False Pretenses?

I am not good at attracting men. I'm not sure that I ever have been, which is kind of weird to say for someone who was nearly always dating someone from the time I was 17 until recently. In my early years, I was obsessed with men wanting me for my looks, since I was always seen as one of the guys. But then that put me into a different category: If I'm one of the guys and attractive, I must be easy. That's something I never was, so that leads me back to where I am now: creeping up on one year of celibacy and dating only one man in four years (for a mere two months).

Recently, I was talking to one of my many male friends (one of the guys, remember?), and we were talking about how I scare men by being so frank and honest. He knows me pretty well, and he suggested that had I been more subtle at the beginning and then opened up the layers to reveal that more aggressive, atypical female side, it would have been way more attractive.

Today, I asked another male friend who knows me as well as the first, and he agreed completely. Apparently, one must appear to be like 99% of the women out there, and then—only once the man is smitten—reveal who one really is. In other words, if I want to win, I have to play the game.

Just as I'm not good at attracting men, I'm equally poor at playing games. I play to win, and I am aggressive. Just ask anyone who's played me in Words with Friends. And I'm scared to death of losing, to be honest about it.

If I am more demure at the beginning, I'm more vulnerable. I don't have a way to vet out potential partners if I don't test them at the beginning by tossing out sexual innuendos and seeing how they respond. I want a man who is unafraid of my banter and will volley with me. Can this be achieved with softness?

Actually, I tried that approach not too long ago, around the same time a coach gave me a DISC assessment. That showed me to be fighting with myself and not being true to who I am. As the coach pointed out, if I catch a man as one person and then am really someone else, he'll likely run anyway. So wouldn't I rather he run at the get-go instead of after I'm invested?

My head hurts....