By Melissa Balmer
Copyright © 2006, Seduction Insider, www.seductioninsider.com.
I love reading online personals. I can spend hours browsing through the plethora of people on the planet looking for love. However, there’s one thing on a man’s profile that literally makes me cringe – overt romance. That’s right, if a man starts off his personal profile talking about romance right off the bat, especially in his headline with a title like “Knight Seeking Princess” or “Lost In Love” or the worst “Hopeless Romantic”, (and yes, these are actual headlines that I took off men’s profiles just today) my friends and I skip over him as quickly as possible and move on to greener, if tougher, pastures.
I know it sounds like we’re cruel hearted, but we aren’t. What we are is practical. A man who is in love with romance is usually a man who can’t see the forest of a woman for the trees of romance. What I mean is that he’s more in love with the idea of romance than interacting with a real live woman. He thinks he’s looking for a date, a lover, or even a wife, but he’s not, not really – he’s looking for someone to fit into his cookie cutter idea of what romantic ensues. What he wants is a reason to buy flowers, walk on the beach looking at the sunset, write a poem, or listening to music that pulls at the strings of his heart – not a flesh and blood woman with her own ideas, opinions and quirks.
Just yesterday one of these starry eyed men contacted me. Instead of a short sweet email letting me know he’d like to get to know me, he sent me an email that comes across as an email infomercial of his ideals on romance. It felt about as personal as a chain letter. In fact, I’m sure it is a form letter he sends to each woman who he believes might fit into the mold he’s looking to fill. Think I’m going to set up a meeting? Not on your life.
The truly sad thing is that the world is full with these “wanna be” Prince Charmings who’re totally baffled by why they have yet to meet their Princess. Unfortunately, you may be one of them and not realize just how and why you’re constantly shooting yourself in the foot with women. Here’s a checklist to find out if you’re stuck in the Prince Charming trap:
-Have you already picked out the theme song for your next romance?
-Is your online personal filled with descriptions of the type of romantic activities you’re looking to partake of with the “perfect woman”?
-Are you itching to have someone to write a poem for?
-Do you insist on buying the kinds of flowers you like for a woman rather than finding out what she likes?
-Do you already know what you think is the most romantic evening possible?
-Do you already know where and how you’d like to propose marriage?
Yes, romance and love are fantastic, but they can’t be manufactured in advance unless you’re writing a screenplay for a movie – and then there’s no sure fire formula unless the two leading stars have fantastic chemistry.
If you’ve answered yes to even one of the questions (and if your online dating profile, or any type of personal, has a title like the one I mentioned earlier), or if you’re friends have tagged you as a hopeless romantic, then you’re in danger of living in a land of ideals unprepared to deal with the here and now of dating.
By deciding in advance the tone a romance should take in your life you’re not allowing for the magic of real chemistry to happen between yourself and a woman. You’re not allowing for the organic unfolding of common interests and magic moments of discovering a new favorite place, song, moment, or movie. In fact, the ideal that you have of romance is acting as a wall between you and the women you meet. Sure women love romance, but they want to star in their own romance, not step into a pre-planned one.
So how do you fight your way out of the trap? By getting real. By getting honest. Step down off your white horse and set your ideals of romance aside for a while. Wake up to the here and now. Meander about and watch the world closely. What sort of women are catching your eye? Who would you like to have sex with? Why? What sort of music and movies make you feel sexy and alive? What makes you laugh? Please note, I didn’t say feel romantic – I said sexy and alive, I said laugh.
Real women (of the sort you’d really want to have a relationship with) don’t like to be put on a pedestal, or put in an ivory tower. Go searching too hard for a Princess and you may find yourself ending up as a serf, slaving away in the manner of Wesley at the beginning of “The Princess Bride”. There are plenty of women out there who are looking only to be spoiled – but have no plan to give anything much in return for your attention and labor. Get stuck with one of these ugly ducklings in a glamorous disguise and you’ll rue the day you ever learned about romance.
Real women (the sort who like men) want a personalized romance created just between the two of you, they want to be listened to, and communicated with, and they want to be sexually desired by a man who can’t wait to be alone to peel their clothes off. Real women want to know the real you - not the sanitized, air brushed version posing as a Prince Charming. After all Wesley does win his Buttercup at the end of the “Princess Bride” but only after he steps up to bat, stops letting her boss him around, and proves that he’s smart enough to outwit the Prince.
