Dating Standards Too High? Why I Changed My Mind on Settling

Should you stay single rather than settle? Not as a blanket rule, and that is a big change from where I was. In October 2025 I was separated, broke, and writing a journal entry that called holding out for a high-caliber woman "the virtuous path." Today I think that was half right and mostly a trap. Standards are not the problem. A checklist of demands almost no real person can meet is the problem, and so is treating every date as a job interview.

Here is my view in one line: have firm standards about character, values, and how someone treats people, and be willing to date a real, imperfect person on everything else. My own answer changed most on looks. In my July 2026 post about average looking women I say I want a partner whose personality I love, and that a woman who is a ten in the ways that matter beats a nine who is wrong for me. That comes from 15 years with the most attractive woman I could get, 13 of them married, and a divorce anyway, because we were not compatible.

Here is how the view developed, oldest to newest. The earliest piece is the journal entry I'd Rather Stay Single Than Settle, written on October 23, 2025, in the first months after my separation. I had no money coming in, nobody I wanted to date, and I was waiting for a woman who was passionate, wanted kids, and was emotionally available. Looking back, that post is honest about how needy I was for validation, even though I still treated holding out as the principled choice.

Eight months later, in Your Standards Are Too High — Mine Were Too, I had reviewed more than 100 creators' dating advice and noticed my own filters. I had narrowed an entire metro of millions of people down to maybe 10 or 20 women who fit. That post is where I started to say the checklist was the problem, not the people. I also committed to taking a default second date, because I was too quick to judge someone from one meeting, and I started seeing attraction as something that can grow.

The newest post, Only Date Average Looking Women, from July 2026, is where I have ended up on looks. I am not telling you to date someone you are not attracted to. I am saying I lived the beauty-first strategy for a decade and a half, and it did not hold up. In a relationship built on worshiping someone's beauty, the worship eventually stops, and then there is not much underneath. I also said plainly that I am against looksmaxing, and that I want a partner who loves how she looks too. This is one man's experience, not a rule for everyone.

Below this opening you will find all three posts in full, newest first. The July 2026 post covers the trophy trap and the long-term cost of it. The standards post goes through the creators I studied, from Logan Urie on unrealistic expectations to Evan Marc Katz on why commitment feels scary even with the right person, and it explains my default second date rule. The 2025 journal entry is the rawest of the three, and it shows where I started. You do not have to agree with all of it, and I still disagree with some of the advice I quote.

If you keep finding a reason to say no, or you are wondering whether you are waiting for a perfect person, you may want to read the rest of the dating pieces on the site too, starting with dating mindset: abundance, agency, and making your own dating life and dating advice that doesn't survive contact with real dates. If you would like me to look at your own version of this question, I offer a personal video review.

Only Date Average Looking Women

From my video published July 8, 2026.

Only date average looking women, and you will be so much happier. I saw a video from Coach Kyle Raw today saying never date average looking women, and I'm like — that's ridiculous. Based on my experience: all I cared about in my 20s was getting the most beautiful woman to date me, to marry me, and have kids. And I lived that. I had the hottest girlfriend, then wife, out of any of my friends by far. My dad's like, "That woman should be a model." My dad was blown away. But all I cared about was getting an attractive woman to fall in love with me. I already lived the beauty-first strategy, and what I can tell you is that it doesn't work out in the long term.

Certainly in the short term, I was very happy having this hot girlfriend, showing her off, having all kinds of sex, and feeling like I had won the game of life. But what I didn't do is consider personality constraints and compatibility at all. I didn't think at all about where this was going to go long term. Where it went long term is years of a marriage where my now-ex is saying that we're not compatible. And I was in denial, because I'm like: you're hot, and I have to stay with you, and nothing else matters. Now that we're divorced, I'm like — she's absolutely right. Our relationship had so much friction because all I cared about was beauty. And what you can also see over time is that beauty fades. Now I'm like: I want a woman where I really love her personality, and that is just an average looking woman.

I Lived the Beauty-First Strategy

I had a hookup after my ex, and this woman was average — and I've never been desired like that in my life before. You see, when you go try to find the very most beautiful women and get them to date you, unless you're one of them, you're not going to be able to date them. If you're one of the very most beautiful men also, then yes — my ex and I did have a lot of chemistry. We had sex every day. We had like ten, eleven times in one weekend before, six times in one day. We had tons of sex, and there was a lot of chemistry there. And to some degree, I just did the numbers game that some of these guys are talking about, and I won based on numbers. I found a woman that wanted a guy to worship her.

The Trophy Trap

This is one of the main things I will point to and call the trophy trap. What I had with my ex was a trophy trap, where she wanted a man who would worship her for her beauty. She wanted a man that would treat her like a goddess. And yes, I do believe that's important — but especially in the long term, that creates a bad dynamic where she's in control of the relationship, where she knows she could get rid of you at any time and just have somebody else. That's what happened. My ex got tired of me, divorced me, and just immediately went online and found another guy right away.

