Why do love-shy men NOT want to show they like/love a woman?

Omg. .

krs2snow said:

Omg. .

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could you elaborate please...

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since this is the currect active thread for love-shyness related issues I want to mention 2 items first: Talmer Shockley's book: 'The Love Shy Survival Guide' is out which is probably required reading for all of us. Also I recently listened to an audio motivational course that deals directly with love-shyness but gives it a different name, titled: 'Overcoming the Nice Guy Syndrome: How to Stop Being Shy Without Becoming A Jerk' which I found both fascinating and rather helpful unlike many other anxiety and depression resources for dealing with our problems; I highly recommend checking this one out (I found it somewhere i can't remember as a free online audiobook i think)...

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"Why do love-shy men NOT want to show they like/love a woman?"
Love-shys are firstly phobic of interacting with potential romantic interests and secondly phobic of being judged negatively by otherwise potential romantic partners; IN SPITE of desperately wanting the end results of those sorts of action paths if we were to succeed...

One of the main points discussed in Overcoming the Nice Guy Syndrome, was that the Nice Guys (love-shy men) feel that interacting with women they are attracted to in an assertive way is 'doing something to her' which could inspire a negative reaction from 'her', but this discussion instead makes the point that acts like talking to 'her' or asking for her number or otherwise 'hitting on her' are 'doing something for her' which creates opportunities for both rather than us nice guys/love-shys being selfish by 'wanting to get in her pants' as some more confident and assertive guys are notorious to do...
There was also a whole lot of discussion about practical self improvement for nice guys (love shys) and about the way our ideas about respecting women are flawed (really important stuff, that) and a whole lot of stuff about breathing in down into your balls (read: testicles) which sounds absurd written here but the whole thing is really worth the listen... seriously it's given me a fresh perspective on all of this...





I'm wondering if this is a widespread similarity for all love shys or of it mainly just applies to those with aspergers syndrome as well: that we haven't been able to intuitively learn the human mating ritual for whatever reason and have had to try and learn it intellectually instead...???

jneal25 said:

I won't lie I am bitter. I don't hate women however. If I've hated anyone over the years it's myself, cause I can't change how other people are but I should be able to change myself right? Being beaten by an irrational fear frustrates me to no end.

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This brings up for me an important point about feminism. While I'm not opposed to gender equality, the way that feminism has affected some boys growing up has been to make them shy and timid and feminised in such a detrimental way that it makes us completely unappealing to women except as that 'just friends' status. Feminism has been trying to balance gender equality by turning assholes and jerks (at the opposite end of the masculinity spectrum to us) into more decent guys, though some of the otherwise more decent guys to begin with like us have been turned into pathetic unassertive timid unmasculine and weak excuses for men known as love-shys or 'nice guys'. Also, while Feminism is all about gender equality, many women these days haven't really lived up to their responsibilities towards equality of the sexes by being assertive in the dating world - guys are still expected to make pretty much all of the moves in developing relationships: guys still have to approach girls, ask for dates, numbers, take the rejections, organize most events, and sometimes pay for most of everything too depending on how manipulative some girls are...

Us love-shys or nice guys are unbalanced by being overly feminised, we need to become more masculine and confident if we are going to get anywhere in the dating world, that's just reality. Personally I'm going to start doing some martial arts beginners course soon at a local dojo (iaido and karate).
Blaming our parents or 'feminism' or women in general for our unbalanced situations is useless, we need to change. So my general message right now to all of us (myself included) is to stand up, make an effort, quit bitching about it and do something to become healthy men. I'm not saying go out and get into fights or become an asshole or a jerk or a 'ladies' man' - just become balanced and healthy. It's going to take a lot of hard work, and therapy for every one of us most likely, we are going to have to use our resources to recover from this because that's all we can do to fix our problems.

Why do love-shy men NOT want to show they like/love a woman?

because they are afraid they will get thier heart smashed into a thousand pieces once they open up to them...

freestylemonster said:

Yeah I mean the worst she can do is say she doesn't like you that way...And if she's really mean and harsh about it then she's not worth it in the first place! But for some odd reason it still scares the crap outa me to even think of saying my feelings toward a girl

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It's funny how the worst she can do is so NO! And yet, we are afraid of that...the human mind and heart are so deceiving.

Ooooooh maaaaan!

I admitted my feelings to a girl once, and it's not all what it's cracked up to be.... and to make it worse she was one of the more popular girls of the school. After that things got kinda strange. I could tell she didn't hate me by the way she acted but she didn't seem as outgoing when I was around. It just got kinda awkward from there but uh... well... yeah....

I'm not that shy, but i don't want to get hurt..again, so I avoid talking to girls now, which sucks , I'm a noob

The problem here is visual perception, the other problem is the negative voice inside your head, the other problem is self conciousness. the other problem is judging people based on a gender, like you see a girl and she must be some alien species from another planet who doesnt speak english so you could never talk to her. the other problem is how you are picturing that person, are you drawn to that person because of the visual/physical which is more sexual or do you want to make a friend for conversation and then see if you gel and get along. the biggest problem is fear.

if you take every decision and algorithm as do or die, imagine a gun pointed to your head, but you have to truly believe it then you'll take more risks. dont be afraid to trip over alot though then at least you are making progress and not staying idle.

