Nice guys finish last belief

[JohnMPhilomena]

Any woman who demands that a guy swim through shark-infested waters just to get a glass of lemonade a is a “princess” and Trouble with a capital ‘T’.

The point is that a good guy will want to do almost anything for his woman. But she also must be worthy of that. - She didn’t ask for the lemonade, he volunteered it.

Just as Christ (the bridegroom) laid down his life for the church (his bride), so a husband should be to his wife. He should be a servant to her and she should be submissive to him.

Now I know many women will object to the submissive part, but if he is truly a servant to her in love, then she must be submissive to his leadership of the family.

John

 

[EvelynEVF]

I think it’s a lot easier to be submissive to a man who is clearly a leader, meaning that he takes responsibility for the family’s well-being.

One of the non-abusive but still difficult elements of my failed marriage was that I had to handle all the money, all the maintenance and repairs, all the scheduling, all the childrearing, and yet I was expected to be submissive to his whims and preferences.

I had a very heavy load of responsibility to carry and no extra strength to invest in a one-sided relationship. I couldn’t win, and frankly neither could he.

I don’t want to be dominated, as someone put it earlier, but I wanted to be provided for and protected, so that I have the ability to respond in love. Him doing his “job” frees me up to do mine, and of course it works in the opposite direction, too.

 

[The_Bucket]

I think it’s a lot easier to be submissive to a man who is clearly a leader, meaning that he takes responsibility for the family’s well-being.

One of the non-abusive but still difficult elements of my failed marriage was that I had to handle all the money, all the maintenance and repairs, all the scheduling, all the childrearing, and yet I was expected to be submissive to his whims and preferences.

I had a very heavy load of responsibility to carry and no extra strength to invest in a one-sided relationship. I couldn’t win, and frankly neither could he.

I don’t want to be dominated, as someone put it earlier, but I wanted to be provided for and protected, so that I have the ability to respond in love. Him doing his “job” frees me up to do mine, and of course it works in the opposite direction, too.

I was the one that said dominated, and I don’t mean it in the sense of a man who is bullying or abusive. I mean exactly what you’ve said.

You want a man who will take care of you and lead you. You want to bend to his will, but you want the confidence that will is also God’s will. In a more earthy sense, you want to be taken by the wrist and pulled to new destinations… but have confidence that he will lead you towards only good things for everyone. It’s quite natural, quite basic and quite a product of our primal and quasi-civilized evolution.

How nice that such subconscious evolution dovetails exactly with the allegory of Christ. He steps out boldly in front, leads his bridegroom, the Church in new but only good directions and sacrifices his all for us. Sometimes we think don’t want to be pulled by him, so we pull back, but he only pulls ever harder and when we search the depths of our hearts, we know that’s what we really want.

See? Sometimes guys know what women are like if they evaluate the relationship between God and His Church enough! Now if only I could put it into practice and be more like Christ…

 

[kelleyclip]

The point is that a good guy will want to do almost anything for his woman. But she also must be worthy of that. - She didn’t ask for the lemonade, he volunteered it.

Just as Christ (the bridegroom) laid down his life for the church (his bride), so a husband should be to his wife. He should be a servant to her and she should be submissive to him.

I agree but know that both Jesus the Messiah and the Church work together. Yes Jesus is obviously calling the shots, but it is a team effort to reach out to people and spead the Gospel.

Now I know many women will object to the submissive part, but if he is truly a servant to her in love, then she must be submissive to his leadership of the family.

John

I understand your point that the man is the leader of the family and the wife supports his decisions, but please use a different word then “submissive”. There is a better way to describe that I’m sure. I think a married couple should do things pretty equally, as in both the man and woman wear the pants. It should be a team effort, not one or the other should be able to overide the others opinion.

abject, accommodating, acquiescent, amenable, bowing down, comformable, complying, deferential, docile, domesticated, dutiful, giving-in, humble, ingratiating, lowly, malleable, meek, menial, nonresistant, nonresisting, obedient, obeisant, obeying, obsequious, passive, patient, pliable, pliant, resigned, servile, slavish, subdued, tame, tractable, uncomplaining, unresisting, yes*, yielding

Who wants to be like that? Man or woman? Perhaps I am just one of those girls that doesn’t take orders very well, I only follow rules I choose to follow.

 

[The_Bucket]

I think deferential is probably the most apt word. My wife has an independent streak a mile wide. She lived on her own in a city a thousand miles away from home, working two jobs at Outback and Panera Bread when she decided to take a break from college. She refused any help from her parents and lived in a bad area of town as a single 19 year old. Amazing she didn’t end up dead.

