When It Comes To Dating, Which "Experience" Are You?
Alright, first of all, I'll come right out with it.
You already know I consider "just be yourself" to be perhaps the most dangerous and certainly the most generic bit of attraction advice I've ever heard.
And with that bit of housekeeping behind us, I'm going to suggest that you instead avoid trying to be someone you are not.
At first glance, I'm sure that comes off as simply a semantic variation upon the same worn out "just be yourself" cliché.
Kind of like the "mirror image" of it or something.
And were it such, it would be a throwaway.
I agree.
Except there's this issue that keeps nagging away at me.
As much as I want to change things, "stop trying to be someone you are not" is absolutely the most elegant possible utterance of an undeniable truth.
A truth that many of us willingly and defiantly ignore.
And that's keeping us from greatness with the opposite gender.
So, in the interest of getting your attention, today I'm going to illustrate what this truism entails in a way you may have not heard before.
After all, it's typical of dating advice clichés that they be delivered in a decidedly "hit and run" manner.
Elaboration in any shape or form is practically unheard of.
Consider this example:
This whole business of what "type" we like.
We talk about that a lot, huh?But have you ever stopped to consider what "type" YOU are? And here's an even deeper question:Are you YOUR OWN TYPE?If you've ever found time to ruminate upon this subject, then you may have some idea of how you tend to be categorized by MOTOS (Members Of The Opposite Sex).
And here's the money question:Are you okay with that? See, it's like this.
Most of us, unless we've signed an NBA contract and are penciled in for a future episode of MTV "Cribs", probably have one car.
In order to get that car (or is it a truck?), you went shopping.
My guess is that you knew up front whether you were going after a four wheel drive SUV or a 2-seater sports car.
Yeah, maybe in real life it was a minivan or an econobox, but for the sake of decorum here lets stay on point here.
If you need an SUV, the 2-seater won't cut it.
But if you want the wind in your hair and autocross trophies, a foot and a half of ground clearance and a tailgate is not the hot setup.
So if you are SUV hunting, you've got lots of options.
Most of us in that position would rather land a Hummer H2 in our garage than a Kia Sportage or a Jeep Compass (which I wouldn't personally wish upon anyone).
Sports car guy?It's the Porsche GT3 over that new Saturn lawn-mower wannabee.
(Does that thing even take real gasoline?)But the Ferrari F50...
yeah, well.
That's what I call "never settling".
Many options of varying degrees of quality-all easily categorized under their appropriate "type".
I once saw a Hummer commercial that exhorted me to "Experience The H2".
Poetically, all that is entailed with piloting a Ferrari was long ago coined "The Italian Experience".
So which "Experience" are you? Some great women are what I call the "Redhead Experience".
Others are the "Exotic Experience".
Still others the "Girl Next Door Experience".
Some are the "Tomboy Experience".
The list goes on.
Some guys are the "Clean Cut Jock Experience".
Others are the "Artistic Poet Experience".
Some are the "Executive Experience".
Etcetera.
Where the rubber meets the road here there's an ironic truth.
We can CHOOSE which type we LIKE when it comes to MOTOS.
If that's related to sports cars, we can also then go out and DESERVE the F50 over the '91 Mercury Capri (Ha...
remember those?).
But when it comes to ourselves, let's face it...
there's a "type" that we almost always fall naturally into.
That's how others "experience" us as individuals.
And we aren't always our own "type".
So we try to change the "experience".
And that can backfire.
Emily happened to flip the channels a couple of months ago while cooking dinner.
From the other room, all I heard was "OMG...
why is this kid wearing BLACK NAIL POLISH?"That's was pretty much my introduction to "The Pickup Artist" on VH-1.
Indeed.
The "kid" should have thought twice about the black nail polish.
Not his "experience".
Then again, were I to try and dress up like Sean Connery's James Bond later tonight, I'd probably more likely be assumed to be going as Alex Keaton from "Family Ties".
