Do You Really Want Her Back, Or Are You Settling?
How to know if you really want her back or if you are just settling because you are impatient that you haven’t found anyone better.
In this video coaching newsletter, I discuss an email from a viewer who sabotaged his relationship with his girlfriend because he felt like he wanted to play the field and that he could eventually find a woman he was really into. After a few months of dating other women, he decided that he really wanted her back.
He has tried to get another chance with her, and even though he says that she was really in love with him before the breakup, she says she is too hurt and doesn’t really want to give him another chance because he was so cold and discarded her so callously. My comments are in bold italics like this below in the body of his email.
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This is something, now being fifty, that I have seen so many times over the course of my life. Not only in my own life, which I wrote about in my first book “How To Be A 3% Man,” but lots of friends, family members, just people that I’ve met along the way. Most people tend to major in minor things, meaning they settle in every area of their lives that’s important to them.
And when you settle and you don’t really go for the things you want, you give up on them, but that desire is still in the back of your mind. And as you get older, and one by one give up on your goals and you dreams, personal or professional, these are the kinds of things that just sap your enthusiasm and make it harder to keep moving forward towards the things you want and cause you to start losing hope.
And once you start losing hope, you typically don’t take care of your body, you don’t take care of things in your life, and eventually this is what ends up causing us to shorten our own lives because we’re just simply not taking care of ourselves. So, emotionally, mentally, spiritually and physically when we’re in the decline and we’ve given up on ourselves, it really does shorten our lives, and that is a tragedy.
I’m all about reaching your full potential in every area of your life, because I’ve been living this way my whole life. I’ve never been satisfied with mediocrity. Whether it was personal or the professional part of my life, any time there was a part of it I wasn’t happy about, or I didn’t have the same enthusiasm, I knew I needed to change something. I’ve always been one to basically start over. That’s just the way I am. That’s why I’ve experienced so many different things over the course of my life compared to average people.
Basically, my life has been a guinea pig for all kinds of experiments health-wise, self-wise, relationship-wise, business-wise — where I live, where I travel, where I work, where I play. I’m always curious to see what’s going to happen next.
Viewer’s Email:
Hello Corey,
Thanks for all the work you do. I have been watching your videos on and off for some years now, as I have had some successes and failures. I also now have your book.
So, you’ve been watching my videos on and off for years and cherry picking, and now you just got around to reading my first book. You are a bad student, my friend. You could do better, but at least you’ve got the book now. And as the book instructs you, you want to read it 10–15 times, because if you radically want to change things in your life, you can’t just dabble.
That’s what most people do. They just kind of dabble their way through. They dabble this, they dabble that and they just kind of half-ass everything in life. You’re just dabbling your way through life. It has consequences, especially as you get older, because you’re wasting a lot of your time and a lot of your energy on things that are incredibly inefficient and not very productive.
My ex and I broke up about 6 months a go. We had been dating a little less than a year before that. The breakup was mostly due to my own actions. I treated her carelessly for the last few months of the relationship. She was madly in love with me and I took it for granted. I did this because I was not sure she was the one and wondered what else was out there.
I’ve done so many phone sessions with guys over the years in this situation. I was once in this situation. I was once married to my ex-wife, who’s a great woman. We had a lot of fun together, she was really cool, a good wife, but there was something always missing. I was young and inexperienced, and I didn’t really have anybody around me that I could talk to that could give me any kind of decent advice.
Any time I went to somebody I worked with or I knew or talked to some girlfriends of mine, they were like “Oh, you’ve just got cold feet. Oh, this will pass. She’s a great girl. You’ll get over it.” Because that’s what they had all done. They had all kind of settled, and so all of the feedback I was getting was them justifying their mediocre relationships and their mediocre choices.
Because if we see somebody that’s stretched beyond their comfort zone and really wants to go for the things that they want in life, and yet we’re not living up to our own potential in our own life, typically, we don’t like to see that because it reminds us of how we’re not moving forward. And the average person then attacks the other person, tries to convince them that settling is the right way. “You’ve got to be realistic about those dreams.”
I was the opposite of mr. nice guy, a true cold fish. But now, months later after some dates with average women, I realize it was a mistake and want her back.
When I read a statement like that, what that tells me is, “I thought I would find somebody in a couple of months, and it didn’t happen. And then I started to become fearful I wasn’t going to find anybody better, so let me go back and heat up those leftovers, and hopefully I can get her back.” The reality is, everybody he met after her wasn’t as good as her. But what happened? He became extremely impatient. He wasn’t willing to wait and hold out.
Great loves take years to come along, just like great friends. How often do you meet a great friend that becomes one of your closest people in your inner circle? Where you meet, and you just kind of click, and you feel like you’ve known each other your whole lives. To me, those are divinely orchestrated, and they just don’t happen very often. And so, when they do, you’ve got to really hold on to those kinds of people.
Almost a hundred percent of the people that you’re going to meet over the course of your life are going to be average, mediocre people you’re not really going to jive with for very long. You might hang out and be acquaintances and do fun things when you work together at a company, but then when you go work somewhere else, those relationships fade, and you make new relationships and and friendships at the new company.
