Who was your first crush?

I hardly remember about my first crush. In fact, I hardly remember about my childhood.

Having said that, here’s something I vaguely remember: I was rather popular among girls, and I was a bad boy type… when I was 4 or 5. That’s almost 15 years ago. I have no idea why I was popular or the bad boy type. Perhaps I was popular because I was the bad boy type, and the reason why I was the bad boy type was… because I was a spoiled brat.

My first crush may well have been a teacher or a girl at daycare. Which one was my first crush? I don’t know. I liked both of them. This girl at daycare was my first girlfriend. As far as I can remember, she moved to another town or something in the end. I may be wrong. Memories are elusive.

It’s funny how the dynamics between boys and girls change over time, as they grow into adulthood. When you are a little boy, it’s usually not cool to play with girls. Maybe that’s the case for girls too, but I don’t know about their perspective. I believe that’s not the case only with Japanese kids, but in many societies if not all.

Eventually, I stopped playing with girls. Again, I don’t remember whether it was because I was afraid of other boys judging me for not being cool, but I’d say it’s likely. From my own perspective, I was never popular among girls after my preschool period.

I had crushes and such, and I was never a bad boy type again, at least the kind that could express my feelings for them without any worry. When I did ocassionally, I got rejected… and that must have hurt. If I could talk with my 9 year old self, I’d tell him to stop trying to impress his crushes, but to be curious about them and get to know them by talking with them.

There’s pretty much nothing impressive about how I interacted with girls or women when I was a teenager.

I grew up in a fatherless household where there were a lot more women than men. I lived with my mother, grandmother, aunt, and two younger sisters as well as my grandfather and younger brother. 5 women. 2 other men.

During my teenager period, I never thought about this environment where I grew up, but as I think about it now, there’s no way I can be disrespectful towards women; I’m on their side as much as they are on my side.

In my early 20s when I was a university student in Australia, I started learning to love. I also learned a bittersweet feeling of breaking up, a couple of months after I came back to Japan. That was 2007.

Something led to another, and I decided to get better with women, because I had no clue about how to initiate or to have interactions with women I found attractive, on a romantic basis. This period of honing social skills and pushing myself out of my own comfort zone was helpful, as I learned to be more comfortable around women.

A couple years after I started this journey of becoming an attractive man who is good with women, I took the Ars Amorata Online Program. It was in early 2010, and going through the program helped me see women from a different perspective.

If I’m to summarize the core messages of the Ars Amorata (the art of loving), it’s this: be authentic, love and celebrate women, and express that love and celebration of women. I’ve been living with this spirit since then.

But why? Why this journey? I don’t know. All I know is that I love the beauty in their eyes, I love feeling connections with them, and I love letting them shine if they allow me to.

I’m much more curious about women than 10 years ago or even 5 years ago. I’m a student of women and will always be a student of women. There’s always something to learn about women from women, and I’m thankful for every woman I met and will meet in my life.

If you are a woman, thank you for being who you are and for being the beauty that is you.

Days and months and years went by since I started this site. When I started it, I didn’t know what it was going to be about. It was simply a platform where I would post my writings.

Its focus became clearer after I came to think that my life is my art (or likewise your life is your art) and after I realized that one of the things I want to do is to make the world more romantic.

But here’s a problem. The problem that had been stuck in my mind is, what I consider as ‘romantic’ is not what the majority of people associate with from the word ‘romantic’.

Why is it a problem? It’s because I want my core message to be much simpler than something that would require an entire post to explain what it is.

So, I’ve been thinking about how to narrow down my message–something I want to convey through my words.

When I think about what I value, the following comes to my mind: love, freedom, truth, beauty, authenticity, knowledge, creativity, and life.

I could say this site is about how to live. Or rather, it’s about how I live and about sharing my knowledge and experiences through writing.

I strive to live a life that is inspiring to myself and to others. I strive to live a life where I seek beautiful experiences and share them with others. I strive to live a life of freedom by being aware of choices I have, making my own choices, and being responsible for the consequences. I strive to live a life with the attitude of ease and delight. How do I do it? By being creative and authentic.

