Traditionalists are generally against moving in with a woman until you’re married. 

This is one of those things that I used to think was silly, over-conservatism, but as I’ve gotten older, I can see a lot of truth to it. 

Because something very dangerous happens when you move in with a woman. I’m not talking about eternal damnation or it suddenly being forbidden to leave the toilet seat up. I’m talking about the default position men switch into where they now “may as well” marry that woman. 

First comes:

“I live with her, it’s going to be too much of a hassle to break up with her.”

Then comes:

“We have some major issues, but I like her, so I’m going to take it further.”

And finally:

“We’ve lived together for a few years. Now is about the time where we’d get married.”

There are very few absolutes in dating and they don’t call me Pat “Nuance” Stedman for nothing. However, I can safely say that you should never marry a woman out of laziness. 

Yet that’s what happens when some guys move in with a woman before marriage. 

Now, my prescription isn’t to never move in with a woman. Many will not move in for religious reasons, but that’s not everyone. 

If you *do* decide to move in with a woman, here’s what I’d say: 

Avoid settling. Settling is like running girl game on yourself. You’re creating a fantasy of how much your girlfriend needs you, and that makes it hard to do what is best for you. 

And on a long enough timeline, what is best for you is what is best for her. 

If you’ve been reading these emails for any length of time, then you know girl game is when a woman plays to your fantasies of her to keep you hooked. 

One variant of girl game is about making a guy feel like he’s her savior. 

Guys often tell me “she’s SO obsessed with me” and that constantly wants to have sex with them. That’s great… but it’s also the hidden fantasy that makes a guy settle. These are the same men who stick around and ruin their lives.

The male ego is a tricky thing. In this situation, while the girl isn’t explicitly “running girl game” on you, you are letting your own fantasy seduce you. 

“She really needs me” is when the problems begin and the savior complex starts to play out. 

So like I said at the beginning, I now understand where the traditional point-of-view is coming from. And I factor that into how I coach men through decisions like this. 

It’s my job to help my clients avoid major mistakes while making them aware enough to recover quickly from the minor ones. 

And while it’s easy to make settling about the woman in the relationship and whether she’s worth committing to for the rest of your life, the variable I always look at first is the man. 

What most men don’t see is that a part of settling is choosing not to be the best you can be. Not looking in the mirror at weaknesses that are easy to ignore when you have a woman that will give you easy sex and and attention. 

Of course, the answer isn’t to avoid moving in or to break up as soon as you think you might be settling, because these fantasies that we fall for also reveal something about ourselves. Your settling may just be that you aren’t showing up as a man yourself, and breaking up with her without fixing yourself first is just escapism.

We also look at the woman. Guys have their own fantasies and they need to learn how to play defense. So while I preach discernment, when you’re moving in with a woman, you need to focus on discerning your own feelings.

Seeing through them is the beginning, but learning how to not be seduced by them is the major leagues. 

One thing I want to reiterate is that any life you don’t want is a form of self-harm.

There are too many men who paternalistically make the decision to stay with a woman because they aren’t willing to make the hard choices. What’s crazier is how many of these men think they are the good guys for engineering a relationship where they are going to end up resenting the woman, which will eventually lead to cheating and/or divorce down the line.

How do you escape this?

There is a book I recommend on this topic, and there are signs to avoid, but really, you need to spend time with these ideas and cross-reference what I’m saying with what you’re experiencing. 

Until you know what you would fall for – what you would be seduced by – and how to heal yourself of this weakness, you’re going to make mistakes. 

Module 2 of my Masterclass focuses on female nature and vetting women, and this is where we get into the meat of these decisions.

In fact, there are whole videos on Girl Game and Settling that focus on this explicitly. 

Learn to understand the dance, and your dating life will vastly improve. 

It starts with the Masterclass and the many hours of information I’ve packed inside:

https://masterclass.patstedman.com/sales-page

-Pat