Whereas I've been dating now — I got separated in October, it's now July, and I've been dating the whole time. I've gone out with at least 20 different women. What I've found is that these days especially, it's a different environment than when I met my ex 15 years ago. We didn't have Instagram back then. Think about that. Women didn't have this endless validation, these endless options, these guys all over the world they could DM to fly out all over the place. The trophy trap today is awful.

What Being Desired Taught Me

I love having a woman desire me. With the last woman I had sex with, I had never had a woman desire me so much in my entire life. Because of that, she was extremely easy to please and very excited. Unfortunately, I didn't like her personality that much — but it did give me a very big takeaway. I don't need to date some quote nine or ten. I would rather date a five, six, or seven, or an eight that I'm attracted to, where I'm obsessed with their personality.

Because when I look back at the relationship with my ex, all I cared about was her beauty. What I should have been paying attention to was: how is she acting when you tell her about your business and your YouTube ideas? How is she going to act when she wants to stop having kids? How is she going to treat you around her family? I endured a decade of having a wife that did not like or support my work. She tried to, but she hated hearing about what I was most passionate about. And yes, I should have had more friends to talk with perhaps, but I lived with a woman where we didn't have very good personality compatibility — where her family does things one way and mine does things a different way, where hers likes to be very private and just not talk about stuff, whereas mine is the opposite. We struggled for a long time on personality incompatibility, because I was worshiping her, and that's all she wanted. If you recognize yourself in this and want to talk through the pattern you keep repeating, you can join Jerry Banfield Family and I'll share honestly what I've learned, no promises, just one person's experience.

What Happens When You Stop Worshiping

The problem was: what happens when I stopped worshiping her? Over the last few years, I stopped worshiping her, and then I started getting interested in all these other women — because now my ex is 15 years older than when we got together, but then I'm at yoga and I see a woman a decade younger than her, and now I start to worship her instead. You're not going to get to keep the beauty. Often people's beauty does not stay at a nine or a ten indefinitely. And when your relationship is based on worshiping someone's beauty, and only wanting to be with them because of how pretty they are — what happens when that beauty starts to fade? Your whole relationship is going to start to fade. That's what happened with me. I started worshiping other women. Even though I was physically faithful, my emotions over the last several years started going out the window.

Even earlier than that, I got tired of being the submissive one in the relationship. When you get with a woman that is very, very, very attractive, often you are not going to get to be in even an equal position, let alone the dominant position. The woman's going to tell you what to do. And at least if you're a man like me, I don't like being told what to do. The relationship with my ex started to fall apart when she comes in after having our second child and says: you need to get a vasectomy, I'm done having kids. There was no discussion. There was no "maybe let's think about this." She's giving me orders. And that just destroyed our relationship. Then I started getting crushes on other women after that, and then I stopped being able to be a provider after that as well.

That's what happens when you get stuck where, instead of being an equal — where you both belong together because you're compatible, because you want to hang out together — all you do is prioritize beauty and go for "they've got to be a nine or a ten or I'm wasting my time." That's more about validation for your insecure ego. That's what it was for me. I wanted this beautiful woman to prove my worth as a man. But give it long enough — even though I got the beautiful woman, I ended up on the other side as the ex going, what the hell did I do with the last 15 years? Now I have an ex that can just date anybody she feels like, and I'm here having to start over again.

And I catch myself going through the same stuff in my mind. My first thought with dating was that I needed to get another really attractive woman. And now I'm like: no, I want an average looking woman that's attractive enough for me to be with, where we have the best compatibility in our personalities — where we can just talk to each other, where how my personality works plus her personality equals a super cooperative relationship. Because as Jimmie said in Pulp Fiction: I don't want to get fucking divorced. I didn't want to get divorced once, but we needed to, because even though we both were trying, the relationship was so hard because we didn't have this compatibility, especially when I stopped worshiping her.

I promise you: if you date based on attractiveness being most important, first, that is coming from a place of weakness in yourself — that you need other people to validate you, that you need a woman beside you. That's all about ego. And second, it's generally not going to work out, because at some point you're going to stop worshiping her. As my dad always used to say: boy, look at any attractive woman and just know there's some guy tired of fucking her. That's exactly what will happen. And if that happens when you've based the whole relationship on worshiping, then it really goes downhill. That's what happened to me. After a decade with the same amazingly beautiful woman, I got tired of it. And then I start seeing women five, ten years younger that seem so much more attractive, and I don't worship my wife anymore.

Date Close to Your Level — or Even Down a Little

So the trophy trap: ideally you should always be with someone who is very close to your level of attractiveness, or even date down a little bit. Like with the last woman I had sex with — she was probably a step or two down from me, in my opinion, if you saw both of us. I'm not showing you her, because one, I don't have a picture of her, and two, we've got to keep that private. But if you looked at the two of us, you'd probably think I was maybe a point or two higher. And my God, I would rather be the one who's worshiped in a relationship, let me tell you. I had never experienced that before, and it was awesome. But ideally, I would rather have someone perfectly equal.

