The Incel Breakdown: How To Deal With Constant Rejection
How To Deal With Dating Rejection When You're Totally Sick Of It
The word "incel" wasn't really common knowledge until the spring of 2018. These days, it's something you hear a lot more. But what does it mean, and why is it a part of the discourse around gender, dating and sex? We decided to investigate. This article is one of five parts of AskMen's The Incel Breakdown. You'll find the other four linked at the bottom.
Listen. No amount of advice is going to make rejection fun. Especially constant rejection-- the kind of rejection that would drive you to be an incel. It’s always going to deliver a flavorful salad of stinging pain and revolting embarrassment. However, while you can’t change your feelings, you can absolutely change how you frame those feelings. And a change of mindset could change your life in a big way. It could pull you away from inceldom.
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If you need an example of how powerful mindset can be, look at Navy SEALs. They have a saying: “embrace the suck.” This is relevant in their case because there’s a lot of suck to go through if you’re a SEAL. As part of routine training, you go through something called “hell week,” an intense physical and psychological breakdown. People have died doing this. Following that, you have to do military service.
Now, your situation sucks, if you’re getting constantly rejected. But it probably doesn’t suck as much as that. There’s no live fire and you won’t die. This means that you can certainly learn to embrace the suck. How do you do that? Well, my advice may sound confusing at first, but it won’t when I break it down. Basically, my advice is to not take rejection too personally -- but, at the same time, to take it a little bit personally. Let’s address these steps in order, so we can sort this out together.
First, the not taking it personally part. It’s easy to take rejection personally. When someone rejects you, it can feel like they’ve punched your whole soul right in the balls -- that they’ve passed judgment on your entire personhood. Which is wounding, because your whole personhood has been developed through years of struggle, and pain, and you probably have a good heart, deep down. You did all that stuff, and you have all those redeeming qualities, and then a girl you like says, “nope, I’d rather hang out with someone taller and cuter than you.” And then you have to sit next to her the whole semester, being reminded of your supposed inadequacy constantly as she plays with her hair or whatever.
This is not what’s going on, though. What’s happening when you get rejected is that you’re being judged on someone’s impression of you. This is a partial slice of your personality. It essentially consists of how you look, your social status, and how good you are at talking to people who float your boat. This is not everything you are. If you consider the breadth of your whole experience, in fact, it’s a relatively small chunk.
If you don’t believe me, think about what would happen if you got propositioned by someone you really, really weren’t attracted to. Like, someone who doesn’t have a chance with you, who you’d instantly reject. During the process of rejecting them, would you take the time to peer into their complex inner life, consider the entire content of their character, and take a delicate, balanced measurement of their attractiveness? No. You’d make a snap judgment, deciding more or less instantly that you’re not buying what they’re selling.
Knowing this can make rejection feel less significant. It can also make it clear how you should deal with rejection. Which is that you should only take it personally to the extent that it’s actually personal.
Let’s go back to the operative factors: your looks, social status, and how good you are at talking to people. These are all somewhat malleable. It’s difficult, but it’s possible. Let’s address these in order.
It might sound preposterous to say that you can change your looks. You can’t change your bone structure, unless you go to Korea and shell out a lot of money for crazily comprehensive plastic surgery. If you’re dramatically asymmetrical, there’s nothing you can do with that. (Take it from an asymmetrical AskMen.com editor.) But you can work with what you have. One fact that’s not well-known: in six months of lifting, you can effectively double your strength, due to the magic of what they call “noob gains.” When you double your strength, you’ll look bigger and more impressive. Which makes a difference. If you’re cash-strapped, bodyweight exercises can also be awesome, and there’s a wealth of videos about it on YouTube.
Also, dressing well isn’t that hard. While it is, in fact, quite tricky to stay up on the latest fashions, it’s not tricky to do better than the average guy in college. All it takes is a crisp pair of jeans, a nice button-down shirt, and some solid dress shoes. If you have three shirts and a good pair of jeans, that’s enough for a social life. H&M and Uniqlo have made this process cheaper than it’s ever been before. Then, go to a fancy barber and just tell them to make you look good. You can get the same haircut done in the future for less money, if that’s an issue.
Meanwhile, you can take care of social status and your ability to talk to women with one step. Make some friends, dummy -- and make sure there’s a mix of genders in your friend group. Having a female perspective in your life will make you a less narrow-minded person, and, significantly, a person at less risk of thinking that women are somehow homogeneously evil creatures who cackle at your suffering. (And it could also help a lot with the dressing well part.) If you’re bewildered about how to do this, just find an activity and talk to people who are also into it. For maximum efficiency, do some kind of group fitness. Yoga is wicked for relaxation and has a healthy gender ratio. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is more male-dominated, but it’s great for learning some confidence, and also learning how to choke someone out. Having a shared activity makes bonding easier.
Falling into a solid friend group will both give you a big boost in social status, make you better at extroversion, and expand the circle of people you can date. The social status part might sound weird, because when we think “social status” we tend to think “Donald Glover.” And, okay, Donald has a lot of social status. But, to start dating, all you need in terms of status is a group of friends around you who’ll make you look awesome when you’re out at a party and you encounter someone attractive. When women see you with a friend group, they’ll think, “okay, he must be cool, because all these people like him.” They’ll also make you happier, which will help, too -- upbeat people are far more attractive.
Do all these steps, and you’ll go from being a solitary guy who mumbles awkwardly to someone who rustles your jimmy, to a more confident guy who feels a little more at home in the world, even if he doesn’t get dates all the time. At this point, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking both, A, that sounds really hard, and, B, what if I do all that stuff and still get rejected? And you’re right. It is hard -- this a journey that could take a few years before it has real effects. You could do all that stuff and still get rejected, at least for a while, maybe for a long time, until you really master social skills.
But that actually doesn’t matter. These steps will make you happier and healthier no matter what, and that process will start quite quickly. Hell, it’s possible that when you’re interested in looking good, and you have group activities, and friends to hang out with, you’ll be less fixated on getting laid. Which, by the way, is one good way to get laid. When you’re at a point where you don’t look at women as exotic and possibly evil creatures, and start looking at women as normal people who you can just talk to, the women you’re into will detect that comfort -- it’ll register as confidence. Everybody wins.
I would wish you good luck, but that would be disingenuous. Because while luck certainly affects where you start out, luck has nothing to do with whether you choose to move in a positive direction.
The Incel Breakdown:
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Dating