Church

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I don’t get why you list working for family business as a kind of negative. It often pays quite well. I wish I had a family business I could work for. Construction work isn’t for me but I wonder if it was where’d I’d be, I’d have a trade skill and get paid good. My uncle owns a nice house as well as a beach house, money is no issue for him. But as an aspie and feminine aspie labor isn’t for Me.

Women don’t bother to know me most don’t think I’m good enough to waste talking to.
Those who didnliied my personality and traits but wanted a man with a real job and life together, they want a 4 bedroom house, multiple cars, trips to Europe every year and eating out most nights. Classic middle class lifestyle and point out I won’t ever give them that.

Could pm you a picture I don’t post publicly after getting bashed on Reddit and imgur for my pictures of me.

Nobody bashed you for your picture here.

I didn’t fully explain...

He worked for his family business because he couldn’t do what he really wanted to do. He had dyslexia and was unable to graduate high school or get his GED. He was really smart, though.

Women want different things. Not all women want the things you’ve listed.

You can PM me a picture.

Twilightprincess,

I say this with respect and the understanding that you're trying to help, but in my opinion, as someone who feels similarly to sly, there's only one way to make him feel more optimistic about his chances of getting a relationship. That is by showing him why things should be different now than they have been in the past.

Sly clearly has an extensive history of not being able to get into a relationship despite his desire for one. If we assume he started wanting a relationship at 18 (though I'll bet it was even earlier), he's spent 13 years wanting a relationship and not being able to get one. Why should he believe that that is going to change? It could, but where's the evidence that it will?

Your anecdotal evidence about a typically less desirable man finding a woman proves that it's not impossible, but it doesn't prove that it's not unlikely. In my opinion, your lived experience can't stack up to his lived experience in terms of shaping his perspective, especially when his lived experience is at least 13 years of loneliness, and yours is one instance of an obese guy finding love.

So if you want to convince sly that he should have hope, you have to demonstrate to him why he should expect the future to be any better than the past. What will be different about it, and why?

Otherwise, I don't think you'll be able to convince him.

I used to serve as an usher at a Catholic church (been Catholic all my life, have no plans to change denominations mind you) for about six years but slowly over the course of time, I realized how many people took pride in contradicting the teachings of faith with some expressing great prejudice towards anyone who they refused to understand, including but not limited to people on the spectrum.

About halfway during my tenure as an usher, my family and I went through a period of crisis that lasted for about two years. When people at our church began finding out, they shunned us as if we were threats to the parish's well-being. Even the priest wasn't much of a help, so in turn, I felt I had no one to turn to.

Even though my family and I managed to fully recover, my sister stopped attending Mass entirely (she still prays) and about a year-and-a-half ago I left our former parish in favor of a nearby Catholic church. I have not regretted my decision since in part because of many open-minded people I have met. The priest of my new parish is very nice, gentle, and knows how to get a good laugh out of people when he delivers his Homily.

Brother Sly, if you don't mind me asking, what Christian denomination are you a part of? Are there any churches of the same denomination near the church you attend services at and if so, would you be willing to attend services at any of them?

I frequently see posts on this forum from single guys who say what women want (as if they are experts on the matter). All women are portrayed as wanting this specific guy who has everything. As a female, I know that that’s simply not the case. I’ve known plenty of women who didn’t marry a Mr. Perfect.

Rather than focusing on things that can’t change, I think that a change in outlook and attitude could make a great deal of difference. It’s a lot easier to try new things, meet new people, and connect with others when one isn’t mentally stuck in a negative place.

I didn’t say all women. Generally speaking when I talk I talk about single women, and I talk about most of the single women. I’m nit interested in taken women.

For me, church is a horrible sensory and social expirience. It also triggers my insecurities and rejection-and-guilt-trip-based traumas. I used to zone out in meditation to cope. I can't do it any more so I stopped attending any church at all. If the God is the one described in Evangelies, I believe He would understand. If there is no God, it's better not to waste my time and energy on this torture.

@feeli0 I suspect the little church with large amount of autistic people formed that way because it was the only church the autistic people found comfortable - just like you My friend attends a Catholic meditation group which is a collection of introverts, mostly matematicians - that's the very rare kind of religioius group they feel comfortable in

Churches make me really uncomfortable. I've been forced to attend services before and there's something about it that's not right for me.

Since you're quoting me directly, I'm going to have to assume you're referring to me here and respond in kind.

I have never indicated that I believe women are looking for a man who is rich, good-looking and successful in every area of life, and will not settle for any less. Women of course are not a monolith, and as such obviously there are differences in terms of the kinds of men they're looking for. But in saying that, there are also trends, and generally women who are more appealing are looking for men who are more appealing, and vice versa.

There are also notable trends in terms of who is not finding themselves able to get into relationships. Men who are autistic, unemployed or under-employed, overweight or obese, living at home, who are socially awkward, etc are overrepresented in the people who can't get relationships. You can't tell me that you think that's random. There is a random element to relationships, but they're far from completely random.


I don't see myself overly focusing on things that cant change. For the most part, I'm looking ahead to the future, and at the present.

