This is my journal entry from November 9, 2025, part of my daily autobiography Divorce Day — my real, unedited days, published in order.
I slept restlessly, and my body felt noticeably more responsive than it had in a while, which I was genuinely happy about. I’ve been low-key worried about that side of things lately, so it felt reassuring, almost celebratory. Watching porn the night before clearly flipped some switch, which was both exciting and unsettling at the same time. Still, the reassurance itself mattered more in that moment than the philosophical discomfort around it.
The morning disappeared almost immediately. I took the dogs out and then burned way too much time swiping on dating apps, the kind of time drain that doesn’t even feel good while it’s happening. Eventually I pulled myself together and went to my tennis lesson with my tennis coach. A fellow student couldn’t make it this week, so it was just the two of us. My coach absolutely ran me into the ground, pushing my footwork hard, drilling things my other tennis coach and I had been working on, and getting me into some solid volley practice. It was a great workout, exhausting in the best way, the kind where you can feel your coordination improving even while your legs are screaming.
From there I went straight into hot yoga with one of my yoga instructors. Last time, a staff member at the studio had canceled my reservation at the last minute, and I’d given her a little bit of shit about it. She’s beautiful, and part of me would love to know whether she’s interested in me and even available. Today I told her I just wanted to jump straight into class. I hadn’t booked anything, so there was nothing for her to cancel. I think she enjoyed it as playful teasing, though there’s a chance I pushed it a little too far. Still, she got me into the class even though it was full, and somehow I fit perfectly. I ended up in the back instead of by the door, and it was brutally hot.
The instructor said something during class about thinking how much you respect yourself, and my immediate thought was that if I really respected myself, I’d probably be at home on my ass instead of sweating through hell after already doing an hour of tennis outside. At the same time, I was genuinely happy with myself for being able to handle that much cardio and exertion in a single day. Sweat was pouring off me, and at certain points when I moved, I kept seeing little stars. I think of that sensation as a brownout, the moment right before you faint, except it clears almost immediately, like the blood flow is just a fraction of a second behind. If it ever didn’t clear right away, I know I’d need to get into a safe position and prepare to pass out.
There was a cute girl next to me, someone I hadn’t paid much attention to at first, but during this speed skater pose my mind went hard in a sexual direction for a minute. Very shortly after that, she got up and left. It made me laugh internally. I felt like Steve Urkel from Family Matters, the character famous for sheepishly asking whether he’d caused the chaos around him, accidentally causing chaos just by existing. Probably not, but you never really know. After class, I ran into a friend, and she shared some of her own experiences on the dating apps. She encouraged me to be patient, to be clear about what I want, and to make sure I’m not obsessing over it. That conversation snapped something into focus for me.
I walked away realizing, again, that I need to be brutally clear about what’s non-negotiable. I’d been thinking about it since the speed dating thing last night and into this morning, asking myself what actually matters. I got it down to three things I can openly put out there. First, I want a woman who is athletic. I want someone who can keep up with me physically and is in genuinely good shape. A pretty face is nice, but for me physical health and fitness matter more. That’s just where my attraction is, and I’m being honest about it.
Second, I want a woman who actually wants kids. I am exhausted by the vague, hedged answers—maybe I want kids, I don’t know, probably not, ask me later. I have tried every angle, every workaround, every theoretical alternative, and it always circles back to the same truth. I want a woman who wants children. Not someone tolerating the idea or postponing it indefinitely, but someone who genuinely wants to build a family. That part is not negotiable anymore, and I’m done pretending it might be.
I also want a woman who lives a sober lifestyle. I do not want someone who has to smoke pot every day because life feels too hard to cope with otherwise, or someone who needs a glass of wine every single night just to “unwind.” Develop some coping skills. I am not interested in being the one who teaches you how to emotionally regulate yourself. I want a woman who appreciates sobriety for whatever reason she has, and it doesn’t have to mean absolute abstinence, but I am not willing to deal with weekly drinking rituals, girls’ nights that revolve around alcohol, or the constant normalization of needing substances to get through life. When I see that kind of casual drinking around me, it consistently turns me off, and I just don’t want any part of it. That perspective comes from me being a sober alcoholic, and I know people who aren’t alcoholic may not experience it the same way, but these are my standards. Athletic, wants kids, sober lifestyle. Those are the three things I can publicly put out there without hesitation.
There are other things I want too, even if I’m less likely to advertise them upfront. I want a partner who genuinely shares my level of physical desire, where intimacy is something we both want regularly rather than a source of resentment. I’ve heard the horror stories—relationships where the spark disappears almost entirely—and that’s not what I want. I may not lead with this publicly, but I am absolutely bringing it up early in the dating process. I have a normal, healthy sex drive, and I want to be with someone who feels the same. I know what I want now, and that clarity alone simplifies everything.
