How do I stop chasing women for validation?

Exis007 · 2023-04-09T12:07:31+00:00

I am going to tell it to you straight. That hole you're trying to fill with other people's love, affection, sexual desire, and approval? It doesn't take that currency. You feel this lack inside yourself and you're thinking, "Well, if women want me and I prove myself, then I won't feel like a loser". But the problem isn't other people thinking you're a loser. The problem is that you think you're a loser. You are your own bully. You're the problem. This isn't hypergamy, you're not "dating up" at every available opportunity. Side note: hypergamy isn't real so we can get into that if you want. But lots of people have holes inside themselves. They fill them with food, with drugs, with sex, with money, but the hole persists. They think the hole is innate to them and if they just find the right thing to fill it, then they'll feel at peace. But it's not some innate missing piece inside of you, it's a wound you keep reopening by attempting to plaster over it instead of actually healing it.

The call is coming from inside the house. The wound is coming from you, and you're the one who has to heal it.

But...that's easy to say right!? Just heal it! Well, how the fuck do you to do that? There aren't a bunch of simple or easy answers there, but there are answers. There's a nasty little troll voice inside of all of us that likes to scream at us that we're fucking worthless. Let's call this asshole Mark. Mark thinks you're a loser. Mark thought you were an incel. When you say, "Maybe I'm as good as everyone else", Mark grabs the mic and screams, "No you aren't, you pathetic piece of shit". Everyone has this dude, it's not just you who has an internal heckler. And because most people have Mark hanging around doing insult comedy in their heads, people generally have to learn a whole arsenal of strategies to get Mark to shut the fuck up most of the time. Not 100% of the time. Rarely does anyone achieve that. But you can get him to be a lot quieter and you can start being able to rip the mic out of his hand more and more. Hell, you've already made progress. But taking control of the negative self-talk, the self-sabotaging fears, and stoping intrusive thoughts from making you feel like shit all the time is a game-changer in terms of living a much happier life.

This is by no means comprehensive, but there are three big things I do to shut Mark up.

You are not all your thoughts. Thoughts are unconscious and sometimes unwanted. You will have intrusive thoughts. Sometimes you need to get a bird's-eye view of your own internal monologue and start looking at the stories you're telling yourself so you can identify which are really coming from Mark, so to speak. I need to prove myself to other people. I'm a loser and people will figure it out. My goal is to be with the best possible person. I desperately need to fit in and be better than other people. Once you start spotting these narratives, you can learn to notice when you're telling yourself these stories. You don't need to try to stop yourself from telling them, you probably can't do that. But you can emotionally distance yourself from them. When they pop into your brain, just let them wander through your mind. Oh, look, that old story about not being good enough...I suppose that's what's playing today on my inner radio. You don't control your own thoughts, but you do control how much you latch on, internalize them, and start emoting with them.
Emotional regulation. Learn how to feel your feelings and then let them go. We so SO MUCH to try to avoid feeling bad. We literally run ourselves ragged avoiding negative emotions because we're scared of them. One of the most powerful things you can do is learn to actually feel your feelings. This is not the same thing as writing stories about feelings. Take fear as an example. You feel fear in your body. You also probably tell a story about it in your head like, "I'm going to this party and everyone there is cooler than me and it's going to be me, trying to be seen and acknowledged all night and I'm going to feel like shit about it and oh god, I don't know if going to this is a good idea". Mark's telling you that story and, as we've established, Mark is an asshole. We're letting that story just come and go. But the actual feeling of fear in your body, the tightness in your chest, the random energy in your arms and legs, the twitchiness, the squirmy feeling? You can LEAN into that without leaning into the story. Clear your mind and just feel that feeling in your body. Breathe into it. Take big, deep breaths and just breathe out all that twitchiness. This is a kind of mini-meditation practice. The emotions in your body and your self-narrative about them can be disconnected and you can deal with one without dealing with the other.
Self-care. I don't mean bubble baths and candles or whatever, but those can be nice. I mean the physical work of caring for yourself. You are your own parent. That means noticing when you're having a hard time and taking a step back into self-parenting to say, "What do I need right now?". Are you eating healthily? Did you get enough sleep? Do you need rest, water, or sunlight? Is there a big task you're procrastinating on that you need to address? Is your living space clean? When we feel bad, it's time to step into self-care mode and look at what we really, fundamentally need as bodies and people. And that's work, I generally don't like doing this work and I struggle with it. I often want to think I'm above these petty considerations, but I'm not. Taking a shower, putting on clean clothes, unfucking your habitat, and going on a walk outside actually does improve how you're feeling. Eating a meal with vegetables helps. But the larger point is that you need to care for yourself like you're someone of value. Making yourself important, treating yourself like you matter, makes Mark fucking miserable. Caring for yourself is a daily practice of taking control away from Mark.

