The Real Reason Women Are Attracted To Tough Guys And Alpha Males
Your love life has more to do with your father than you think.
zegers06, Syda Productions | Canva Bad boys, tough guys, and alphas — whatever you call them, it’s no secret that the ladies are often drawn to men who exhibit or embody these traits, and dating them has become a goal. Most believe that feminine energy has a deeply-rooted and visceral need to feel safe, and a big, strong, tough man by her side would feel like an ideal protector. Yet, while big muscles may equal raw attraction for some, others may find it a huge turn-off. When looking for love, everyone has a highly personal attraction blueprint that is a product of their deepest values, desires, and core beliefs. But what if there’s something else?
I’m working with a client right now whom I'll call Annie. She’s just out of a painful breakup with a live-in boyfriend after a previous divorce. We’re doing some work to understand why intimate relationships have been such a source of struggle for her. She’s incredibly cheerful, pleasant, attractive, and great with people. She even makes her living in human relations so she’s a great communicator and quite gifted at connecting deeply with people. So what’s the problem?
On paper, Annie seems like an incredible catch and in fact, she is. But, she doesn’t fully know it yet. That’s why we’re working together. After a divorce and an embarrassing breakup with a man who moved in with her and her kids, she’s starting to doubt her worth and secretly wonders if she’ll ever find anyone who truly loves her, for her, forever. Getting down to the root of the problem, things aren’t always as they seem. In my work as a relationship coach, I help my clients learn how to find love by digging deep to uncover the subconscious blocks that sabotage them, again and again, until they are healed. In Annie’s case, her biggest roadblock to love and happiness was a deeply buried and painful, unresolved wound with her father.
He was an emotionally cruel man who manipulated her to do what he wanted by taking away his love and disowning her if she didn’t do what he told her. It’s not a coincidence when you realize that the same patterns and issues keep showing up in all new people. How is that even possible? It’s also a total game-changer when you finally realize that all of your little, "individual" arguments that seem unique and different are actually rooted in the same unresolved issues also. It is a R.O.O.T™ issue — what is it?
The R.O.O.T. issues that keep popping up, again and again, are your Relationship Origins Of Trauma. In Annie’s case, she continues to get this lesson not to torture her but to teach her. Once we fully heal this, there will be no need to get this lesson ever again. When I asked Annie to share the kind of man she’s attracted to, she described the typical alpha male prototype as if he was right out of Central Casting. She tended to go for tall, broad-shouldered, muscular men. She loved the look of a man with a shaved head and she reminded me that her first husband was a police officer.
As she continued to describe the guy for her, it started to sound more and more like the guy you’d see working as a bouncer outside of a bar or doing executive protection. What doesn’t she see? One solution for Annie was to see that her attraction type, as she described him, was that he was highly likely to possess some serious tough guy, authoritarian traits as part of his personality package…just like her dad. Even though she wasn’t consciously aware of it until I brought it to her attention, this preference simultaneously raised the likelihood that she would once again attract someone who may be prone to bullying tactics. This wasn’t an accident.
Annie’s ability to resolve these lingering wounds from childhood’s unfinished business is exactly what she will need to heal it all and attract a successful relationship with a high-quality partner. The real key, for her, lies in standing up to intimidation tactics and manipulation that require her to continue jumping through hoops and "performing" for love. Now that she’s seeing the once-invisible compulsions that drove her, we’re giving her new choices so that she can proactively change everything. For good.
In fact, she saw her dad for the first time in years not too long, and put an end to the entire dynamic. She wasn’t aggressive. Just very matter-of-fact and calm. And guess what? He wasn’t so tough at all when she called him on his old tricks. It turns out his bark was far worse than his bite. Here's what's great about that: Now that she stood up to her dad and spoke her truth in a kind, assertive way while simultaneously forgiving him since he was only doing the best he could with what he knew at the time, she is no longer triggered by him.
She also sees how that unbalanced power dynamic shaped her worldview from a very young age. The direct benefit for her is that she no longer has to beg for scraps of acceptance from disapproving men. She's now in a very healthy relationship with a man who appreciates her for who she is and has no interest in manipulating her into compliance. That's the beauty of self-healing.
Dave Elliott is a relationship coach, human behavior specialist, and author of The Catch Your Match Formula. He has appeared in multiple media outlets and publications, including eHarmony, PopSugar, Latina, Psych Central, and Fox News, among many others.