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Comment by vecter | Hacker News Reader

"Be yourself" is absolutely the worst dating advice a man can ever receive. Seriously, don't take dating advice from women. They give you bad advice not because they don't care for you (they genuinely do want to help and their intentions are good and pure), but their advice is bad because they don't understand what it's actually like to date women. It's not their fault either. Before everyone jumps on me for hating women, I don't. I love the women, they're wonderful. I'm not making a moral judgment, just stating a practical fact.

To see why this is bad advice, consider if you weren't very good at basketball and asked a friend on how to improve. If they said "be yourself", that would be crazy. Clearly, whatever you've been doing hasn't been working, so doing more of that isn't going to improve anything.

If you actually want tips to meaningfully improve your dating life, feel free to email me (email in profile). Happy to chat more offline.

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You miss that dating is not a game for some people. That's the crucial difference between it and basketball.

In dating, some people are after finding someone who is compatible with them, and if you're not being yourself, you're basically misrepresenting yourself, and lessening your chances of finding someone compatible -- as they think you're someone other than who you really are, and if they think themselves compatible with you, they're really only compatible with the image you are projecting of yourself.

So, really, lie about who you are at the risk of incompatibility.. which might be fine if you're just looking for a one-night-stand, but if you're looking for a deeper, longer-lasting relationship, you're doing both of you a huge disservice by lying... not to mention that it's skeezy and unethical.

You take my analogy too literally and interpreted it incorrectly.

I could have used "crocheting" instead of "basketball" and the analogy would be just as strong.

From your incorrect interpretation, you made wildly false conclusions about my lying to others, pretending to be someone I'm not, and generally misrepresenting myself, as if you think that's what I do on my dates.

I've learned how to date women by building self confidence, learning tactics, and also just as importantly, understanding what women want at a deeply psychological level. What this results in is my making the right moves at the right times in the right way and advancing the ball forward appropriately. You can bet that I do this with women I'm attracted to, both physically and in terms of beliefs, values, and attitudes. This also means that I back off and move on when I realize that there is no mutual interest. Too many men chase after women who will never be interested in them, and that is a complete waste of time.

Everything you said after your first two sentences is completely false conjecture. If you believe that that's what learning to date women is about, then you are doing yourself the greatest disservice in the world.

Still doesn't make sense. You don't crochet by finding a weave that's compatible with your personality or whatever. You crochet by following correct technique and stitching.

Dating is a skill. You and your date can be greatly compatible, but as a guy, if you don't know how to move the ball forward, you two will never have the chance to enter an actual relationship.

If you don't understand that there is skill in dating, then you probably don't understand dating.

Be yourself means stop giving a fuck about being perfect. That's sexy.

I think when most people offer "be yourself" they actually mean "don't pretend to be someone you're not".

I don't necessarily disagree, but it's still bad advice because:

(1) The point you just made isn't clear at all and

(2) It's not actionable whatsoever and gives the wrong impression that you don't actually need to do something, when the reality is the complete opposite and you do need to make major changes to your life and approach to dating

The proper advice is to improve yourself, work on your confidence, and understand female psychology. How to do that is not trivial, but once you read and learn more about it, it's not that complicated either.

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