Let’s say you want to attract men/women you like. You want to meet men/women you like and cultivate a fruitful and romantic relationship with them.

If you ask me how to do it, the first thing you are likely to hear from me is a question instead of an answer. I can give you an answer to this question about how to attract men/women, but I’m inclined to think there are at least two ways of interpreting “attracting men/women”. My answer depends on which interpretation you have in mind. So, here’s my question.

What do you mean by “attracting men/women”?

One way of interpreting it is to understand it as “making men/women like you”. So, on this interpretation, what you want to know is how to make men/women like you.

My answer is simple. You can’t make people like you. When you present your most authentic self to those you find attractive and they are not interested in the kind of relationship you want to have with them, there is nothing you can do about it. All you can do is to show up as who you are and to let people make their own choices as to whether to go with you or not.

Having said that, there are ways to manipulate people into liking who they think you are; I have a feeling that many of resources on dating and relationship teach such manipulative ways (intentionally or unintentionally) or at least mislead people into thinking that it’s possible to attract men/women in the sense of making them like you. These resources give you a false safety net – you want people to like you, not your false persona you pretend to be.

The other interpretation is more about making yourself visible to men/women who would like you if they knew you.

If this is what you want to know, here’s what I know about how to make yourself visible to such men/women: the best way to do so is to show your most authentic self to people when you interact with them. You don’t need to be cool or strong or physically attractive or whatever, but you need to be you.