When I was thirty-seven I decided to make finding a committed long term relationship less of a priority and try to concentrate on playing the field. It hasn't exactly been a swinging singles sex party for me since then, but I also haven't really been hurt since then either. I would tell therapists that I did not want a relationship but instead a variety of dating experiences with a variety of women, and it was either met with this attitude that there was something wrong with me, or it would just go in one ear and out the other and I would continue to incessantly hear "relationship" out of them ad nauseam. So I'm done with therapists. They cost a fortune and they've never been all that helpful in my relationship with women.
Yeah, a variety of dating experiences with a variety of women. There are quite a few reasons for this. A big reason is so that I will find out what kind of women I actually like being around. A lot of my drive was so fantasy driven, and things would not work out so often, that I really didn't know much about women who didn't fall into the narrow confines of my ideal choices. I would be so sure that my ideal woman, whomever that was at the time, was "the one" that I missed out on actual experience. It could be said that I really didn't like women that much, because I could not accept the idea of going on even one date with someone who didn't live up to my ideal.
Another is the issue of experience. Women confer higher status on men who have more experience with women than men who have less. I think that movie "The 40 Year Old Virgin" was bullshit, The female lead would have cut that guy loose after taking his cherry instead of marrying him. I don't think that a man needs to make a sexual conquest of a hundred women to know what's up with women. I just try to go on dates and have a good time. I think the ability to learn how to empathize with women and know what they want is not just for womanizer types, but can acquired by other types of men.
Another issue is history. I've been able to acquire a history with women where I don't get hurt since I lowered the priority of finding love. I haven't really crashed and burned since 1999, and I doesn't look like I will anytime soon. Again, it's not been a history that's been chock full of dating women, but I have been able to consistently make intelligent decisions about women, especially since I committed to abstinence from drugs and alcohol since December 2008.
Another reason for a variety of dating experiences with a variety of women is to compile a meaningful frame of reference. When I invariably always made it about the best looking women in my environment, I would almost always come up empty in some way. A lot of this kind of women, that is, the best looking women in my environment, would be such assholes in the same kinds of ways that I would wind of just comparing asshole women to other asshole women. Going out with other types of women would give me an idea of what to look for in women that often would have a genuine interest in getting to know me better, and I could compare apples to bananas to oranges instead of always apples to other apples.
What do I look for for in a date? Three things will usually do it: available, interested, acts like she gives a shit about taking care of herself. Those three traits will usually get you at least one date. Several women over the years couldn't manage that last one; that is, act like you give a shit about taking care of yourself. A couple of them not bad looking women, either. That's one reason why I decided to quit drinking and drugs, because it seemed like the only women who took an interest in me before I quit were not very presentable women who just wanted a drinking, drug buddy. If I could have dated the cute girls and still used, I wouldn't have bothered quitting. Substance abuse is a one way street. No one who drinks heavily, for example, wants to date someone who drinks a lot more than even they do, but they'll consider someone who drinks a lot less or not at all.
So that's about it. Until further notice, I just want a variety of dating experiences with a variety of women: a goal that I've found much more doable than finding true, everlasting love.