The Singles Gym Blog

Alpha Female Relationships: Part One - Busting the Myths

I had the pleasure of being interviewed for a feature article in the June 2008 issue of Eve Magazine, where Catherine Gray, who was lovely during the interview, poses the question: "Are you with the wrong man?  Successful women are now turning their backs on driven, ambitious men and finding happiness with laid-back, domestic types."

According to Gray's research,

• The alpha female intimidates the traditional alpha male and her success is a passion killer for him
• A man's chances of marriage goes up with his IQ, but for each 16 point rise in a woman's IQ, her prospects of getting hitched decline by 40%.
• Women are only admitting to half their salaries and dumbing themselves down in a bid to attract men, which even I, in the article, confessed to having thought about doing! More on that later...

The bottom line according to Gray is that "alpha/alpha relationships often lead to conflict and not blissful harmony." 

The obvious answer seems to be to partner up with a Beta Male - someone who is confident and unthreatened by his alpha woman, happy to let her be the centre and puts family and friends before his own career. Examples shown in the article include Madonna and Guy Ritchie, and Courtenay Cox with David Arquette. 

While this solution obviously works for some women, the danger as I see it is that we end up creating yet more myths and stereotypes.
 

‘Love Drug’ Offers New Hope for Shy Men

A new ‘love drug’ which may offer hope to millions of shy people is being researched by scientists in US, Europe and Australia.  Oxytocin, a hormone that is naturally produced during sex and childbirth, promotes romantic feelings and helps mothers bond with their newborn babies.

According to the Daily Mail, research is showing that this hormone reduces anxiety levels, eases phobias and facilitates social contact.  This is also found to be a safe product with no side effects, and it isn’t addictive - positively good news for the 60% of Britons who suffer from shyness.

And this is great news for shy men in particular.  Living in a society where it is still commonly assumed that men take the initiative when it comes dating, this new discovery will offer new hope for millions.  I recently received an email from a young man who described how his shyness was crippling his life.  He was too shy to speak to women, much less ask one out on a date and he feared that meeting and falling in love with someone would elude him forever.  This new ‘love drug’ may offer hope for him and for millions of shy men, who until now have been suffering in silence.  For these men, dating success may not be so far off on the horizon after all!

Times are changing: Part Two - How do you respond to change?

Yesterday I was talking about the growing trend of men and women deliberately choosing the single life over a family life, how things have changed, and that it's what you do with change that counts.

In reality, what usually happens in times of change or transition is a sense of confusion and instability, and there are some quite different ways that people deal with change. One way is to attempt to hold on to the "old" - have you noticed the proliferation of the gender books:  men are from. . .women are from....?  In this scenario change is resisted.

Another and opposite approach is for the pendulum to swing from one extreme to the other - a bit like going from the Victorian age to the Flower Power and "Spread the Love" age.  In this scenario it's more to do rejecting the old than embracing change. Everything to do with the old is thrown out and what you end up with is taking the extreme opposite position.

Times are changing: Part One - Men and Women Choosing Solo Life over Family Life

A couple of weeks ago I noticed two articles about the growing number of men and women who are choosing NOT to be in a relationship.

The first one was about a bachelor Carl Weisman, who wanted to find out why a growing number of men, like himself, were shunning marriage and opting to stay single.  According to the article, he surveyed 1,533 men and concluded that these men were not afraid of marriage per se but that they were afraid of a bad marriage and that they were more afraid of marrying the wrong person than of never getting married at all. 

The second article suggested that women, in greater numbers, are now choosing the single life over the demands of the family life. According to these women, they believe they can be happy and fulfilled without having a partner. The name coined for women making this choice was "Freemale," which made me wonder: what would the term be for men who make this choice?

Better deals for single cruisers

The Telegraph reported today that British company Mundy Cruising is campaigning to reduce supplements for single travellers.

They pointed out that single travellers often get a raw deal, when it comes to accommodation and pricing, with some supplements as high as 100%, and many passengers surveyed felt that cruise lines treated them like second-class citizens.

I find this amazing in this day and age, especially as single people make up 39% of the adult population - that's almost 19 million people - hardly a small minority. On top of that, there are some people who prefer to cruise on their own, even if they do not actually live alone. So isn't it about time that choices and prices started reflecting that? It would certainly strike me as common sense, not to mention business sense.

What do you think? Do you have any interesting experiences to share of being a single traveller? I'd love to hear from you - drop me a line in the comment box below.