Nice Guy's Approach to Socializing (And Dating!)

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In response to these threads: DataSage's Alpha Male Guide to Meeting Women, Nice Guys and Love, What's your take on the issue

I've found that being an "alpha-male" isn't always about being dominant. Many women genuinely want "nice guys," but many of us here have issues fitting into some of their social expectations and cues. For example, confidence does not mean being an ass. There are ways you can express this without being domineering. This article will (hopefully) be a step-by-step guide for getting your romantic life on-track. Not to mention, most things here apply to other ordinary social situations as well.

Most of this has been learned from personal experiences (such as being teased on a first date for staring too much and hugging myself) and my opinionated girlfriend, whom I asked for help on this. She is a definite people person and has no problems getting a date, so I would assume her advice is trustworthy. Luckily, I swayed her enough before we met that she looked past my first-date fallacies.

A major issue with the so-called "nice-guys" is that they lack confidence. There are ways to express confidence without being an as*hole. A major component is body language, and there are a number of things to look out for. When you're talking to a date at the table, how do you act?

To display an appropriate message at the table, it's best to either keep your fingers threaded with your hands close to yourself and out of her "bubble," or with one hand relaxed on its side on the table and the other in your lap. When eating, use the hand in your lap rather than the one you're keeping on the table so that you don't look so passive and scared that you're trying to slide under the table and hide.

Why not the alternatives?
- Palms down, both on table - Appears domineering
- Palms up, both on table - Too inviting
- Tapping, with hands or feet - appears nervous, or bored (both very bad for a date)
- Hands both in lap - appears too passive

Eye contact is another important issue. You don't want to stare too much or too little. Basically, avoid the creepy stares and floor stares. Pay attention while they speak, taking in things like hair, clothing, the way they dress, eye color, etc. Every 15-30 seconds take a second or two to break eye contact and quickly take in the rest of your surroundings, but refocus your eye contact almost immediately. If you stare constantly too long, it appears intimidating, but you do want eye contact a majority of the time. If you don't use eye contact enough, you come off as either overly passive or disrespectful, neither of which will get you a second date.

Teasing is an issue even neurotypicals have trouble with. If you can get this one down, it will help out a lot. Most women asked will label a guy's sense of humor as very important, if not critical. The best solution to working past this, is to know how to tease someone without being an obnoxious as*hole. If they make a simple mistake that you could see them laughing at, then you should be safe in teasing them about it; just don't go overboard. Joke about it for a short while without overdoing it. If they start looking distressed in the slightest, change the topic. If it looks like it is still getting to them after a quick topic change, apologize immediately, and try to move on. Asking if you offended them is not going to work and may offend them further or elicit a false "I'm fine." Just apologize.

Movement: Except in restaurants, or situations that do not permit, be at someone's side, rather than in front of or behind them. Also, avoid sitting or standing directly across from them (except at restaurants), as it may seem intimidating and will cause you to appear less focused on listening to them.

Remember, most people are not logical computers. People in general are very prone to exhibiting both the virtues and the flaws of their animalistic biology and spiritual natures, hence being human. It's worth keeping this in mind and understanding that people are not perfect, and as fellow members of society, we are expected to hold to their standards, however unreasonable, if we want to get along. It sucks, yes, and most neurotypicals would agree with you there.

Topics of discussion: This one is the most difficult one I could describe to you, given that there's not much help I can give you when such skills are not natural. Discussions are entirely individual-based, depending on their interests and how much they've had to deal with individual topics as of late. Many people may not appreciate you being the 9000th person to ask them how classes are going. It's worth your effort to discuss topics they are interested in, know about, and can give elaborate contributions to the conversation about; just avoid beating a dead horse, especially after several others have already done so or after you have personally repeated yourself or exhausted a topic. If you're discussing recent events, make sure it's actual NEWS that hasn't been beaten to death dozens of times already.

To keep their interest peaked, stay on topics they like for a majority of the time, while not being afraid to venture away from their areas of interest every once and a while. Show that you have knowledge to offer them outside their range of interests. However, avoid topics they are completely adverse to (i.e.: if they hate science - don't bring up the LHC).

Does anyone have suggestions for other topics to cover in this guide? If I can't help you, I might be able to find someone who can help me create a section for the guide that will cover the problem.

i wish i had time to think

This is a great idea.

In my opinion,

(1) most how-to pickup guides out there appeal to the egos of the adolescent and young guys who read them and b.s. with each other over it, more than they contain meaningful information on how to appeal to the women on whom it is supposed to work, they are like a 13-year-old's comic book idea of what flirting is, more than they are meaningful information for a real man

(2) most how-to pickup guides out there teach a guy how to act like the shallow goofball lamely strutting and hitting on girls in bars using lines, like something out of a comedian's stand up act, a caricature of how real men act

(3) resemble the game plan of an adolescent or young male who is more interested in his own ego trip than actually getting closer to women

(4) work only on those women that any man with two hands and two feet can pick up anyways, it's just the cheesy, formulaic behavior acts as a flag that the guy is out looking

(5) don't work for AS, who need instruction and skills-building stages before they can apply formulas

(6) don't recognize that, like any football team has special teams and game plans for different occasions, many women require "nice guy" approaches and that these approaches are actually the best ones for AS