What I mean by being creative is to put myself forward, to enjoy what I do, to go through trials and errors, and to experiment with new things.

What I mean by being authentic is to be comfortable about who I am, including my own vulnerabilities and desires, and to be honest with myself and with others.

What I strive for seems to come down to, simply, love. How do I create a life I love and I want to live? By being aware of what I want and figuring out how to get it and so on and so on. But the most important, essential ingredient seems to be love. It’s about loving myself. It’s about loving others. It’s about loving what I do. It’s about loving my life.

The notion of love can be hard to define, but I believe it’s more intuitive than that of being romantic. After all, I could say, “I want to let there be more love in the world” instead of “I want to make the world more romantic”.

“Being romantic” may have sounded fluffy to you. If that’s the case, “love” may sound fluffy to you as well.

Love–what’s in it, really? Why should I talk about it? Why should you listen to me? Or even if you choose not to listen to me, why should you care about love?

Here’s how I perceive the current situation: we seem to know what love is and be familiar with it, but many of us have little idea and don’t really practice as much as they want… or should.

The question is: do you love yourself, people around you, people not around you, things you do, and everything else that comes into your life? OK, maybe not everything, but a lot of things. Are you willing to love more?

Whether you choose to love more and more is up to you. But if you do choose to do so, I’m with you. I’m keen on practicing the art of loving and helping you love more and more. I write about love for myself and for those who are on a similar journey.

But isn’t it supposed to be heavy and deep? I mean, all these talks about love? Perhaps. But if that’s the case, it is exactly a status quo that I want to tear apart.

Let’s make it light and bring it up to the surface. Instead of a heavy bag you want to throw away into the ocean, let’s imagine it to be something light and portable that you can give away. Yes, give it away. Lots and lots of it.

We’ll talk about it more. We’ll love more.

Strangers approach me quite often. I guess it’s because I look approachable and harmless.

Some people simply ask me for directions. If I know, I tell them. If I don’t, I I suggest them to talk to somebody else.

Some people ask me for a quick help. Yesterday, I was approached by this guy who lost his phone and was waiting for the person who found his phone, bud hadn’t shown up yet. He asked me if he could call this person’s number. I let him use my phone, but we soon realized that my phone didn’t have enough credit to make a phone call. Soon after we realized there was a public phone nearby, so I believe he managed to call that person.

Some people ask me for money. I sometimes give, but it’s very rare.

Christians approach me, because they want to tell me about Jesus and God, wishing that I’d join them (I think I’ve never been approached by non-Christian, religious people). People from charity approach me, because they want to tell me about their cause, wishing that I’d join them. Sales representatives approach me, because they want to tell me about their products and services, wishing that I’d buy their products and services.

But, no one has ever succeeded in making me join them. What they tell me may be really good, but there is something that puts me off about the way they approach me. What comes to my mind as this something is: they have an agenda, they are desperate, and they use manipulative, psychological tricks whether they are aware or not.

I see there’s a parallel between the way these people approach and the way some men approach women.

I don’t get approached by women at all, but I imagine, if you are a woman, you might have experiences that guys approach you, because they want to tell you how impressive they are, wishing that you’d be with them.

In fact, I’m guilty of making these manipulative approaches myself, even though I had a clear intention of being non-manipulative.

What’s wrong with being manipulative is that it devalues human interaction by treating others as only means to an end, I think. Here, my assumption is that human interaction is valuable in one sense or another.

On a more casual note applying this point to romantic relationships, treating others as means to an end takes the fun away from these relationships too. This one is practical a reason, I suppose.

Anyway.

As I see it, one major difference between being manipulative and being non-manipulative is whether your actions deprive of choices from others, or acknowledge, make it clear and even encourage them that they have choices they can make on their own.

If you lead a conversation with a woman in such a way that she feels she has to give you her phone number to you whether she likes it or not, I think that’s manipulative.