After talking with my friend, I went home and made a sandwich. Actually, I had several. The night before, I’d taken four plant-based sandwiches home because they were going to throw them away. I ate one that night, then finished the remaining three throughout the day. One became lunch, and later I got on a call with a guy who used to watch my ICP videos. He paid me $300 for an hour of my time, and he pitched an idea that I thought was complete garbage. He wanted to build some app to track a bunch of things that didn’t need tracking. I told him straight up it wasn’t necessary. He said the idea was stuck in his head. I told him most of the ideas that get stuck in my head aren’t good ideas either. They need to be tested, disproven, and discarded so I can move on. Plenty of ideas I was convinced were brilliant completely fell apart the moment I tried them in the real world. That’s just how it works.
I had been so confident that I’d be God’s gift to women. In my head, this was going to be effortless, like flipping a switch. I genuinely believed I’d have no problem finding another woman immediately. Actually trying it out in real life has been sobering. This isn’t a sprint; it’s a marathon. In some of my older autobiographies, I talked about how I thought being single again would feel like The Bachelor, with women lining up. That fantasy turned out to be completely inaccurate. There are not women lined up to date me, at least not women I’m attracted to. If I were attracted to a wider range of body types, I could probably have women coming over constantly. They are relentless on these dating apps, posting very sexual photos and making it clear what they want. What’s wild is that some guys seem accustomed to that dynamic, and then they try messaging a woman who actually wants something real, and they have no idea what to do when she’s not immediately propositioning them through the app.
I keep thinking about how absurd it all is. If I opened my mind to a wider range of partners, it really might feel like The Bachelor. There are so many people on dating apps, and even more who aren’t on the apps at all. The question is how open can I actually make my mind. I honestly don’t know if it can stretch that far. After that realization, I had another call lined up, about $90, talking with a woman about ICP. I was already in the mood to deal with that kind of nonsense that day. While the call dragged on, I scrolled through my dating apps at the same time because the conversation was slow. I ended up tightening my filters even more, to the point where most days there’s almost nobody who meets them.
On Bumble, I’ve got women set from ages 18 to 41 within 22 miles. I know I’m a niche guy, so I’m willing to go a little farther geographically. For advanced filters, I’ve selected long-term relationship, fun casual dates, marriage, or life partner, and for family plans, open to kids or want kids. I don’t care about the rest of the fluff. I also filter for exercise, no smoking, and for drinking either rarely or not at all. On Hinge, I run basically the same filters, but I only browse women who are active that day, which dramatically cuts down how many profiles I see. A friend told me she met a guy on Hinge, so I take it seriously. On Hinge, I’ve set deal breakers for a maximum distance of 22 miles, age range 18 to 41, monogamy only, and dating intentions focused on a life partner or long-term relationship. I’m not interested in polyamory. It sounds fun in theory, but in reality it just turns into confusion. Family plans are set to want children or might want children, and I’ve set deal breakers for no drugs, no smoking, no marijuana, and no drinking.
With all of that in place, I don’t have many matches to look through on any given day. Tinder is its own mess. You can’t filter nearly as well, and it relies heavily on an algorithm that often shows you people who aren’t even active. I tried setting Tinder to only active profiles, but it’s still rough. I paid for Tinder Platinum, which is about $50 a month. Bumble is costing me $30 a month right now, and I just dropped $100 on the highest-level Hinge subscription for three months. I’m even considering upgrading Bumble for more features. When I step back and look at it, though, it’s still cheaper than blowing money at strip clubs or paying for sex. That’s how I’m rationalizing it. These dating apps, as frustrating as they are, at least have the potential to be worth what I’m spending.
Later, a friend told me he’d read an article on LinkedIn claiming that Facebook Dating is now bigger than Hinge. That immediately annoyed me. The last thing I want to do is sign back up for Facebook. I escaped that place for a reason. I also realized I forgot to mention something earlier: when I was leaving yoga, the staff member I’d been talking to asked for a copy of my book. I gave her one and casually told her my phone number was inside if she wanted to share feedback or comments. That’s something I do with everyone, but it also accomplishes the obvious secondary goal. She has my number now. If she’s interested, she can open the door. My job is just to keep generating leads and see what converts. I’m not trying to contaminate the communities I’m part of by acting like some kind of pickup artist.
After yoga, I went home, cleaned up, showered, ate, and knocked out the calls I had scheduled. That night, I headed to a Tantra speed dating event. As soon as I arrived and looked at the check-in list, I knew how it was going to go. There were roughly twice as many men as women. I sat down and started talking with a man there. One of the guys from the speed dating event the night before was also there, which I found pretty funny. As the women walked in, I watched closely and didn’t see a single attractive woman who looked like she was actually participating in the event. That pretty much sealed it for me. This was likely my last speed dating event. Online dating may be miserable, but at least it doesn’t require hours of your life just to discover that you’re completely incompatible or that there aren’t any women you’re attracted to in the room at all.
He ended up telling me one of the craziest dating stories I’ve heard in a while. He said he recently met a woman online who was very high-powered and intense. They had a couple of dates, and on the second one things took a turn at her place. She wanted to get into some intense role-play that quickly became aggressive and physical in a way he wasn’t comfortable with. At some point he stopped and told her it was too much for him.
