Do not underestimate how important it is to maintain clarity about what you want in life and what you’re willing to tolerate in terms of the way other people interact with you. Many men fall into the trap of suppressing their own wants and boundaries in an attempt to please others, especially women they find attractive. They mistakenly believe that by deferring to a woman they find attractive and accepting disrespectful treatment without complaint they will win her affection.
Answer the following questions honestly to gauge the strength of your frame of mind for dating.
Check Your Frame
You approach an attractive woman at a party and begin chatting. She teases you with some comment to the effect that you are too old/young/short/tall/cool/uncool/etc. for her to consider dating you. How do you respond:
Apologise and walk away.
Accept her statement and try to justify why this is not really the case.
Carry on the conversation without acknowledging or showing any concern for her comment
Playfully accept her comment and and agree and exaggerate it to the point of absurdity (i.e. flirt based on the comment).
When asking someone on a date, do you:
Ask if she’d like to go on a date some time?
Negotiate a date and time and ask her where she’d like to go?
Negotiate a date and time and offer her the choice of a couple of venues?
Negotiate a date and time to go to the venue of your choosing?
You’ve been dating for a few weeks and your girlfriend asks what you’d like to do next weekend. What’s your answer?
I don’t mind. What would you like to do?
Let’s play it by ear.
List a few things you want to do, and let her know that once that’s done you can make time if there’s something else she particularly wants to do with you.
Tell her the plans you have already made.
Your best mates have invited you to a barbecue next Saturday afternoon. It’s a “boys only” affair to catch up without wives and girlfriends. You’ve recently become exclusive with a new girlfriend and have seen her every weekend for the past few weeks. Do you:
Let your mates know that you have a new girlfriend and need to check if she’s OK with you not spending Saturday with her?
Let your mates know that you might come a bit later or leave early because you need to spend time with your girlfriend?
Tell your girlfriend that you have plans to catch up with your mates and won’t be able to see her on Saturday afternoon/evening?
No need to say anything. I’m going to the barbecue.
When you tell your girlfriend that you’re going to your mate’s barbecue without her, she acts visibly disappointed that you’re choosing to spend time with your mates instead of with her. Do you:
Apologise, explain that you didn’t mean to upset her and tell her you’ll cancel on your mates and spend time with her instead?
Apologise and suggest you can leave the barbecue early to do something with her?
Let her know that your friends are important to you, that you’ve been neglecting them recently and you really want to catch up with them?
Ignore her behaviour, you recognise that she is either being unreasonable or testing your resolve. Either way, it won’t affect your decision.
You’re about to meet a woman for a second date. She appears to be everything you’ve dreamed of in a girlfriend. It’s already 20 minutes past your agreed time to meet. What do you do?
Keep waiting patiently. You know she’s worth it!
Send her a message to ask if she’s OK.
Call her to let her know that you have other time commitments and ask her in future to respect your time by letting you know in advance if she is running late.
Message her to let her know that you’ve waited long enough and are getting on with your day.
When you make contact with her after she failed to turn up for the date she offers a vague explanation to the effect of “I just lost track of time and forgot what time we were meeting”. How do you respond?
Don’t worry about! When should we meet again?
That’s OK. How are you going to make it up to me?
Let her know that you consider courtesy and respect for people’s time to be essential to a healthy relationship. Decide whether to pursue another date with her according to whether she considers your expectation fair and reasonable.
That’s too bad. It’s clearly not going to work between us. Goodbye.
To calculate your score, tally up the number of 1,2,3 and 4 responses, and then apply the following multipliers:
1: x -2
2: x -1
3: x 1
4: x 2
Doormat
You are so focused on pleasing others that you never assert your own will or prioritise your own needs. Other people view you as powerless and take you for granted.
“Nice Guy”
You frequently compromise your own priorities and values in an attempt to gain favour with women.
Self-assured
You maintain firm boundaries yet remain mindful of the need for balance within the context of a relationship. Other people respect you for consistently asserting reasonable boundaries whilst being considerate of the needs of others.
Self-absorbed
Your blind commitment to your own priorities makes you inflexible toward the wants and needs of prospective partners. Others may fear your lack of tolerance or consider you to be self-centred.
How did you score?
For most men, the ideal range to aim for is the “Self-Assured” category. This suggests a strong frame of mind that honours your values and priorities, whilst allowing sufficient flexibility to create and maintain a harmonious relationship with someone who respects your values.
Each of the scenarios in the test above represents a common way in which women tend to test men. This phenomenon, commonly referred to as “shit testing”, is widely regarded as a subconscious mechanism women use to quickly gauge whether a man is truly as confident as he appears. During an initial encounter such as strangers meeting in a social setting, women who experience many approaches from men will often behave coldly towards any man who approaches as a way of quickly deterring those who lack the self-confidence to ignore the frosty response and proceed to establish rapport. Within the context of a more established relationship, a woman starting to doubt her partner’s confidence and commitment to his own purpose and values might complain about him prioritising his needs to test how readily he concedes.
The popular theory behind this behaviour is that a man who lacks the backbone to maintain commitment to his own values when challenged by his girlfriend is unlikely to have the strength to stand up for her in the face of an actual threat. This theory serves as a useful model because it provides an effective guide to how to respond to such tests. If you interpret the test as a woman indirectly expressing doubt as to whether you possess authentic self-confidence and whether she can count on you when the going gets tough, it is fairly easy to predict the outcome of your response.
Men who falter in the face of such tests are signalling that they are unsure of themselves, and will generally find it much more difficult to build attraction, or in the case of an established relationship, will likely undermine respect and attraction thereby weakening that relationship. On the other hand, men who stay true to their own priorities and gracefully deflect the test tend to reinforce attraction.
If you experience frequent tests, it likely suggests that either your partner is insecure about your relationship, or that your actions and words lack a sense of confidence and certainty. Consider your values and priorities and give some thought to how concisely you honour them in your day-to-day planning and decision-making. Above all, remember to put your own priorities first. That’s not to say you should never prioritise your partner’s needs over your own, but rather a reminder that you are the only person responsible for satisfying your personal needs, and a man who can take care of himself as well as his partner is much more attractive than a man who neglects himself.