Hey seddit, long time lurker and first time poster so bear with me here. I had a literal epiphany last week, something I truly didn't believe was possible, and it's lead me to try and share what I learned. My epiphany didn't simply happen overnight. It culminated over years, more specifically over the last six months or so. I was brutally honest with myself after some personal experiences with women and life in general and this past week or so has been the happiest I've been in YEARS. I'll try and make this as concise as possible (yeah, that didn't go too well...). I guess I should add I'm 21 years old, and consider myself an introvert with good social skills (I work in a bar, have for years, so I have to be good at talking to people). I wish I had learned this lesson when I was 17 but the best lessons are learned the hard way.

Why I was a nice guy.

After hearing several people, specifically people I work with saying things to me about being too nice I kinda just had to accept that it was true. This made me ask myself, "Why am I too nice?" There's obviously a reason behind it and I consider myself a pretty introspective person so I thought long and hard, being brutally honest with myself the whole time. I came to a few conclusions:

I wanted to be on good terms with everyone I met.

This was the biggest game changer for me. I realized this was my main reasoning behind being too nice. I have always been a very liked person, by both guys and girls, and didn't really care to understand why this was or why it could be a bad thing. If everyone liked me, women included, then good interpersonal relationships were bound to appear out of thin air! NOPE. I'll focus on why this is a bad thing. It's bad because when I had this mentality I became unconsciously concerned with not upsetting anybody. This caused me to not speak up or speak my mind when I really should have in a lot of situations. I unintentionally had become a sort of pushover. It wasn't because I really was a pushover, I would call somebody out when they harshly disrespected me, it was for another reason:

I had a hard time finding a balance between caring too much and not giving a fuck.

This was me in a nutshell, and probably will be for a short time until I train myself to truly change my ways. When a girl I was seeing would do something that irked me, for example, I would care too much. I would get butthurt and insecure about the littlest thing and my actions would show that. My actions were usually something that would lead them to not want to see me anymore or be more cautious about getting closer to me in a relationship. Sometimes it would come off as neediness. In these situations, I need to stop caring so much. It would make me come off as an AFC, which nobody likes.

Conversely, in situations which slightly bothered me, like when I'm being disrespected in a social situation where I should speak up for myself, I would fall victim to not giving a fuck. My indifference made me look like a pushover, and even worse, a "nice guy." It's generally agreed that this will not help you with women or in social situations in general.

How this ruined my game, how I came to accept I needed to change, and why I'm happier now.

After realizing WHY I was a nice guy, I finally understood why it really is HORRIBLE to be a nice guy.

From the way I analyzed it I was simply being too selfless. I would put others ahead of myself. For example, in a situation where I should have spoken up for myself and called somebody out for being rude, I was thinking (in a way), "I don't want this person to dislike me at all, so I'll just keep my mouth shut. I don't want them to think I'm an ass, right?" WRONG!!! I'll explain more at the end of this post.

This kind of snowballed into something I've heard countless times but for some reason never committed to doing: Living life for myself. As I said I was too concerned about being on good terms with EVERYONE that it disabled me from putting the most important person in my life first: me. I've been happier this past week because I finally said, "Fuck it, I need to focus on me for a while. Not worry about women at all." I stopped smoking weed because it makes me far too unproductive, got back to the gym, and have been forcing myself to be more social outside of work (remember, I said I'm an introvert, putting yourself outside of your comfort zone is a good thing). Also, I'm getting my lazy ass back to school, because simply put it's best for my future. In addition, I've been reading about things that interest me and am planning on joining an adult sports team (rugby or flag football) because those are things that make ME happy. THOSE things should have been on the top of my priority list this whole time.

All of my previous relationships failed, both casual and serious, because I simply wasn't in the right state of mind to be successful. I prioritized trying to foster a relationship with somebody than being truly happy with myself. This is all part of being "In State" and you should definitely check this post by /u/TofuTofu and anything else about being In State if you haven't already.

What you should do right now.

First of all, don't try to skip steps into being better with women like I have been doing. Get your Inner Game in check NOW. I feel like the root of all nice guys being the way they are is because of poor inner game, so don't think you can skip getting yourself right before you're going to have success. It's all over this subreddit and I feel like a lot of guys, myself included, are in denial that this is true and overlook it.

Secondly, be more selfish. I don't mean start being a complete asshole and pushing people away from you because of it. Simply be more assertive, put yourself first when you need to, and be generally mature and polite about it. Nobody, especially women you're going to try to pursue, like a man who is socially immature. If somebody is being rude to you, call them out on it. Also, you're going to have to accept the fact that not everybody is going to like you because of it. I already burned a bridge in the past week because of it but it was for the best. There are very few situations where you should put somebody else's happiness above yours. Remember that. Being too selfless can also make you forget about the abundance mentality, which is another reason I was failing in situations I should have succeeded in.

If you do those two things the way you adapt to situations should change for the better. I know from experience making the transition from a "nice guy" to how I am now isn't an easy one. Like I said had this epiphany after years of failing and had to just be honest with myself. If anyone is interested in an FR or story in which I tell what I did, analyze what I did wrong, and outline what I SHOULD have done. Let me know. There are a few which specifically led me to having this epiphany and typing up this post and would be glad to share.

Edit: spelling

Edit 2: HOLY CRAP YOU SOME OF YOU ARE TAKING THE TERM "NICE GUY" TOO LITERAL. I used that term because that's what get's thrown around here on seddit and on other subs. Just read the post and don't try to read between the lines. I put "nice" in quotations in the title for a reason.

Edit 3: Thanks everyone for your responses, it's good to know this helped some of you. I did just post my sort of FR that I discussed and you can find that here.