I’m, for the most part, happily married, and we just had a kid a few months ago. So I kind of feel a bit qualified to offer an opinion.
I haven’t had many girlfriends, because I used to have terrible self worth/esteem issues because in Highschool I got rejected by every girl I attempted to ask out. So I thought I was unattractive. Also watching porn made me think my dick was inadequate, and those two things coupled with being poor made me have huge self worth issues, so I thought no girl would want anything to do with me.
I think a lot of young men go through a similar thing nowadays. I used to not even bother interacting with girls/women, even through college. But looking back I feel like that was a waste, because you really you need to put yourself out there.
I ended up finding in retrospect that girls didn’t like me in Highschool because I wore dirty sweatshirts all the time and didn’t care about my appearance. After Highschool, when I started doing more things for myself I noticed girls started to say I was attractive. I still had issues talking with them because I figured they’d hate that I played video games or that I didn’t have a car.
Really I needed to get my act together, but it took my first girlfriend dumping me for a guy with a car/money to see that what I really needed to do was improve my own situation before looking for someone else to add to it. So I bought a car, got my own apartment, and started going to the gym.
Eventually I met my wife and we’ve been together for a while. We’re not rich but we both work hard and support each other so it’s worked out.
So I think it’s two things. You need to better yourself for your own sake; so that you’ll be financially and physically healthy regardless of if you’re single or not. Being secure in those areas will give you an inner confidence that people, and more specifically women, can sense.
Secondly, getting over the fear of rejection and talking to women is the biggest hurdle. I suggest talking with girls/women that you’re not even interested in. I’ve done it a bunch of times before. Since you’re not interested, you have no expectations for how you’d want it to go, therefore you’ll talk much more naturally and and won’t be nervous. If she ends up being into you then you have the options to pursue or not. Then since you have practice it’s easier to talk to women you’re actually interested in.
In addition, talking to a bunch of different women (while you’re single) is good because if they know you’re already talking to other women, then that could make you more attractive as women usually want a guy that other women already see some sort of worth in.
That being said, once you’re in a committed relationship, I would lower the amount of women you have long conversation/contact with, so as to not make your SO potentially jealous. Though that may depend on person to person. My wife gets jealous haha.
Sorry if that’s a wall of text but I’ve been there man so I hope it helps.