None of these are cure-alls. No one completely cures the voice in their heads that is your worst critic. But you can beat it back a whole hell of a lot and make it small, make it ignorable. When that wound starts to heal, when you really don't feel like you're trying to prove to everyone that you're good enough but you just feel good enough most days, most of the time? Then authentically connecting with people gets a lot easier. I hope some of this is helpful.

No_Jelly_6635 · 2023-04-09T04:42:15+00:00

I think you need 1. A break. Nuff said. You need to stop dating. Give yourself a time frame. Like 3 months where you don’t date or talk to anyone

A hobby/ few hobbies. Find things outside of dating that can help you find internal validation. One that is artistic. One that is athletic. One that is community based.
A cause you believe in. Volunteer or help an organization. Could be a shelter, hospital, foundation nursing home etc helps build empathy and compassion for others. Also when you do good for others you think outside of yourself. Helps a lot with sense of identity and need for validation.
Spend time with friends and family. Spend quality time with people you love. Platonic friends especially 💗💗💗

StarTrippinn · 2023-04-09T10:05:30+00:00

Honestly it sounds like a low self-esteem thing disguised as confidence.

MarsNirgal · 2023-04-11T18:03:30+00:00

At the end you need to stop getting validation from others. The only person who can truly make you feel validated is yourself.

It's difficult. I have been without a partner for ten years and it's painful to see people in relationships and wondering what am I doing wrong and why I can't get someone to look at me like that.

I know exactly how you feel.

But the thing is... making your own self-worth depend on the desire of others is making it depend on something you have no control over, and that's a losing strategy every single time. You need to build your own self worth depending only on you.

External validation can help if you get it, but you cannot depend on it because if it's lacking you will be lacking.

Now to the practicalities: How can you build your own self worth?

Answer: It's a lot of work, first of all. And it's mostly about finding things you care about, things you enjoy, and things you're good at, and doing them. Become a better version of yourself. Make yourself someone that you can look at the mirror and be proud of. Even things you may not be good at, but you enjoy, just do them because you enjoy them and you deserve it.

Build your life. That's the secret.

QueenPeachie · 2023-04-09T08:21:29+00:00

Scott Pilgrim, is that you?

StarTrippinn · 2023-04-09T05:21:28+00:00

Make-TFT-Fun-Again · 2023-04-12T04:26:04+00:00

"The funny thing is, as I distanced myself from a lot of media, specially ones related to dating and sex, the more I realized how much I don't want it? How much I'm not interested in sex, how much of what I did was just pressure to fit in, and prove myself better than other people."

That's most of the heavy lifting right there, bro. Obviously having sex is pretty awesome and it's okay to want that. But if you tie up your sense of self-worth with how much women want you instead of things that are within yourself, you're going to have a bad time.

SnooOranges4231 · 2023-04-12T06:05:56+00:00

You're kinda describing being a sex addict. I was in a similar position, at your age too. You feel this compulsion to be constantly trying to prove something to yourself, even though on some level you know it's not a good idea. But it's great that you recognize the problem! That already means you're most of the way to fixing it.

The key is self esteem. Once you feel better about yourself, you won't feel that pressure any more. I don't mean to sound corny, but try to meditate and find your zen space, or at least consider it. Find some sense of peace, rather than being so hard on yourself. Tell yourself to take a break from it all, don't try and carry the world on your shoulders. Take it easy, buddy. Hope this helps.

Sekina7 · 2023-04-13T16:10:08+00:00

Imagine all the women you destroyed just “because “. You see women as sex/validation objects like a lot of males...

Title	How do I stop chasing women for validation?
Author	FakeAssWriter
Upvotes	29
Comments	21
Date	April 9, 2023 4:16 AM UTC (3 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/ExRedPill
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/exredpill/comments/12g8hxu/how_do_i_stop_chasing_women_for_validation/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/ExRedPill/how-do-i-stop-chasing-women-for-validation.1213636 https://theredarchive.com/post/1213636

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