I am writing a book on inner game and I am struggling with how to define "alpha male." This is what I have now and I was wondering what y'all thought:

You have probably heard a million times that women are attracted to the “alpha male.” But who is this “alpha male?” And what do you need to do to become one? The “alpha male” has become one of the most abused and misunderstood concepts in modern society, with almost every meathead bro having a different definition of what an alpha male is, which is why most people roll their eyes the moment they hear the term. To many, the term “alpha male” evokes an image of a loud, obnoxious, try-hard douchebag full of steroids and Budweiser starting fights with random guys. But that is not what the alpha male is.

The “alpha male” is not a real person. No living, breathing human has ever been the perfect alpha male for a short time, much less for an extended period of instead. Instead, the alpha male is an idealized archetype. The archetypal alpha male is all powerful, he can do anything he wants, he owns all the resources of the tribe, he can defeat any challenge, everybody loves and fears him, everybody obeys him, and he never feels fear or anxiety. Our subconscious mind evolved to recognize this archetype and classify real people as “alpha males” only to the degree they resemble this archetype. But as you can imagine, all real men, including the most powerful kings, dictators, athletes, and celebrities fall far short of this ideal. The closest thing to the archetypal alpha male is God, which is why it has become such a powerful and popular idea, whether or not he actually exists.

This means, unfortunately, that women are never truly satisfied. Women don’t want just a man who is “strong,” they want a man who is infinitely strong. They do not want a man with some resources, they want a man with all the resources. They do not want a pretty important guy, they want the most important guy in the world. At the same time, women need to be accepted by the alpha male, so they “settle” for the closest thing to an alpha male they can get. I am not trying to say that all women are disloyal and will jump to the next best thing the moment they can get it - human psychology is complicated and there are many other emotions that motivate women to be attracted to and stay with a man. That said, the desire for the archetypal alpha exists in the human psyche and is extremely powerful. And oftentimes when you don’t understand what is going on in your relationship, you can figure it out by going back to these fundamental emotions.

Women have different preferences when it comes to men, so some women may place more or less weight on looks, others may place more or less weight on money, and yet others may place more or less weight on intelligence. Other women may overlay additional desires and preferences onto their basic wiring, so a particular woman might want a man who shares her interests, is of the same ethnic/racial group as her, has a certain career/financial situation, or dresses/looks a certain way. But no matter what the woman’s idiosyncracies are, all women are wired with a basic attraction to the archetypal alpha. No woman WANTS a poor, short, ugly guy and if everything were equal, she will almost always choose the guy closer to the archetypal alpha.

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