For years, I’ve wondered why my love life is great in many foreign countries I’ve lived in (and some U.S. cities), to where one night out can result in a full schedule of dates for the month, and inevitably a girlfriend (or two, or three). But at home in sunny LA my love life is about as successful as a Samsung Note 7 production facility. The Tinder matches don’t write back, the women are flaky, numbers don’t work, and the few girls I end up dating are defective, to put it nicely. (Crazy as fuck).

Many have thrown theories my way: “It’s because you’re an American, and when you’re abroad you’re more interesting.” Or “Because Los Angeles sucks for dating, your game must be airtight. Foreign women are easy.”

I always knew these explanations were shallow. Finally, after thumbing through some old books on different spiritual philosophies lying on my shelf, all the puzzles pieces finally fit together: I’m simply energetically incompatible in some cities or communities compared to others. Bear with me, whether you’re allergic to the word ‘spiritual’ or not, this information could permanently change your perspective about this topic.

10,000+ Years of Teaching Condensed to Some Soundbites

The root of most “ancient wisdom”, spiritual philosophy, mystical teachings—whatever you want to call it—is that human minds are made of dual components:

The first component is our connection to “God”, AKA the collective. What this means is that all minds / sentient creatures were chipped off the same cosmic block of marble. We’re all united together / come from the same collective mind. Maybe we could literally exist as another person, and the only thing stopping that from happening is some weird dimensional property of consciousness. We can call this the right-path.

The second component is our individuality. The universe would be awfully boring if everyone were sharing the same mind and nobody had autonomy. So, the “collective mind” decided to animate all its individual parts and give each part a sense of separateness. We can call this the left-path (which is represented by the inverted pentacle loved by rock stars, where the top point—representing spirit—is pointed down toward the Earth instead of the heavens.)

In Practical Terms, This Means …

The right-path desires social unity, because it’s the part of us united together with everyone else. We can thank the right path for: amazing sex, amazing parties, close connections to friends and family, euphoric feelings of love for your puppy, and concepts like empathy.

In no uncertain terms, our desire for unity is the quickest path to happiness. A community with strong communal bonds is going to exist in a much better flow state; people will live longer, there will be less stress, life will be “good”.

The left-path, however, diverges from this. The left-path recognizes the individual and separate unit, and so it desires to maximize its output and enhance itself as an individual. We can thank the left-path for: career success, personal fame, and concepts like uniqueness of personality, self-expression, and all manner of creative, self-glorifying pursuits.

One Isn’t Better Than the Other

I always found myself disagreeing with not only ancient Buddhist teachings, but also most of the New Age stuff on the internet, but I never understood why. It finally hit me that it’s because many people make the mistake of thinking the right-path (unity) is superior to the left-path (separateness).

In practical terms, if you choose one path OVER the other, you end up with a maladjusted person. Somebody who ONLY cares about unity experiences / interconnectedness becomes a kind of doormat; they never develop themselves as individuals. These types of people, if exposed to external factors of stress, bend like Twizzler licorice. You’ve probably met these people in real life; they have big furry beards and are constantly crying—snot dripping down their beards—about who-knows-what. They may be “happy” with their giant circle of friends but they’re not living up to their true potential or developing inner-strength, because those concepts are more left-path.

It seems, with all these millennia of trying to figure out the human condition, the big take-away point is we’re both separate but also equal. This is duality, and it’s definitely a balance. Ultimately, these two paths are *supposed* to be complimentary. For example: somebody builds up their personality, ambitions and desires through the left-path, and this allows for an amazing relationship and enhanced social bonds as we get to explore each other’s unique attributes. In tantric and sexual-energy study, the left-path can manifest as intense sexual desire while the right-path manifests as loving bonds—both occurring together during good sex.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work out in this fun balanced way.

To Get Back to Dating, and Why Los Angeles Sucks

Just like you can be maladjusted by only following the right-path, you can get VERY maladjusted by neglecting the right-path. To put it bluntly: career-driven cities, ESPECIALLY Los Angeles, New York, etc, are imbalanced toward the left-path.

This is very clear to me in LA, a city where people go to pursue fame—personal Godhood. Western religion would interpret LA as a very “satanic” place, where people actively separate themselves from God. However, it doesn’t mean it’s a bad place, because all the individual enhancement means a city full of interesting characters, brilliant artists, self-expression,

However, social connectivity SUCKs.

Out-of-control left-hand philosophy leads most alarmingly to selfishness, and at its worst: sociopathy, which is the ultimate form of disconnection from others.

While not everyone in LA is bad company, there’s an overriding predisposition toward disconnection from each other. It’s very important to keep this in mind.

Whichever Path You’re More Aligned To May Determine Your Social Experiences

I realize that I am slightly more inclined toward the right-path: while I do pursue individuality and healthy-selfishness, at the end of the day I care most about friends, loved ones, social inclusion, meeting people, etc. I’m also very empathic by nature.

Because of this, there’s an automatic energetic incompatibility between me and people who are more left-path. And unfortunately, that means the majority of attractive women in LA. Many women in LA utilize their looks specifically to exploit fame / status, career success, social media attention. Some of these women, unfortunately, go so far left they delve into highly selfish or sociopathic behavior (the men do as well, but I am writing this from the POV of a man meeting women). For me, these personality attributes are an anathema. Likewise, a left-hand imbalanced person may feel repelled by someone who is even slightly more right-path than left-path—and not even know why.

In any culture that is more right-path—more centered on the community and sociality, it’s going to be easier to meet people if you are more right-path. By contrast, pluck a left-path imbalanced person out of LA and stick them in such a community, and they’ll feel highly anxious and insecure as they try to fit in. Right-path people may even react with hostility toward someone who is trying to compete for status and popularity—which is how completely left-path social circles evolve (e.g.: “Mean Girls”).

In Summary

Keep in mind what spectrum of individuality vs. unity that you exist on. Then, pay attention to your environment. If you’re on a very right-path wavelength, a highly selfish career-driven community is not a good idea for you.

But secondly, keep in mind your own spectrum. It’s not healthy to be more left-path than right-path. Selfishness and social disconnection leads to stress and depression, which leads to disease. On the same note, being too far right-path can be disastrous.

My late mother is a good example of the latter. She was extremely empathic. On the right / left spectrum, she was probably 90 / 10. She eventually fell into a severe depression, primarily because she never developed the strength to pursue her career and personal ambitions very far. She was afraid of any behavior that was outside of social unity even the slightest. As a result, she could not fulfill her own desires for self-expression; creating an existential crisis. The ensuing depression actually led to her death.

So, find a healthy middle-ground between both philosophies, and consider only living in environments that are also balanced in this regard, or else your social (and dating) life could suffer greatly.