Why am I still single? Is it because I’m weird? Is it because I’m an introvert? Is it because there’s something secretly, horribly wrong with me?
In today’s vlog, I give honest answers about why I’m still just a ‘me’ instead of a ‘we’.
If you’ve ever asked yourself “why am I still single?”, you know that I had my work cut out for me filming this vlog. In it I offer my honest take on why my past relationships didn’t work, while also sharing my best introvert dating advice.
It’s another one of my up close and personal vlogs that y’all seem to like so much. I hope that you can relate in some way, or that, at the very least, you find my relationship metaphors, and strange dating philosophy entertaining — something interesting to chew on during your lunch break.
Anywho, I hope you enjoy the Why Am I Still Single video. Remember to subscribe to my YouTube channel, as it really supports my work, AND gives me warm fuzzies. 😉
Lots of love,
thanx for this 🙂 i really like what you said about keeping an open mind every day … you really do meet interesting people … it’s all about attitude 🙂
good luck my dear 🙂
You’re welcome, I’m happy you liked it! 🙂
Hi Michaela, I’ve just watched your new vlog, very interesting.
I can relate a little bit to that! Why just a little bit? Because I’m “single” too and I’m NOT single: I’m in relationship with ROSI – my CAT Rosi!:-) Does that sound weird to you?
I don’t hope so. 🙂
Every night, 10 p.m., Rosi comes in my workingroom, because she wants me, to switch off the computer and come to bed, finally! Haha… so it’s almost like to be “married” isn’t it?
Rosi really cares about what I’m doing and so do I. Except: Unlike “human & human”-relationships we NEVER discuss or argue about anything and we both love that!
Maybe Rosi is introvert too, who knows? – What I always hated in my failed “human & human”-relationships was this useless disputing about any bullshit…Ugh! – What an exhausting waste of time! – That never happens between Rosi and me; and I’m happy about that! –
Now I’ve a question:
Why do you think “dating” is a good advise for introvert singles? I don’t understand this. “Dating” always was very exhausting and mostly frustrating for me in my younger years and meanwhile I’m “too old & weak” to try this again… leave my alone, for heaven’s sake! Lol…
(On the other hand, I truly believe: You can’t find a good “partner” when you are hunting for it. If you’re lucky you will meet your “good partner”, right when your are busy making other plans… 🙂
– All the best!
Matthias
PS: By the way, meanwhile I’m on FB (and Instagram) too.
I understand the Apple to pear metaphor well. However I want to add that it’s in everyone’s best interest to date logically versus emotionally. Women often mistake, not feeling chemistry for a man as a indicator of lack of compatibility, this is a myth when it comes to long term relationships, initial chemistry especially with introverts comes after the safety threshold has past. I for one have the courage to show up as myself and I think this can be intimidating or off putting to a female due to my genuine authentic demeanor. I find social masks to be unethical and being told by relationship and dating gurus that I need to do things to manipulate a woman’s emotions in my favor distasteful and immoral.
My INTJ friend and university professor says this about relationships: “Because love is absolutely no indicator of mutual compatibility, and compatibility matters if you intend to marry. If you don’t intend to marry, compatibility isn’t a huge issue. You’re just dating, and there’s no commitment involved. Dating and true partnership are different species.
If you are highly incompatible with your partner, merging lives is a very unwise idea, as this will eventually lead to friction, tension, power struggles, and frustrating impasses. And because you’ll feel so crappy around them most of the time, you will also stop loving your partner.
Compatibility is the far-range component of any relationship—a sort of risk assessment. The Big Three areas of compatibility where couples fall critically short are mutual physical attraction, money management/finances, and agreement as to have children (and if you agree to have children, how many, when, and how to raise them—this is really complicated!). Then you move onto the next tier, which encompasses things like political and spiritual leanings, values and morals, and lifestyle preferences. There’s wiggle room for almost everything except for the “having kids” bit—that’s a solidly binary issue.
Love requires practical solutions to constantly progress and keep moving forward, and to do this, you and your partner must be on the same page about the most important issues—at least the Big Three.
You can love someone very, very much and not be able to sustain the love.”
