Dear Men: How to Keep Her Interested Beyond the First Swipe

Looking for some real, human dating advice that won’t leave you single and more frustrated?

This is part 1 of a larger series on dating, which will include thoughtful somatic based advice that applies to men in relationships as well. Dating isn’t a single man skill! Women aren’t looking for a fake courting period, followed by a death bed relationship anymore. Hopefully you aren’t either!

I will round up all of the articles at the bottom of each post.

As an embodiment coach dating isn’t my focus, the nervous system is.

Because my first embodiment job was leading a somatic dating program and I have had personal experience in adult dating, it makes sense that half my clients over the last few years want support in dating. It also is what sells the most coaching and I have bills to pay!

Also, dating is triggering! It requires honesty, vulnerability, excitement and time availability right out of the gate. Which is all “nervous system stuff”.

One of my most popular articles to date was, Dear Men: How to Initiate With Women Without Being Creepy or Annoying. I am sure it’s popularity is due to the title, which looks like I am giving advice. If you spend any time with my work you know it’s more nuanced than that.

Because most canned dating (and relationship) advice leaves people single.

We have a global connection problem and the Internet is making it worse. When you enter a world of should and should nots you often leave what feels good to you far behind. The “thing” about good romantic matches is that it’s the little synchronicities that really build safety.

The weird, niche thing I really need is the weird thing you also need! I am not crazy. I am not alone! I am not too much!

When you put your entire personality and all your preferences up on the operating table of Internet therapy you risk becoming unrecognizable to your people. You can easily shift into turning off your better matches through rules that only makes sense for perfect therapy people that don’t exist.

Of course some women are out there looking through tiny fraction of the 3% (real number) of men who are six feet tall and make six figures who are ALSO single and super monogamous. Then there are other women looking for someone to ‘save’ them from a normal life, which hasn’t ever met their expectations. They are 43 years old wondering why they never met their soul mate and instead of working with me they make another vision board and spend 5k on a program promising them access to “perfect men”. Ok. Let them keep fishing.

I want to talk about the women who have retired their inner mean girls and gotten real about life.

This is what they want, it’s not extensive. These the three areas I see men set themselves up for failure in consistently with the women they like the most.

1: Physical time availability.

There isn’t anything more important to me personally in dating than a schedule match up. Otherwise, it isn’t going anywhere. We won’t ever build a connection that would turn into a relationship. I just can’t get attached. A guy that’s got new women at the bottom of every other person in his life is just a confusing dump of my time and emotions. I am a normal adult person, so texting (something you can do on the toilet) doesn’t feel like intimacy to me. It shouldn’t!

There is also nothing that my clients over the last few years have mentioned wanting more than to date someone who has time to date. Two times per week at the start seems to be the standard expectation to get off an app and date exclusively.

Healthy adults will not build a relationship over a phone.

You need not only nights free to date, but also flexibility to make sure you aren’t controlling all the time either. Offering one or two times that are good for YOU to someone with equal life responsibilities, makes you look like an asshole. The women you actually want to date are going to want you to flex around their kids and jobs too, as they equally accommodate yours.

What does this week look like for both of us? Oh, that’s a night you have your kids and you don’t have them all the time, let me see if I can move or just skip trivia.

Married? Your wife wants this too.

She doesn’t want to do date nights on only the nights best for YOU and YOUR work and YOUR mood. She wants to negotiate time equally. This is how you make people feel important. This is the basis for any relationship, in person time is where you build connections. Girlfriends aren’t found online. You build relationships. You break them too, when you stop building.

Twice now I have had male clients quit their most demanding hobbies and make almost immediate relationship matches.

On top of work and family, they were not available enough to build any kind of attachment with women who had other options. So they were dating, expecting they’d edit hobbies and other obligations once they were in a relationship, but they never made it into a relationship with anyone that they liked. Because they weren’t available enough to build one. The women they liked either passed on them for other men who showed more consistency or just felt turned off.

If a woman is willing to “wait” for you she either has low self-worth or other male attention she isn’t ready to let go of.

Plus! Women will look over a lot of things they thought were important for a man that makes them feel like a priority in his life. You don’t have to be perfect but you do have to do this.

2: You have cleaned up after your exes.

Clean out your house & attic, get new bedding, clean up your social media and especially the stuff you say. Your ex-wife isn’t downgraded to your sister now. I am the only woman I know that will give feedback about this directly. ALL of the women I have ever coached would just tell you they aren’t attracted to you and move on if they got turned off from ex-talk and ex-connection. They’ll tell me your friends list, your constant female texting and your travel group of mostly women turned them off, but they are unlikely to tell you.

This is one of the “things” that can get confusing between women and men because women believe that talking about their own exes really doesn’t bother men. So they do it and give the green light that it’s ok when they HATE it back. Double standard? Yes. But men have some of these too. Like only dating women who outrank them in physical attractiveness. Yeah I work with straight dudes, I know what I am talking about. You guys want to date women that are far hotter than you are and it’s just accepted as normal. Accept what I am telling you too.

Women with other options… the ones you want to date… are not putting up with a bunch of weird ex connection.