(7) don't recognize that there are many "Alpha Male" types, and the one that is right for you depend on education level, social class, personality class, profession, e.g. artists, construction workers, students, all have different renditions of what an "Alpha Male" is like, and the pickup guides that are out there don't focus on universals that any guy can develop in themselves, but shallow surface traits of one particular flavor that happens to appeal to the author of the particular guide

I have the following suggestions/comments:

Define your guide as a supplement or alternative to other how to, "pickup style" guides out there, for women who are looking for a "Nice Guy" approach

State that the guide is geared to have working information on how to appeal to the women on which it is supposed to work, not appeal to the young male egos of the guys reading it

Instead of defining a "Nice Guy", define an "Asperger Alpha Male" archetype that fills in some missing banks for guys who (1) cannot lie, (2) cannot manipulate, (3) is not going to be approaching strange women (but will talk and flirt if approached or spoken to), (4) are nice and sincere and transparent, (5) is not looking for women who are looking for the routine programmed pickup

Recognizes that even for the same guy, there are different approach models, just as there are different teams in a football team for different games conditions and different seasons. This guide recognizes that there are some women for whom standard pickup how-tos are inappropriate and some guys for whom the definition of "alpha male" is less formulaic (and that includes Asperger Alpha Male).

States that often existing dating guides are framed toward pick-up and approach of strangers, which is not an optimal subject for AS guys, so define an "Asperger Pickup Scenario" where the first contact is initiated by a woman who speaks first, or accidental contact occurs, like a woman talks to you in a grocery store line or at the library (scenario includes a nice smile, how "accidental contact" sometimes signals interest like if the woman lingers and looks at you after asking you where the reference section in the library is and how maybe if she does you should then offer to show her and walk her over, etc.)

and so on...

IMO the optimal dating guide is, for AS Males, a social skills development-oriented one and should include links to some of the conversational schemas and courses out there, links to body language video courses, how initial relationship negotiating steps unfold, etc. The optimal dating guide for AS helps them develop some social skills that fit into the big picture of developing themselves over life.

I don't "get" formulaic dating guides and behavior models. All the ones that benefitted me are the ones that were actual social skills development oriented, where you explicitly build some new corner of your social skills. Over several years of this, you start to look confident and present well in public.

Online behavior is totally opposite of real, in-person behavior, as far as I can tell. I would never act, in public social situations, the way people are supposed to act online to fit in and be socially acceptable. You have to totally stick out, be openly yourself and ignore convention -- and project a glow emotionally and physically that is the best you that you can be. Then you become an "attractor", and you attract people who are most likely to like you to approach you. Out there in person, if you hang in the shadows muttering with the crowd, never sticking your head up and out because you are trying to fit in, and only make forays out to deliver some creepy, cheesy pickup line, you become part of the noise that adds to the social anxiety of females. I have seen guys on this forum talking about getting slapped down in bars, etc. and that would be part of the reason why.

AS should not be looking for women in bars, etc. They should train themselves to learn how to spot attraction signals and how to talk to women they bump into while out doing things they like to do, where they are likely to meet someone who has things in common with them. They should not try to learn the formula attitudes of any one "Alpha Male", but universals about body language, conversation skills and negotiating a relationship. They should be getting in good physical condition, making themselves as attractive as possible and learning how to train their outsides to project their insides accurately and in the best light possible (posture, natural smiles, etc).

Finally, the ultimate dating guide for AS would be written for both men and women with subsections where there are splits. The reason for this is that the best dating guide teaches not only what you should be doing, but what the other should be doing along with you. This creates the basis for how to develop what is the best tool any single person can have "Dating Theory of Mind".

The ultimate dating guide would be a mixed-gender social skills development course outline that covers body language, conversation and personal attractiveness development, and only has emphasis on sex and flirting, i.e. the examples and context of the development material are all in the dating and opposite-sex context, with a lot of links to outside social skills development web courses and videos out there.

I love nice guys It is lack of confidence that is a turn off for me.

The dating guides out there don't teach that which really works best with women: be sweet, happy, healthy and NICE

The guys who study how to lie, cheat and game the system to get laid in their teens and 20's are the ones who develop into sexual harassers and hobby-sexual-predators in middle age.

I finally get where all that corrupt abuse and passive aggressive coercive manipulation and sexual harassment came from, how it develops and the guys in which that mentality takes root and grows into the mind of an abusive sexual harasser when he's old, reduced to trying to trap defenseless students into coercive sex and promoting the women that do them on the side over women that don't.

I get why this forum has fascinated me so much and what I was trying to figure out. I get "the Sexual Harasser ToM" now, where they come from and how they develop the disrespectful, predatory ideas they do toward women... how being a sexual Machiavellian and predator becomes okay in their mental landscape. I can see them in their habit, with their "girls as sex objects" threads and sexist dating guides, sexual Machiavellian win-at-all cost codes, and view of being cheated in an unfair game. The guys who really take to these guides and who enjoy the misogynist, woman-belittling attitude, who continue to strike out with women in adulthood, they are the ones who turn into the abusive sexual harassers when they are old.

Wow. That's why I've been here, on WP. Sometimes it takes a while for me to figure out why I have to do something, why my systemizing was making me do something obsessively... usually I figure out the why out when I've accomplished what my subconscious was pushing me to do it for.

I've learned what I needed to learn. I can go back to work now because I get the "Sexual Harasser ToM" and can handle them now.