Anyhow, that’s the kind of person she is and I’ll concede I’m a play it close to the vest guy. But I guess I’m bold enough sometimes, when I really get up the courage anyway, to have earned her attraction and love. Still, despite her independent streak, she now finds herself frustrated when I don’t take the lead. And I don’t mean on huge issues because I handle the finances and working, but I mean stuff like where we’ll go on vacation, what we’re doing with the kids on the weekend or even what I want for dinner! She wants me to tell her what we’re doing or what I want so she’ll do it. It’s pretty remarkable.

Now that said, if I suggest an activity or food or whatever that she doesn’t like, obviously she’s going to say something and usually I’ll go with what she wants because I didn’t have a strong opinion anyway. The way she puts it; she wants me to lead and take charge, but listen to her advice and act on it when it’s good advice, even if it means doing something I’m not first inclined to do but would be good for everyone. That seems pretty on the money to me.

 

[JohnMPhilomena]

I agree but know that both Jesus the Messiah and the Church work together. Yes Jesus is obviously calling the shots, but it is a team effort to reach out to people and spead the Gospel.

I understand your point that the man is the leader of the family and the wife supports his decisions, but please use a different word then “submissive”. There is a better way to describe that I’m sure. I think a married couple should do things pretty equally, as in both the man and woman wear the pants. It should be a team effort, not one or the other should be able to overide the others opinion.

abject, accommodating, acquiescent, amenable, bowing down, comformable, complying, deferential, docile, domesticated, dutiful, giving-in, humble, ingratiating, lowly, malleable, meek, menial, nonresistant, nonresisting, obedient, obeisant, obeying, obsequious, passive, patient, pliable, pliant, resigned, servile, slavish, subdued, tame, tractable, uncomplaining, unresisting, yes*, yielding

Who wants to be like that? Man or woman? Perhaps I am just one of those girls that doesn’t take orders very well, I only follow rules I choose to follow.

Sorry you don’t like the choice of words, but Peter chose them first. Believe me it’s not a dominance thing. It’s a love thing.

Ephesians 5:21
21 Submit yourselves to one another because of your reverence for Christ.
22 Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as to the Lord.
23 For a husband has authority over his wife in the same way that Christ has authority over the church; and Christ is himslef the Savior of the church, his body.
24 And so wives must submit themselves completely to husbands, in the same way that the church submits itself to Christ.
25 Husbands, love your wives in the same way that Christ loved the church and gave his life for it.

 

[Jay82]

I understand your point that the man is the leader of the family and the wife supports his decisions, but please use a different word then “submissive”. There is a better way to describe that I’m sure. I think a married couple should do things pretty equally, as in both the man and woman wear the pants. It should be a team effort, not one or the other should be able to overide the others opinion.

I personally like things to be as equal as possible as well. Decisions should be made collectively.

 

[JohnMPhilomena]

I personally like things to be as equal as possible as well. Decisions should be made collectively.

Yes and who am I kidding. My wife is a Type A personallity and I usually submit to her will.

We are able to resolve our differences without coming to blows.

My whole point for you ladies out there is to get someone who is willing to lay down his life for you. But you have to be able to give up some of your will too.

The two shall become one flesh.

John Marie Philomena

 

[chevalier]

I partially agree with this… I fall into the ‘alpha’ category and girls pretty much have to try for my attention/time because I am highly involved in a number of different things and have a lot of friends that I plan to spend time with throughout the week. It definitely sparks their interest in me in the beginnning. However, once they do get to spend some more time with me they find out how polite, kind, dependable, etc I am, they kind of lose any romantic interest they had and just want to be my friend. It happens a lot.

I could say the same thing, except the friends/week part. I’ve seen stuff like probably no bad boy can pull off, but the end is always the “f” word.

An interesting side note… I recently had a close female friend tell me that I have a lot of very attractive female friends (single, in a relationship, or married) which she found a bit intimidating when she first met me (and she is very good looking too). That didn’t really occur to me as ever being an issue, but I suppose it could make some girls insecure.

I can imagine why. I can certainly imagine it being intimidating from a male point of view because one would wonder how come she’s keeping all those attractive doods as friends. Other source of alarm: how she acts around those attractive friends, i.e. if she doesn’t have a blurred line between friendship and romance (competing with other doods is not as intimidating as this).

 

[The_Bucket]

A lot of decently attractive guys as friends? Those would be beta orbiters and I’d have no qualms about that. A girl with a ton of guy friends is either a tease, tomboy or very intimidating… to most guys. Once you realize that “dude, she’s just a girl” and shrug off the beta orbiters without overly demeaning them, that woman is going to automatically assume you’re alpha.