If you lead a conversation with her in such a way that she can choose what she does without being disturbed by your potential action (i.e. getting angry, getting upset etc), I think that’s non-manipulative.

The questions I’m asking myself right now are: Are there still any manipulative things I do, and if there are, what are they and what can I do about them?

What’s your thoughts?

The Wait Is Over

I sense there’s a little status quo about typical dating advice you hear in various places.

When I say typical dating advice, I mean the kind of advice that suggests you to follow certain steps to make him/her fall in love with you so you won’t have to worry about being rejected, because rejection sucks and hurts like hell, and because you are afraid of showing up as who you are.

The reason why I consider this approach as a status quo is simple. It keeps you away from the delight of loving and being loved, which I believe is what you ultimately hope to get from following that kind of advice. If that’s the case, there’s no point in taking this approach.

This status quo is all about waiting to be loved, because loving actively can hurt you. What I suggest instead is to love actively. The wait is over.

Reclaiming the Delight of Loving and Being Loved

I’m assuming here that your aim is to enjoy the delight of loving and being loved. If your aim is to collect phone numbers from every attractive girl you see at a party for the sake of collecting these phone numbers or to get cute guys you fancy to make a move on you for the sake of getting attention of these guys, then this approach may be for you whether it’s ethical or not. But as a reader of this blog or someone who didn’t go away after looking at “Your Life Is Your Art. Love Is How You Create It.” on the top of this site, I believe you are interested in the delight of loving and being loved.

But why can’t you get this delight by following typical dating advice as above? Roughly speaking, I think there are two major problems in the approach suggested by such advice.

The first one is that when you are following a certain step, you can’t put yourself 100% into the interaction you’re having with the guy/girl you like. What goes on in your head is probably something like, “OK, what she said sounds interesting, but hey, I think this is a situation where I need to show her that I’m indifferent to what she’s saying and this way she will be more interested in me, because I’m not like other guys who would be all over her” and of course, you aren’t listening to her as much as you could without thinking about a step you’re supposed to follow.

The second one is that it’s only a temporary solution for your fear of rejection. The reasons for deciding to follow such advice may vary from person to person, but I have a feeling that most of people who are attracted to such advice are afraid of rejection. Instead of teaching that you don’t need to worry about rejection, it teaches you how to reduce the risk of getting rejected by using psychological tactics. So, if you are currently worried about being rejected, what I’m suggesting you to learn is how to realize that no one can reject you (unless you reject yourself) instead of trying to protect yourself from rejections that don’t exist or matter to you.

I believe a solution for this second problem will provide a solution for the first problem. If you aren’t worried about being rejected as who you are, you don’t need to try to follow certain steps to get people like you and that would help you focus more on interactions you have with people you like.

So, what’s a solution for the second problem then? I believe a little change in the way you think would help you solve this problem.

Change The Way You Think

Let’s say your whole approach to dating and relationship is based on the idea of getting guys/girls you like rather than creating meaningful interactions and connections with them. Does this sound familiar to you?

In this approach, if you don’t get them, then that means you’ve been rejected. If you tell a guy that you like him and he says, “Sorry, I have a girlfriend” or “Look, I’m married”, then you can’t get him and you feel rejected. But, what if you aim to enjoy these little interactions and to create some romantic moments instead? Whether you will get him/her in whatever sense you mean by “getting him/her“, you give him/her a gift of being desired and loved for who he/she is.

Your goal is to give this gift without asking for something in return. Whether they will take your gift or not is up to them, and it doesn’t matter to you as much as your giving it to them. In this picture, whether to give this gift is up to you and the act of giving is the most important thing. So, no one can reject you unless you reject yourself.

Love Actively

Even if you do understand this new way of thinking, you might still be afraid of loving actively, because there are possibilities that your love won’t be returned at all. But here’s a question – instead of taking risk to love people (and things you do and your life) without the guarantee that you’ll be loved in return, do you want to wait for love to come to you? It may come tomorrow, or it may never come.