Artanis said:

'Overcoming the Nice Guy Syndrome: How to Stop Being Shy Without Becoming A Jerk' which I found both fascinating and rather helpful unlike many other anxiety and depression resources for dealing with our problems; I highly recommend checking this one out (I found it somewhere i can't remember as a free online audiobook i think)...

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I'm glad someone mentioned this because I will have to also give it my backing. This audio book is phenomenal, it really changed my outlook greatly.

The reason is something they touch on in the CDs right away. It's your association to "groups". As a man, you have groups and you have a very strong mindset as to how you think your groups are expecting you to act. Your groups are things like "women", "coworkers", "teachers", "religious group" etc. Just a label you put on certain class of people in your life.

So the major major problem shy people have is they have a group or more that they believe, in their own mind, would think negatively of them if they tried to do anything concerning talking to or dating women. For example, one person's group, let's say "women"... the way he grew up, he thinks all women would find it offensive to be hit on. Or another guy thinks all women should be protected from perverted people and so would never dream of hurting a woman like that. etc etc. Or perhaps your family group taught you that women are to be respected, and you wouldn't want to disrespect them by asking them out or scaring them or whatever.

The key would be to define your groups and what you believe your groups think. Then you have to somehow redefine or confront it if you think it's hindering you.

In this case, I highly recommend reading something like Dr. Phil's "Self Matters" which tackles this problem basically head on.

Get both of these resources right now and use them. They both have their weaknesses but they fill in information nicely. In just a few months my outlook on the world has changed dramatically. I am afraid of women about 80% less now, I'm serious.

Don't order the audio CD for Nice Guys off the author's website, it's like $100. Amazon has copies for $30-$40. They are worth it, trust me. Read my review on amazon for it. It explains in detail the weaknesses and strengths of the CDs.

Because rejection means extinction

Well I once showed a girl I liked her and she just played games with me.
I think she was not interested but she probably liked that there was a man
out there that was interested in her. Instead of rejecting me I guess
l she liked to have me around because it fed to her self esteem.

After that I am very hesitant to actually show or tell a women I am into her
because I am afraid it will be like the last time where I felt I was just strung
along.

I have really come to despise women like this now.

^ Yeah there are women like this who like to have a guy around to feed her self esteem....I've been there.

..............

MandyMouse said:

^^^This can work both ways. My ex used me to boost his self-esteem in the beginning. Until he wore me down to a unatractive, blubbering, pathetic mess of mangled emotions.

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I know how that feels i had an ex a few years ago who totally wore me down, i stopped talking to friends and going out just to keep him happy, but that wasn't enough he still felt the need to belittle me and make me feel ugly, useless and worthless to the point i believed him. I had no one but him in the end and that really messed me up.

There is a saying "All is fair in love and war" which I dread but given how it is
been for many I guess it makes sense.

redski not everyone plays games...some gals want to be with a special someone..even if he is terribly shy

iamthenra said:

Just like allot of us, being scared to death. The fear is what prevents us that have SA or SP from approaching people especially the "attractive" opposite sex... For me, just thinking about approaching someone that is attractive makes me want to run away. I would rather bathe in acid and then run through fire and then jump out of a perfectly good air plane without a parachute, than to ask a girl out or even tell her how I feel.

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Yes, sir. that'll do.

How's one supposed to say anything when in a state of impossible confusion? Not leaving the tight rooted fear that stirs inside. Waiting to be fed. A continuous knocking in the head.

Open to change, not easy. Mostly I'll sit back and relax or join iamthenra and run the course.

I see the same girl at the gym and school all the time. I'm sure by now she thinks I'm nothing more than a creep who stares at her across the gym...because I don't say hi, I don't smile at her because I can't.

Also I've come to realize I am very lazy with everything. I'd probably not be good at relationships because women like to do stuff, whereas I don't need to do anything as long as I'm just WITH them...

wow old thread! still want to vent after reading it though.....

when a girl tries to get to know me my first instinct is to run and pull away because by some convuluted logic if she chases me then I know she is into me. In reality, this attitude probably filters out the truly nice girls and just allows the crazies (no offense to anyone, I've played the crazy role once or twice) to start a relationship which always turns out bad because they are either clingy or emotionally abusive and so perpetuates the shyness because now I think all women are either overwhelming or emotionally witholding.

A few women who are frinds are like me, having had major trauma in their lives and so they are damaged and don't really know how or want to be in a truly mutual, healthy relationship (like myself) and so I guess I assume all women are like that, although I hope not.

Honestly I wish that I could find or have someone find me who knows how to be in a relationship and could understand that I don't mean to be mean or run away, its just how I learned to deal with the world.

When you're a guy who's never had a girlfriend in your life, there's always that fear hanging above. The fear of rejection, the fear of opening up, the fear of change. The fear of the unknown. Just like someone who's never went rock climbing, or went on an airplane, fear of the unknown. Some guys stay idle and alone for so long they get consumed by it entirely.