Nerdlife

I’ve heard a lot of good advice on relationships. I’ve also heard a lot of bad advice. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m young and as such, probably not the best giver of relationship advice. But I do, however, have one piece of advice that I feel obliged to give to a specific group of people. Ironically, this advice can only rarely be received…I find that it must normally be deduced by everyone for the message to be effective. Unfortunate, but true of most good advice.

So, to all of the “nice guys” reading advice on”picking up chicks”, or even generic “dating advice”. Whether you’re in high school, college, or beyond, if you constantly tell people that your problem is that you’re the stereotypical “nice guy” and blame that for your poor luck, please, I implore you, take one piece of advice:

Ignore all the advice you’ve been given

I know this is counterintuitive and creates all kinds of logistical paradoxes, but I truly believe in this. And here’s why:

Everybody’s different, plain and simple. From the type of pheromones you give off to the type of people you are attracted to to every single aspect of you personality, no two people are alike. Thus all the advice you are given does not necessarily apply to you. But it might. Why, then, should you ignore it? That brings me to my second point:

Advice goes against intuition. There are two types of advice: internal and external. Internal advice is that gut feeling, things your mind is telling you, things that you do without a good explanation (”intuition”). External advice is everything else. People let external advice overwrite internal advice quite frequently, but we are much more in tune with other people’s body language than we think (yes, even the anti-social nerds). We just need to learn to listen to ourselves. If things feel right, you’ll know it. External advice only gets in the way of this. If external advice goes with your intuition, wonderful, but if it doesn’t then we question our decisions. If this is the case and our intuition is normally right, then all external advice does is slim down the probability that we follow our intuition.

And the main reason relationship advice is inherently flawed:

Advice implies change. Is change a good thing? The answer, as with most things regarding relationships, is “it depends”. Change is good if you want to change. Change is bad when you are simply using change as a means to an end. An example, if you will (note that this is a very quick overview of two long and involved stories, so please forgive the brevity):

A while back I decided that I wasn’t happy with who I was. I was afraid to try new things, afraid to take chances. So I changed. I made a note and a conscious effort to be more spontaneous and take more chances. It went well, I had some good times, and I think I am a more balanced person because of it.

Less than a year before I decided to make this change, I was fed up with my lack of success with women. So I started looking at what was the problem, and decided that I was too conservative. So, I decided to take more chances. While this did not end poorly per se, it did not end well. I was unhappy with who I was, because I often had a face on.

In both instances my action was the same: take more chances. My goal, however, was different. My point is that the desire for change should not be for the sake of some other goal. The problem with doing so is that one becomes lost in the pursuit of the change and loses sight of the underlying goal. Only change for changes sake can avoid this common pitfall.

Also, change for the sake of a goal implies that you do not necessarily want the change itself. Originally I did not want to be more spontaneous, I was trying to have more success with dating. This meant that when I realized what I was doing and how I was acting, I felt disjoint. I was unhappy with the discrepancy between myself and my actions. I’d imagine that this discrepancy was also apparent, if only at a subconscious level, to people around me, and as such I imagine my actions gave off an air of “fake”.

So if I already said that this advice (or anti-advice) has to be discovered on one’s own, I do hope that it will make people more open to this idea, and perhaps in the long run help people to stop relying on the advice of others and more on their own intuition.

advice, girlfriends, relationships

While I do believe strongly in the correlation made in my last post, I feel that Jared’s response was slightly off the mark. I really don’t mean to go back and forth on this one, so this will be my last post directly relating to the topic of startup/dating analogies, but I would like to throw in a more serious $0.02.

• The article Jared used is a sales pitch and, at least partially, inaccurate. The average online dating demographic is a shy nerd who, statistically, is much more introverted. He would therefore be a “Nice Guy” who does many of the things mentioned in this article. This article caters towards this demographic for the sake of garnering interest, newsletter signups, and god-knows-what-else. Many of these points are valid, but The complete opposite is also often valid. For #1, being a complete dick will not get you women (at least it won’t get you steady relationships). For #3, #4, #5, and #8, being a pansy is never a good idea, but neither is being completely removed, you must show at least some compassion. #6 and #9 basically say “know what to do”, which is some pretty dumb advice. Everything comes in moderation, if you stray too far to either side of the spectrum you’re in trouble.
• While I won’t go into rebutting every analogy, I will say that some of them seem very contrived and easily reversible. Arguing a difficult position is a good skill, but in this case it’s a little forced.
• I have not dated 20 women in my life (then again, I am young). I have many female friends, and women see me as “just a friend” more often than not, but that is more of a choice than anything else. I recognize that my actions lead me to friends, and I accept that because I believe that the strongest relationships are formed by those who start out as friends (I could write volumes about this, but I’ll spare you…for now).
• I don’t think the issue with CS majors in general is that they don’t “take the time away from the monitor to get into dating”, I think it’s an undervaluation of the importance of connections. I know several brilliant people who simply don’t meet people, fall into their mediocre IT job, and work hard with no chance of advancement. I believe that anyone can go from anti-social nobody to a social being (mostly because I have made the jump myself). Many CS majors accept their position because they are happy that way (which is fine, it takes all types), while others simply don’t have the right opportunity or drive.
• Not to contradict myself, but I think we as CS majors are overly stereotyped in our level social activity. While there are more anti-social CS majors per student than in other majors, we are more social then we get credit for. CS majors have a tendency to keep to their kind. They are very passionate about their trade, and as such like to talk about it often. Most people who aren’t CS majors don’t want to hear this day in and day out, so they stick to their own cliques. It only takes a small group of people to be considered social. While this creates a segregation between what CS majors consider socially acceptable and what everyone else accepts, there is most definitely nothing wrong or anti-social about it. This is very similar to fine arts majors, who tend to socialize with other fine arts majors and as such develop their own social norms.

