How to increase my chances of success in life

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Hi, I haven't been here in a long time. But I wanted to ask about something.

How can I seriously increase my chances of success in life. By success I'm talking primarily about my own goals, like:

-Finding a beautiful girlfriend/wife
-Figuring out my aptitude and getting whatever it takes to succeed at it
-Finding my own place etc.

Please don't tell me that "success is only for NTs" or similar NT bashing, or saying that I have no hope. Why do we take NTs for granted anyway? I have no problem with most of them. Ignorance isn't caused by being NT either, so I thought I'd make that clear.

My goals just simply align more with traditional ideas of success.

I really feel like I have the cognitive ability of a child in some ways. I have no idea behind the concept of things like loans, finance etc. I know that I'm trying to gain life skills to live on my own and I am not confident in my social skills quite yet. I have been seeing a girl lately, but I still don't feel any confident about what I'm doing is socially "right".

As for life skills, there are so many boxes that need to be ticked, I don't know what skill I need to work on first.

Study hard, and get good grades. Graduate.

Stay out of trouble, especially with the Law.

Stay away from drugs, including alcohol and tobacco.

Bathe. Dress well. Smile. Get a nice haircut. Smell good.

Develop a talent - a musical instrument, played well at social gatherings, is a sure way to attract people. Ballroom dancing comes in handy when invited to wedding receptions.

Volunteer at charitable organizations and events, except when asked to go door-to-door.

Never whine, complain, or point out someone else's flaws.

Develop a sense of humor, and refrain from expressing anger or depression.

Never become violent, except in self-defense or in the defense of the weak.

Finally, never argue with someone who offers helpful suggestions. Learn to say "Thank you" even when you believe that their advice is useless to you.

Good luck.

I agree with Fnord. He has good advice for you.

The one thing I can add on is this: What do you want to become during your lifetime? This is a question that you alone must answer. Once you have answered that question, it now becomes a new quest: going from point A (where you currently are) to point B (where you want to be). Sometimes it can be a rocky path to follow, sometimes the path partially disappears, but never give up trying to get there. Even when the future looks bleak, you may find a different route than you first planned on taking, leading to a better destination than you were originally looking for.

Another thing that should be toss in here as well is. Get to know yourself, work with yourself. Don't ignore or deny who you are as a person. I know that's easier said then done, especially when you personally is 180' out of phase with the rest of the world around you, and you're under tremendous pressure to adapt. But simply trying to suppress your personality just to adapt to your environment. Or maybe I should rephrase that to "Trying to fit in with others." is gonna have long tern consequences on you, especially on your self esteem. I know, Ive been there, done that.

On "Finding a beautiful girlfriend/wife":

A lot of us social rookies seek someone to make themselves feel good or to look good to others. This reveals an interest in women as "Arm Candy" - something sweet and pretty to show off to others as yours, and yours alone. This may stem from a lack of confidence in one's self, and how one appears to others.


Using other people to enhance your own looks and social status is exploitative, as it involves treating those other people as property or mere fashion accessories. Be practical and respectful of others. Define a good potential partner. There are plenty of women who are attractive enough to add to the quality of your life. They are attractive because of their personality, energy, interests, style and lots of other real, enduring qualities. List the qualities you want in a date. Look for clubs, interests and interesting places where you have a common ground already.

First, find a way to make money. That means work at any job that you can do and will hire you. While working, think about what career you would like to pursue. With money, keep expenses minimal. You need to save as much as you can if you wish to move out on your own and be financially self-supporting. A good book on managing money is by Dave Ramsey. It is called "Financial Peace". It's common sense stuff like not spending more than you make, budgeting money so that you don't waste it, putting aside money for a rainy day, etc.

As for women, one thing I have learned over time is that you need to put yourself in a position to get a mate. What I mean by that is you have to have money to spend to go on dates. you have to have free time to go on dates. you have to have enough self-esteem to be yourself around potential partners and accept it if they reject you, and you have to find ways to go out and meet people. Also, some things are beyond our control. We don't have complete control over who comes into our lives no matter what we do. We might go on a million dates and not find the right one. Or we might not be actively looking, might even be avoiding dating, but someone who seems like a perfect match comes into our lives. I am not in a position to put a lot of effort into dating right now, so I just try to be open to a relationship if a nice lady (who seems compatible) shows interest. Compatibility is so important. I know more about compatibility from just knowing more about who I am as a person, what I want from a relationship, and what I am able to offer. When I was younger, I use to focus on things I could do to change myself to improve my chances of getting a relationship. Now I focus more on just living my life, being me, and sticking with people who accept me as I am.

