Ex-Incels, how did you dig yourself out?
I'm an ex incel myself, but I've been seeing a few users here exhibiting the tell tale signs. "I'm not attractive enough", "I don't socialize correctly", "I'll never find a woman" - all extremely unhealthy attitudes.
Personally I burned through many friendships and ruined a lot of chances with women because I was in the incel community. The community warped my view of women so much that I made it even harder to meet women, I became my own worst enemy. I lost friends because all I could think of was how horrible it was that they had girlfriends.
I have a friend who helped me out of it. She was the one who started calling out my bad behavior for what it was, and I started on the long uphill path out of it. I'm now married and stable for well over a decade, but I still think back to those days, and it depresses me seeing other people causing this themselves and not being aware of it.
So, Lemmy, for those who have clawed out of it, what's your story?
Not exactly answering the question here but I am wondering about whether or not this counts as inceldom.
So here's the deal with me. I am an ugly person who is only attracted to attractive women. I have tried dating women who were, for a lack of better term, "looks-matched". But even though we actually connected really well I just couldn't develop any romantic feelings for them because of their looks.
Now this has left me in a situation where I am certain I will never get a girlfriend. My beauty standards are just too high. But I do not blame women for this. It's perfectly reasonable for attractive people to want attractive partners. Hell, that's pretty much my standard as well when it comes to dating (except I'm not physically attractive). So whadaya gonna do?
One thing you could try, if you haven't, is dating someone you connect with, and have a fun time with, even without "romantic spark". Attraction can be important in a relationship, but in a long term relationship spark often doesn't last anyway, and it's other things that actually keep people together. Getting along well, working well together, handling stress in complementary ways, etc, are all more valuable long term.
So just as an experiment you could try dating someone for something "long", but not actually that long in the grand scheme of things. Maybe 3 months, roughly one season. Even if you're not physically attracted to them, try dating them anyway. If it doesn't work, you haven't actually lost anything. Just a bit of time. And you will have officially "had a girlfriend", and gained some amount of relationship experience, even if it wasn't the best.
And if it just so happens that you're just not an "early term" guy, buf you're actually a pretty good "mid-term" guy, then that's great! Keep going! You haven't got a lot to lose, in a sense, so you're available for experimentation.
Basically what you seem to be saying is that as long as you can connect in some way like shared interests and desires, they could be a good partner. They don't have to be a superstar model for you to have a connection and also enjoy being intimate with them, which could easily be a strong enough motivation to spend the rest of your lives together or even end up starting a family. You could definitely fall in love with them.
Yeah basically! There's a reason most romantic comedies end with them starting to date. It's because that's the zany exciting bit. After that part, the next 40 years or whatever is a roommate who lives in your home with you, and you do taxes together, and you eat dinner together, and you go to your shared friend's homes to hang out, and maybe you teach weird little gremlins how to be humans, and you talk after work about how your day went, and what you're planning to do in the future.
And that stuff can be great! But looking like a model doesn't make that stuff much better. Even people who live with models probably "get over it" pretty quick. You can't be in awe 18 hours a day every day for 15 years. But, having a shared foundation of experiences and mutual respect does make those things easier. Liking each other's friends does too.
You can learn to love someone, and you can learn to find an attractive person unattractive through interaction.
Well I would say for a start that while you say you're ugly someone will think you're pretty. The thing is one of those people should be you. Anyways, I wouldn't call it inceldom, if anything just a mild lack of self-esteem, that's fixable, how depends on you tbh, I personally recommend going to the gym because it worked for me, even without much gains it helps a lot with confidence, especially if you compare yourseld only with your past self and not others. Of course it may or may not work for you. Once you figure out why you feel ugly and work through it, giving yourself time to adjust and not being too harsh on yourself while trying to still maintain some discipline, you will probably realize you aren't as ugly as you think you are and maybe one day find someone you like. Or not, well at least not for a while, but at least you'll be happy even if single
Yeah, it's clearly important to make sure you're clean and you cut your hair how you like it and dress how you want. Even if you're a morbidly obese sweatlord, you'll be a lot happier about how you look in the mirror when you're doing those kinds of things.
First of all, most people are their own worst enemies, because you have to live with yourself, and you know exactly where your weakest points are to emotionally punch. So chances are you're more attractive than you're giving yourself credit for.
Secondly, your body is not static. You can really be whatever you want to be, and if your body isn't in shape now you can get it into better shape, and probably into better shape than it ever was before in your lifetime. There is certainly a genetic and birth lottery for how easy your goals are to achieve, but they do remain ultimately achievable. I personally felt like as a nerd I couldn't choose to be physically active, that I had to pidgeonhole myself into a stereotype, which is very not true.
Thirdly, whether or not you're super hot in reality, getting your body moving is freaking amazing for your mental and physical health, and once you can start hitting milestones your past self never could have its incredible. I literally could never do a pullup when I was younger, but now I can do pullups. And that took literally 2 months of 20 minute workouts. So pickup even a basic 5 day at home workout regiment, or bike every evening or run every morning. Seriously the healthier feeling from actually moving vs. being a lump is amazing
Finally, the bar is so freaking low for dudes. If you can be confident and not a douchenozzle and have decent lifeskills I guaren-fucking-tee you there is a woman out there who is perfect for you and far more interested in that criteria than simply finding someone who's conventionally attractive with social traits that they can put up with.