True friends always stay in touch and make a mutual effort. Good people who are good for you, good to you, good for your soul are so rare. They are absolutely a precious gift. You can’t just give up after a few months.
And I know how you’re feeling, because I felt the same way after I left my wife. I hadn’t met anybody right away, and I started getting worried, because the whole reason I married her was because I was afraid if I broke up with her I would never find anybody better, or who was as nice to me, or treated me as good as she did, or loved me as much as she did, even though there was something missing.
There was a spiritual connection that was absolutely missing. It did not feel right. And I talked myself into going along with it. And after I left, I really struggled with it. I had friends like, “What happened? You guys were so good together? What’s the matter with you?” And it’s tough when you haven’t found anybody else right away, because it just doesn’t happen like that.
Like I’ve often said, most people get two, maybe three, sometimes one of these really amazing loves where you just click, where it’s easy, where it’s effortless, per decade. And the only way those can happen is if you’re single and available and looking. You’re working on yourself and becoming a better version of yourself.
It’s part of our life paths for these synchronistic types of events to happen, and most people just don’t want to wait. And the ones that don’t want to wait, oftentimes that person eventually comes along, but they’re in a marriage or they’re in a relationship. Sometimes it ends in affairs, sometimes it ends in the relationship breaking up, and then they go off with this other person that their emotions get carried away with, and eventually that other person cheats on them or they cheat on that person. It’s just a bad way to go.
It’s tough. It’s really hard to stick to the things you want and to hold out for great things, especially when nothing is happening, and you’re just having one failure after another, and nobody that’s come along has caused you to feel at least as good about her as the ex did. So, it’s totally understandable and natural that you are feeling what you are feeling. I know what that’s like.
When I look at the time from when I left my wife in 1997, I was 27 years old, until I was finally in a committed relationship with a woman I really jived with and clicked with, it was five years before that happened. And there were a lot of women that I met and hooked up with in that period of time, in those five years, that just never felt right, that just never clicked like that.
But in 2001–2002 — and I wrote about that relationship in “How To Be A 3% Man” — it was worth the wait. It was better than I could have ever imagined. I really got to experience the depth of my emotions and how much I could really love and care for somebody, and who felt the same way about me. But it was messy. It wasn’t easy, because I was still learning. I didn’t have a book like mine. I didn’t have a coach like me that knew the things that I now know that could help me. I had to figure it out mostly on my own. And it was worth it.
We talked for a couple months after the breakup, but eventually she told me we needed to move on and essentially cut contact. At this point, I still did not ask for her back — I was unsure, so I don’t know if she wanted to move on or didn’t want to be in my friend zone.
You’re doing what a lot of women do. You’re kind of keeping her warmed up in your life in case you don’t find anybody else. You can always go back to her. It’s like the saying, “You can’t steal second base if you keep your foot on first.” That’s what you’re doing. And the fact that you’re only giving yourself a few months to meet somebody better, and now you’re like, “I’ve got to go back and get the ex-girlfriend back,” that’s a bad way to go. It might be two or three years down the road, it might be four or five years down the road, before you finally meet somebody, because you might have a lot of work you’ve got to do on yourself.
Maybe you’ve got two or three job changes that you’ve got to go through. Maybe you’ve got to build your business to a certain point. Maybe you relocate your business to a different city, or maybe you run into somebody two years from now and you become an entrepreneur and you start a business.
That’s why it’s so important to pursue your goals and your dreams, the things you love and are passionate about. It’s in the process of achieving those goals and dreams that you meet somebody really magical, that you’re really great friends. It’s just a magical, spiritual connection. But in order for those things to happen, you’ve got to create the space for that to happen.
You’ve got to get comfortable being alone and being by yourself. And the fact that you broke up with your girlfriend and you held on to her for all those months tells me you’re not cool with just being alone by yourself. You’re not cool with coming home to your house or your apartment by yourself and having a blast by yourself.
You’re looking to a woman to make you happy, and that’s never going to give you sustainable success. Eventually, you realize that if you’re an unhappy person, and then you get into a relationship and you believe that person makes you happy, once the infatuation wears off, you’re going to realize that you’re still not happy. That’s why it’s so important to do the work on yourself first.
Get to a place where you love hanging out by yourself, you love being single, you enjoy it. You don’t really care about being in a relationship. You don’t really care about attracting the perfect person right now. You’re focused on your goals and your dreams, and eventually, the right person will come along when you least expect it. It’ll just happen and it’ll be magical. And in the meantime, you’ve got to focus on yourself, getting ready for that to happen. You’ve got to become what you want to attract.
I honored this, mostly, except one time I asked her to meet up when she was in town visiting her family, but she had plans already. We lived in different states at the end. Anyway, after this I tried to move on permanently. Well, last week, I was in her town and texted her. I convinced her to meet up after some intense back and forth texts of her not really wanting to.
Never try to keep somebody that doesn’t want to keep you. She obviously came to the realization that you just weren’t into it. And obviously, through your actions and your words, you made it clear that you weren’t that into it. And deep down, she knows that you’re trying to settle with her. If you’re trying to settle, at some point, you’ll go back to treating her exactly the way you were before you broke up with her. That’s reality.
