We all love the sappy Hollywood ending where the good guy gets the girl, even after she initially falls for the jerk/villain.
It's too bad that real life often doesn't play out this way.
The one thing that many women find irresistible in bad boys is their confidence.
Sure, oftentimes they're just faking it, but this doesn't became apparent until later.
The other day, as I was reflecting on my primary and secondary school days, it suddenly hit me: All the guys who girls were typically drawn to were either:
1. Athletes
2. Troublemakers
3. Much older
4. Some combination of the above
But not usually academic standouts like me -- the well-behaved kind who just liked to chill at home or with friends after school/on the weekends.
To be fair, there are always exceptions. But by and large, most attractive girls (and even ones that might not be considered 10s by any stretch) followed this pattern.
Chances are, the reasons girls chase after bad boys boils down to one or more of these:
1. They want to rebel against their disapproving parents.
2. They were treated poorly by their father or male guardian, so now they seek such treatment in a partner.
3. The bad boy has some issue that the girl hopes to fix (even if, in her mind, it's to mold him into a nicer guy).
To go back to my #1 reason, though, it's the confidence and charm that really gets them. The ability to keep the girls guessing, on their toes. Mystery and unpredictability make an attraction cocktail like nothing else.
Nice guys offer no such concoction. They're sweet, romantic, caring. Everything a girl could want -- once she's ready to settle down. If she's not, it's just so much more exhilarating to go after what you can't have or control.
Bad boys project this aura of not caring what others think about them. Many girls will think, "Well, maybe he'll care enough about ME to change. Maybe he'll care about what I have to say."
When it doesn't turn out that way, however, the girl -- frustrated and heartbroken -- proceeds to cry on the shoulder of the poor guy who professed his love to her.
I realize that many women outgrow this eventually -- hopefully well in advance of whenever they get the itch to settle down with a more steady companion.
But it's appalling how, at a certain stage of their lives, many girls perceive what they know isn't right for them to be right for them.
Immaturity? Maybe. Not knowing what they want? Perhaps. Influences like TV shows and friends? Likely.
I once fell for a girl I met in person after talking online for years. Mind you, we were teens at the time. She claimed to feel the same toward me, but her actions didn't support that. She was flighty and fickle, never invested deeply in the relationship as I was. It later turned out that she was seeing another guy all along; today they share two children.
Had I picked up on the signs she was giving off sooner (flaky, never really wanting to hang out, never going the extra mile to see me), I would have washed my hands of her and set my sights on other girls.
If a guy senses that the feelings aren't mutual, he shouldn't try to will his way to her heart. Either she feels it, or she doesn't. What's more, he should never change who he is in an effort to woo her. That precludes other girls who would actually fall for the most genuine version of himself from seeing him at his most authentic.
While nice guys might not be as risky and adventurous as a jerk, what good is to choose someone who might leave you reeling emotionally?
Sometimes it's better to opt for long-term happiness over short-term gratification.
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