I wish I'd have found a wife/girlfriend before becoming professionally successful...

For various reasons, I went out of my way to avoid any meaningful relationship or even date for several years. None of the people I met were ever someone I'd consider spending my life with or even becoming mildly serious about. I actively pushed away and discouraged people from trying to be friendly with me beyond what civil politeness called for.

Eventually I did meet the right man for me. But I didn't know it and continued keeping him at arms length and never encouraged him in the least. We were often together, though, as I helped him recovery from a medical issue and later spent time with him socially. But I was very determined to stay single and independent. Eventually, he just took charge and told me I was his. His timing was impeccable. He is a past master at reading people and knowing their minds better than they do. A week later we were engaged. I met him in October and we were married the following March.

While this isn't quite the same as your situation, not actively looking might be the best way to find someone. You need to hang out where people you'd like to be with gather and avoid singles bars unless that's how you picture your social life afterwards. Just go out and be yourself and have fun. Go skating, take sailing lessons, there are plenty of places to meet people who are more interested in your than you bank account. When that person comes along, I think you'll realize it.

I do understand your apprehension about someone latching on to you because you're affluent. Were anything to happen to my husband, I would find myself in similar circumstances: Unsure about who is being honest and who is being smarmy.

Hi fellow doing-okay person here with all of the same trappings of (wannabe) wealth as you. My household income is right around $200 and I live in an extremely affordable state which puts my income in a very high percentile. My wife was furious with me the other day when she found out that I had no idea what the price of gas is. I work a cushy office job and have a beautiful antique house in a beautiful area (with a leaking basement!). So I can relate.

You're probably not finding love because you have defects in your personality that you aren't seeing. It sounds like a combination of an inability to value the things that matter most in life and an inability to love yourself. People who are naturally at ease with themselves and their place in life find potential partners coming out of the woodwork. It's magnetism. You bought a "prestige house", what did you choose to fill the rooms with? Did you buy the house as a trophy or out of some desire to tick boxes, or did you have an intent with how you would fill it with loved ones and memories? Your house comments remind me of "nice guys"; they don't treat women nicely to be nice, they do it in a transactional manner. "If I do this then the things I want will happen to me".

"I've got a great job, car, house, why aren't I getting the things life promised me?"

Because it's the person that you've worked to cultivate that matters the most.

Some day you'll be in the ground and none of that shit is going to matter. What matters are the people, and the relationships you build along the way.

Now why are you failing to do that? That gets to my second point, an inability to love yourself. More importantly, you need to be a whole and complete person before you can involve your life with someone else. This means you need to have a development plan for your life that is centered around the values that matter. Getting into a rut working long days at the office and blowing off steam by buying expensive toys is fun but it doesn't cultivate a personality that attracts good partners. This is hard. It's a chicken-and-egg problem. It's best solved by finding things to do with your life that genuinely make you happy to be alive. Get out of your comfort zone and try different shit and do it with a smile on your face and you will be amazed at how your life will transform.

Grindr

Created an account to comment on this thread. Similar-ish situation, but probably significantly different in other respects. I would say go with your gut and use your head. It really depends on what you want out of the situation, what your endgame is. Church might be an option for meeting people less focussed on material wealth, depending on your lifestyle. Just find someone who is happy and content with what they have already, everything else is just a bonus.

Well first of all....don't talk about you. Women want you to hear them and think of them. They are the most contradictory creatures on the planet.

You tell them what they want to hear and do what they don't expect.

Never mention your income, possessions, or status. Just say you are content with where you are in life and are looking for someone to share it with.

It's easy to find one honestly, and perhaps you need to go to another country in order to find one. Personally I can't stand American women....just can't.

Values are lacking within them all. Media and social pressure tells them to do this and that.....be promiscuous, you need that new shit to show your special.

Meh to all that. I got me an Australian woman....same age just a month younger.

Best part is that when she gets pissed the accent gets more noticeable.

She cooks, cleans, maintains the home......and I provide.

Perhaps I got what you consider lucky, but really I was just selective. I knew what I wanted and conveyed it is all.

You seem as if your all tied up with what you think you can offer......don't.

Make sure she can offer you something. It seems to me you would be the one with more anyways.

You send off so many red flags.

I dated someone like you a few times and knew immediately to end things with him. He had the perfect house to start a family in, the upper middle class job, the car... the guy had everything right on paper. Getting a wife was literally just another check box of his. It felt like “insert wife here”.This isn’t the movie “Field of Dreams” if you build it, they will come.

I am, quite literally, one of the most eligible bachelors in the city I live in.

No, no you are not. You are the guy who thinks they have everything a woman would want but you lack substance. Your post is all about monetary things and how to avoid people liking you for your monetary things.

“Look at all my things, you should like me because I have things...but don’t like me because I have things”
dude, that attitude really unattractive and a woman of worth can sniff that out on date number one!

You sound like a 40+ year old self centered guy who’s severely self conscious to the point of paralysis.

The only thing you will find with your mindset is exactly what you’re trying to avoid.