The previous posters have all had some very good insights. I would only add to it to say two things:

First, focus on the life skills before anything else. It's very difficult to have a successful relationship or live on your own if you don't know basic life skills. Things like balancing a checkbook, making sure you have enough money in the bank before you buy something, basic cooking like boiling pasta and frying eggs, doing your laundry, shopping for groceries; everything you would need to do within one week. Make a list of things you will need to be able to do to live successfully on your own. Figure out which things you need more training in. Then just pick one and practice it until you feel like you know it well enough.

Second, don't try too hard to get a girlfriend/wife. My experience has been that the best relationships form out of nothing, when neither person was looking for it. Also, you need to learn how to be alone before you get into how to be with someone. You need to know that you can survive without another person, and that being alone is not scary. Lots of people, NTs included, are afraid to be alone because they've never done it. So they end up with someone who is wrong for them and who makes them miserable because they are too afraid of being alone to walk away. "Anyone" is NOT better than "No one." And, a lot of people realize that they prefer to be alone and they decide they don't want a relationship. That's perfectly fine.

1. Get your ass off them video games boy. Take your xbox, playstation, whatever you have and throw them out the window. Then smash them with a baseball bat while acting like a caveman then run them over with your car. Those video games don't do anything with your life.

2. Get ripped. All you have to do is do 1000 pushups a day, 1000 sits ups, 100 pull ups, and run 3 miles everyday for the next 6 months then you'll be super buff and girls wont be able to help themselves, they will HAVE to talk to you. Oh yeah, work on your social skills so you can actually hold a decent conversation.

3. Learn to sing and play the guitar. Last time I heard, chicks dig dudes who sing and play the guitar. All you have to do is buy a cheap guitar and learn to play that. Practise your singing skillz while you're in the car and sing along to all of those crappy pop songs like California Girls. When at a stop light, roll down the windows and blast the music up then start singing as loud as you can. This works on your confidence in singing in front of others. You may get laughed at but who gives a s**t? You're just having fun. If you're having fun, then screw what other people think.

As for finding your own place do your homework on that, and ask yourself do you want your own house or do you want to rent? Know how much you make and what you can afford, also set up an emergency fund in case of need. That helps, and if you buy a house take a look at the neighborhoods you are looking at, where your job is.

You don't "succeed" at life, but whatever, it's probably best to just listen to the others...

That is the entire point of a relationship-- to increase your social status and therefore your confidence. Fact is you can do anything in life you want without a partner in tow. The partner is merely a symbol of your status in the social hierarchy. Sex? That's a commodity, it can be traded for with currency. Kids? Also a commodity, you can buy from a sperm bank if female or purchase a surrogate if male. Companionship? You don't need a wife/girlfriend for that either. Want to be president? You can do that as well, Buchanan and Cleveland were both bachelors. Someone to share bills with? Get a roommate, carpool, etc. I'd say the only thing you can't do without a "girlfriend/wife" is claim you have one (see it even just sounds possessive), but the truth is you can go online and just make s**t up.

The concept of "girlfriend/wife" "boyfriend/husband" is a societal construct, always has been. That's why when we talk about marriage we talk about it in context of culture, not biology. The thing about societal constructs is that they are there to create competition since in a hierarchy not everyone can be at the pinnacle. In the modern world people derive the majority of their self esteem based on their status inside the hierarchy, thus a "girlfriend/wife" is only necessary to rise in said hierarchy which in turn raises one's self-esteem/confidence.

This could not be further from my truth, and I suspect a "few" other people’s truth for that matter. Finding my partner was the best thing that ever happened to me and not for any superficial reasons. He makes me feel whole, it's like finding pieces of you that you didn't even know that you were missing. It has nothing to do with having a partner because that is what you are supposed to but everything to do with finding the right person. We both give the other something that makes us feel whole, it is natural.

And I have to say that I agree with Fnord and his comment about "arm candy", it is spot on.

Thanks, Bondkatten! I've known a lot of guys who seem to derive their self-esteem from the attractiveness of their wives and girlfriends. Those men also seem to have difficulty keeping friends and getting along with others at work.

Then there are the guys who've taken what amounts to little more than a "sour grapes" attitude against women and society in general. They seem unable to maintain even the most superficial of relationships, especially with women. Too bad for them! It's likely that they will always be angry and bitter, while blaming everyone but themselves for their sad an lonely lives.

