Why Popular Dating Advice Is Keeping You Single ...and what works for finding love.

Our search for healthy love is one of the most defining missions of our lives. Yet sadly, much popular dating advice actually leads us away from the very love we
 desire. Here is why popular dating advice fails us, and we can do about it.
Most popular dating advice builds upon a fatally flawed concept: If you want to find your soulmate, make yourself more desirable. As useful as this might sound, it’s the kiss of death for true intimacy, because it leads us away from the most essential ingredient of all: authenticity.
Thankfully, there is a good amount of advice that’s thoughtful, research-based and effective, but the field is mostly populated by the “make yourself more appealing” school. This debilitating advice falls into two main categories: Change the way you look, and change the way you act. Though there may be nuggets of truth in such advice, but in the end, it promises love, yet delivers insecurity and disappointment.
Why is this so? Because it’s impossible to be authentic when you’re struggling to play a role. It’s like exhaling while holding your breath:

Keep him or her guessing.
Learn to become “irresistible” to the gender of your choice
Men, learn the skills of seduction
Women, learn how to make him pursue you
Men, show your sensitivity—but only in small doses, or you’ll look like a wimp instead of an alpha male.
Women, it’s okay to be strong, but don’t be too strong—you’ll frighten men off
If you’re excited and enthusiastic about someone new, don’t reveal it. Play hard to get
Act confident. No, be confident. No matter what.

Not to mention the stream of exhortations to tone up, look younger, develop tighter glutes, accessorize better—it’s almost endless. In my decades of work as a psychotherapist, I’ve seen so many men and women come into my office reporting that they felt like the walking wounded after spending years trying to play these games.
When we try to become more attractive—instead of becoming more skilled at being authentic, we’re bound to feel off-balance.  It’s like climbing a wobbly ladder. The warmth, clarity and sense of humanity that come with self-acceptance just can’t be faked. If we try to be someone other than who we are, we’ll find people who are looking for someone who isn't us! Even worse, others sense the insecurity that underlies this approach. And that insecurity is one of the most intoxicating scents of all for selfish, unavailable and abusive people.
But there’s also good news here. Really good news—and it’s backed by solid research. It’s the real, hard-won skills of authentic intimacy that lead to healthy love—not the skills of game playing.
In 1985 evolutionary psychologist David Buss conducted an extensive study of the traits people rate as most important in finding a mate, and his finding was clear: The quality people valued most in a potential mate was not physical attractiveness. Nor was it wit, self-confidence, strength, success or youthful appearance. The number one trait people sought was kindness and understanding.

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There’s a take-away here with the power to save us from tremendous pain:  Practice kindness and understanding in your dating life, and then only pursue relationships with people who strive to consistently do the same. Only. No matter how sexy or how compelling the object of our affections may be.
Here’s one more hopeful insight that flies in the face of much dating advice: Immediate sexual attraction is not the most important factor in finding and keeping healthy, passionate, romantic love.
In fact, Arthur Aron, one of the most renowned researchers in the field of attraction and love, states that multiple lines of research strongly suggest that people who are highly attractive are no more likely to find love than people of average attractiveness.
The media teaches that looking spectacular is the sine qua non of success in dating. Research reveals something different. The more we get to know and care about someone, the less compelling conventional attractiveness becomes, as explained beautifully in this illuminating New York Times article.
At the end of the day, trying to “become irresistible” is little more than an exercise in self-loathing. What really works is authenticity. It’s when we learn to name, honor and treasure the parts of ourselves that are most unique to our nature that we find the keys to deeper intimacy. These are the parts that I call Core Gifts. These qualities are often the exact parts we first try to hide when we're dating, but they are where our soul lives. And in my experience, they are the very qualities that naturally make us “irresistible”--not to everyone, but to the person who is right for us.
As we learn to honor our vulnerable authenticity, and to get right out of Dodge when we’re with someone who doesn’t consistently do the same, we find we are meeting kinder, better people, and that, miracle of miracles, there’s mutual attraction. We deserve to be extravagantly choosy when it comes to choosing a life partner.

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It takes real bravery to turn away from  the dating advice that tells us to be different,  better, shinier, and instead rely on the worth and beauty of our own authenticity. But it changes the future of our dating life. I've witnessed that change many times, with client,s friends and in my own life.
Skilled authenticity leads to intimacy. Game-playing leads to games. Research proves this: the skills of dating are simply the skills of healthy intimacy. In the words of Chip Conley, author of Emotional Equations,  “If you’re seeking a soulmate, then learn to lead with your soul.”
To learn more about my work and receive my free e-book: Four Insights to Transform Your Search for Love, please click here
© Ken Page, LCSW 2015