Women Aren’t Going to Bars to Meet Guys Anymore

Guys, they’ve caught on. Either that or we’ve blown it too many times and have now ruined our chances of possibly finding a potential mate at a bar. Yes, the current statistics do state that less than 5% of relationships today originate from an encounter at a bar or nightclub. But that hasn’t always been the case. There are plenty of friends’ parents I know that met at a bar. They never said that it was the only way to meet people but it was a lot easier to then. You could definitely just approach “strange” people with much less pressure. I feel like the 50s, 60s and 70s were such a more social time than now, even though we have more social outlets at our fingertips today. So what’s the problem? Why are women averse to meeting guys in bars now? Well there are plenty of reasons but I’ll talk about a one particular aspect.

The dating world has changed dramatically. My dad had my sister at 28. My mum was 25. There are so many more factors today say why that will most likely not happen to me. I can mention the evolution of gender and racial equality, education and the economy to name a few. Nowadays, the concept of hooking up is widely accepted. On the other side, it can be stated that the progression of maturity is slower these days. In other words, the idea of “growing up” no longer includes having a spouse, kids and a home. Other people can say people are more selfish now because of our access to more information and opportunities. I could just keep going but I’ll just put out what I think the dating world looks like right now, by perspective of age.

Ages 13-21: Craziness. I hate to drop the starting age so low because I wasn’t even thinking about sex at that age but with stories in the news of teachers catching younger kids performing sexual acts on one another and quicker sexual development of kids these days, it’s just no longer surprising that kids would be thinking about sex that soon. The media has a lot to do with it as well.

At this age, boys and girls are just figuring out “what this does” and “how do I use this” and “I can do that?” kind of stuff. At a certain point, sex is all they want and they can’t get enough because it’s a novelty. Having sex is seen as a trend then anything else. “Everyone’s doing it.”

Ages 21-25: Casual relationships. At this point, you’re done with undergrad and now starting a new chapter in your life. You have no idea what’s going to happen and nowadays, that’s a great thing because you’re not committed to anything or anyone. At the same time, you still have NO clue who you are (or at least who you will be). In this stage, hooking up becomes the more acceptable thing. Commitment just isn’t realistic for most, maybe because of work or a lifestyle choice. People don’t want to be tied down at this time and they figure they can still party like they used to in college…but in the real world. They can worry about the committed stuff later.

Ages 25-30: More exclusive dating and relationships. Reality sets in and you realize that you can’t be partying and hooking up like this for the rest of your life and wouldn’t mind getting into something a little more “routine.” So you start to be more conscious of whom you’re going out with and if the right person comes along and you two have a good few dates, you may put yourself in a relationship. Those relationships can last for years or months, depending on where you are in your life. You’ll go through phases of loving your relationship or missing being on the market but you avert your thoughts because you think you’re on the right track. In between relationships, you’re back to your hooking up phase, catch yourself doing it, stop and get back into your relationship-seeking mode. It’s a sucky cycle and these are the years where you REALLY figure out what you want, as frustrating as it may be.

Ages 30 and up. Commitment. This is where you realize that you’re 30 and would like to start a family soon. Women would consider their “clock” starting to tick a little louder around this time. Pursuit is a little more aggressive as more effort is put into finding the potential spouse and provider/protector of your children because you feel pretty convinced that you know what you want.

Obviously these are general statements and don’t apply to everyone because of special circumstances but this is how I see the dating world now. This is the only dating world I know. I’ve had plenty of conversations with my parents and my friends’ parents about this. There are so many choices today and people are quick to put aside things for more selfish reasons because of this accessibility. Would you agree? Disagree? Let’s talk about this.

So if you’re asking me, “if I can’t meet women in bars anymore, where can I meet them?” I’ll have the answer for you tomorrow.

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Lesson for the weekend:

"Actions will ALWAYS speak louder than words - no matter how good your words are."

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Giving and Taking: The Win/Win or No Deal Philosophy of Relationships

This is the last part of a series that I have been doing about the different paradigms of human interaction and relationships.

These paradigms are based on Stephen Covey’s book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Here are the other parts of the series.

Win/Win
Win/Lose
Lose/Win
Lose/Lose
Win
Win/Win or No Deal

We are going to end with the Win/Win or No Deal philosophy.

“I only want to go for Win/Win. I want to win, and I want you to win. I wouldn’t want to get my way and have you not feel good about it, because downstream it would eventually surface and create a withdrawal. On the other hand, I don’t think you would feel good if you got your way and I gave in. So let’s work for a Win/Win. Let’s really hammer it out. And if we can’t find it, then let’s agree that we won’t make a deal at all. It would be better not to deal than to live with a decision that wasn’t right for us both. Then maybe another time we might be able to get together.”

