This question contains an assumption i.e. that women have it easy, while men have it hard.
When I was in my early 20s I met a woman online through a social anxiety support group. Lets call her Lainey for sake of argument. We both had no sexual experience or ever even been kissed. How things went for us influenced my views on who ‘have it easy’ or ‘have it rough’.
When I first met Lainey, we both tried internet personals. She got 200 responses I got 0. Nothing. Nada. Seemed to prove my point that women had it easy.
We had our initial successes offline, but I still bitched as Lainey got hit on constantly when she started putting herself out there. But most of the attention she got was from horny losers and creeps, while the few times I had success with a woman she usually turned out to be a great person.
I kept compartmentalising it, saying it was just Lainey that had this issue and that most girls would have a phonebook bulging with numbers etc etc. I was surprised Lainey remained my friend as I beat myself up repeatedly and expressed these views to her on IMs over and over. My beliefs were also reinforced when amongst the dregs of horny guys, one turned to be not so horny and he became her boyfriend, while the most success I had were casual hooking ups and/or 1 date if I was lucky.
As time wore on I eventually got ballsier with flirting and started getting results. I met someone and we had a great relationship. Part of what helped was that I started taking charge and not just looking for attractive women but women I actually liked on a personal level.
It was so empowering. It really showed when I contrasted my situation with Lainey. The girlfriend I had met was a Canadian student in UK on visa. We had agreed for it to be a one year thing, with her moving back to Canada. Had that happened years earlier I’d have moaned and/or tried to do something crazy like long distance afterwards. Instead I took it in my stride, confident I could move on afterwards. In sharp contrast around the same time Lainey was having issues with her boyfriend and admitted she was staying with him out of fear of having to start again with dating if she left. She eventually left him, but felt dismal about her prospects of dating again.
It showed even more so when I found my next girlfriend online. A friend gave me a few tips on openers to use online. I started getting 5–10% of openers responded to and a few dates. Not all worked out, and some I didn’t even like, but eventually I found someone where the chemistry was great. Lainey tried internet dating too but it was like something hadn’t changed since last time. Same deal - creeps and horny dudes.
It’s also helped with my perspective that I had more female friends now. Even amongst female friends that had great dating histories I noticed that they had similar issues to Lainey or a lot of unwanted attention. Some even admitted to doing what Lainey refused to do i.e. put out to a loser and regretted it enormously.
The one common factor amongst friend, male or female, dating successfully was having confidence and being very confident and self assured about what they wanted when dating. It just doesn’t go “sit around being pretty and get a boyfriend”, or “ask 1000 girls out and eventually someone says yes”, it doesn’t work that way.
When I reminded Lainey that her experiences with internet dating hadn’t changed it gave her a kick up the arse and she started doing CBT and improving on confidence. She met her now husband a year after finishing the therapy through work. Partly it helped that she approached him, partly that she seemed to attract more reputable guys now that she had taken charge (when we met up before that she seemed to attract a different type of guy).
My views on this have changed over the years, but now I realise that dating is easy for you if you let it be. Having good looks, tons of money, being in demand or even getting hit on don’t amount to making dating easy.