Man, looking back on it I really should have put this knowledge to good use since I wasn’t a bad looking guy! Ah well, my approach was awkward, a combination of alpha and beta (too much beta imo) and weird, but I ended up exactly where I wanted - married to a gorgeous, loving, kind and good Catholic woman who is a great wife and mother. Whatever works, right?

 

[chevalier]

A lot of decently attractive guys as friends? Those would be beta orbiters and I’d have no qualms about that. A girl with a ton of guy friends is either a tease, tomboy or very intimidating… to most guys. Once you realize that “dude, she’s just a girl” and shrug off the beta orbiters without overly demeaning them, that woman is going to automatically assume you’re alpha.

Sorry, sir, ain’t gonna work that way. Having beta orbiters = using people as objects. I don’t care if she thinks I’m beta, gamma or megaprotoalpha, if she’s vain and inconsiderate enough to do that to people… My Alphaness shall thereupon depart forthwith.

Man, looking back on it I really should have put this knowledge to good use since I wasn’t a bad looking guy! Ah well, my approach was awkward, a combination of alpha and beta (too much beta imo) and weird, but I ended up exactly where I wanted - married to a gorgeous, loving, kind and good Catholic woman who is a great wife and mother. Whatever works, right?

Depends. If it involves moral questions, I don’t care if it works or not. If it doesn’t involve morality… I will find the way or carve the way. In these matters, generally, my preference is not to drop below a certain level (of late this level is set at the highest that can be done) and if a woman won’t appreciate and return it, it will be farewell.

 

[whatevergirl]

*I don’t think nice guys finish last…but I know bitter ones do. If men grow bitter…it shows to women. Women are not ‘‘things’’…we’re human beings, and while our gender has some commonalities, of course …we are all unique thinkers, and the same man won’t appeal to all women. Commit this to memory, some of you.

And women don’t owe men something for a few dinners…or whatever. They don’t. It’s either there or it isn’t. Finding a partner for marriage can be hard, in the sense that you are (or should be) looking for someone who shares the faith…I hear that is hard to find these days, along with the other characteristics someone might be looking for…but don’t despair. There are not right or wrong people…there are people who are right for YOU. But, as long as men and women look at one another as puzzles to figure out, or a maze to travel through or a code to be cracked (grrrr)…they will find themselves alone, and bitter about it. Treat people as you would want to be treated…if a guy does this, he will attract the right woman for him. But, if he thinks he’s going to ‘‘xyz’’ and it should attract any and all women of his liking to him, he has tons to learn about human beahvior. Every woman is unique. Every woman is different. If you don’t start believing this, then you will be alone for most of your life.

I say this as a general statement, I’m not addressing any one person here.

I would also find someone close that you trust if you find yourself constantly at the short end of the dating stick, to give you a true assessment of what they think you are doing to cause this to happen. You might be enlightened to changing some things that you yourself can’t see in yourself. Just my ramblings. *

 

[The_Bucket]

Sorry, sir, ain’t gonna work that way. Having beta orbiters = using people as objects. I don’t care if she thinks I’m beta, gamma or megaprotoalpha, if she’s vain and inconsiderate enough to do that to people… My Alphaness shall thereupon depart forthwith.

I don’t think that’s necessarily true. She could very well be totally unaware of her own beauty and ability to attract hangers-on. I know for a fact that my wife fit that bill in a certain way. She had a good number of male friends who never asked her out but come to find out later that they secretly had crushes on her. She was totally unaware of it; though she WAS aware that guys she dated were “falling” for her very quickly. She found it to be really weird and I suppose that since I had similar feelings but didn’t speak about them for awhile after we started dating, that made me different in a good way. When she told me this (she didn’t bring it up until we were already engaged actually), I replied that it probably had a lot to do with her being the perfect girl, which she denied and then insisted it was because all of those guys were immature. Go figure.

Having beta orbiters doesn’t make them objects. They CHOOSE to orbit and be stuck in the friends zone while secretly pining for the girls they orbit. Should attractive women just assume all of their guy friends secretly want them and so dismiss them? Now if on the other hand they’re not actually being their friends, but just using them as a barrier to ensure the only men that approach them are the strongest and most confident well that’s a whole different story.

 

[kelleyclip]

Sorry you don’t like the choice of words, but Peter chose them first. Believe me it’s not a dominance thing. It’s a love thing.

Ephesians 5:21
21 Submit yourselves to one another because of your reverence for Christ.
22 Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as to the Lord.
23 For a husband has authority over his wife in the same way that Christ has authority over the church; and Christ is himself the Savior of the church, his body.
24 And so wives must submit themselves completely to husbands, in the same way that the church submits itself to Christ.
25 Husbands, love your wives in the same way that Christ loved the church and gave his life for it.