The whole concept of Win/Win or No Deal is usually best applied to business relationships but in the kind of reality you’d like to create, anything less than Win/Win is not going to be beneficial to long-term relationships. What is hard in relationships is being able to accept the No Deal, because we confuse that as Lose/Lose. Being able to have this mentality requires a very high level of maturity, understanding and a great deal of listening and communication skills.

If you get a grasp on this, you will achieve such a level of emotional freedom and avoid so many conflicts down the road. This mentality also can be applied to the beginning stages of any relationship to give you the same emotional freedom and make you no longer needy.

Using the elements of Win/Win, if you can’t come to a good resolution, you should be able to accept No Deal and find an alternative. While great at the beginning of a relationship, it becomes harder and harder to accept a No Deal, especially when more feelings and emotional investment are involved. This is where compromise comes in. While compromise – which can be considered a secondary level of Win/Win – may appear to be Win/Win, it tends to end up being Win/Lose or Lose/Win in reality.

Of course, there will be times in a relationship when No Deal cannot work. For example, if she REALLY needs you for something and it could be very inconvenient for you but you know what? You have to do it, because you care for her and want her to be happy. Instead of thinking about how inconvenient it is and how that negative thinking makes you unhappy, reframe it and think about how happy she’ll be, how much fun you MAY have and how she’ll reward you down the road. Keeping that frame of mind will not make situations seem terrible, because in hindsight, it’s not.

Plus, you care about her, right? Part of that is being able to do selfless acts for the greater good.

If you haven’t realized by now, obviously all of these philosophies are not set in stone and there is some leeway, as many other things in life – but it requires maturity, integrity and self-control to acknowledge the give some things have.

In the end, this whole Giving & Taking series is all about knowing how the pieces fit in a relationship. You have to know what and how much you are willing to give to your significant other and what you are ready to accept from her. It’s about sacrifice. It’s about understanding. It’s about making time. It’s about giving yourself. It’s about learning. It’s about growing together. It’s about disagreements. It’s about resolution. It’s about…everything.

I write those things and I think of my girlfriend. She embodies everything that I want in a woman and the best part is that I feel more like myself at this time more than any time in the past few years. She is growing to become more than just something to me. She’s becoming everything to me. And as I wrote this series, she was always in the back of my mind, wondering about how well we do together. She’s amazing and although it’s still early, I hope you guys (and girls) can read this, possibly learn something (I’ve learned a lot writing this) and you can find something even remotely close to what I have now because let me tell you something.

It’s incredible.

This caps the Giving & Taking series here at Project Infinity. I would love to hear feedback, questions and comments you may have. If you’d like to contact me, feel free to send me an email.

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Giving and Taking: The Win Philosophy of Relationships

This is a part of a new series that I am doing about the different paradigms of human interaction.

These paradigms are based on Stephen Covey’s book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. So far we have done,

Win/Win
Win/Lose
Lose/Win
Lose/Lose
Win
Win/Win or No Deal

Today we are talking about the Win philosophy.

“People with the Win mentality don’t necessarily want someone else to lose. That’s irrelevant. What matters is that they get what they want.”

This is more of an interesting mentality because it’s easier to use when there isn’t any contest or competition but in relationships, how can this even work?

Well, it’s not really something you see used in relationships because there is always a level of consideration of the other person, whether fully or not at all. Win is more of an independent mentality. As long as I get mine, that’s all that matters. Everyone else can fend for themselves.

Wait, I take that back. There are times when the Win mentality is used in a relationship. As a man, one of your responsibilities is to be able to physically protect your mate and make sure she is safe. If she is in danger, you are going to do whatever it takes to make sure she is safe and secure. There isn’t a win or lose for you and everyone else’s fate doesn’t necessarily matter to you. Your girl is the priority.

Use that example – which is actually a rare but not extreme one – to think about other times when you place yourself and others out of the equation because your girl takes precedence.

Just keep in mind that sacrificing yourself for your girl doesn’t automatically make it just Win. The key difference between Win and Win/Lose is that with Win, you’re not worried about how that win affects others. With Win/Lose, even if it includes you, you ARE worried about how that win affects others (or you).

See the difference? Confused? Ask questions. We’ll wrap up this series tomorrow with the Win/Win or No Deal.

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Giving and Taking: The Lose/Lose Philosophy of Relationships

This is a part of a new series that I am doing about the different paradigms of human interaction.