This is “straight people” advice. Let’s not over-think it. Ask your mom and dad if you don’t believe me.

To defend it a little, straight men have seemingly terrible conversational memories. On the other hand, when a man talks about his ex to a woman she stores it in her long term file. It is going into your permanent record. Her cave woman brain is scanning your voice for threats. She doubles down on it by telling her best friend, therapist, journal and looking at 100 pictures on the Internet of your ex to “calm herself down.” Sadistic. It’s going to bite you HARD once she gets attached to you if you overshare about other women. Just trust me.

Finally, what would your ex-wife have expected?

Would your ex-wife have dated you with photos of you with your exes plastered for her mom to see on the most popular websites in the world? Would your ex-wife have tolerated you texting your ex on her birthday or telling stories about her casually all the time? No.

This is the dumb stuff that is driving off women and you aren’t realizing it because they are societally shamed for saying it.

They don’t want to look “jealous” which is just about the worst thing a woman could be these days. Even though that’s actually what all the men on the Internet say they want women to be. They want women who are excited about them and passionate about them. Jealousy, passion, sexuality, commitment = symbiotic (it’s ok look it up). So if you don’t want a woman to act like your side chick, then maybe stop making her feel like she is in the shadow of your past everyday.

This is an example of the real WHY she suddenly “wasn’t attracted to you” or got upset about something small and called it off.

Your ex wife would have NEVER gone on dates with you while you texted your “single mom friends” and “women friends you met online dating that didn’t work out” about your dating life either. The stuff men do in divorce that would have never worked in their entire lifetime of dating women makes me so frustrated in coaching.

Look at the partnered women in your life and think about how they pick for a minute. What do they expect? What is attractive to them as adults? Your dating pool grew up remember. What did they REALLY look for in dating? Not what your therapy list said they look for. Does any woman in your mostly female friend group that you do ‘hot girl walks with’ date men who have the connections you do with their exes and other women? Did the partnered women in your life date and then partner with men who have tons of fun adult side hobbies that keep them busy most nights? Just think about it. Would your female friends date you? Did your ex move on yet your lack of boundaries with her are holding YOU back but not her. Just think about it. Look inside of your real life.

Women have very predictable buttons when they actually like you and want you.

When they don’t want you because they have a bunch of side stuff going on and are hoping to get back with their ex they don’t care about this stuff.

Also no, your kids do not care if you keep family photos up all over the Internet or store a bunch of their mom’s stuff in the house. They think that stuff is weird too, it is. Me and your kids and the woman that freaked out about your ex wife’s travel photo shoot are all on the same team. So is your mom. Ask your mom.

3: Mutual interests.

People feel connected through shared interests. Doing fun things together builds connection. Going out to eat and having sex isn’t enough. You can fill in the gap with trauma stories for a while but then those will just turn on you (see number 2). I guess you can just date women where they is a huge power differential like one of you is the savior and one of you is the victim of life. But aren’t you tired of that yet?

As a woman, I judge if a guy has similar values to me and has an orientation towards himself, his work and his family that I can essentially respect through doing fun stuff together and listening to him talk. I don’t want anyone to tell me about themselves over dinner interview questions, I want to experience them! I’ll decide for myself on the weekend kayak trip Todd!

Do you have interests that the women you enjoy dating would like doing?

Have you ever been the most attracted to women that play and watch sports as their main hobby? Have you ever wanted to have sex with a woman that plays video games (in real life, not the hot gamers on YouTube)? What about TV. Do the women you dream about binge the same TV at night you do? Have you ever had a Magic the Gathering or intense board game crush? RARELY. Make a list of the things your ex partners enjoyed, find stuff you can get into.

A lot of men put up a dating profile that looks more like an ad for a fishing or a sports buddy.
They showcase photos with sunglasses on playing golf and at large sporting events. Then swipe on women who read and go on slow walks every night. Work on developing some interests women can do with you. This is also going to make spending time together easier, you can invite dates to your hobbies! Win-win.

To Summarize:

If you are dating OR in a relationship with a woman, do you have flexibility to bounce back and forth with your partner to find two real nights a week to “date” that work for BOTH of you? Not just you offering two nights or time under your “real life”.

Have you thought about your relationships with other women and how you talk about them and your exes? Do you make comments about how beautiful other women are and stay connected to your exes and people you have dated online? Do you follow Insta-models? How is that influencing female attraction towards you? (This is the rabbit trail I really wish the red pill dudes would follow.)

Finally, do you have anything in common with your wife or if single, the women you date? Do you share any mutual interests with women besides eating, sex, taking care of stuff and TV? If not, you have a big problem.

Want to do even better with women? Fix your nervous system.

This course is $33 and you can do it single or with a partner.

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Somatic Dating Series:

1 (This Article)Dear Men: How to Keep Her Interested Beyond the First Swipe: Three things women are searching for in the men they date
2 How to Get Ready to Date — Publishing Next! Subscribe to my Medium emails to get it in your inbox.
3 Dear Men: How to Initiate With Women Without Being Creepy or Annoying: Six Steps to Asking a Woman Out on a Date Well.

4 Coming Soon: How to know if you should move dating into a relationship or if you should bail.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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