That's your perception of it, and again it's a social construct, not a necessity of nature. If your partner left you or died would you be any less human? Obviously not. Would you be sad? Sure, that's neurochems at work, but it wouldn't make you any "less" than you were before. That same love you have for your partner can be transmuted elsewhere if you wanted-- you choose to invest it on your partner. Then entire concept of monogamy (modern relationships) has only been around a few thousand years, in some places it's still not "en vogue". Societies/cultures imprint certain ideals on people at a very young age, the majority of the time those imprints are so powerful the individual grows up believing their wants/needs are their own when in fact it's a societal construct they've been taught to believe. If you grew up in a society that favored independence and a lack of human contact you'd most likely feel a partner would make you less complete-- ancient Sparta being one example were you would find that attitude. I'm not saying you don't feel what you feel, I'm saying the underlying fabric of that feeling is based on a social construct you've grown up with, not something nature creates.

If we look back at the evolution of human relationships we find that they were indeed tied to power-- hence the reason virtually every ancient king/pharaoh/tyrant had a harem and not an individual partner because the more women one had the more power/status one had. If you read enough Greco-Roman literature you'll find that the entire concept of marriage was solely to ensure the genetics of the husband were passed down, and not some other suitor-- hence the possessiveness of relationships (another by-product of power). In Athens there was a period right before the classical age where a man's social status was increased with the number of prepubescent boys he buggered-- again a relationship, but not necessarily the way we think of it.

From a purely logical viewpoint relationships are about social status and are not necessary for humans or humanity to function. Just because someone chooses to buy into and truly believe the conventions of the day does not make it fundamentally "correct". Fact is the idea of "love" and "relationships" is an ever changing dynamic, and where does that dynamic come from? We aren't forced to evolve these concepts due to some natural phenomenon, society chooses to evolve these constructs.


Nice allusion to my previous post, unfortunately it's dead wrong-- I have no need/want for a partner of any kind. Also, critical thought isn't bitter it only appears that way to the those that value fantasy over logic/reason. I see society for what it is, merely a hierarchical construct to keep people in line-- generally keeping people from pursuing and realizing their true potential. It's been my experience that if one has to hide behind the cloak of majority opinion and teenage insults they don't have a very strong argument to start with.

That's kind of a sad way to look at love and friendship.



Considering that I have Asperger's I'm not exactly socially talented or driven by a desire to follow social constructions. I think monogamy is in my brain, soul whatever you might call your essence. I never grew up with a desire to find someone, because that is what you should do. I know that I would not be much different whether I was born 100 years from now, or 1000 years ago. I would still be the same, still have my core beliefs and still have the same talent for not doing the correct thing.



Yes but the thing is that I don't live in ancient Greek and neither do you. Thankfully today female sex slaves and pedophilia is illegal in most countries. I as a woman is nowadays considered to be an equal to a man and I have the same rights to freely choose a partner for whatever reasons I choose to.




What social status did my partner win by falling inlove with me? I can say that without a doubt he gained none, maybe even lost some.
I don't think that the way I live my life with my partner is for everyone. Frankly, I don't care about how anyone lives there life as long as they are not hurting someone. Live alone, live with several people, it's not my business. But please don't assume to know what goes on in my head.

I'm not assuming anything, I'm explaining a process-- the process in which humanity has constructed the idea of relationships and how it's evolved to it's current form. If that upsets you I'm sorry, but I myself refuse to let emotion get in the way of logic and reasoning. Many truths are uncomfortable, upsetting, etc, but it doesn't make them any less true. Look up Victor of Aveyron, he's a child about two centuries ago that was left in the woods and developed a majority of his childhood without human contact, i.e. society and culture-- his story highlights exactly how much those two institutions develop and shape an individual's mental processes, autistic or not.

You feel happy and grateful for your relationship-- that's great, I'm not arguing that. I'm arguing that the concept of modern relationships (last 10k years or so) are not a natural biological process. Example, let's say you were Victor of Aveyron, and had never seen another human-- you wouldn't feel incomplete without your partner because you wouldn't even know other humans existed. Not every subconscious desire is a natural biological one, many times they're constructed through our interaction with the world around us, namely other people. Repeated messaging, over a course of time, leads us to believe that the desires we hold are our own when in fact they're desires society has trained us to believe.