These paradigms are based on Stephen Covey’s book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. So far we have done,

Win/Win
Win/Lose
Lose/Win
Lose/Lose
Win
Win/Win or No Deal

Today we are talking about the Lose/Lose philosophy.

“When two determined, stubborn, ego-invested individuals interact, the result will be Lose/Lose. Both will lose. Both will become vindictive and want to “get back” or “get even,” blind to the fact that murder is suicide, that revenge is a two-edged sword.”

Here, when you are so focused on making sure that the other person lose that you don’t even care if it affects you, both parties will lose. This philosophy is one that used in revenge, war and serious conflicts. In relationships, of all of the mentalities to have, this is the one you want the least.

A hard situation you may come across in a relationship is when your significant other is miserable. Maybe something happened to them that made them really unhappy. He or she may be so miserable or angry that they don’t care about anyone else’s happiness because they would rather wallow in their own misery – or even worse, make people feel the same misery that they do. Depending on the circumstance, that can be a sign of dependency and lack to inner guidance. They may need the failure or misery of others in order to make them feel better (remember, it all depends on the circumstance. I would hope that you can use your better judgement to realize what circumstances may make this situation different).

You can’t let that happen. You stick to your mentality and try to help them bounce back. If they respond negatively – either to try to bring you down with them, doesn’t want you around or if they just don’t want to hear it – then maybe the best thing to do is to give him or her space and have him or her gather her thoughts properly, assuring them that you are there for them. The last thing you want to do is keep this Lose/Lose mentality for any period of time in a relationship.

Needless to say, it’s very detrimental to the future to you two staying together.

Four down, two to go. Let me know your thoughts about this series and how it could possibly be better to help you.

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Giving and Taking: The Lose/Win Philosophy of Relationships

This is a part of a new series that I am doing about the different paradigms of human interaction.

These paradigms are based on Stephen Covey’s book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. So far we have done,

Win/Win
Win/Lose
Lose/Win
Lose/Lose
Win
Win/Win or No Deal

Today we are talking about the Lose/Win philosophy.

“Win/Lose has no standards – no demands, no expectations, no vision. People who think Lose/Win are usually quick to please or appease. They seek strength from popularity or acceptance. They have little courage to express their own feelings and convictions and are easily intimidated by the ego strength of others.”

This is the opposite of Win/Lose, obviously, instead of showing selfishness, you are showing selflessness – but on an extreme. The Lose/Win mentality is the one that lets people take advantage of you. You avoid confrontation and just let things happen because you want to preserve the peace as much as possible, it much as may hurt you, in the long run.

You know who loves these people? Obviously, it’s the people with the Win/Lose mentality. They feed off of you just to boost their egos, have the upper hand, and take advantage of you to get what they want. And you know what Lose/Win people do? They give in. They give up.

So let’s see here, how can I put this in a way that can drive it home really well?

Lose/Win guys are the “nice guys that finish last.”

In relationships, the Lose/Win will do whatever it takes to prevent fights and please his or her mate. He will sacrifice his identity for the sake of the relationship. It’s probably one of the worst mentalities to have in a relationship. And it’s not just because you give up all the time. It goes much deeper than that.

By letting this go, not expressing their feelings and allowing themselves to get taken advantage of, Lose/Win people hold EVERYTHING inside. You can’t possibly think these feelings won’t resurface later on, right? They may come back in the relationship as a total lashing out against your significant other. It can come back as an internal beatdown. It’ll crush your self-esteem and completely lower your sense of self-worth not just to your mate but also to the world around you. Your relationships will deteriorate to nothing if you just accept the Lose/Win mentality. People will take so much from you that there will be nothing left to take from you.

Both Win/Lose and Lose/Win mentalities drive themselves from personal insecurities created from past events and it’s so easy to go between the two. The perfect example given in the book goes something like this.

The Win/Lose starts as selfishness and inconsideration then goes into guilt and loss of courage as Lose/Win then frustration and anger sets in and in a fit of rage, a more aggressive Win/Lose mentality kicks in. Either mentality will not be good for a long-term relationship.

In the end, you have to battle your inner demons and resolve issues of the past in order to clear your mind and be truly ready to embrace the Win/Win mentality.

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Giving and Taking: The Win/Lose Philosophy of Relationships

This is a part of a new series that I am doing about the different paradigms of human interaction in relationships.

These paradigms are based on Stephen Covey’s book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. So far we have done,

Win/Win
Win/Lose
Lose/Win
Lose/Lose
Win
Win/Win or No Deal

Today we are talking about the Win/Lose philosophy.

