I have strong talent in music, so in my church, I mainly serve as a violin, and sometimes as a singer. So I know this is the direction that I will continue to pursue to serve the Lord. Should I pursue a career in music instead?
Great things, but unless you’re a full or part-time worship leader you would still need a job. Or unless you’re really good enough to get into an orchestra or something like that it’s not going to be something that pays the bills. These are areas in which you can serve God, but you need to be practical in the sense that they’re usually not jobs or occupations or vocations.
There’s a concept called FIRE (financial independence, retire early) which Aaron Renn just covered in the Masculinist newsletter.
Basically, work a good job (that you might not be interested in all that much) and save up as much as you can and be smart investing the money to have it grow. Once you hit a certain point, you’re fairly financially independent in which case you don’t necessarily need your job or you can pursue what you love more full time.
That’s what I’m aiming toward with my family so I can eventually be involved in full time ministry off my own pockets, so like Paul I won’t be tempted by any monetary gain and can focus on the Truth and loving others without it getting in the way.
In the post on understanding the friend zone and escaping it, I detailed 4 main ways that you can “get out” of the friend zone.
You were her friend, but she always liked you. She was waiting for you to ask her out.
You were her friend, and you underwent some change to become a man while you didn’t see her for a while. When you meet her again you impress her.
You were her friend, but you are developing into a man. Then one day her friend or some other random act of God makes her reconsider you and her eyes are proverbially opened.
You were her friend, and she doesn’t know a certain side of you. An inadvertent crisis or significant display of social dominance or leadership shows her a side of you that she never saw before. She reconsiders you now as more attractive because of this masculine display.
All of these, aside from the first one where she already wants you to be the head/leader of a relationship, are “epiphanies” where she realized she’s attracted and wants to be in a relationship with you.
Let’s consider this in terms of the female life path.
Overall, virtually no one gets into a relationship with a woman other than headship or tingly respect. In other words, she must respect you and/or think that you are attractive to go on a date with you and want to be a in relationship. I can’t think of any relationships where this wasn’t the case, unless the woman in question was trying to use the man for something whether time, money, or other things.
In evaluating the friend zone specifically, we can understand that the vast majority of men in the friend zone are trying to garner a woman’s interest by doing things for her that they would do for someone dating them. In other words, they’re hanging out with her a lot, spending money to buy her gifts, food, or other things, complimenting her, and things such as these. I’ve gone over this before on some of my earlier (2013-2015) blog posts. In other words, the men are trying to back into a relationship with the women much like women try to do with attractive men by thinking sleeping with them will make them want to be in a relationship with them. It rarely works, and this is virtually feminism in action.
On a large scale, feminism seeks to re-distribute male resources (typically via the government) to women without any compensation. The majority of government spending on welfare, healthcare, and such goes to support poor women, single mothers, and women’s health.
Likewise, we see the same thing with friend zoned men who are attempting to get into a relationship with women. They are spending much of their time, energy, and resources (money or otherwise) on women who don’t want to date them and usually just let them do it. After all, who would deny a free meal ticket? Not most people on welfare especially the single mothers or the women getting free healthcare even if they don’t need it (e.g. free planned parenthood). I’m not saying that these social systems are bad. They’re great for people who are actually in desperate circumstances. I’m criticizing the ease and perhaps ubiquity of the ability to abuse the system much like women who have a ton of male orbiters.
To conclude, to the men who are friend zoned or are trying to get out of the friend zone just stop. You’re acting like a feminist. You’re spending your time, effort, money, and other resources on a woman who doesn’t want to be with you nor does she value you. Move on to a woman who is actually interested in you.
It actually appears that “religious conservatives” still marry off at a rate higher than the other groups, even with the disruptions in the potential marriage marketplace in regard to sex before marriage and many more requirements/qualifications for marriage.
I believe this trend continues even despite the cohabitation data we examined earlier. The overall increases in cohabitation don’t make up for the gaps we see between the religious conservatives and the other groups. I believe this makes some sense because men and women who are targeting marriage are indeed more likely to get married than those who just fall into it.
There is still a significantly large gap from 5% -> 18% (or 8% -> 25% or 7% -> 25%) among religious conservatives is the big issue. EAPs (“Evangelical American Princesses”) are pricing themselves out the market much like some of the women who were following Bushnell’s sex and the city lifestyle. , even though Bushnell herself and other UMC ended up “sticking their landing.” Likewise, the men who “failed to launch” or haven’t been trained properly (by the Church or their family) to lead but instead to be “nice” and “wait for God to bring someone” and “godliness is attractive” are also likely being priced out on the bottom fringes.
All of this to say is that we need to be focused on teaching and discipling our children about these things, and mentoring men and women who want to learn as they are able. Only way you can bring about individual Christian success stories, which may add up to large success stories in the long run. There’s no society wide fix, but God can use individuals to influence those around them.
