Why we shouldn’t overlook the “nice guy”

Working on “The Tip” has meant I’ve literally had no free time and after being reprimanded by my family and friends, last weekend I decided I would relax. I failed woefully.

On the upside, I finally left my bedoffice* and spent some time with a few of my friends. One of whom has recently become a resident of Singleville and as a former serial monogamist, she’s having difficulty grappling with her new status. She’s become contemplative (well paranoid) and believes the Gods are conspiring against her. As she’s the only friend I have that actually wants to get married soon, you can imagine how distressed she is by her current “predicament”.

I find it all very amusing because:

1) She has nothing to worry about and her paranoia is completely misplaced.
2) I think 5 year plans are stupid and love it when I’m proved right.
3) Her rants are the holy grail of all things entertaining.

Mid-way through her, “I’m single and I need to get married in 27.5 months speech” she said something that hit me.

“Christiana, I’m watching men I said no to make other women really happy. What’s worse is there was nothing wrong with them! ”

Why did she say no to these men? At the time she felt they were “too nice”. I can’t judge her because in the past I’ve behaved in a similar manner, as have many women reading this. We’ve passed on perfectly sane men with great prospects just because they were “too nice”.

We weren’t quite sure when our thought process became so polluted, that a man being “too nice” was considered a liability rather than an asset. Since we were feeling ambitious we tried to decipher the root of the problem.

Disclaimer: Our reasoning faculties were severely hampered by drinking too much Rosé. We used the home of all faction aka Wikipedia as our research source.

We concluded that being “too nice” is a liability not necessarily because of niceness itself. Taken in isolation being nice is an attractive trait! However when a man’s too nice and he likes a woman, it means there’s no challenge. The absence of a challenge diminishes a man's attractiveness. Our jaded perception of relationships means that many of us think “true love” must come with a struggle. We believe that if it’s easy to attain, then it’s not worth having. Which is for lack of a better word….stupid.

Not only is there no challenge with a “nice guy”, there’s no competition from other women. Those two factors combined and we have a generation of women who would rather catch a permanent case of thrush, than catch a man who’s “too nice”.

So…..

We are proud to announce that after thinking (well talking) about it extensively, we’re official members of #TeamNiceGuy. We’re also on the hunt for new recruits, because it’s lonely over here. As such we thought we’d compile a list of reasons why the unconverted among you should join us.

Why we shouldn't overlook the "nice guy"

1) Nice doesn't mean he's boring

I think we’re hardwired into assuming that a man being nice means he’s boring. Newsflash! Nice and interesting can co-exist!

2) Even if he is “boring”, it’s still not that bad

Boring is better for your blood pressure, heart rate, weight and you’ll cry less. Yes boring is boring, but I’d take boring over insane any day.

3) Passionate relationships with passionate men are overrated

Romeo was passionate and Juliet is (still) dead. Passion is overrated. In fact, I’ve come to the conclusion that when “passion” is used to describe a relationship, it’s nothing more than a euphemism for “doomed”.

4) Relationships with other "types" probably won’t work in the long term.

The thug, the commitmentphobe, the serial heartbreaker, the emotionally unavailable hoarder, the man who oscillates between loving you and being indifferent, the dreamer with no work ethic. Relationships with such men have a high mortality rate. And even if they do survive, the relationship is so diseased it might as well be terminated.

If you just want a bit of fun it makes sense to go for such men. After all, the quality of man doesn’t matter when you don’t intend for him to stick around.

Sidebar: Isn’t it funny how the men we don’t intend to keep around, still manage to stick around?

However, if you're at a stage in your life when you've chosen the "No More Drama" route, then a nice guy will compliment that choice.


5) You don’t need to “change” him

At least once a week I’ll get an email from a woman engaged in the mother of all Sisyphean quests. She’s trying to change a man. Here’s the thing, no woman has the power to change a man. Not because men can’t be changed, but because people can’t be changed unless they choose to change.

On the other hand if you get with a nice guy you won’t feel compelled to “change” him, because he’s not (as) crazy.

6) Nice guys grow up into great men

Fact.

7) They’ll take care of you AND his mum will be nice too

Anecdata proves (and when I say anedata I’m really talking about statistics I made up in my head) that nice guys take better care of their girlfriends. This is simply because men that treat women like princesses’ tend to have been raised by queens. He’s great, he treats you great and his mum is great. Win. Win. Win.

8) They deserve our time

With so much pressure to conform to the status quo, “nice guys” have the courage to run a different race. They still persist in being nice even though it makes them less attractive and many will overlook them. That alone deserves admiration, respect and at the very least a second date.



Love & Light

Christiana xxx

P.S If you follow me on Twitter or are my friend on Facebook you'll be aware that I have another "secret" blog. It's called "Like I don't blog enough". http://christianam.tumblr.com/ If things are quiet here I may pop up over there. My favourite post thus far is "In Memory of Friendships past" which I felt freed me after writing it. Just thought I'd share it on here as I've had it for months and still haven't got round to it!

* Bedoffice = A bedroom that’s morphed into an office.