I'm a guy but I read the commitment post. I think I can add something valuable.**

The real heart of this post is that women can give man SOOOOO much. I was just thinking about that, and I list the ways down below if you want to skip ahead. During the day I do my work, in tech, and at night and on the weekends as a 42 yo single male no kids never married who wants a wife and kids, I try to maximize my free time, to both learn and grow (which I love) and meet people to build relationships, and gain financial freedom. All three of these things are my goals. During the day I do as much as I can but at night I have dreams and longings of the heart that spring up on their own.

Now, this post is not intended to be the least bit controversial. I'm not prescribing anything or even giving advice... but just wanted to share my perspective.

I just had dinner with friends, young friends from church, a guy 23 I think and his with 20 or 21. Their home was so well kept and beautiful. It's their first home. They don't own it, it is provided by the church. They don't have a lot of money I found out but they're a young glowing couple and she's 6 months pregnant. The church doesn't let them rent their extra rooms, which is unfortunate, because there are three spare and it is not cramped. Alas.

I know things are really polarized right now, politically. People are literally killing each other. For me I don't care what people think, just that they think, and the best way to think over complicated or controversial things, which raise ones passions, is to think slow, and define all the terms. That's all I hope for and even desire. I don't care if people disagree with me but I don't want a society of reactive people, but articulate people. I don't care if such people are communist, man hating whatever as long as they've thought their own position and heard the other side. I always try do this but it seems like people think fast and don't go deep but still react. Even people who agree with what I believe on a subject, but only because they learned it from their parents, I like to get them to think too. I'm actually very centrist, though people impute values to me. I live around left leaning woke people in a woke neighborhood in a blue state and they assume I'm that. I spend a lot of time around conservative traditional friends and they assume I'm on board with everything they believe too but it is by no means always the case. Not by a long shot. I also scored 95% on Jordan Peterson's big five test for open mindedness, which means 95% of people, if it's accurate, are less open minded or more close minded for me, so that's what I deal with in the world.

Now, I realized.. I have a good life, a pretty good job, real estate assets. I have my health and I know more than 99% of people about a lot of things, because I read and think A LOT taking detailed notes in books. But let's look at what women can give a man. Men try to use force to get it, including coercive force. It is wrong and unjustifyable but understandable. BTW I don't believe in free will anymore. I think it's hard determinism all the way down, and I'm always thinking about the implications of that. It has helped me resolve LONG STANDING regrets that would just not go away. They melted away. For whatever reason also, I was always one to assume a high level of responsibility. I'm not a nice guy push over. I can assert my needs, but still I take responsibility. This is actually a joy when it comes to taking care of tenants. I like being their landlord, and I think they like being renters and prefer it.. whether long or short term. Some move out. In some ways though my taking of so much responsibility is unhealthy. I could hardly fathom letting go, or blaming others for my failures or being a victim, but I realize I am in the extreme.. so I invite everyone to consider determinism. Just consider it, and see how it fits. There's always some subtle cause, I've found, that moved the needle and changed my desire.

So what can a woman give a man?

- She can give him feeling** and even healthy and entertaining drama.

- She can give him physical intimacy and sexual experience (vs lonely masturbation)

- She can give him children!!!

These are three very big ones but she can also give him

- she can give him encouragement and kind of emotional support or cheerleading in a way (like in the song "don't give up" by Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush)

- a well kept home (like my friend gave my other friend)

- support in other things, other chores or business administrative tasks - or even main tasks of the business (which I think works best when people see themselves as a unity and not two individual parties). I met a girl who liked me, who I should have gotten with but I missed the window, chasing someone else, but she was really nice, really heartfelt, from a good family and she gave me signals, and she did marketing marketing for a big company and was good at that, and had good energy. She complimented me on my real estate endeavors and I thought and think in retrospect our skills would really synergize well, especially when I was doing short term rentals. Alas, if you miss the boat you miss the boat. If you fail to value someone in time, you lose. Who can you blame? Sometimes there are go backs but actually in my experience not that much.