I do believe that you’ll be loved if you are willing to love first, but even if you don’t get loved for your entire life at all (hypothetically speaking, of course…), if you love actively, you will at least enjoy the joy of loving. I believe that’s better than the situation where you keep waiting for love to come, it will never come to you, and you don’t even get to enjoy the joy of loving because you’re too scared to love. Am I making any sense here?

Why don’t we move on from learning how to make others fall in love with us, to learning how to fall in love with others? It’s not about attracting people to you, but it’s about getting attracted to people… the right people.

Let’s love actively and make the world more romantic.

Finding out why you suck is difficult. You might recognize it but don’t know how to fix it. You might not know it and make mistakes unconsciously. But you want to know when you’re sucking because often, no one will actually tell you. They won’t have the balls or know the right words to use. They’ll want to help but they won’t know how.
Julien Smith

This guide will tell you why you suck at romance.

Recently, my favorite writer Julien Smith wrote The Brief Guide To Sucking At Life and it inspired me to write this post. In fact, you could read his post from this romance perspective. He tells you why you’re an asshole, why you are boring, why you’re depressed, why you’re in a dead-end job, and why you’re a loner. Make sure to check out his guide as well as his other fabulous posts like this and this.

This site is all for living a romantic life and I aim to share with you what I learned from my own journey. This post might sound harsher than my usual posts, but do keep in mind that I want you to master your romantic life rather than to keep sucking at romance.

That’s about this post. Now… let’s start.

Why you’re not meeting your Mr./Ms. Right

You haven’t been able to meet people you want to get to know for some time and you wonder why. I don’t know your exact situation, so I’ll think of a few reasons. See if any of these applies to you.

Because you’re in such an environment where you don’t meet new people to begin with.

You live a static life. You get up, go to work, go back to home, watch TV and go to bed. You have a few good friends and might do some stuff together with them on weekends, but your social circle is limited and you don’t get out of that circle at all.

You’ve been this way for a while; you haven’t met anyone new in a long time. If it’s been like this and you are not going to change it, it’s highly unlikely that you will meet someone new. Even if you do, you are leaving things up to chances. If you become more active and expand your social circle and reach out to people, you will meet people you want to meet and your chance of meeting your Mr./Ms. Right will increase.

Because you don’t know how to start a conversation with people you are attracted to.

Do you know how to start a conversation with people you are not romantically attracted to? If you do, you already know how to start a conversation with people you are romantically attracted to. If you don’t, you can say hi and start a conversation already. It’s handy to have this skill and to develop guts to approach strangers just in case you see someone who totally attracts you. The best way to practice this conversation-initiating skill is… to initiate a conversation with strangers.

(By the way, whenever people ask questions like “How do I ask out this guy I like?” and “How do I get a phone number from her?”, I believe they know what they need to do and how to do it.)

Why you’re awkward in a romantic context

So, you do meet new people and you find some of them attractive. You can start a conversation with them, but somehow, the whole thing becomes awkward after a few minutes. Why?

Because you are too needy.

You act like a hungry beast who just found a piece of meat and you seem as if you will do anything to get it. Ladies and gentlemen, calm down. Treat your Mr./Ms. Right as a person instead of a piece of meat and be curious about him or her rather than drolling over him/her.

Instead of trying to get something from that person (it could be approval, sex or something more minor like a phone number), enjoy that interaction itself. If you are indeed attracted to that person, you can express your feelings about him/her in a discreet and honest way. That way of expressing your feelings is authentic and not needy, because your intention is like that of giving a gift to him/her. Just don’t expect you will get something in return.

Because you suck at having a good conversation.

You might be a shy person to begin with, and now you are talking with someone you find attractive… this situation can make you feel even more nervous. So, you don’t talk at all.

You need to learn to express your thoughts and feelings. Again, the best way to improve your skill is to express your thoughts and feelings when you talk with people.

It’s important to ask good questions as well. In fact, I’d say it’s easier to work on your questioning skill and listening skill than to work on your expressing skill.