I think we should remember that through translation of the original texts words are changed. Perhaps Peter really did mean “submit” but perhaps that is just from the translation. Don’t get me wrong I understand Peter’s point of view and I don’t disagree with it, but I have a problem with that description in particular. We choose to love the Lord for all he has sacrificed for us, just as we choose to love our husband/wife. Submit almost gives off this attitude that you are forced into a relationship where you have no say whatsoever. Marriage is a choice, just as it is a choice to believe in God.

 

[dakotagirl]

I think that creepy “mental stalking” of women as seen on this thread is an excellent use of every man’s time. Don’t get me wrong: I adore figuring out approximately where people stand, but this is absolutely obnoxious.

For the single ladies on this thread I would just like to point out that dear feminist St. Paul’s words, paraphrased: It is better for a lady to remain single, for when she has the misfortune to be married, she must kowtow to her husband, but when she is single she has time for the things of the Lord.

 

[Nec5]

beta orbiters? What…
We’re in too deep here.

As the culture continues its decline, it’s not surprising that nice guys and nice girls have a harder time finding each other. There just aren’t many of them left.

 

[chevalier]

I don’t think nice guys finish last…but I know bitter ones do. If men grow bitter…it shows to women. Women are not ‘‘things’’…we’re human beings,

**
There is some common room there. People grow bitter precisely from being treated like things.
**
**
*

and while our gender has some commonalities, of course …we are all unique thinkers, and the same man won’t appeal to all women. Commit this to memory, some of you.

**
Appeal fills at most half the equation.

And women don’t owe men something for a few dinners…or whatever. They don’t.

**
Nope, sorry, reliance damages. If one party induces the other party to act in a particular manner in reliance on representations by the former party, the latter party is owed reliance damages.

There’s no quota of a few dinners or a single trip to wherever or a number of months of something yet else. The problem is in messages.

No one owes a relationship apart from married people (who do owe, actually), but everybody owes to everybody truthful communication (don’t have to tell everything, but what is told needs to be true and not misleading), not playing with his feelings (we owe it to everybody not to do him harm, plus, we owe it to everybody not to use him).

Therefore, I agree with you that a relationship is not owed. At the same time I couldn’t agree with any proposition (such as someone could interpret out of "don’t owe) that nothing is owed at all. We are responsible for what feelings we awaken in other people. We can’t claim it’s just their minds doing the job, if we know what we do, or if we just don’t care. Mixed signals and back-and-forths are a prime example of this… Which I know you’re firmly against because we’ve talked about it already.
**
*

Treat people as you would want to be treated…

if a guy does this, he will attract the right woman for him.*

Attraction doesn’t fill the equation either. Lots of things happen at the selection stage, where it’s not that someone isn’t attractive or appealing, but other factors decide.

As for treatment, my general idea is that if it’s too good, it will do the trick and get you friended (despite this, I do the best I can on principle anyway). I can’t even say if it makes you lose respect, or appear soft, or anything like that because it isn’t always the case (and I don’t even really know what is), but it will unfailingly get you friended (maybe if you don’t cause the person to lose nights thinking, he/she won’t notice he/she cares, or some other chemistry won’t fire?). Obviously, I may be bitter and we’re talking about subjective experience here, but can you say I don’t have a point?
**
*

I say this as a general statement, I’m not addressing any one person here.

**
I report for the flak anyway.

 

[chevalier]

I don’t think that’s necessarily true. She could very well be totally unaware of her own beauty and ability to attract hangers-on. I know for a fact that my wife fit that bill in a certain way. She had a good number of male friends who never asked her out but come to find out later that they secretly had crushes on her. She was totally unaware of it; though she WAS aware that guys she dated were “falling” for her very quickly. She found it to be really weird and I suppose that since I had similar feelings but didn’t speak about them for awhile after we started dating, that made me different in a good way. When she told me this (she didn’t bring it up until we were already engaged actually), I replied that it probably had a lot to do with her being the perfect girl, which she denied and then insisted it was because all of those guys were immature. Go figure.

I respectfully disagree with that. It makes it sound like just not talking was the only difference. It definitely doesn’t speak for maturity. Failing to non-disclose your feelings until a later time so as to keep making things interesting/alluring does not seem to me be a requirement of maturity. Contrary, when keeping up the non-disclosure seems to be a primary concern, it makes me want to question the maturity of the criteria being applied.

This is said even though my own preference also is not to bring up the subject too early. However, pretending I’m not moved, trying to be casual, not treating the woman too well on purpose etc. etc. is basically the reverse-princess-treatment and… it makes me sad to hear that it would appeal to anyone at all and especially when used as a concious strategy.

