Hello RP – I’m having a bit of an internal dilemma that I’d like to get your collective perspectives on about some decisions that I’m going to have to make in the near future.

Warning: The background is somewhat long, TL;DR at the bottom.

Roughly a year ago I began an initiative to improve myself personally and professionally. I was still very BP at the time, but was aware enough to realize that much of what I was unsatisfied with stemmed from the state of my health, appearance, and the way people perceived me – I was a textbook skinny-fat introvert with low self-confidence.

Fast forward to today after a year of lifting, personal enrichment, and deliberately practicing interpersonal skills: my personal appearance, confidence, and career have all improved dramatically. I’d rate myself around a 7 on initial impression and I think career might nudge me a bit above that overall (Engineer, 90k). As a consequence of seeking resources for personal improvement, I inadvertently stumbled across TRP ~3 months ago and boy have my eyes been opened. Things that I always knew in the back of my head to be true were suddenly validated and I look at the world completely differently than I did even half a year ago.

Because I previously bought-in hard to the BP mentality I've already been married for almost 8 years of my life (32 now), and honestly it’s been pretty good. Being ignorant of TRP philosophy, we still managed to stumble into a fairly RP LTR – Common-law married, no huge wedding, no expensive ring, kept finances separate, split all expenses proportionate to gross income, etc. I run the affairs of the house, act as decision maker, and have guided her on how to handle the “hard” stuff like finances, investing, and retirement. Sex is frequent and good, and not surprisingly she’s heated up even more over the past year due to the dramatic change in my appearance. I do love her, she makes a good “first officer”, and we’ve built a nice life together.

Now the problem: I tried to bring my wife along on my personal improvement journey which she initially attempted, but hasn't really taken seriously and thus hasn't made much progress. The more I improve the less I’m satisfied with her physical appearance and lack of drive to better herself. She hovers somewhere between a 4 and a 6 depending on the situation, but I know she could be a solid 7 if she dropped some weight and put more effort into her hair/makeup.

Prior to her I had only been with 4 different women, 3 of which were LTRs. Now that I realize what it means to be fit and how much more attention I draw from attractive women, I’m afraid that I’ve missed out on a huge number of life experiences by not playing the field more. I’m better than I’ve ever been both physically and financially and I feel like there’s a whole section of life that I completely missed out on.

The way I see it there are 4 options:

  • Address her directly and give her another chance to commit to improving herself, bail if failure.
  • Continue my improvement and evaluate to see if she correspondingly ups her game of her own volition.
  • Present the idea of an open relationship – she is also low partner count and has missed a lot of fun on the carousel.
  • Cheat

Breaking it off would be very hard on both of us and would have non-trivial implications to our social circles – sides would definitely be picked. I’m also opposed to the idea of cheating, but I included it for completeness to objectively analyze all possible options. What would you do TRP?

TL;DR: Married early while BP nerd, good marriage but serious regrets about not experiencing life more. Sorted my shit out, got ripped and found TRP, but wife doesn't want to join the hot-person party, which is further fueling my regret and resentment towards her. What do?

Edit: a word