And I'm absolutely against looksmaxing. You will not catch me doing any fake shit trying to make my appearance different. I love how I look, and I want a woman who loves how she looks also. And I want a woman who's loyal to me — because the more options you have, the more difficult it can be to be loyal. Even me: I was out here while I was married, looking at all these women and getting attention from them. Even a guy like me has enough other options. You take that up a level or two, and you don't want that.

Rate the Whole Person, Not Just Looks

This emphasis on looks is so shallow and so superficial, because when you're talking about marrying somebody — to me, the point of dating is to build a deep spiritual partnership. If you're just looking to hook up, a lot of these dating coaches will give you very good advice on that. But I've hooked up enough to know that's a waste of time. I don't want to approach all these women just to get some attractive woman to sleep with me — to then what? Validate myself as a man? I'm already extremely proud of who I am as a man, and I don't need a woman beside me to validate my worth to society.

Then when you combine that, beauty often will stop you from looking objectively at other things. When you date an average looking woman, you will much more objectively assess the rest of her. And I hate these rating systems — I'm trying to talk in your language; I don't use them myself, and they're extremely subjective — but I would much rather date an average looking woman who would be a ten out of ten mother, a ten out of ten wife, a ten out of ten best friend, a ten out of ten lover, a ten out of ten business partner, who would listen to and love all my YouTube videos.

Because when you get with an attractive woman and she is not as turned on by you anymore — which can happen very easily — my ex did not want to have sex with me that often by the end of our relationship, and it just felt like a drag for her. That leaves you feeling bad. That's what seems to be happening with a lot of guys: you find these women that are really attractive, and then you're out in public with them and you don't even feel good about it, because you know she's not that interested in you in the bedroom anymore. That's what happened for a lot of the last years of my marriage. I wasn't even that proud to be out with my wife anymore, because then it comes time when we could have sex and she's tired. She'd still do it out of doing her best to support the marriage, but then neither of us feels good. It just feels super transactional.

To me, it's very important as a man to use your logic and your reason and your observations to evaluate and rate all the different characteristics across the board. Never simplify it to rating by looks — and often the way these coaches are talking to you, all you need to do is rate by looks and everything else, whatever, it doesn't matter. No. You should be looking at every aspect, and ideally the highest combined score wins. If you find a six or seven in attractiveness who's an eight or nine in terms of how your conversations are, an eight or nine in terms of what kind of mother she could be — does she want family and kids? Look at what kind of sister and daughter and friend she is. Look at her friends. You'll notice sometimes if a woman just has all attractive friends — that shows you how things are going to fall off. If your attraction falls off, if anything falls off with you, you're out of there, and there's going to be no loyalty. Beauty has such diminishing returns over time.

These Coaches Haven't Lived It

This is why so many of these coaches have never had a long-term relationship. They've never had kids. They don't know what the fuck they're talking about. I do, because I've been where they've been — I had a relationship for 15 years with the beautiful woman they're telling you how great it is to get, and I can say: I've been there, I've done that. It's delusional to go tell guys never to date average women. It's absolutely part of the problem. You should just love people holistically, wholeheartedly. Stop looking at people's appearance and thinking that's all that matters — because if you look at other people that way, then you're going to be seen that way too.

What I love is that women generally care much more about the depth of a man than the superficial stuff. Obviously there are going to be examples where you could show the opposite, but to me, it seems women — at least off of dating apps — are much better at looking for and putting together a whole picture of a man. How attractive is he? What kind of status and money does he have? But also: what kind of personality? How does this guy make me feel? How does he treat other people? Would this guy be a good father? Would this guy be a good husband? Would this guy be loyal over time? That's how men should be thinking too.

I hope I can help at least one person avoid the trophy trap, because the trophy trap also makes life too hard. Many of you have no realistic chance of ever even getting a nine or a ten to date you. It took me a lot of work and a lot of failure and a lot of rejection — and things were easier 15 years ago, when they didn't have all the infinite options. Most of you have no chance of ever having anything real or decent or long term with a woman that's a nine out of ten anyway. These guys talking all this shit to you are just wasting your time and setting you up to feel bad. My dating channel and my dating content are all about setting you up to have a beautiful long-term relationship, to learn from my actual lived experience, and to have a life of connection and joy — which will best happen when you're in a healthy, loyal, stable relationship with someone who's extremely compatible with you.

I have much deeper experience than almost any of these other dating coaches on YouTube who are teaching you shallow shit like hooking up and looksmaxing. If you want somebody to help you with a real-life dating plan to get off dating apps — man, you should never be on a dating app — you want real conversation help to have better conversations with women, you want to translate that and get ready for a relationship or see what kind of relationship you're in, you want strategies for dating, standards, and boundaries: I'm there.

Your Standards Are Too High — Mine Were Too

From my video published July 1, 2026.

