ClueChick: real clues from a real chick

So, I have this friend. He's a smart, capable, fit, entertaining guy in his 30s. He's great! Except, he exudes that air.

You know the air I mean. It's that air of desperation. It's the air that precedes him when he walks into a room so all the nice women there know to avoid him like the plague, and all the mercenary women perk up and think, "Oh, hey, I can string this guy along for months before he catches on that he's not gonna get any..."

This guy isn't looking for casual sex; he's looking for a serious relationship leading to marriage, and he's utterly miserable about the lack in his life. Seriously, he can't have a conversation without bringing it back to this at some point along the line. It kills me.

Why? Because if he weren't so achingly, painfully, heartwrenchingly desperate, he might have a chance. But I like him, and even I get the willies when he's around women who are potential matches, because I can feel all his clingy little psychic tentacles reaching out with trembling, pathetic hope that maybe... possibly... could it be...?

I want to tell him to chill out and relax, but, of course, that's no help, because, well, he really does want a girlfriend, and unless I have some specific suggestions as to how to chill out and relax, he maintains himself in this incredible downward spiral of flailing desperately, which makes any potential partner nearby flee in horror, which leads to more flailing...

So, listen, I can't tell him this, but I can tell you:

The absolute first step to being hot is not to need to be hot. In fact, it's not to need anything from the stranger you're meeting-and-maybe-interested-in. It's all well and good to need things from your friends or from your partner, but if the first sense I have of you is that you need me, you can be damn sure I'm going to run screaming. And the people who find that hot? Watch out for them. Abuse comes in a hell of a lot of forms.

This friend of mine, he has several great hobbies, which he continually talks about as ways to meet women. It's true that hobbies are great ways to meet new people, but you should be doing them for yourself above all. As long as every act you engage in is oriented toward finding someone to hold you at night, you're going to give off that air.

My advice is this: Find yourself. Make yourself a whole and happy single person. Create a life that is complete and fulfilling to you. Then figure out how to make a space in that will be comfortable and inviting to someone new, who might like to come home with you and spend the night and maybe make a life together, if that's the sort of kinky shit you're into.