It's all about the "experience".
Ladies, tell the media to "stick it" and avoid the "Blonde Experience" or the "Supermodel Experience" if you are the "Brown Eyed Girl Next Door Experience".
Trust us when we as guys tell you (or at least a solid percentage of guys tell you) that we're fine with your "type"...
even if YOU AREN'T.
Yeah, we may kick tires on SUVs, sports cars and maybe even a three-quarter ton pickup truck when the mood strikes us.
But ultimately, after all the test drives, we're only going to be parking one such shiny object in our respective garages.
Who knows, we may have been somewhat drawn to the "Blonde Experience" or the "Supermodel Experience" at first.
But maybe her tank always seemed to be on "E", or we read a consumer report that told us the electrical systems tended to fritz out.
But I'll tell you,when we meet the "Brown Eyed Girl Next Door Experience" in her ultimate iteration, that could stop us dead in our tracks.
You know, she's the one who DESERVES WHAT SHE WANTS.
At that point, all of us who are shopping on that lot will know we're dealing with the Ferrarri F-40 of her type, instead of the Mercuri Capri with the Earl Scheib paint job.
Meanwhile, I'll be over here...
at peace with the fact that I can't fake "Cary Grant", but that plenty of women (including "Brown Eyed Girl Next Door Experience", F-40 such that she is over in the next room) are all about The "Alex Keaton Experience".
So, I'm cool with that.
I stopped fighting what I can't control years ago in favor of being the best damn version of my "type" possible instead of a poor man's version of some other guy.
Perhaps not coincidentally, I always loved how a four-door Audi RS4 (read: "station wagon") can smoke a Corvette.
Whatever your "experience", go with it instead of fighting it.
Then become the ultimate version of it.
Just somebody get my Mother-In-Law to stop pinching my cheeks, will you?
You already know I consider "just be yourself" to be perhaps the most dangerous and certainly the most generic bit of attraction advice I've ever heard.
And with that bit of housekeeping behind us, I'm going to suggest that you instead avoid trying to be someone you are not.
At first glance, I'm sure that comes off as simply a semantic variation upon the same worn out "just be yourself" cliché.
Kind of like the "mirror image" of it or something.
And were it such, it would be a throwaway.
I agree.
Except there's this issue that keeps nagging away at me.
As much as I want to change things, "stop trying to be someone you are not" is absolutely the most elegant possible utterance of an undeniable truth.
A truth that many of us willingly and defiantly ignore.
And that's keeping us from greatness with the opposite gender.
So, in the interest of getting your attention, today I'm going to illustrate what this truism entails in a way you may have not heard before.
After all, it's typical of dating advice clichés that they be delivered in a decidedly "hit and run" manner.
Elaboration in any shape or form is practically unheard of.
Consider this example:
Person A:"I just met someone great, but not my type at all.Conveniently, "Person A" above has provided me with just the segue I need to stay on-task.
" Person B:"Well, you can't choose who you fall in love with.
" Person A:"What does that mean?" Person B:"You know...
you can't choose who you fall in love with.
" Person A:"How do you know that? Person B:[changes subject to the Red Sox and/or Kobe Bryant]
This whole business of what "type" we like.
We talk about that a lot, huh?But have you ever stopped to consider what "type" YOU are? And here's an even deeper question:Are you YOUR OWN TYPE?If you've ever found time to ruminate upon this subject, then you may have some idea of how you tend to be categorized by MOTOS (Members Of The Opposite Sex).
And here's the money question:Are you okay with that? See, it's like this.
Most of us, unless we've signed an NBA contract and are penciled in for a future episode of MTV "Cribs", probably have one car.
In order to get that car (or is it a truck?), you went shopping.
My guess is that you knew up front whether you were going after a four wheel drive SUV or a 2-seater sports car.
Yeah, maybe in real life it was a minivan or an econobox, but for the sake of decorum here lets stay on point here.