Logan Urie and the tyranny of unrealistic expectations

Number five on my list is Logan Urie. She was actually on the Jay Shetty podcast, and I wasn't able to find a video of her alone, but I love her core thesis: that modern dating is hindered by unrealistic expectations. I've been carrying what seemed like reasonable expectations to me. I thought I should be able to encounter a woman who's not addicted to alcohol, marijuana, or plant medicine, a woman who has some emotional stability and consistency, a woman who wants kids and takes care of her body. And it's like, all right, I guess. I do all of this stuff myself, so I kept thinking, why can't I just find a woman who does the same stuff I do?

But maybe a woman has her own strengths alongside her weaknesses. I've been guilty of expecting that a woman should have all the strong points I have, plus be strong in all the areas where I'm weak. I actually just talked to my matchmaker about this — I have a matchmaker, and I still have six more matches I've talked to. I told her, look, if a woman is weak in some of the areas I'm strong in but she's very interested in me, I'd happily be interested to meet her and help her along. I'm really strong in diet, eating, exercise, holistic health and energy, taking care of myself, and creativity, and I could use a woman who has complementary things in the areas where I am weak. I've been struggling with this, and I've noticed women have been doing the exact same thing to me — treating me like a consumer good. If there's any little thing they don't like immediately, then it's no sparks, not interested, nothing. If you catch yourself treating people like a checklist of features, or feeling treated that way, I would be glad to talk through how to date from your strengths instead when you join Jerry Banfield Family.

Soulmate mindset versus the work-it-out mindset

There's a distinction between the soulmate mindset and the work-it-out mindset. Relationships do require work, and you're going to do work one way or another. One big reason I got divorced is that I realized my ex didn't seem interested in doing any of the character development work with me anymore. She just wanted to keep being the same person and not change anything, and I felt like we needed to work on and grow our character, build, and change. She felt most comfortable doing that in the context of getting divorced, and honestly it's made things a lot easier for both of us.

So yes, there's a point where working it out is no longer working. But I'd still say my ex was the leader in taking the divorce — I was much more in the let's-work-this-out mindset. It seems a lot of women are initiating divorces; the vast majority, more than two-thirds, are initiated by women. A lot of women are in this mindset of, I'm not going to work it out anymore, I'm not going to try, it shouldn't be this hard. But being single is hard, and being in a relationship is hard. There's going to be hard work either way. The real question is where you're going to get the biggest return on investment. In my case, I do believe I got a much higher return getting divorced, as did my ex. But most of the time, instead of thinking about a soulmate, it's better to try to work it out and make a great team together. That's the ideal. If you're burned out on dating apps where people are always finding a reason to break up, or if you're waiting for the perfect person, Logan Urie's thinking is worth sitting with.

The default second date rule

Then there's the default second date rule, which I had never heard before — that by default, you should go on a second date. I've been very quick to say no to a second date with women, and they've been just as quick to say the same to me. For example, one woman said she didn't find me physically attractive, so I canceled the second date. Another woman, out of the blue after we'd already scheduled the date, said she didn't feel the romantic spark and canceled on me with no explanation at all.

Going forward, I'm planning by default to have a second date, because meeting someone one single time means we're overemphasizing how much intuition and how much of a superpower we have to analyze, judge, and figure people out right away. Realistically, from what I've seen, you don't know someone hardly at all from seeing them one time. So I'm personally committing to going on as many second dates as I can, because sometimes I just don't get that great of a first impression of somebody. I'm way too quick to judge and cancel a second date myself, or to act in a way that encourages the woman to cancel. This was an awesome rule. If you're on dating apps it might be too much, but I'm not using dating apps anymore, so it makes a lot more sense when you're in community and you already know somebody.

I've been over-optimizing my dating filters for sure — filtering for women who want kids, who don't drink, don't smoke, don't do drugs. My filters were so strict that there were only about 10 or 20 women, and maybe 30 or 40 on the dating apps, in an entire metro of millions of people. That's how strict I was. So this had a big impact on me: I realized I'd been getting crazy about the idea that if she's not perfect, I shouldn't see her again. That mindset makes you miserable, constantly trying to find this perfect person while somehow also thinking that you're the perfect person. I have no delusion that I'm the perfect person. In fact, I see that the majority of women who meet me don't feel any romantic chemistry — my big personality, my big energy, my very strong opinions, my absolute ruthlessness about my whole-food plant-based diet, my absolute sobriety with no alcohol, no drugs, no marijuana, and my very dark humor that I used to censor in person and am not censoring anymore. Most women meeting me don't feel any romantic chemistry or aren't right for me, and that is fine. At the same time, it's ideal if you can find someone where there's a little chemistry, and then take some more serious effort investigating it instead of giving up right away.

Steph Anya: the dating tips that are making it worse

Creator eight out of one hundred is Steph Anya, a therapist whose thesis is that the dating tips people share are making it worse. Her core point is that blanket dating advice — like "if they wanted to, they would" or "never settle" — is often given way too rigidly and lacks the nuance necessary for real dating, which prevents people from building healthy, committed relationships. Exactly. This has been a theme repeated a lot: it seems a lot of us have let our standards get way too high. We expect way too much, and we have the illusion of way too many options. The most mature and realistic advice is that relationships are not a reward for doing everything perfectly.

