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Message: <blockquote data-quote="fusangite" data-source="post: 2721825" data-attributes="member: 7240">Funny. I just helped my mother write a speech for a college graduation she was asked to address based around this exact theme. There's a great John Milton quote on this to the effect of 'there is no such thing as an untested virtue.'Going by that definition, I am a very confident man. I set a minimum annual rejection quota for myself which I have met or exceeded every year for the past 5 years. I make sure that I risk rejection on a regular basis, based, precisely, on this understanding. For instance, I have been rejected by four women since September 15th just this year -- that's one every 2 weeks.I think all people are afraid in these situations; I'm not positing a qualitative difference between sexually successful and sexually unsuccessful groups of men; I'm positing a quantitative one. Women will naturally gravitate towards the men who display the least anxiety; I happen to, through non-verbal, coded verbal and tone-based signals, all outside my direct real-time conscious control, to display a significantly above average level of anxiety. Some people are just like that; their brains are wired to make them a little more anxious. In present day society, where social confidence is especially prized over wealth, strength and other, more traditionally important attractants, people who have less inherent talent in managing social anxiety find themselves at the bottom of the heap when it comes to dating. I'm not especially resentful of this; my brain may screw me when it comes to over-producing certain neurotransmitters but, on the other hand, I benefit intellectually, socially and professionally in other ways from my neurological makeup.I have practiced this theory very successfully in other areas of my life. But I think there is a key difference when it comes to dating, however. There are lots of fears where you can perform just fine, in spite of anxiety, because your task is something other than "don't be anxious." For instance, someone can succeed at giving a speech, even though they are nervous because people can still appreciate a good speech given by a nervous person. Similarly, non-romantic social interactions can still be successful even though one or both parties appears nervous; it is possible for women to like men non-romantically, even though they are nervous; but in the romantic arena, this simply is not the case.For this reason, I would suggest there are two classes of activity for looking at confidence building through flooding/exposure: (a) those activities where one can succeed despite being exceptionally anxious and (b) those activities in which it is impossible to succeed if one is exceptionally anxious. Most activities such as non-romantic social interaction, public speaking, etc. fall into category (a); however, a small minority of activities like dating and swimming fall into category (b).Are you secretly corresponding with my mom or reading my outgoing e-mails? You're directly quoting the speech I wrote. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />These are wise words. I agree with them. But I think that people are allowed to be exceptionally incompetent at certain things, just as we are allowed to be recognized as exceptionally competent at others. I'm not giving up, nor am I advising Aaron to do so. I will continue meeting or exceeding my rejection quota every year, mainly because, as you point out, not trying often leads to escalating feelings of self-loathing and despair. That pent-up energy has to go somewhere. But I think it is a real mistake to tell Aaron that if he keeps trying he will eventually succeed because (a) he will continue expecting that happiness is something that will come to him from an external source rather than something that will come from within himself and (b) not everybody who tries does make it in the end; I know it's a big part of American national mythology to peddle that idea but it's just not true; what Aaron wants is worth working for but not something that is guaranteed to people as some kind of entitled payoff for hard work.Rel, Rel buddy -- it's me! It's me! Ignore the strawman, talk to me.</blockquote>

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