“Win/Lose is the authoritarian approach: ‘I get my way; you don’t get yours.’ Win/Lose people are prone to use position, power, credentials, possessions, or personality to their way.”

Most people feel as though they are in that kind of relationship already so they inherently have that mentality most of the time. It’s a very common mentality to have since we are raised from birth to compete with everyone and everything. Even in some of our families, you may have had to compete with your siblings for the attention of your parents.

In school, you were given a grade because you were compared to other students in the class. The “A” was the benchmark and if you got anything less than that, you practically was told, “you’re not as good as this student.”

At work, you may be competing to meet numbers so you can get a bonus. Not everyone can make those numbers. So while some of your co-workers are splurging on an island Christmas vacation, you’re wondering what he did to meet the numbers and how come you can't get a bonus.

You lose.

The idea of being conditionally rewarded in a relationship is a difficult topic. From the intial approach, you have to earn the trust and love of your significant other. If you do certain things, you will slowly gain the trust of your mate. But here lies the difference. If you are constantly being tested and reward for your actions - several months, years down the rad - then you are still in that Win/Lose dynamic. Eventually, you will want to get into a Win/Win dynamic. This is where conflict occurs.

The reason why is because by taking the Win/Lose method, you are deeming someone invaluable or lovable. As a result, he or she will have to constantly validate him or herself with their actions and never feel secure with internal validations from you.

Make sense?

I remember my ex-girlfriend – God bless her soul – was the embodiment of the Win/Lose mentality. If she didn’t get her way, it would be hell for everyone, even for those who cared about her. I realized that it wasn’t her fault. How she was raised and the kind of environment that she grew up in caused her to be that way. In the end, it wasn’t healthy for me in the long run, no matter how much I wanted to be with her at the time. You can’t approach a relationship with a Win/Win attitude and expect someone to change from his/her Win/Lose habits. Just doesn’t work like that. It takes communication, patience and consideration – if you think it’s worth it. I would constantly push to make her happy because I didn’t want to see her in any emotional pain. In the end, I was on the losing side more often than not.

We’ll get into that tomorrow.

Obviously there is a time and place for Win/Lose situations in life, such as sports, law, perhaps, and video games. Never in a relationship. Basically you are saying that you have a low level of trust for that person and isn’t trust one of the pillars that keeps a relationship intact long-term?

I make sure I let my girlfriend know that I am in it for Win/Win all the time. When we both have that approach, it makes it so much easier to work together to make us both happy. That's why it's important to be a good team in your relationship.

Competition is healthy in a relationship if you are making your significant other a better person and it doesn’t affect him or her negatively. But don’t use it to gain an upper hand or unnecessary leverage over someone you supposedly care about.

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Giving and Taking Series Introduction

This is a new series I'm starting and I’d like to thank my girlfriend for giving me the idea.

I think this is a great topic when it comes to building and maintaining relationships, especially with those you care about.

We all have had this thought that goes through our minds when it comes to how much we should give and how much we should take, preventing being a taken advantage of or being the one taking advantage.

Then on the flipside, disagreements or conflicts of interests can happen and there needs to be an appropriate resolution to move the relationship forward.

And yes, I do mean sometimes, doing things that we may not want to do necessarily. But I do believe that there is a good way to go about it where you won’t actually be in a position where you’ll be doing something you don’t want to do. It’ll require an open mind and a genuine interest in the other person.

Are you ready?

Here is the analogy that I am going to use. For this, I am going to thank Stephen Covey and his book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. A great read it you want to learn about making your life and the relationships you have more efficient and more fulfilling.

In learning how to become more interdependent and taking on a bigger leadership role in my industry, my life and other’s lives, through this book, I learned the Six Paradigms of Human Interaction. Here they are:

Win/Win
Win/Lose
Lose/Win
Lose/Lose
Win
Win/Win or No Deal

I am going to talk about each paradigm, the frame of mind that is necessary in order to get the result and why each one is good or bad to have in a relationship. I am very excited about this one as well.

Tomorrow, we will start with the best one, Win/Win and how it’s possible to get that result more times than you think, without compromising anyone’s value in the relationship.

So while you look forward to that beginning tomorrow, I am still going to share with you some content with you.

You can check out my TSBMagazine segment Ask Your Wingman where last week I answered some interesting questions and talked about things going on in my second job.

My consulting company, The Professional Wingman has been updated with services specifically designed for men and women and I also have a media page where you can see some panels that I have been on where I give some good stuff.