According to him, she snapped almost instantly and started screaming at him to leave. The shift was so abrupt and extreme that he was stunned, and he gathered his things and got out as fast as he could. When he finished the story, all I could say was that it was absolutely insane.
That story is exactly why I say no to role-playing until I actually know someone. Someone once told me I was pretty vanilla, and I didn’t disagree. I’m not trying to turn intimacy into some elaborate performance, and I’m not interested in costumes, scripts, or personas. I had a woman over about a week ago who was into “daddy” role-playing, where the man acts like a father figure. I shut that down immediately. I have two kids, and that idea is deeply disturbing to me and one of the biggest turn-offs I can imagine. No thank you. I have a general no-role-playing policy. Maybe there’s fun to be had there for some people, but after hearing his story, that whole world feels unhinged to me.
What he described was completely insane. It also highlighted a double standard that’s hard not to notice. If a man had escalated to that kind of aggression with a woman, he’d likely be arrested, charged, labeled, or worse, while a woman can sometimes get away with behavior like that without any consequences. He told me it felt like she wasn’t even present anymore, like she was replaying some old trauma instead of responding to the actual situation in front of her. People need to deal with their trauma instead of constantly reliving it and dragging unsuspecting partners into it. Hearing all that made me a little more cautious about dating in general, though I don’t believe I’m particularly attracted to women who are that unstable. At least I hope I’m not.
The best move he made that night was deciding he was done with the event. He said he had things to do and didn’t want to stick around. The last time he’d attended, there were more women than men, and they’d even paired women together for activities. This time, he could already see where it was headed—men getting paired with men while the remaining women cycled through. He told the event leader he wanted a refund or a credit and that he was leaving. I overheard him and immediately said I wanted the same thing. I was out. The guy sitting next to me joked, “Thanks a lot, we’ll be taking our best two out of the competition.” I told him I was happy to let them battle it out. I wasn’t interested in wasting my time.
The upside was that I got home with time to actually do something productive. I worked on my two books and submitted the Kindle versions of ChatGPT for President and Is Bitcoin One Big Lie? to Amazon. I also fixed the cover for Sober Through Separation. After that, I headed over to spend some time with my ex-wife and the kids. They had just gotten back from their glamping trip and whatever they’d been up to earlier that day, and it felt grounding to end the night there instead of sitting in another pointless circle of forced dating interactions.
I spent the rest of the night hanging out with my ex-wife, the kids, and my mom, which was genuinely nice. My ex-wife told me how the glamping trip had unfolded, and the logistics alone made me grateful I hadn’t gone. The original plan was two tents: one for our family what would have been the four of us—me, my ex-wife, and the kids—while a separate tent was meant for her parents, her sister, and her sister’s daughter. Her sister had just gotten engaged around the same time my ex-wife and I decided to divorce, and then, the morning they were supposed to leave, she announced she was bringing her fiancé, his two kids, and the dog. Literally that morning. Everything had to shift. In the end, my ex-wife’s parents stayed in the tent with her and the kids. Hearing all that, I felt relieved I wasn’t there. I would have felt like an extra, completely unnecessary, and honestly, even if we were still married and everything had been great between us, I wouldn’t have wanted to be in that situation.
My ex-wife’s family is kind, and I do love them, but they aren’t my people. When I’m around them, the conversations stay polite and shallow. There’s no room to be real, no space to talk openly or directly about uncomfortable or intense things. I can’t stand being in situations like that for long. The conversation I’d had earlier with that man—raw, unfiltered, and honest—could never happen with my ex-wife’s family, and that contrast really stood out to me. After that, I took the kids over to visit my mom. She had some nice birthday presents for my ex-wife, and we spent about forty-five minutes there before getting the kids ready for bed.
Later, I walked home and dictated the entries for the seventh and eighth, since I’d fallen a bit behind. Going forward, I want to keep most of these entries shorter. Writing them a day or two later seems to help me cut repetition and focus on what actually matters, even though it does make some details harder to remember. At the same time, the details are what make this interesting in the first place. The little specifics are what bring it to life. I want to avoid rehashing the same themes over and over while still keeping what makes these entries feel real. I’m committed to refining this series and making it as good—and as joyful—as I can.
That said, I’m very aware that I don’t actually know much about anything. My main hope is simply that I keep dictating and don’t stop. I’m also realizing that I want to work on one book at a time—start it, finish it, and move on—because juggling multiple books at once leaves me feeling scattered and overwhelmed. I’ve got several ideas lined up, and I’m even thinking about writing fiction. A lot of people read fiction and fantasy, and I know I could do that too. So yeah, let’s get ready for it.
As the night winds down, my mind drifts, as it often does, toward winding down in my own way. I briefly consider how easily certain habits could become compulsive, stacking stimulation on top of stimulation, and recognize that might be a little much. We’ll see.
If you connect with how I live and think, you can follow the rest of my days on YouTube in my Life playlist.