I want to add that character to me is a big deal. Like most intuitives I think having like values or at least compatible values, is what seals the deal for me. That sounds very narcissistic however things like loyalty and fidelity and moral character can be deal breakers. Many people do things out of fear and people often fear what they do not understand. So point being get to understand your target of interest being a man or woman, study them, learn their biology, don’t love them on auto pilot like you would want to be loved, or love them the same way you would show love to someone of the same sex.
Understand logic doesn’t always equal masculine and emotion doesn’t always equal feminine, they are two different animals, one is brain chemistry and the other is energy fueled by hormones. Yes most women are feminine and most men are masculine, but INTJ females prove that women can be very logical and INFP men prove that men can be very emotional. You as an individual either feminine or masculine will be drawn to the opposite polarity, it’s truly Ying and Yang.
Can compatibility be influenced? Yes it can! Surprisingly, you can’t another person but having standards and boundaries, you can influence another to be more compatible with you. This depends however if they themselves are willing to grow as a person and I wouldn’t advocate anything less than a growth relationship between two individuals. You can do this by operant conditioning. This is where you praise the acceptable wanted behavior and ignore the unacceptable behavior. What isn’t understood consciously is that the sub-conscious mind will adapt to positive strokes if only given positive strokes. What I mean is that the sub-conscious is so baby like in it’s understanding of of negative or positive it only knows needs on an emotional level. So negative attention still can feel like attention. So if we’re careful and love logically and consciously we can in fact build an amazing relationship with another person, which for women this actually is a boost their self esteem, being that relationships are their first psychological need of the true self, where as for a man it’s accomplishments of career or work. Self esteem for women is built in four areas: relationships, being a woman, children and career. Where as for a man it’s career, women , being a man. Women often focus on these areas all at the same time, because they can more easily jump from logical brain to emotional brain where as most men do their thing one thing at a time, this is due to white matter between the two sides of the brain, women have more where as men have less, however if a man is conditioned to make the jump he can grow more white matter between the two halves, however this takes time.
Sorry I wrote so much Michaela, this is one of those areas where I’m really passionate about, love and relationships are a big deal to me.
Oh Unfortunately I’ll miss your workshop on Thursday October 5th. I won’t be in Toronto
🙁
Really hope that you organize another workshop anytime soon!
I’ll stay tuned (and fingers crossed)
Thank you Michaela (I do not feel like I am an alien in this world anymore hahaha)
I love your work!
wonderful “why am I still single? ” this book is just you see me and reading my mind. I’m single and all the behaviors of being introvert I do have, but before I couldn’t know what’s is it and who I am. but now I know , thank you so much and I wish I could get someone to understand me like you
Because of my blog, I am give everyone my opinion regarding staying single:
1. You choose to be unattached to anyone because you need more time for freedom, self-learning, career, business, etc.
2. You do not want to travel to another city, another state, or another country in order to find the right partner or spouse.
I have written a recent blog post called “Travel for True Love”. In it, I have explained that many people (especially the ones in United States) remain single or keep getting involved with the wrong partners/spouses. If they do not go overseas and possibly find better partners/spouses, they are giving themselves limited dating options. They are only making themselves available to local people who may have too much baggage.
Many people choose who they find attractive. But, they cannot also choose who is right for them too. When they learn that their partners/spouses are not who they have expected, they try to change their partners/spouses. People who enter international relationships or marriages do not have to worry so much about this issue. Most foreigners are different from Americans/Westerners characteristically, culturally, and emotionally.
Hi Michaela, great video … and I can relate as an introvert who went through a failed marriage, I eventually found the love of my life (and now know that with the right inner work, anyone can too).
In my experience (I’m author of a short kindle ebook called Single No More and Law of Attraction expert) relationship come down to two things:
1. Split energy – Typically caused by past relationship trauma, this puts out a vibe that keeps potential partners away. For example, if you experience a traumatic breakup, the subconscious mind flags relationships as unsafe. Part of you now wants a relationship, but a deeper subconscious part of you is afraid (being controlled, hurt again, cheated on, etc …). Split energy is usually at the root of self sabotaging relationship patterns or unknowingly keeps people single.