What do you really want to know about people you find attractive? This is something you need to ask yourself, because if you know what kind of people you want to meet, you will know what questions to ask so you can find out if people you find attractive match with your values.

Some general tips on this. Try to avoid asking simple yes/no questions every 5 second. It’s a conversation, not an interrogation. When you get an answer from the person you are talking with, simply catch a keyword that intrigues you and develop on that. Or you can ask him/her to elaborate more on what he/she said.

Why you’re always friends

Oh, the friend zone. You are even friends with the friend zone. You meet someone and it seems to be going fine, but along the way, you end up being friends with that person and you are not happy about it, because you wanted to be more than friends. Why is this happening to you always?

Because you act like a friend.

I don’t know what exactly you did, but I think I know what happened. So, you met someone. You were very friendly towards that person, because you didn’t want to come across as too needy. Your were thinking like this… “Well, I like him/her, but I shouldn’t express my feelings… yet. I really want to ask him/her out, but he/she might not be interested… I mean, we just met. And, to be completely honest, I’m a little bit afraid of rejection. So, let’s see what happens and act friendly for now.”

In a nut shell, you decided to act like a friend instead of acting like someone who expresses his/her feelings towards people he/she is attracted to. When you express your feelings in an authentic way, it is not needy. There’s nothing to worry about. So, if you wish to avoid the friend zone, don’t voluntarily bring yourself into that zone to begin with. Show your interests from the outset

Why you’re not making deep connections

Creating and cultivating deep connections is what really matters when it comes to having a epic romance that you will remember for the rest of your life. You’ve got skills to meet people you like and to have a more-than-just-friends relationship with them? Good on you. But isn’t there something missing… like deep connections that allow you and your man/woman to have beautiful experiences together. Why is this not happening to you?

Because you didn’t know creating deep connections is what really matters.

Now you know that it’s important. So, I’ll tell you why it’s important. When you have a romantic, meaningful relationship, two people in that relationship are like going on an adventure together. I’m talking about an adventure called life. So, they grow up together and help each other achieve big dreams and get to share amazing experiences together. The way I feel about connections between two people is that these connections help them have life experiences on a similar level. When these connections are deep and tight, two of them can share their experiences much better than those who have not deep connections with one another.

So, in short, why is it important to create deep connections with people you like? My answer is that it will help you amplify your great experiences and minimize bad experiences by sharing these experiences with people you are deeply connected with. Does this make sense?

You know it’s important to create deep connections, but how do you make connections? Let’s move on to the next reason.

Because you don’t know how to create deep connections.

A good way to create deep connections with others is to look for similarities between you and them and to share your experiences with them. There are so many similarities between us. After all, we are all human beings and we are meant to be similar. But among a number of similarities, there are some things that put you and others into a smaller group of people. I’m sure you know that feeling – when you meet someone who gets along with you well, because you share similar values with that person and you go like, “Hell yeah!”. You want that effect in a romantic context as well.

When you found similarities between you and others, you can start creating new similarities with them by experiencing some amazing things together. You go hiking with someone and watch a beautiful sunset together, for example. That experience will be shared between two of you and becomes something that connects two of you together. Create and cultivate connections like this.

***

By the way, here’s something useful to remember. How others will react to you (i.e. they like you too, they can’t be with you, they completely ignore you etc) is not as important as the fact that you take action (i.e. expressing your interests and feelings to others). Deliver your gift of being your authentic self to those people you want to share your experiences with and enjoy each interaction rather than what you might get later on.

Most of what I wrote above applied to who I once was. I sucked at romance, because I didn’t know what I need to do. But once I decided to take action and did start taking action to improve my social and communication skills, I got better understanding of this whole romance thing. You may not choose to live a romantic life, and that’s OK, though I believe that you are interested in living such a life, given that you’ve read this article up to this point.

If you want to make your life more romantic, but don’t know what you can do to make it that way, please do ask me questions. You can contact me from here. You can subscribe to this site and get free newsletters as well. I sometimes write a personal e-mail to my readers and try to be as useful as possible.

Cheers to you all and may your life be more romantic!