One of the most common Romance novel plots is the rich, womanizing playboy that finds an amazing woman, realizes the error of his ways, and settles down to be tamed by this amazing woman.
But is this realistic?
Will a man change for the right woman?
Well, we all change over the course of our lives. The truth is that most of us change in ways that are UNPLANNED. We just wake up one day and find we’re 20 pounds heavier…
Or 20 years older…
Or we get divorced and we need to learn more about how to date and make a relationship work again.
Let’s face it, most of us get married way too young.
Because when you’re in your 20s, you can meet people all the time. It’s easy! And if you breakup, no big deal! Cry for a week or two, then go out and find a replacement.
But after your 30s and 40s, things don’t work like that anymore. Finding the right man or the right woman isn’t as easy.
So you realize that you may have to find Mr. Good Enough, and hope you can shape him into something that will work for a relationship.
And you also start to realize that most real life relationships don’t work ANYTHING like a Harlequin romance novel. And sometimes it’s not so easy to get a guy to change into your Prince Charming.
So here are a few tips (and secrets) about making your man change for you.
First of all –
- Will a man change for the right woman?
- Will he change for the woman he loves?
Well, it all depends on how you imagine your relationship.
If you’re picking a man who’s not quite right at the moment, and you’re hoping you can shape him up – sculpt him – into a guy you can be happy with, you might be disappointed.
Let me share a few tips about making a guy change for love…
Change A Guy Tip #1: HOW Does He Need To Change For You?
It’s perfectly understandable to want a man to settle down and be monogamous with you. That’s a healthy change in a relationship that signifies going from just dating to a more committed relationship.
So you have to understand what are the ways you need him to change?
If it’s just to be more committed and monogamous and stop dating other people, that’s perfectly understandable. Of course you would want that. And if he’s a normal healthy guy, and he is attracted to you, that should come naturally.
If it doesn’t come naturally, that’s where you need to step in and figure it out.
But if you’re also needing your man to change in specific ways, I might ask you why you aren’t choosing these guys in the first place. Why not simply have a good list of qualities that you’re looking for, and then find a man with them?
It’s far easier to choose the kind of guy you want right off the bat then it is to have to modify him down the road. That would seem more like laziness to me.
Change Tip #2: WHY Do You Need Him To Change?
This is one of those questions you have to ask yourself. WHY do you need him to change?
Do you have a history of needing men to “change” for you?
Again, if you’re not choosing the man you want to begin with, and you’re just choosing a guy who conveniently will get into a relationship with you, you’re probably reverse engineering your relationship.
Meaning that you’re choosing the guy first, and then shoe-horning him into what you want him to be later on.
Change Your Man – Tip #3: He’ll Change A Little – But Not A Lot
You have to understand that we all change. Bit by bit, day by day, we’re all changing.
Unfortunately, this kind of change is usually the UNCONSCIOUS kind. Meaning that we don’t really notice the change that’s going on until we see it in the mirror.
The other part is that no one really wants to change drastically. It feels like we would be sacrificing our identity in some way.
Men are no different about this.
You need to manage your expectations with him. He’s not going to change significantly.
Even if there are a lot of changes a guy would like to make, he wants to do them on his own schedule. If you try to get him on a big self improvement plan, you might find yourself scaring him away.
Can He Be Changed? – Tip #4: Don’t make him a project
The fact is that men have a primary need in relationships. And it’s one that most women aren’t aware of.
A man needs to be ACCEPTED by you.
Here’s the rub – how accepted can a guy feel if he thinks he’s your pet project? That you need to change:
- His wardrobe
- His friends
- His house/apartment
- His hobbies – maybe he’s a video gamer, and that doesn’t work so well for you
- His habits
- His looking at attractive women
- His goals and aspirations
Let’s face it – there are a metric TON of things to potentially change about a lot of guys.
Like when he cleans his ear with his car key on the way out of the restaurant. (Yeah, I’ve seen guys do this with my own eyes.)
But if you set about changing a whole laundry list of things about him, don’t be surprised when he doesn’t respond with happiness.
Make Him Change For Your Love? – Tip #5: It’s a Trade
If you want him to really invest in the relationship, you need some “quid pro quo” – meaning you have to give him a little something in return. Don’t expect a man to subscribe to a makeover without there being something in it for him, too.
A guy will gladly participate in a self-development adventure – IF he sees that you’re also going to follow along and improve some stuff about you.
Some ideas:
- Get back to the gym – show him you really care about how you look.