She didn’t become a different person overnight. You just gave up on finding somebody else. You didn’t hold out. It’s hard. It’s not easy, because you never know when that’s going to happen. Especially when you’re thinking, “Man, it might be a few years before I meet somebody that I click with?” You’ve got to get to a place where you’re cool with it, where you’re happy with that, where you’re content with that and you have peace with that.
She finally agreed and basically told me how bad I made her feel and how she felt like she was a nuisance when we hung out.
That statement right there, that shows you how much you hurt her by being weak and being a bitch and trying to keep her in your life, when deep down, you weren’t feeling it. And that’s why she’s so adamantly opposed to it, even though she still cares for you. Obviously, you can see here, it bothers her. It’s like you’re trying to settle, and you’re getting her to go along with your bullshit and your weakness. And that’s not masculine at all, dude.
You’re being a weak fucking bitch. I’m sorry, I know that’s harsh, but it’s fucking reality. It’s not right to do this to somebody. It’s not right to give her false hope just because you’re bitching out on your dreams and your goals and finding the kind of person you really want.
I felt terrible for everything and apologized, taking full blame for everything. I then asked if we can start talking again and if there is any way she would give me another chance to earn her trust.
Again, as soon as you know she’s back where she was and feeling the way she was, you’ll go right back to feeling how you weren’t that into it. I’ve seen it thousands of times over the years and I’ve experienced it in my own life. It’s not an honorable way to treat somebody that really cares about you that you just don’t feel the same way about. It’s not manly, and it’s not masculine.
She told me she doesn’t want a guy who just gives up after a few months and makes her feel how I did.
If she was really the right person, dude, you wouldn’t have gotten bored right after a couple of months. That’s reality. Think about your best friend. You don’t tell your best friend after a couple of months of hanging out, “Yeah, have a nice life, dude. I don’t want to fucking hang out with you anymore.” That doesn’t happen.
So, think about it from her perspective. If you met somebody that was ten times hotter and who you clicked with better and you jive with more, you’d want to be with her. You wouldn’t want to get back together with this ex, because you already know what she’s like.
The only reason I waited to reach out now months later was because I wanted to make sure I was ready to give her my all — which I am now, but she simply does not believe me (I don’t blame her).
She shouldn’t believe you. What’s happened is you’re giving up, you’re trying to settle because you became impatient. Rejection breeds obsession, and now you think you want her because she doesn’t want to get back together. Whereas, you talked to her several months after breaking up, because you really didn’t care. She knows you didn’t care. She felt that, she knows that.
Again, it’s not an honorable way to be to try to get her to go back to that. It’s not good for you, and it’s not good for her, because it’s going to keep you from meeting who you really want, and you’re going to keep her from meeting who she really wants. And all you’re going to do is hurt her more if you take her back or she agrees to go back with you and give you another chance.
Anyways, she basically told me she can’t be with me “right now” because she can’t trust me anymore and there was a lot of hurt.
You should respect her wishes, dude. Stop imposing your will on her.
She said she still has feelings for me and it was evident because we were holding hands, cried, kissed a few times, and basically had the same connection as before. What hurt most was she didn’t open the door for us to communicate further so she can work on moving on.
Well, if I was there, I would be giving this girl a big fucking high-five, because she’s doing both of you a favor. She’s got bigger balls than both of you.
I told her I’d honor her ask of me essentially not initiating contact so she could move on. I did however tell her that I still love her and that if there is the slightest chance she would allow me to prove I am trustworthy, to let me know immediately and I will make it happen.
Is this completely over or are there any other actions I can take with her? I do want her back but realize my odds are low.
Thanks Corey!
Best,
Bob
Well again, the masculine thing to do, the manly thing to do is to let her go. You’ve got to admire the fact that she’s strong enough to say no to you. Because like you said, she was totally in love with you. And for a woman to be that strong, to say no to you, that’s impressive. She deserves to have a guy who feels the same way about her as she once did about you.
For you to go back, you’re just living a lie. That’s why I’m being brutally honest here. I’m absolutely not going to enable your bullshit fucking behavior. I know it’s harsh, but I’ve been through this myself, I know what it feels like, I know the hurt that it causes other people, and it’s just not an honorable way to be. Plus, I’ve seen it thousands and thousands of times over the years in phone sessions that I’ve done with men from all over the world.
The honorable thing to do is to wish her well and hope she finds the right guy for her, and you need to focus on reading my book 10–15 times and applying it and getting better, so you can meet and date the kind of women that knock your socks off — not somebody that you just have mediocre feelings for. Because if your feelings are mediocre, you’ll never invest the time and the energy and the heart to make it last long term. That’s just reality.
“Every personal and professional goal you really want never tends to manifest very easily. Great things take time. People will do more to avoid pain than they will do to gain pleasure and the success that they really want. Most people settle for way less than what they are capable of because they are too impatient and addicted to the instant gratification that society convinces us is the norm, when in reality this is not the experience of most high achievers who have the lives that low achievers envy. Set goals and pursue dreams that set your soul on fire. Mediocrity and settling is for losers.” ~ Coach Corey Wayne
