<center><h1>Where's Mom and the Need to be Told what to do</h1></center> A cocky attitude and a good sense of humor are great for getting first dates and establishing that initial attraction quintessential in all new relationships. But watching Nick D on this season of Love is Blind reminded me of an uncomfortable truth: charm without substance all but guarantees a dead relationship. Landing a date doesn’t mean you can keep a partnership alive. Just like being the life of the party doesn’t mean you’re mature. And, while women might laugh at your jokes in the beginning, they’re looking for something deeper - a sign that you can handle yourself when life isn’t funny anymore. Again, this is great in the beginning because there are no problems. Women will say, “oh he’s so easy to be around” or “I can’t stop laughing with him”. Yes, no shit Jessica, it’s been two months. Nick and his match, Hannah, speed run this dynamic and it plays out exactly like all the others. Hannah has her life together. Clean home, steady career, clear goals. Nick D has no job, lives with his parents, and at one point in the show has some confusion over how to cook pasta. Hannah bullies the hell out of Nick. It’s merciless. It would be impossible to watch the show and not think she’s being a bitch. She ridicules him for his worth, emasculates him, and rarely shows him affection. Her behavior was cruel, but her frustration is worth examining. She should have handled this better. It would have taken little effort for her to coach him through these missteps, lift him up, and likely make him a better man. If you’re a woman reading this you might have had a physical revulsion to what I just said and for good reason. It’s not your job to make a man a **man**. It’s his. Hannah mentions a few times that she doesn’t like telling Nick what to do. “Take the trash out Nick”, “clean up after yourself”, “put your laundry away”. I’m sure in their actual relationship this happened daily and we only caught a glimpse of it. She never says it, but the reason she (and other women) hate doing this is because it makes them feel like the parent in the relationship. Very few people want to manage their own lives and even fewer want to manage another’s on top of their own. On first watch I was team Nick. He was trying to make a career for himself and it failed and now he’s a bit rudderless. It was “okay” that he couldn’t make pasta, he’d learn how to in no time. But then I started thinking about Hannahs perspective. She’d set up her life for success. She went on the show looking for a loving relationship, not a parental one. A husband, not a child. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to give her full devotion to finding a partner. She ended up with a man still transitioning into maturity. Of course she was frustrated. This isn’t just Hannah’s story. This is the same scene playing out in apartments across the country. Men across the country are struggling with the transition to adulthood, often without realizing it. We mistake independence for isolation, thinking we can figure everything out on our own time. But there's a cost to this approach – both to us and to the women who enter our lives. Being an adult isn't about knowing how to cook pasta or having a perfect career path. It's about taking ownership of your space in the world. It's about being proactive rather than reactive. It's about handling your business before someone else has to tell you to handle it. Women like Hannah aren't asking for perfection – they're asking for partnership. They're asking for men who can carry their own weight, who can anticipate needs rather than wait for instructions. They're asking for men who understand that adulthood isn't something that happens to you – it's something you do. Stop waiting for someone to teach you how to be an adult. Stop expecting women to be your life coaches, your cheerleaders, and your personal assistants all rolled into one. Every answer you need is a Google search away. Every skill you lack has a YouTube tutorial. The path to becoming an adult isn’t hidden - it’s waiting for you to show up. Charm might get you the date, but your character keeps the relationship alive. Stop selling women on who you could be, and start showing them who you are.