Back when I was an 18- or 19-year-old college student, way before there were computers (OK, there were IBM 360-series mainframes!), I started to get infatuated with one of the hottest girls I'd ever been out with. If memory serves, the problem seemed to be that she was hung up on some BMOC life-of-the-party Highland Park frat president type, and didn't seem all that interested in me.
Then one day I heard this song on the radio:
http://www.metrolyrics.com/carpet-ma...dimension.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5QZZE9GYmg
Right then and there, I decided that those were words to live by! So from then on, I (mostly, anyway) did just that.
Although I never quite understood why so many young women are drawn to the roguish, "bad-boy" types, I saw that sort of dynamic play out in real life time and time again. So I tried to cultivate a demeanor of semi-aloofness, while at the same time trying not to be a compete jerk. For the most part, that served me pretty well during my 20s. Not for anything was I going to become the "Carpet Man!"
Thankfully, as we get older, concern about that gradually becomes less and less necessary.