I've done so much work on myself. I've thought, look, I'm pretty good at communicating now, right? So why don't I just instantly find a partner? I've had a number of women attracted to me, signaling me, women I've gone on dates with. I've done so much work on myself — shouldn't I just get a partner like that? Well, it still is difficult. It's kind of miraculous when you can ever line something beautiful up. I've struggled a lot with feeling like I'm doing everything right — which obviously I'm not — but remaining single anyway. I've known people who have been single their entire life who feel like they're doing everything right, and I'd argue there's some evidence that they're not. If you were doing everything right, you'd probably be in a relationship, and you'd have been in relationships for the majority of your adult life. That's not everybody's path, but it does seem to hold.

Her point about a relational cure is beautiful, but she doesn't spend much time detailing how you avoid trauma dumping or unfairly making your partner responsible for your psychological healing. That matters. And viral advice like "if he wanted to, he would" is actually keeping people single. Look, there's a woman right now I would absolutely love to go on a date with. It was essentially an instant date — we spent hours together talking and holding hands at an event, and I've seen her at several more events since. But she managed to get a boyfriend who turned toxic, and now she's grieving and crying over him. That's a woman I would love to date and explore something with. Yet I actually deleted her phone number, because I got tired of reaching out to her and getting no response, feeling like she was interested in someone else and there wasn't anything there. So now I'm waiting until she messages me, and I'd be very responsive — but it's got to be mutual. She's got to signal or express some desire, some interest, to go out with me too. I'm tired of asking women who have no interest in going out and feeling rejected. You should be signaling somehow, some way, and I'm looking for subtle signals.

Evan Marc Katz: why commitment feels scary even with the right person

Creator number fourteen is Evan Marc Katz, with a video on why commitment feels scary even when he's the right guy. If I could point to one video that the women who told me about the romantic spark should watch, this would be it. His idea is that anxiety about committing to a healthy relationship is not a sign that it's the wrong guy — it's a normal fear of losing your infinite single options. And those are theoretical options. Practically, you often have way fewer options than you think. Committing means shredding your independent identity and making the sacrifices required for an interdependent partnership.

I know a number of women locally who are single through community, and they seem to have a hard time committing to a relationship. Some of them have been single their entire adult life, or almost all of it. Because yes, you essentially need to surrender your independent identity and merge into having a relationship. It's been almost a year since I got separated, and it's taken me about a year to get back an independent identity. People still tell me I talk about my ex all the time, so I'm still in the process of getting that independent identity back — because I successfully went through giving up the single option, shredding my independent identity, and making the sacrifices in the first place.

This ties back to something I talked about earlier — being a maximizer, always looking for a better option, versus being satisfied with where you're at. He also talks about the highly independent, quote-unquote successful person — and success is relative — who runs away whenever a relationship gets serious. If you're chronically single, this is definitely one to sit with.

All of this is why community has become so central to how I date and how I live. When you already know people, when you keep seeing them at events and building real relationships over time, you're not judging a stranger in a single sitting and swiping them away forever. That's exactly the kind of environment I'm building with the Jerry Banfield Family — a place to actually get to know people, do the character work together, and take the default second date instead of burning the checklist you're never going to satisfy. If any of this resonates, I'd love for you to come join the community, book a call with me, or just message me and start a conversation.

Infinite choice made us miserable maximizers

Commitment is beautiful, but it is also scary and anxiety-provoking. And it seems to me that a lot of people, most people, are self-sabotaging. Most people are not picking up very serious, legitimate red flags. There are some genuine red flags out there, but those are going to be the minority of the time. The discussion I keep coming back to is that infinite choice has made us miserable maximizers, and I see the need to tone that down a bit in myself. I see it in others too, certainly. The truth is you have far fewer options than it looks like, especially if you are on dating apps. It seems like you have all these options in front of you, but there is really a lot less there than it looks.

Aliza Ben Shalom — the Jewish matchmaker who says the same thing

I wanted to get some Jewish dating perspective into this so the whole thing stayed nice and well-rounded and not just one point of view. Aliza Ben Shalom has matched thousands of couples, and the video she was on was titled something like "Here's the single biggest mistake smart Jewish women make." Doesn't her core thesis sound familiar? Isn't it interesting to hear a Jewish matchmaker saying the same kinds of things that so many non-Jewish dating videos have said? This is exactly why you want to hear so many different perspectives and take them in together, so you can get a sense of what is true across the board — not absolutely true, but true often enough to matter.

She says highly successful women often sabotage their chance of finding love by clinging to superficial checklists and demanding partners who out-earn them, rather than focusing on a man's character, kindness, and willingness to be a supportive, complementary partner. My laughter here is not meant to be offensive. This is what a lot of guys are saying across the board — that women want men who out-earn them, that you have to get your money right, and then you'll be able to get any woman. And yeah, it is really challenging.

