There's a loneliness epidemic among young men, and nowhere is it more acute than in dating.
~50%
Of young men have never had a romantic relationship
Nearly half of male teenagers have never dated. Not "haven't had a serious relationship." Haven't dated at all. And that number is almost double what it was for previous generations.
Meanwhile, over a third of young people aged 18-24 feel "no one will ever fall in love with them." That's not a dating slump. That's despair.
If you're a young man struggling in this area, you've probably developed theories about why. Women are too picky. Dating apps are rigged. You're not tall/rich/attractive enough. Women only want jerks. The game is unfair.
Some of those contain grains of truth. But they're not the whole story. And focusing on them keeps you stuck.
Let me tell you what's actually happening. And what you can actually do about it.
The Manosphere Lied to You
Somewhere along the way, you probably encountered the manosphere's explanation for your situation. The red pill. The black pill. The elaborate theories about female hypergamy and alpha males and the 80/20 rule.
Some of this stuff identifies real phenomena. Dating apps do create distorted dynamics. Women do have more options in certain contexts. Attraction isn't perfectly democratic.
But the conclusions drawn from these observations are poison. They lead to bitterness, resentment, and treating women as adversaries or objects rather than human beings. They make you less attractive, not more. They become self-fulfilling prophecies.
If you've been marinating in this content, you need to understand: it's making your situation worse. The contempt it breeds leaks out. Women can sense it. And it repels them.
What Women Actually Want
Put aside what the internet told you. Here's what women consistently report wanting in a partner:
Direction. Not necessarily wealth or status, but movement. A man who knows where he's going and is actively going there. Who has goals, pursues them, and makes progress. Stagnation is deeply unattractive. Momentum is magnetic.
Emotional availability. The ability to have conversations about feelings, not just logistics. The capacity to be present, to listen, to engage emotionally. She doesn't want another child or a robot. She wants a partner who can meet her in the full range of human experience.
Leadership, not control. She wants a man who can make decisions, take initiative, and move things forward. She doesn't want a dictator or someone who bulldozes her preferences. There's a difference between leading and controlling, and women can tell.
Reliability. Doing what you say you'll do. Showing up when you say you will. Being consistent. Trust is built in small moments, and broken by small failures. She needs to know you're dependable before she'll risk her heart.
Kindness. Not niceness as a strategy to get something. Genuine kindness. Care for her wellbeing. Respect for her as a person. The "nice guys finish last" crowd confuses manipulative niceness with actual kindness. They're not the same thing.
Self-respect. A man who values himself, maintains standards, and doesn't abandon his own needs to please others. This isn't about arrogance. It's about having a center. Women don't want a doormat.
What Women Don't Want
- A man who has no direction in life
- A man who can't have emotional conversations
- A man who defers every decision
- A man who's unreliable
- A man who's nice only to get sex
- A man with no self-respect
- A man who blames women for his problems
- A man who's bitter about dating
What Women Actually Want
- A man with purpose and momentum
- A man who can be vulnerable
- A man who leads without controlling
- A man who keeps his word
- A man with genuine kindness
- A man who respects himself
- A man who sees women as people
- A man who's content and moving forward
The Real Reasons You're Struggling
With that framework, let's look at why you might actually be single:
You have no direction. What are you building? Where are you headed? If the answer is "I don't know," that's your first problem. A man without purpose is unattractive because he's incomplete. Get a mission before you get a girlfriend.
You can't connect emotionally. You've never learned how to have deep conversations. You don't know how to be vulnerable. You deflect with humor or go silent when things get real. Women want intimacy, and you're offering surface.
You're passive. You don't initiate. You don't make decisions. You don't lead conversations or plan dates or move things forward. You wait for things to happen to you. That's not attractive. It's exhausting.
You're bitter. The resentment toward women, toward dating, toward your situation leaks out of you. Maybe you think you hide it well. You don't. Bitterness is repulsive. People can smell it.
You've been too online. You've consumed so much content about dating that you've developed distorted expectations and warped views. Real women don't match what the internet told you. Real relationships don't look like what you've been watching.
You haven't done the work. You want results without investment. But you haven't developed yourself physically, emotionally, spiritually, or professionally. You want to be chosen without becoming choosable.
What You Actually Need to Do
Get a mission. Before you pursue a woman, pursue a purpose. Figure out what you're building with your life. Start moving toward it. Direction is attractive. Stagnation isn't. She shouldn't be your purpose. She should join you in a purpose you already have.
Develop emotional skills. This means therapy, books, conversations with men who are further along. Learn to identify and name your emotions. Learn to sit with discomfort. Learn to be vulnerable without falling apart. This is a skill. You can develop it.
Practice social skills. Talk to people. Not just women you want to date. Everyone. Build your capacity for conversation, for listening, for engaging. Social skills are muscles. They atrophy without use and strengthen with practice.
Get off the internet. Or at least dramatically reduce your consumption of dating and relationship content. Most of it is poison. It's making you worse, not better. Replace it with real-world interaction.
Get your body right. Not because looks are everything, but because physical health affects everything. Exercise improves confidence, mood, energy, and yes, appearance. Take care of your body.
Stop treating dating as the goal. Paradoxically, the men who do best with women are often not focused on getting women. They're focused on their mission, their growth, their purpose. Women become attracted to the byproduct of their focus, not the desperation of their pursuit.
Approach women as people. Not as targets, conquests, or validation machines. As human beings with their own complexities, fears, and desires. If you can't see women as people, you're not ready for a relationship with one.
The Despair Is a Lie
I know how dark the loneliness can get. I know what it's like to feel fundamentally unlovable. To believe that something is broken in you that can't be fixed.
That belief is a lie.
You're not unlovable. You might be undeveloped. You might be unskilled. You might be headed in the wrong direction. But none of that is permanent. None of that is who you are.
Men who were worse off than you have turned their lives around. Men with less going for them have found love. Men who felt the same despair you feel now are now happily married with children.
The path isn't mysterious. It's just hard. And it starts not with finding a woman, but with becoming the kind of man a good woman would want.
Stop waiting to be chosen. Become choosable.
Stop blaming women. Become better.
Stop consuming bitterness. Start building something.
The loneliness is real. But it doesn't have to be permanent. And the way out isn't through resentment or tricks or giving up. It's through transformation.
Become the man you were meant to be. The rest will follow.