This past Friday I tried out giving away free Twitter consultation regarding dating and lifestyle. Judging by the response, it was a huge success! Thank you for all of the feedback and I believe it will be a nice weekly thing.

Also, I would like to get back on the live tip. Something that I am going to try is having a live forum jam on Friday at 6 PM on UStream. It will be mostly open forum where you can ask me any question you’d like about dating, lifestyle and fashion. To guarantee some structure to this jam, I will talk about approach anxiety and give you some free tips that you can use that night when you go out!

I’m pumped about this and I hope you are too. Just trying my best to give you all what you need!

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Elements of Communication: Element #2: Giving Space & Trust

I wrote this article in early January and it a response post. I loved this article and I wanted to add it to the Elements of Communication series. Here is the first one:

Element #1: Having an Opinion

And here is the article explaining Element #2: Giving Space & Trust

This is a follow-up post to lisaq’s post on 20-forty answering the question, “is it okay to go out with the girls or should couples always go out together?” You should read her post.

When I read this post, it brought me back to so many moments when that issue came up in my previous relationships. Whenever my girl would want to go out without me, there were so many different things that went on in my mind.

“Why does she want to go out somewhere without me? “

“What’s wrong with me that makes her not want me there?”

“I wonder what’s she is going to be doing since I’m not around. Actually, I wonder what her friends will make/let her do with me not there.”

Then the usual sequence of ideas goes from that to wondering what drunk idiots will do when they see my girl with her friends, without her man. And then what she would do. Needless to say, it would cause a lot of problems in my relationships. What I would confuse for showing how much I care and don’t want anything bad to happen to her was actually showing a lack of trust in her, her friends and most importantly, insecurities about myself.

Never again.

I think it’s important that we talk more about relationships, as it is very important not only to gain one but also to maintain a very healthy one. This is one issue that proves to be a deal-breaker. If you haven’t read my post about fulfilling a woman’s emotional needs, I highly suggest you give it a good read. By far, one of my best.

In any relationship, it is important to establish two important things – trust and space. Yeah, trust is a given but it’s so easy to give off the feeling that you don’t trust her inadvertently. That whole “not trusting the drunk guys out there” thing is a lame excuse (just like Lisa said). If you really trust her, you’ll also trust the fact that she’ll know how to handle those drunk men. And what if she gets drunk herself? If you have to worry about her actions being different when she’s drunk, then that is something that you will have to confront her with, but ONLY if you have seen or heard that she does things while drunk that can be questionable.

On the same note, I feel as though trust can be related to space. Most people have different test levels of trust. Sure, we can trust someone we like with some personal secrets, or with some of our personal belongings, and of course, our love, but then when it comes to being separated – even if for just a few hours – it becomes a different test of trust. If you feel good about your relationship and actually trust her, I think it’s good for both of you to have other things to do in each other’s lives that don’t involve the other person. A typical example is a girls’ night or a guys’ night. But other examples may have to do with hobbies that only you enjoy.

Remember in high school when you had your girl but you played a sport and had to dedicate a crapload of time practicing and playing your sport (for me, it was football)? Your girl wasn’t around that much – unless she went to see you play at a game, but still, she couldn’t talk to you until after the game was over. With practice everyday, you she rarely had a chance to see you. But, whenever she did have that chance to be with you, you could tell she really appreciated the time with you – and vice-versa. I strongly believe that you need to find something like that and continue to hold on to a good chunk of your world as you two slowly merge them together.

When I talk about building your life, making yourself interesting and doing things that YOU love to do, once you get into a relationship, that doesn’t mean that you have to give up any of those things. Logically speaking, if you did give up those things, you wouldn’t be interesting and you certainly wouldn’t be the attractive person that your girl fell head over heels with – which is not what you want to do, right? Plus, you won't feel obligated to have to do everything with your girl if you have other activities going on in your life (I don't see anything wrong with that, just as long as it doesn't interfere with your relationship.).

So if there is anything you take from this it should be a few things.

1. Read lisaq’s blog, 20-forty.

2. Allow your girl to have nights out with her friends and without you. If she doesn’t invite you, chances are it’s a girls’ thing and be ok with it. Give her the benefit that she has nothing up her sleeve. Don’t give yourself reason to doubt if she hasn’t done that for you, already.

3. In the meantime, go and have your poker nights or your beer and wings nights with your boys.

4. Make sure that you are still having a life and doing things that you love. Remember, your whole point of wanting to be with a woman may be to actually share those things about yourself with her. Not doing those things and changing your life would be counter-productive.

I’m sure we could get deeper into this but I’ll save this for another post.

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