People with negative attitudes don't adopt them because they seem like a lot of fun to have. Experience plays a massive role in attitude. Do you really think a negative outlook is the default setting, and that there was never a time I was more positive before that was trampled all over by a harsh reality that doesn't care about people's feelings? Confidence is developed by mastering your environment, seeing yourself achieve, and getting the results you want. A feeling of hopelessness develops when the opposite happens, you can't master your environment, you consistently fail at achieving your objective, and the results you want always allude you. The impact this hopelessness has depends on how important it is to achieve whatever it is you're failing at. It is unreasonable to expect the same attitude from those who achieve what they want (in this case a relationship) and those who invariably fail. They might as well be on different planets.

I can't adopt a positive attitude towards the potential of my love life until either I find a partner, or I have good reason to believe that I have a better chance at finding a partner than I ever have before (since it's never happened), based on some kind of change. This is why losing weight is important before I'm even ready to try putting myself on the dating market in any serious way.

Do you know why people develop negative attitudes? It's all about self-preservation. If I had a positive attitude about the potential of my love life right this minute, and I was looking to meet women, setting up dating accounts on sites, trying to meet women at groups and events, etc, I would be setting myself up for the same pain I've already been through. Universal rejection. Having to watch other guys pair up and act like I'm somehow not fazed by it and not feeling inferior. Watching women choose guys other than me and being forced to deal with the fact that I'm not even seen as an option to them.

I've already been through all that, and I cope a lot better emotionally when I distance myself from it, even though I'm still fairly miserable. So why would I want to sign myself up for all that again without any reason to believe that I'll have better results? Why should I feel like things will be different, and how do I shield myself from the emotional pain I'm going to go through if everything goes the same as it has in the past? I can't cope with any more rejection without a visible light at the end of the tunnel.

Some people were never meant to have a significant other.

And you know what? That is okay. The bible comments on this in fact:

So according to the bible, if you don't need to marry you're doing better than a person that does because being single lets you devote your attention to God.

Unmarried people can focus on themselves instead of their partner, this gives them a tremendous amount of agency and determination. Imagine if lonely lowly men, instead of focusing so much on women and being miserable for it, decided to devote their attention to a craft of hobby? Imagine how good they will become in that hobby should they apply all the time they spent brooding towards its creative genius.

Imagine the things these people could create if only they shifted their focus.

People who are single, who are not paired, folks, you have no idea of the kind of opportunity we have. You've tried for years and women are not interested in you, and you know what I think you should do? FLY AWAY, find a goal and objective in life that can become realized from WITHIN. Make that your focus -- NOT WOMEN.

Flying away will be the most potent power of agency and self-determination that you will have ever found, and it's already within yourself, you merely need to take the mantle up and decide who you want to become, not the person that women want you to become.

I've been to a handful of different churches since my 20s; I agree there's something a bit off-putting and impersonal about the "traditional" style liturgy a la Catholicism and Anglicism, but I'm way more bothered by the "mega-church" style, the ones in big modern buildings with fancy technology and "hip" pastors with head-set microphones. Those just feel so empty and superficial to me. I just can't imagine that Jesus would've needed lasers and videos to speak to his followers.

Faith is an intimate, personal thing, and I think church should be a modest, down-to-earth affair, a place which should welcome you and make you feel like a part of it rather than just an anonymous face in the crowd. I don't even believe it should be something you should wear a suit to. My church looks like a church, albeit remarkably more casual...no stained glass windows or Gothic architecture, but no multi-million-dollar modern set-ups. Just people coming together to worship, and then to socialize. That's really what matters most.

Considering I'm an atheist, and I don't see any future being worth living without the prospect of a romantic partner, this comment does nothing at all for me. Good luck convincing sly.

How did this turn in to one of those countless "why some men can't get women" -topics? I thought this was supposed to be about going to church so can we please focus on that? I mean it's probably not that bad if Sly doesn't mind since it's his topic, but since he didn't really mention the matter at the starter post I feel like it wasn't supposed to be the point here... or was it, Sly?

That... sounds weird, the holding hands up -thing I mean. Wasn't a thing in my (former) Lutheran church, that's for sure. If there are other things you don't like about the way your church handles things and perhaps some things you don't like about the type of Christianity you're practicing, could you consider turning to some other type of Christianity? At the very least, I can't see how learning about the different forms would do you any harm, you might even find a religious branch that's a lot more suitable for you. Also, aren't there branches of Christianity that doesn't care all that much what branch you belong to as long as you're a Christian? You could try going to one of their churches, assuming you aren't dead set on your way of Christianity being the one and only correct way of course.



That's what comes to my mind too when someone says the word "church", but I don't think all churches should be that way. If there are people who feel more at peace and at home in these very different churches, then I think their existence is a welcome and a needed thing. After all, isn't making those who come to the church feel safe and comfortable a big part of what going to a church is about? If someone doesn't feel at peace and at home at that type of church, they can just find one that suits them better. Like you said, faith is personal, so those who want to practice their faith the way you mention it above should be allowed to do so.

Certain members always seem to interject their personal issues into unrelated threads. This particular derailment started here.

It sounds like one of those "evangelical/Baptist/maybe Pentecostal" type churches.

This sort of thing is not unusual at all in the US.

What denomination do you follow, Sly?