I came across a woman recently who makes hundreds of thousands of dollars a year and says she wants a man who out-earns her. That just seems insane to me. If you make several hundred thousand dollars a year, what you should want is a man who will stay home, clean the house, and hang out with the kids, so that when you come home everything is taken care of — you don't have to wash any dishes or do any laundry. That was my dad. My mom was in the military, an officer with a great career, and she retired as a colonel. My dad did all the traditional "man stuff" — taking care of the yard, the cars, all of that — and he handled the finances and took care of the entire house. All my mom had to do was work. My father cooked, cleaned, took care of the yard, the cars, and the kids. My mom had no responsibilities outside of working.

So you have to stop expecting a partner to be a perfect unicorn. In my experience, it is insane, if you are a successful earner, to expect that you should date someone who makes more than you. If you make a few hundred thousand a year, date someone who will be a complementary partner to you. If you are a highly successful, marriage-minded woman frustrated by your dating outcomes, this is a great one to sit with. As for the rigid stance on money — honestly, I would love for some women to pay for the first date. I have not had a woman pay for the first, second, or third date I've taken her on. I've had about 20 dates with women this year, and I paid for everything every single time.

Real talk, and I wonder if any single woman who actually wants to date me is reading this far: I've been borrowing money this year while I build all my YouTube channels and videos like this up, because I believe they are going to crush and bring in a lot of income. Even while borrowing, I've been using hundreds of thousands of dollars in credit, having made a lot of money before. I just got divorced, and my finances have been a little turbulent, especially after I redid my whole business. Still, I've paid for every date with every woman I've gone out with. And absolutely, successful women are sabotaging themselves by holding out for a man who out-earns them. I've seen that consistently across all different kinds of women. What you really should look for, as she said and as I agree, is a high-quality human. That should always be your outlook. If money and mismatched expectations keep tripping up your dating life, I have wrestled with all of it myself and would happily talk it through with you when you join Jerry Banfield Family.

Dear CyberSue — your attitude may be blocking love

Dear CyberSue's video is about why your dating attitude may be blocking love. Her core thesis is that approaching dates with negative preconceptions, a rigid checklist, or a defensive shield sabotages you. This is one I have definitely been guilty of — either having way too upbeat, positive fantasy expectations, or going out figuring, "what's wrong with her? let's figure out what's wrong with her." The task I've been consistently applying is to replace judgment with curiosity. Instead of making a date a high-stakes job interview, treat it as low-stakes: let's play, let's have fun together.

If you are chronically single and constantly complain there are no good men or women left, this unfortunately applies to me significantly, and I'm taking it to heart. Now, one piece of advice I disagree with is sitting through a date even if you know there's no connection. I've done that — gone out for hours on dates where I knew there wasn't a connection. I would actually say your time is valuable, so learn to recognize it and cut it off as soon as you're sure. I'm partly joking there, a little comedy for the Google AI, but I would not sit through another dead-end date. I've had women pretty abruptly cut off dates with me where we'd barely been out 45 minutes and they'd say, "oh, I need to go do something." And I'm thinking, I know you don't need to go do something right now, you're just tired of hanging out with me. But I have been very hesitant, when I'm out with a woman I know I don't like, to be that direct with them — which is funny, because look how direct I am here. I should be the same when I'm dating as I am in these reviews.

I definitely believe attraction grows over time. The problem is we've built environments like dating apps and matchmaking that make you expect an instant spark. There was a woman I went out with who told me she wasn't physically attracted to me. She was over 40, and we hadn't even talked about whether she wanted kids — she didn't have any — so the alignment probably wasn't there anyway. But according to the data, the longer a woman gets to know a man, the less important physical attraction becomes, because what matters is the emotional safety and the connection. So I absolutely know attraction can really grow over time. Funny enough, when my ex met me I weighed 50 or 60 more pounds than I do now, and I had my hair dyed blonde, and somehow she found that physically attractive. That's what's interesting — we all have such different types.

Flourish with Lauren — consumption vs. contribution

Flourish with Lauren has hundreds of millions of views on YouTube Shorts. She's really blown up, and I love her videos about traditional masculine and feminine dynamics. Her take is that dating culture trains people to desire the aesthetics, the social signaling, and the lifestyle upgrade of a wedding, rather than the unglamorous day-to-day partnership and sacrifice it takes to actually be a wife. I can identify with that — the signaling that makes me think about how good I'll look to my friends walking around with a really attractive wife, instead of thinking about the day-to-day sacrifice it takes to actually be a great husband.

Her best advice is the distinction between consumption and contribution. This is something I've been working on: focusing on what I am giving and what we can build together, instead of what I get. I've lasered in on what I have to give — unconditional love, structure, support, consistency. That's what I bring. From there, we can build with the woman's emotions, desires, creativity, joy, and playfulness. This is worth watching if you are a marriage-minded man or woman tired of superficial dating — which is exactly how I found her, so tired of superficial dating myself — and especially if you are re-entering the dating market.

