If I’m a Nice Guy, I’ll Get Love, Approval, and Appreciation
Photo by Magda Ehlers: https://www.pexels.com/photo/brown-man-face-figurine-613431/
The Pain of Being Nice
If you’re a nice guy, you’ve felt the pangs of rejection by potential partners. You don’t understand why they still don’t treat you with love and respect when you’ve sacrificed so much for them, compromised your needs so they can be happy, controlled your anger and hidden your secret desires.
Worse yet, the women you’re interested in are more interested in losers than nice guys like you! They seem to be attracted to the selfish, drunken, irresponsible, lying, cheating, possessive and controlling guys you try so hard not to be.
Why it Doesn’t Work
Who doesn’t love a nice guy? Well, it turns out potential partners don’t - not when being nice is a strategy used to manipulate others. There’s nothing wrong with being nice as an authentic state of being. But when being nice is an act and a strategy, it is unsustainable.
Nice Guy Training
Many men who develop the traits and charactaristics of nice guys watched our male role models flex their masculine power over us, our mothers, and our siblings. As children, we watched men abuse their priviledge and power and hurt those who trusted and depended upon them. We saw how hurt and angry our mothers became toward our fathers. And we pledged to never be like these men.
We decided to be nice.
Those who suffer from Nice Guy Syndrome (a phrase coined by Dr. Robert Glover) are often completely unaware that they are being inauthentic, dishonest, and manipulative. They work hard to listen, defer to the needs and preferences of others, and try not to be like their fathers. As soon as their partner loses interest, a nice guy feels hurt and resentful. He can become angry or depressed and eventually withdraw into himself, often ruminating about how unfair life is and blaming his partner for his unhappiness.
How it all starts
Personality characteristics and traits originate in childhood as adaptations to family dynamics. As children, the most important thing about relationships is how to get our needs met and how to be loved.
As boys and young men, we learn from our parents and other adult role models how to be men. When one of our parents are dominating and controlling we resent them. When a parent is loving and kind, we feel love toward them.
The Act
It just makes sense that as we develop our relationship skills, we emulate what was role modeled for us. If we decide we want power, we might emulate the parent that had it while we grew up. If we decide we want love, we might emulate the parent that gave it.
Choosing and practicing relationship skills can be tricky no matter how old you are. But for young adults and teenagers it can seem impossible in households that were dysfunctional, abusive, or where love was transactional.
To emulate someone means to act like them. The key word here is act. When we try to be like someone else, we are not being ourselves. Using strategies and techniques to get love (whether you are aware that you are doing it or not) simply doesn’t work. At least not long term. We are all attracted to authenticity. The best actors can only pretend to be authentic for a while.
No More Mr. Nice Guy
This relationship dynamic was the inspiration for No More Mr. Nice Guy, a book written by Dr Robert Glover. It is also the inspiration for my coaching group, IFS for Nice Guys.
Trying to be or not be a particular way rather than just being who we are was the beginning of the problem that makes it so hard for nice guys to find partners and stay close to them. Nice Guys are actors who try to convince themselves that they are who they pretend to be. Nice guyes feel like imposters, and lose sight of who they really are.
Nice guys attract partners who have also develop strategies in childhood for getting their needs met and for being loved. As children, they too observed adults who abused power over those who trusted and depended upon them.
Nice guy partners fall for the nice guy act at first, believing they have finally found someone who is safe and loving. But because nice guys eventually show their shadow sides, their partners gradually grow weary of the act. They lose trust and respect for the nice guy and disconnect in hurt, disappointment, and confusion.
How I help
I help Nice Guys get the partners, the love, and the life they want and deserve using the IFS model. Internal Family Systems is a proven model for breaking up unworkable patterns like those that Nice Guys employ. As a Certified IFS Coach and Practitioner, I use the Internal Family Systems model to help nice guys transform their lives and become fully embodied and unapologetic men. In the IFS model, this is referred to as Self-leadership.
The IFS for Nice Guys coaching group is for men only. Participants are required to have their own copy of the book, No More Mr. Nice Guy, which will be referenced throughout the 16-week cohort. To learn more, attend a workshop or schedule a free a 30 minute discovery conversation.