2. Emotional roots – Our relationships reflect back to us the emotions baggage we carry. Look at all your past significant relationships and look for a negative emotional pattern that these bring up. For example, if you frequently attract partners who remain disconnected emotionally, don’t allow for deeper connections and don’t seem to be there to support you, this is typically rooted in feelings of abandonment due to lack of physical or emotional presence from a parent as a child.
I’ve got a free relationship breakthrough kit that helps people dig into all this stuff and would love to offer you a 30 minute gift session if you’re drawn to chatting and learning more… I couldn’t find you on facebook or any contact forms on your site, but feel free to reach out over email!
Hi Michaela – thanks for your vlog. I find you seem to be talking to those like yourself, who are lucky enough to have dating experience. I’m an extremely introverted and extremely shy guy who at 36 has yet to ask even one woman out; I’ve never been asked out either. I have a very good, well-paying job, stay in shape, and get complimented by women at work on my clothes, etc., but could never ask anyone out because I just can’t. I am open minded – but nothing ever happens. Is there any hope for me?
INTJ here… I’ve been single for almost 10 years now (virtually not dating at all). I would like to date, but I find online dating terrible and a huge black hole for time, but I am a writer, so it’s not like I’m going to meet someone at work. It feels like a Catch-22.
Hi Robert,
I see a lot of potential happiness for you. You have a great advantage — your creativity and gift for words. The author of Cyrano de Bergerac recognised that sex for women starts in her brain, and words are the key. You could make up a story for a woman that you’re chatting up — ask her five questions, her favourite holiday destination, her favourite bedtime story as a child, her favourite dessert, her favourite food, what she does for work, and one character trait in men that she finds attractive. There you have all the tools to start a great story where you tap into her pleasure centres through memory, and you have her the heroine of the story; you make her beautiful, brave and a total catch. She’s in a dilemma, and then you write yourself into the story, the handsome hero coming to be her hero to stand on her side and be her protector. Yes, she could do it herself, but she’d love a strong sensitive man to lean on and to understand her and see her as she is. And love her. And maybe deal with the spiders.
So, at the end of the story, and you’ve added some well timed humorous moments, you ask her “so what would our beautiful heroine like to do in the next chapter? Would you like to come with me to (insert destination here) to (have coffee/dinner/see a band/gallery/skate/walk) next Saturday?”
If you make her laugh a bit first so she relaxes, and you listen to her, and remember (which you will display by this activity), you look good, smell good, and have a good voice, you’ll do well.
What do you think?
So, at your one-year anniversary, you could write her a special story about her. If her love language is words of love and affirmation, your halfway there.
Michaela, I just stumbled upon this vlog today. I think it is amazing how you reveal your intimate stories with your readers. Definitely you are a good role model for innies. I also love the intellectual feedback in the comment section from many of your readers (James, Nick, etc). As an extroverted man dating an introverted woman, this education is helping me gain a new perspective. Without this information, I would have abandoned trying to figure out innies (at least the one I am with now). When you meet people, you begin with curiosity and attraction of some kind. You do not know their personality type (introvert, extrovert). The underlying theme of your blog tells me RELATIONSHIPS ARE NOT MEANT TO BE EASY! Stay the course, Michaela!
Well for many of us men that are still single today which we can certainly blame the kind of women that are everywhere these days for that one. And had we been born many years sooner which this definitely would’ve never been a issue for many of us since finding real love in the good old days was so much easier. And most of the women at that time were real ladies and very old fashioned as well.
I don’t think there is a proper “blame” target here. And “real ladies” is a pretty lousy indictment of women today. Why aren’t people “real ladies” today? What’s that even mean?
I’m “okay” with being single. I’d rather not be, but that’s what it is.
I do confess that I hate “dating.” I’ve been in relationships, intense ones even, that didn’t start with dating. I don’t object to it, but my form of introversion makes the concept unenjoyable most of the time. The sheer amount of energy it takes to “get to know” someone via first dates and such on a regular basis nearly makes me want to take a nap as I write this comment about same.
Thank you, Michaela, for your honesty and candor about this. I’ve only received a little grief for being single in my late 40’s, but I know I don’t measure up to other’s expectations in that regard. For a while years ago, I wept under the weight of my perceived failure, but came around to accepting and loving myself as I am. Now, I’m happy just being myself.
Cheering for you, and your efforts to educate people about introversion!