That said, this relies on traditional gender roles, which I personally am really vibing with lately. But I've also lived in non-traditional gender roles. There were parts of my relationship with my ex where she made most of the income, where my business wasn't doing very well, and I took care of everything like my dad did — I cleaned the house, did the laundry, took care of the cars and the yard. So I've done both: traditional, where I provided all the money and my ex didn't have to work, and the opposite, where I made not that much and didn't work much while she brought in the income. It can work both ways. I am ideally looking for a traditional arrangement, but if I find a woman making a couple hundred grand a year, your boy might just take it easy on YouTube and take care of the kids. I really love the thought here: are we dating for a viral wedding, or for a 50-year marriage? I want a 50-year marriage next time. I never want to date again. Dating has been fun for character building, but I thought my last marriage was forever — it turned out to be 13 years of marriage, 15 years together. I want a 50-year marriage next time. That's what I'm looking for.

Lindsay Ann — a specific, unique individual, not a type

Number 29, and we'll speed things up from here because some of these ideas start to get more repetitive — though you'll notice there are always new things and unique angles the whole way through. Lindsay Ann's core thesis is that real love isn't about finding a type or managing a partner; it's about finding a specific, unique individual who allows you to continuously grow, diverge, and surprise each other through open dialogue. Yes. This makes me thirsty for my queen, because that is exactly what I'm looking for — a woman where we can grow, diverge, and surprise each other.

Her attraction test: if nobody in your life liked them, would you still validate them? Yes. If you are frustrated by the superficiality of dating apps, this is exactly right. Now, the directive to just go cold-approach and talk to a whole bunch of strangers — I'm not vibing with that. But being around people naturally in a real environment is a big yes.

From here I also wanted to get some Asian perspectives in, some Asian matchmakers, because matchmakers know things the apps don't, and this theme has been echoed before.

Burn the shopping list

Online dating has created a closed-minded shopping list mentality, and in my experience singles find much more success by dropping their checklist. For me, that means not using dating apps at all, and prioritizing how a person makes you feel instead of superficial traits. The height thing is so insane to me. There's no reason as a woman you need a man that's taller than you. Even if you want a man that's taller than you, once a man is taller than you, it doesn't matter how much taller. It's ridiculous. These are things where there's almost no logic behind them that makes any kind of sense, and yet a lot of people are operating with this stuff. Not everybody, which is great.

I don't do dating apps. But for me, thinking about what I bring to the table is where I'm improving — thinking about what I offer rather than all my negative demands and deal breakers. I've been a bit of a tyrant on negative demands and deal breakers. You're not going to drink, do drugs, smoke weed. You're not going to stay up too late or eat like shit. That was very worth confronting for me being 40 plus and experiencing severe dating app burnout. I met my ex on a dating app, so I thought I was excited about it — but we didn't swipe back when I was on dating apps, and it was horrible. I was shocked at how bad dating apps were.

I don't agree, though, with the claim that you should just have a nice conversation and not ask any real questions. I'm getting straight into it on the first date. The problem is that then you're going to get red flagged, boundaried, and disqualified by people immediately off of that. But I'd rather just look for someone who's not in that matrix of "this is exactly how it has to be right away." And yes — has consumerism turned dating into shopping? Unfortunately, as it largely is.

Kimberly Hill — five reasons dating's harder than it's ever been

Kimberly Hill's thesis is that modern dating feels difficult for men not because they're flawed, but because of structural headwinds: the paradox of choice, the loss of relational instincts, and the lack of cultural consensus. Yes. In some previous periods there were kind of clear expectations about dating, and today it's just crazy. Just look at all the stuff I've talked about and what you can conclude from putting all this research together — my mind just feels like it's been scrambled. There are so many perspectives, so many things to learn, so many technical terms.

The advice here is great. Don't confuse the relief of physical touch and attention after a dead-end marriage with genuine long-term compatibility. I really resonate with that. I've seen a number of Kimberly Hill's videos, and I really resonate — even though this could be a watch-out point for some people — with "understand yourself well enough that you can show up authentically." I just did my last live stream on how "be yourself" can be misunderstood dating advice. This is also why I go get a massage every week; it really helps, because that satisfies a lot of my desire for touch.

It can be rough out there, especially as a man. My belief is that women are often sleeping with a small slice of men — like 20% of men that a lot of the women are sleeping with. Then there's a number in relationships. And then there are just tons of single dudes getting nothing. That's inefficient. Collectively we should be doing better than that and having better distributions.

Your Wingman — 10 brutal dating tips for women

Number 52 on my list, Your Wingman, with "10 brutal dating tips for women that women need to hear and men need to share." This goes back to the one before. The thesis is that women are sabotaging their own dating lives through unreasonable standards, manufactured drama, and culturally validated entitlement. Preach. They must take personal accountability and drop their defensive walls to find a good man. I pray to God that I'm there when my queen is ready to drop her defensive walls and find a good man.

There is a distinction between vetting and testing. It makes sense to vet a partner — observe their character and so on. But don't intentionally manufacture drama, pull away, or be crazy. Don't do that. I know a number of chronically single women burned out on dating who keep doing this stuff and have highly defensive tactics, and this ends up happening. I can identify with doing some of this too, by being the one that's testing her instead of just vetting the woman. So I do some of this too. As I've identified and diagnosed things in others — I said diagnosed to be more dramatic — I hope I've identified the same amount of stuff in myself.

