I hate being a stepping stone

Post Reply New Topic

Chatting a bit with a friend with whom I met online, and we went on one lunch date. Not long after our only date, she found a guy, and they've been dating. Just a few months have passed, and now they're traveling together, and she was telling me about how they just work.

I want to be happy for her, and I'm really trying to be.

But I just hate the fact that in all this I'm a stepping stone to HER happiness. It took that one date that didn't work out for her to arrive at the guy she's with now. They're both happy together, at the price of my exclusion.

The concept is so alien to me. I have NEVER known a girl who'd even call me. I was always the one calling, it was one sided, and they clearly weren't interested, in hindsight. Yet I know people who meet others, and in just a few weeks they're inseparable, traveling together, no doubt making love and sharing their lives with each other.

I WANT that. I want that sensation, to know that I am loved. Yet I just don't think it is possible. How could it be, when it seems my role in dating has been to help the OTHER girl decide what she wants? So many girls I've pursued are now married. I was, to paraphrase Leonard Cohen, "Just a station on their way, but not a lover."

When will it be my turn? When will we all have our turn? I mean I'm not sitting around. I'm being proactive. I've been meeting people, getting phone numbers, calling and asking people out (as much as I am filled with terrible anxiety at doing so). I even just got a match.com subscription. I'm trying anything and everything. Yet without results.

I lie in bed at night wishing there was someone next to me. I wish, and I could just weep.

For you to compare yourself to a stepping stone, you are basically saying you were crucial to her finding this other person.
I wouldn't get too absorbed with this idea to be honest. She went out and found this person on her own. They might have found them eventually even if they never dated you. Her not going further with you and ending up dating you doesn't mean she was moving on to someone else, she might have already made the decision she wouldn't date you anyway and was only going for lunch.

Sorry to be a spoilsport, just thought I'd throw this out there.
----------------------------
I think you should talk to other girls. Once someone else you like back gives you attention you will soon forget about all this.

Yeah, but it took a date with me to help her decide who she wanted. I WAS a stepping stone. And I want to be the endpoint for some woman somewhere.

I wrote about a half dozen girls on match today. I'll keep on writing. I will not turn 29 and be single. I'm going to find my love THIS YEAR

Agreed with the above. If you were a "stepping stone", you would have been required in the process of her finding someone else - like if someone used your work to secure a promotion for themselves.

That's a dangerously self-centered point of view. Maybe just a wrong choice of words?

Nevertheless, it still stinks.

She was a great, great woman. I really wanted to get to know her better, and we had so much in common. But with me she was hesitant, and said she didn't know what she wanted. Then after me she found somebody, and she adores him. I it's been only a couple of months and they're already shopping for rings.

I clearly wasn't what she wanted, and I don't know why since there was so much we shared.

I just want to know what love is like, you know? I've felt it, truly, for dozens of women. Any of them I would've adored and loved forever. But they felt nothing for me, and I cry about it.

Why do you want to be glad that she's happy? f**k them. If you can't be happy, who cares if anyone else is?

This is why you shouldn't remain friends with someone after a failed date (unless it's with benefits).

QFT

I know exactly what you mean. Women see me as a friend, not as a lover.

I've had people tell me they weren't ready for a relationship, that it wasn't my fault, it was just the wrong time. And then a week later they change the status on their Facebook page. What they were trying to tell me was that they were not ready for a relationship with me, and wouldn't be until hell freezes over, if then.

There is something wrong, but I don't think anyone can tell me what it is.

if you must think of yourself as a stepping stone, then think that at some point another guy is going to be a stepping stone for a woman to find you. Mind you I don't think of you as a stepping stone, but if you must use that choice of words then we'll go with it. The fact that she didn't stay with you means she wasn't the one for you. It will happen for you. I think the thing is that you can't focus too much on finding love. Love will find you when you're least expecting it. When you're not focused on it. When your'e content with yourself. Then that's when it will happen.

Not to be argumentative, but this advice is better suited to women.

Most of the time, when love "just happens," it's because one partner (in hetero relationships, usually the man) worked very hard to create the circumstances in which it could happen.

As a man, people don't just come to you. It's just not how it works.

I guess since I am a women my advice might tend to lean toward women!!

If you don't already know why I'm here long story short: I fell in love with a guy I work with that has AS. He never persued me. I went after him. He wasn't trying to form an intimate relationship. He wasn't on the dating scene. He doesn't wear the latest fashions, he has his own style He was just him, sitting at his desk, doing his job, minding his own business. Oblivious to the women across the building who thought he was the hottest thing ever and loved his quiet demeanor. So that's why I think it can go both ways.

Most of the time, when love "just happens," it's because one partner (in hetero relationships, usually the man) worked very hard to create the circumstances in which it could happen.

As a man, people don't just come to you. It's just not how it works.[/quote]

That's true, so much so that if a woman made a move on me I wouldn't really know what to do. It is outside of my experience.

It can go both ways. There certainly are women out there who will pursue the men they want (and I think they're awesome), but they are definitely in the minority. As a man, if you take a more passive approach, there is still a chance of finding love. But that chance is much much smaller than for those who take an active approach.

Yes you're probably right on them being the minority. But hopefully more and more women will be proactive in the search for a mate and go after the the guy they want instead of waiting for him to come to her. That's what I've been preaching to my friends. We (women) don't have time to sit and wait around and wait for a guy to come to us. But I do think that focussing too much on not having someone will drive a person crazy.

It would definitely be a positive for everyone if more women would take a more active role in finding love. Women would be able to pursue exactly the men they want, those men who see being the pursuer as a burden would have that burden relieved. Good times all around.

And good on you for taking a risk and actually doing it, rather than sitting back and bemoaning your "fate" like so many (of both genders) who want a relationship but are unwilling, or too afraid, to put in the effort.

As for the OP, you are right that he should not focus on his failures, or on his singleness. I think the best he can do, which he seems to already be doing (good on you too, man) is to focus on continuing his efforts.