If you need an SUV, the 2-seater won't cut it.
But if you want the wind in your hair and autocross trophies, a foot and a half of ground clearance and a tailgate is not the hot setup.
So if you are SUV hunting, you've got lots of options.
Most of us in that position would rather land a Hummer H2 in our garage than a Kia Sportage or a Jeep Compass (which I wouldn't personally wish upon anyone).
Sports car guy?It's the Porsche GT3 over that new Saturn lawn-mower wannabee.
(Does that thing even take real gasoline?)But the Ferrari F50...
yeah, well.
That's what I call "never settling".
Many options of varying degrees of quality-all easily categorized under their appropriate "type".
I once saw a Hummer commercial that exhorted me to "Experience The H2".
Poetically, all that is entailed with piloting a Ferrari was long ago coined "The Italian Experience".
So which "Experience" are you? Some great women are what I call the "Redhead Experience".
Others are the "Exotic Experience".
Still others the "Girl Next Door Experience".
Some are the "Tomboy Experience".
The list goes on.
Some guys are the "Clean Cut Jock Experience".
Others are the "Artistic Poet Experience".
Some are the "Executive Experience".
Etcetera.
Where the rubber meets the road here there's an ironic truth.
We can CHOOSE which type we LIKE when it comes to MOTOS.
If that's related to sports cars, we can also then go out and DESERVE the F50 over the '91 Mercury Capri (Ha...
remember those?).
But when it comes to ourselves, let's face it...
there's a "type" that we almost always fall naturally into.
That's how others "experience" us as individuals.
And we aren't always our own "type".
So we try to change the "experience".
And that can backfire.
Emily happened to flip the channels a couple of months ago while cooking dinner.
From the other room, all I heard was "OMG...
why is this kid wearing BLACK NAIL POLISH?"That's was pretty much my introduction to "The Pickup Artist" on VH-1.
Indeed.
The "kid" should have thought twice about the black nail polish.
Not his "experience".
Then again, were I to try and dress up like Sean Connery's James Bond later tonight, I'd probably more likely be assumed to be going as Alex Keaton from "Family Ties".
It's all about the "experience".
Ladies, tell the media to "stick it" and avoid the "Blonde Experience" or the "Supermodel Experience" if you are the "Brown Eyed Girl Next Door Experience".
Trust us when we as guys tell you (or at least a solid percentage of guys tell you) that we're fine with your "type"...
even if YOU AREN'T.
Yeah, we may kick tires on SUVs, sports cars and maybe even a three-quarter ton pickup truck when the mood strikes us.
But ultimately, after all the test drives, we're only going to be parking one such shiny object in our respective garages.
Who knows, we may have been somewhat drawn to the "Blonde Experience" or the "Supermodel Experience" at first.
But maybe her tank always seemed to be on "E", or we read a consumer report that told us the electrical systems tended to fritz out.
But I'll tell you,when we meet the "Brown Eyed Girl Next Door Experience" in her ultimate iteration, that could stop us dead in our tracks.
You know, she's the one who DESERVES WHAT SHE WANTS.
At that point, all of us who are shopping on that lot will know we're dealing with the Ferrarri F-40 of her type, instead of the Mercuri Capri with the Earl Scheib paint job.
Meanwhile, I'll be over here...
at peace with the fact that I can't fake "Cary Grant", but that plenty of women (including "Brown Eyed Girl Next Door Experience", F-40 such that she is over in the next room) are all about The "Alex Keaton Experience".
So, I'm cool with that.
I stopped fighting what I can't control years ago in favor of being the best damn version of my "type" possible instead of a poor man's version of some other guy.
Perhaps not coincidentally, I always loved how a four-door Audi RS4 (read: "station wagon") can smoke a Corvette.
Whatever your "experience", go with it instead of fighting it.
Then become the ultimate version of it.
Just somebody get my Mother-In-Law to stop pinching my cheeks, will you?
Source...