Now, watch out for the suggestion here that supportive friends are secretly engaging in intersexual competition to sabotage you. I don't know about that, and this is why you need to be able to use your own differentiation in taking things in. But I have noticed a number of cases where people's friends and the algorithm seem to be sabotaging their love life. Is that something you can identify with? It seems like a lot of us have got our love lives sabotaged because we're letting our friends and the algorithm tell us about things that we might be better off getting some better help for.

Esther Perel — 20 years later

Esther Perel, the author of Mating in Captivity, revisits it 20 years later and asks where we should begin. Her point: our expectation for predictability and perfection, fueled by technology, is fundamentally warping our ability to handle the unpredictable, messy reality of human relationships. Yes.

This has been a fantastic video and live stream for me to make, because I'm seeing it in myself. People have consistently told me, "You've got to drop your standards for women, you have unrealistically high standards for women." And I identify a lot with this. Stop expecting tech-level perfection and frictionless, on-demand predictability. But at the same time, it can be so hard to deal with other people — women that are flaky, canceling, and unclear with their desires, who say one thing one day and another thing the next day. They don't want kids, now they do want kids. They want to get married, they don't want to get married. They want to eat healthy but they're eating like shit. I had a drug addiction issue, but now they're smoking marijuana and doing several other things every day.

And it's like — is me saying no the responsible thing in this situation, or am I just not tolerating someone else's unnecessary stuff? Am I having standards that are too high, or am I making a smart decision to stay away from someone who's not compatible? This gets really difficult. If you cannot tell whether your standards are protecting you or isolating you, that is a question I love working through with people, so join Jerry Banfield Family and we will sort out which is which for your situation. And I don't believe in keeping secrets from partners; I think it's very important to know exactly what is going on. Maybe it's more complicated if you have professional relationships. And I do think your smartphone can kill your sex drive — I've especially noticed people on their smartphones at night, which absolutely can kill your sex drive.

Brené Lee — married men give the worst dating advice

Brené Lee's video is "married men give the worst dating advice." I've got to say, some of my dating advice when I was married — I made whole dating courses that sold, with videos with all kinds of views. I agree. Her core thesis is that women must stop dating for potential and enforce their standards. This one was interesting, because you do need to have standards, but don't get crazy with them — so this one kind of conflicts with some of the other ones.

Her claim that financially insecure men will inevitably project their inadequacy onto the woman who tries to build them — I don't agree with that at all. My dad didn't have anything to offer financially, except he actually helped my mom save money. I do agree with her directive to stop dating based just on potential. But my ex dated me on potential, and I certainly made a big glow-up from when she dated me. At the same time, I think this is really speaking to women who have a history of dating fixer-uppers, where women struggle with people-pleasing and trying to take on a man who's a project.

Now, I've actually found in myself some desire to date a woman who's a fixer-upper, and that's problematic. The challenge for me is that almost every woman I meet is some level of fixer-upper, because I think my shit don't stank. I think I've got my life together pretty well, so almost every woman looks like a fixer-upper to me. So this definitely resonates with me. But the idea that every man who struggles financially will inevitably become mean, resentful, and emotionally abusive is ridiculous. Her framing that men's struggle is a trap that exists to get free labor from women — I don't agree that men leave their ride-or-die once they succeed. I would have stayed with my ex even if everything else had gone right; I would have stayed if she wasn't fully committed to getting divorced, even though that might have been the best idea. I've had a huge glow-up since I met my ex — made millions of dollars online, been famous with over a billion views, lost weight. I think I look better now than I did when we met, and I didn't leave her.

Shan and Lester — how to get a man to propose

Shan and Lester, with "how to get a man to propose and what makes him choose you" — Harry Styles and Zoë Kravitz on the thumbnail. Their thesis is that men choose to marry based on their own internal timelines and readiness rather than their feelings. Maybe some guys do. I'm ready to marry a great woman right now, so where are all the women who want a husband? I'm down, I'm ready to go.

You do need to consider your opportunity cost in a relationship, though. This stuff is hard. Being with someone where it's not going anywhere is stopping you from anyone else you could be with. I'm so grateful I got divorced, because as long as my ex and I were still married, we were both stopping each other from being with somebody else. I don't believe in rigid timelines like a year-and-a-half cohabitation deadline and the associated statistics. Ultimatums generally should be used at an absolute minimum. But I do agree — women, if you're in your late 20s or 30s and you've been dating someone for years without commitment, I think you deserve that commitment. I would commit to you. I absolutely would. If you're dating a man who won't commit to you after years, who doesn't want to get married or have a family, yeah, an ultimatum does make sense in that case. There's a delicate balance.

That's what studying all these coaches did for me: it made me see that my standards were too high, and that the checklist was the problem, not the people. And if you want the full breakdown of all 100-plus creators I reviewed, everything I've put together lives in my Dating playlist. Burn the checklist, take the default second date, and I'll see you there.