On a more bloggy note, I do enjoy posting about relationships (one of my many failed blogging attempts was called “Perpetual Optimist”, where I would post about my failures with women and lessons learned. Expect more posts in the future along these lines. While I believe that when it comes to things like relationships one must walk their own path, you never know what could spark a moment of deeper understanding.

Disclaimer: Many of my thoughts are based on what I have seen in my limited view of the world. You may have seen something different. It’s my blog, and as such my opinions.

Disclaimer for my disclaimer: On the other hand, please feel free to disagree with me, but please do so constructively. I am a huge fan of friendly debates, and thank Jared for providing me with a good debate, which I haven’t had in a while. If everyone argued constructively we would undoubtedly be much better off as a society.

debate, girlfriends, nerds, relationships, startups

Note: I came home today planning to write about this topic. Then I read Jared’s post (see #4). Bastard stole my thunder (because obviously I’m the first one to consider this analogy :-P).

I’ve often heard the saying “being married to your work”, and I frequently consider the similarities between startups and relationships. For one, on any given day I’m mulling around a few ideas for startups, and most days my thoughts also lead to my lack of a girlfriend and possibly solutions to that situation. There are many things that are nearly identical when it comes to the “game” (as so many, excluding myself, like to call it) of dating and the process of forming a startup. Allow me to elaborate:

Startups

Girlfriends/Relationships

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Convince successful people that they should invest their faith (and money) into your idea

Convince women that they should invest their faith (and time) into you

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You spend an obscene amount of time working on them

You spend an obscene amount of time with them
(I will avoid the pun here…)

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They have the potential for huge monetary payoffs, yet few reach this potential

They have the potential for huge emotional payoffs, yet few reach this potential

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It helps to be rich

It helps to be rich

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They’re very internet-focused, and meeting co-founders online is no longer necessarily a bad idea

They’re becoming very internet-focused, and meeting women online is no longer necessarily a bad idea

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Many people try for years to successfully start one, and once successful find that it’s a lot of work

Many people try for years to successfully find one, and once successful find that it’s a lot of work

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They will sap your free time and life

They will sap your free time and life

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All joking aside, I do think that this is a notable thing: if you expect to have a steady relationship while working on a startup, 9 times out of 10 one of the two will fail. You need to have an amazing devotion to both, very understanding co-founders/significant other, and full acceptance of the fact that your sleep will suffer double the amount it normally would.I do have a possible solution, though it takes a certain type: date your co-founder (or co-found with your significant other). This only works with 2 founders (being the 3rd+ wheel is never fun…). It seems to be a wonderful test of a relationship. If two people can spend nearly all day together with very little sleep working on what has been called “an emotional rollercoaster” by many and not end up killing each other (sounds like a reality TV show…) it must speak volumes of their bond. Don’t we look for similar qualities from our co-founders and our significant others, trust, honesty, devotion, ability to put up with them for long periods of time, sense of humor. The only difference from my point of view is whether or not gender plays a role. I even submit that there must be a certain chemistry between co-founders, similar to romance but without the lust.

This does create a whole new slew of problems though. Double the stress, emotion, and time spent together, add a touch of competitiveness. Hell, while we’re at it, throw in some romance and programming. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase “late night at the office”.

So, any young entrepreneurial women looking for a good time co-founder?

Disclaimer for those looking to form a startup: The above was written with a strong sense of humor and mild sarcasm in mind. If you are offended by anything I say, or even consider, for a moment, taking me seriously, how can you ever expect to survive months working day and night with the same people (dating or otherwise)? Really, laugh a little, you’ll live longer.

girlfriends, relationships, startups