The last two are lesser and more material and are often what some women think men want, free labor and so on and I'm sorry this has been their lived experience. Again not believing in free will, I don't think anyone can control their beliefs. They can change, based on new life experience, potentially but they are built up layer by layer by life and past experience. I can't fault anyone for anything, least of all this. I also want to learn and understand the "science of transformation" but I don't know it. How can humans transform themselves and update their minds, integrate their wisdom and learned experience? This is easier said than done but it is where the value is. It is kind of the point of a lot of things, like college and university. What's the point if you're not equipped and transformed?

A woman can change a man's life and take him to the next level. A man can neither be a lover (not in the classic sense) and a father without a woman.

I'm not saying you should, or you need to play any of these roles, and people have to be true to themselves, and definitely the right women have to pair with the right men so they are worthy of each other. Some people argue that like attracts like and people sort with those they deserve and I think that's a common pattern, maybe even the norm but I'm not bound by any superstition to think that's always the case. Real victimhood exists in the world. If you want to be single man or woman and swear off the other gender, that's fine and that's your prerogative. I am all about choice, and especially informed choice so as to minimize regret. To each their own and que sera sera.

I don't now what more wisdom I have to add, except, and this applies to myself... I am preaching to myself, but in the words of the late Tom Petty, "Good love is hard to find".

So if you find it, cherish it.

* I know it's a man's responsibility to not put too much of this need on her. Have hobbies, have friends, do therapy etc. To that I say yes and heck yes but still she can instantly give him a great degree of freedom.

*I see how male bad actors, which may very well be in the majority, the norm, ruin things for everyone else. incidentally in my personal life, I fall short socially in short term interactions where I have to prove my trust because it can't be assumed (because of bad actors), and it's just been one of the harder skills for me to develop. In situations where there's a filter (like being a working professional at a company, or getting invited to a private party, or being in a community where I can build a reputation, things just happen. People and women respect and trust me. It's frustrating when it's the other way, which is common, but what can you do? So the takeaway is there are people like me. I don't deserve anything, any love or respect, or even trust and I understand why there is low trust. Bad actors who don't go punished, who would be punished in classical times. See Desmond Morris the Human Zoo where it talks about how we live in super-tribes, as anonymous unaccountable individuals, and that was written before social media and internet. We are living post prosperity, post internet, post smartphone, post (unitary forced) religion, so who is going to enforce male norms? They even get rewards for it, in that maybe 1 in 20 lewd or forward proposition get a result. I don't see things changing socially so this produces 'collateral damage' (and often the good actors are completely unaware of the bad actors. I'm not aware of how bad it is for women and the same in reverse I think, so knowing this, don't take as much of the bitterness and different behaviors personally). It is what it is, but it is not how things were, in hunter gatherer times, in medieval times etc. I'm not trying to be controversial or support the patriarchy but as much as the old patriarchy may have oppressed or repressed women, it kept many of the dogs (male bad actors) at bay. At least that's my take. I'm not trying to be controversial but like in Jane Austen, Mr. Wickam had to marry Lydia. There was social enforcement of things, which was oppressive or at least prescriptive and restrictive, but also protective, and supportive in conditional ways. Now it splits the sexes and is the wild west and never before have man or woman had to be more conscious and aware, having psychological and sociological knowledge in order to know how to navigate. That's my theory and in this are different types that exist in this west- players, nice guys, commitment seeking women, non trad women etc, often wearing masks and disguises. Our grandparents didn't meet on tinder. They used the telegraph lol. All types. A lot of this stuff, analyzing what a guy thinks, determining his trustworthiness is perennial of course but it's been taken to whole new levels due to lack of social structure. Tradeoffs. None of us were alive in the past so it's hard to compare. We have to stretch our imagination and historical knowledge but it's something I think about.