This one is really big for guys, because most men experience a woman who works hard to look good to get INTO a relationship… but after she locks him down she loses her motivation. (Men see this even more when the children come along.) - Update your wardrobe – If you’ve been out of the dating scene for any time, you might not have the freshest clothes. Yeah, it sucks to go rebuilding your fashion again, but it’s worth it. Don’t think of it as something you do for HIM, it’s something you do for YOU.
- Get Hip – If you’re dating again after a break, or even if you’ve been out there for a while, you may have stopped staying current with certain things, like books, music, movies, and such. Get caught back up on your Netflix queue, and other areas of pop culture. Definitely don’t enslave yourself to the “popular” – but get aware so you have good conversation to offer.
You’ll find that a guy is much more amenable to changing for you if you also show some Goodwill by upgrading yourself for him.
It’s only fair after all.
Change Tip #6: It’s not going to be overnight
In the same way that you can’t expect him to change everything about himself, you also have to realize that he’s not going to make a radical change overnight. It will take a bit of time.
This is why it’s so important for you to be patient while he moves forward. If you push too hard, he could go silent, distant, and withdraw from the relationship. And once he does, you’ll need to know exactly how to pull him back.
And this is also a reason you want to keep your scope of changes small at first.
Change Tip #7: Is he a Romeo?
One of the most common areas that a woman would like to make sure a man “changes” is in how he approaches a relationship. And the first way is to tame his desires for other women.
But here’s a somewhat shocking truth: Men aren’t interested in other women if he’s still chasing you.
This is really important, because most women are under the false assumption that – if he were given a choice – he’d sleep with as many women as he could.
This is only the case when:
- He never got much “action” as a young man – therefore now he’s learning about “sowing his wild oats.” This means poor timing for you, unfortunately.
- He’s got other self-esteem issues that compel him to seek validation through sexual conquests
- He realized that this relationship will not fulfill his needs, or it isn’t what he’s REALLY looking for. But he’s also not going to turn down the bedroom action, either.
If a man is not satisfied with only you, it’s usually only one of these three situations.
And there is nothing you can do about any of these, with the exception of #3. If you find out why he’s not getting his needs met, you can fix this one.
This means you need to be brave, and be willing to really drill into your relationship to find out what’s going on. Honestly, it will probably require the help of a relationship therapist.
The problem is that you will have to convince him that a relationship therapist is worth his time and effort. To a man, he’d probably just prefer to try again with someone new.
It’s not what you want to hear, but it’s what you NEED to hear.
Change For Your Love? – Tip #8: It’s not always whether he WILL change, but how MUCH
Some guys are just never going to be capable of changing in a big way. Most people in general can’t, if we’re being honest here.
So more important for you is to know how much of a change you’d like from him.
- If he’s a guy who’s into reading girly magazines…
- If he’s a guy who goes to strip clubs on the weekends, and watches porn most evenings…
What do you think the chances are of getting him to quit any or all of those?
Probably pretty slim.
But if he’s a guy who has been dating around for the last year, but he’s been engaged once or twice – there’s a good chance you could make a committed relationship with him.
Just know your limits.
From all the coaching and research I’ve done over my last 20 years of doing this work, women are often far too concerned about making a man want to commit. He will naturally commit to you if he senses that you are a High Value Woman.
He’ll want to win you. He’ll see the challenge – and step up to it!
“We stop hesitating when we see a prize for us to win.”
How are you presenting yourself as that prize right now? Do you even FEEL like a prize?
Ultimately, change happens from within, not because someone else MADE us change. (Reflect on your own life and see how many times you changed on demand. More than likely, you changed because you saw the benefit of doing so.)
If you want him to change for you, why not show him the woman that he’s looking for?
- Do you know what triggers a man’s irresistible desire for you?
- Do you know how men decide which woman they will stay with – and which one they will pull away from?
- Or which woman he will commit to – and which one he will keep around only as a booty call?
Do you want to be his one and ONLY?
There are things that “high value women” know about that most other women DON’T.
She knows how men think, what men want, and why men choose her over other women.
And it has nothing to do with her looks, her weight, or how well she dresses…
Getting him to fall for you has EVERYTHING to do with understanding MEN.
Most women are convinced that they can discover this secret in the advice they get from friends, or magazine articles – or even on the Internet!
But the truth is that you need to learn this from the one place you might not expect to – from a man!
I’ve spent almost 20 years researching and reporting from the “other side” for women.
I’m a MAN. I’ve dated dozens of women, and I chose only one as my soulmate. She was the woman I finally married.
Do you want to know her secret?
Do you want to know how to make him yours – Forever?
Discover the Secret Password to Any Man’s Heart