I just had a slightly awkward, but good conversation with my mother, who is an evangelical conservative Christian. All my life she had been saying, "I hope one day you find a good Christian girl to marry." When my brother started dating a girl that didn't meet her standards, all hell broke loose. Lots of fighting and animosity. My younger self witnessed all of this and never wanted to be in that situation, despite not sharing her values. Part of why I've been bad with women is that I've been trying to get the impossible: someone who is perfect for me and someone who is perfect for my mom. Everytime I found a girl I was interested in, I held back with a little voice in my head saying, "What would mom think of her?" Today, this came up again, when my mom brought up getting married to a nice Christian girl (I've been single most of my life), and I said SCREW THIS. I am dealing with this once and for all. I explained on the phone that my values and what I want are different from what she wanted. That I was bad at getting girlfriends, partly because thinking about what she would think was holding me back. Surprisingly, she was relieved and thankful I was honest with her and sorry for causing stress in my life. She understood that we are different people, and that she just wants me to be happy. She told me to not hold back and go for any girl that I'm interested in, and to not think of her when thinking about girls, because she trusted I was a good person and that she raised me well. Anyway, I was prepared for hell to break loose when I broke the news, but it went really awesome. I love her. Anyway, I want everyone on seddit to reflect a little on your values in life and if you are trying to live up to someone else's expectations other than your own. If you are, be a man and make it public knowledge that you have different values. There is no need to change people, just be honest with yourself and everyone around you, especially your family. I had been holding this in for 15 years. I feel awesome today! I think this has done more for my game than many other things.