Having beta orbiters doesn’t make them objects. They CHOOSE to orbit and be stuck in the friends zone while secretly pining for the girls they orbit. Should attractive women just assume all of their guy friends secretly want them and so dismiss them?

Attractive women should defeat the temptation to 1) affirm their attractiveness with the use of their friends, 2) keep friends’ hope up so the interest wouldn’t totally go so that the men would be available more than simple friends in normal situations, 3) use friends as emotional fillers, i.e. guys you can date in all but name. This is no superhuman requirement. I’ve had to deal with it too, it can be overcome.

As for the choice aspect (the object of use wants to be used), it only works in law (and not always anyway), but not in morality. Just the fact someone wants to be used doesn’t unmake the use. It’s still use. Keeping a court of admirers is use (by men too and men also have opportunities to do it, I’ve had some too, but while it could make you feel great about your alpha-male-ness, it would make you feel awfully bad about your moral fabric and compassion and it’s just something you don’t do anyway).

Plus, I believe we were talking about attractive friends. Obviously, not all of our discussion has revolved around this aspect, but it was important to me in writing my reply, so let me outline a couple of reasons so you can understand my point of view better. Basically, if a person has a lot of attractive friends of the opposite sex, it starts looking like those friends are picked because of their attractiveness. Something is wrong when we pick our friends that way. It shows we aren’t regarding them strictly as friends. We’re building ourselves a pool. In that pool we will fish, or so we think. As long as the pool is full and we aren’t starving, we have no particular need to fish right at this moment. Except suddenly we might find ourselves a 35 year old teenager if things continue going like that. This connects with the emotional relief aspect of opposite-sex friends that I mentioned above (and will again mention below).

Also, what is more, it is the girl herself who might be placing herself in the beta-orbiter role with regard to several of her attractive male friends, it’s not just they who can be beta and orbiting! It works pretty much the same as idol “worship” of actors, singers etc. You can get over the fact your girlfriend loves Elvis. Can you get over the fact your girlfriend pines over some local petty king who’s keeping her at bay? Ooops! Can she orbit several (other than you) alpha males at the same time? Sure she can. Can you out-alpha them all? With a brain you can. But it is it worth it? The answer is neither yes nor no, it’s basically a decision she has to make herself. It’s very much like growing up.

Erm, maybe on an almost-final note, the world doesn’t end on alpha. Somehow, being picked basing on my “alpha” qualities doesn’t make me happy. I want the woman to pick a person, not 6’5’’ with a law degree and ego to match. She is to marry me, not my CV, and if I outmuscle other guys, even using a brain, I still basically outmuscle them. Means if there had been a bigger alpha in place, that one would have gained the field. So what point would that make of swearing fidelity? “I swear to be faithful to you because you were the biggest alpha around at the time the decision was made?” Sure doesn’t work like that! It takes much more. I’m interested in the “more” and to heck with alpha.

 

[chevalier]

Now if on the other hand they’re not actually being their friends, but just using them as a barrier to ensure the only men that approach them are the strongest and most confident well that’s a whole different story.

Bingo. But I would worry more about those friends being a collective boyfriend, i.e. supplying all the dinner and movie with the added bonus of non-boredom caused by diversity of guys to pick from. You can compete with like a dozen guys, but it’s objectively harder than one-on-one. Plus, you want to be a special man to her, not a primus inter pares.

Things won’t normally take such strong forms in real life as in our examples, but some of the worry will still be there. I can tell you it doesn’t apply just to women. I know the problem partly also from my own life, where at some point, my female friends formed a collective girlfriend (although I was looking for “real love” at that point too) in emotional terms. I know what kind of damaging illusion that kind of thing can be. For example (without limitation to just this one), it can prevent you from looking into the future, finding and placing commitment, because you will have a friend who is not your idea of man/woman but will provide emotional release when you need it… and you will keep going like that. Eeeek!

(It might just be worth noting that having friendships with both sexes is needed for normal development and normal life of a human person. What I’m taking shots at is not having friends per se, it’s some weird ways people approach it.)

Apologies for the length of all this, but I didn’t have the time to go over it and recompose… Late for lectures already!

 

[whatevergirl]

Girls who use guys to take them out for free dinners…and have a plethera to ‘‘choose from,’’ are not girls that you guys should be hanging around with…there are ‘‘bad’’ girl types out there who use men left and right. Don’t let it happen to you. You can control who you hang out with, and if a woman uses you…over and over (one or two times, ok)…you can’t blame her, you’re accepting it.