NCRW
How Does A Man Feel When A Woman Walks Away? 7 Feelings He’s Hiding
Author: Paul R. Brian & Renée Shen
Many men are pros at hiding their feelings when it comes to love.
But the truth is that men feel just as deeply as any woman, and losing a chance at romance hits very hard for them.
Here’s the truth about how a guy feels when a woman he’s interested in walks away.
Consider this a peek behind the masculine mask.
Table of Contents
#1. He Feels Self-Doubt
Even the most confident man is going to feel some self-doubt when a woman leaves him or disengages from him.
If you want to know how does a man feel when a woman walks away, think of this at the most basic level:
How do you feel if you reach for something you want and it is yanked out of your grasp?
You feel angry, disappointed, confused and, likely, critical of yourself for why you didn’t succeed in grabbing it.
You should have moved faster, harder, smarter.
This is a man when he doesn’t get what he wants: the more confident he is the less he will blame himself.
However even the most upbeat guy may have a twinge of self-doubt if a woman he is into doesn’t reciprocate his interest.
“Why doesn’t she like me?”
This is the question echoing in a guy’s head when a woman walks away.
Either that, or:
“What did I do wrong or not do that made her cut me off?”
He’s going to be very curious and confused, looking for an answer.
As the Rolling Stones sang so memorably in their 1978 hit song “Beast of Burden:”
“There’s one thing baby,
That I don’t understand
You keep on telling me
I ain't your kind of man…
Ain't I rough enough?
Ain't I tough enough?
Ain't I rich enough?
In love enough? Ooh, please…”
Case study: Learn how Kristin went from being completely burnt out with online dating, sick of getting ghosted and completely exhausted from giving her heart and soul with nothing in return… To having high value men begging for her attention & having the most “electric” date of her entire life. (…All by changing one simple strategy.)
#2. He Feels Anxiety About the Future
If you walk away from a man, he will likely feel some level of anxiety about the future.
He wonders what will happen next and how this woman will or will not fit into the picture.
If blocking on social media and unkind words were involved, then this is going to apply even more so.
Of course, the caveat here is that it depends on how serious things were and how he feels about the woman who has withdrawn her interest.
This is proportional to how attracted he is towards the woman in question.
If he’s deeply in love, then her walking away is a death knell to his future plans. He may curse his own mistakes or curse the lady who left him in the lurch.
MORE: Is He Falling in Love With Me? 8 Definite Signs He Is.
Either way he’s going to be full of fear about what does or doesn’t come next.
He may drink heavily, go into depression or become highly irritable and unapproachable.
The base emotion here is fear.
He’s scared that she won’t be back and that his future is now empty and alone.
If you still like the guy, but think he needs to up his game, there are two exact words you can say that will trigger his curiosity and even his desire to do better…
#3. He Feels More Desire Towards Her
Let’s be honest:
Playing hard to get can be immature and exasperating for both men and women.
But it can also be really damn effective, provided you actually are a high value woman in the first place.
The thing about playing hard to get is that it ultimately only works when two things are in place:
- When you’re not actually playing; and
- When you have value in the first place
In other words, men (and women) are generally much more attracted to someone who is intrinsically valuable as a mate, and someone whose attention, interest and approval is much harder to get.
Why is this?
Perhaps it’s about rarity, some evolutionary instinct or just the fact that someone whose love is too easy to win can come across as:
- Overly available
- Low value; and
- Easy to conquer romantically
How does a man feel when a woman walks away?
Well, often he feels as though he actually has increased desire for her along with his frustration and negative emotions.
He wants her more, because she’s no longer available and has made it clear she’s willing to leave him in the dust.
Related: When To Walk Away From A Relationship? 7 Glaring Signs To Look For.
This is like catnip for guys, even confident and attractive guys.
If the walking away is genuine and not easily reversed, a man is going to generally decide whether or not he’s interested enough to pursue her.
If he is invested and serious enough about her to pursue, then he’s going to weigh the amount of time, energy and emotion he puts into this chase against what he gets back (ie: is the woman high value enough for him to put all this effort in?)
An intrinsically high value woman who walks away and is genuinely hard to impress is one thing, but a woman who plays mind games or twists a guy’s interest is another and will generally cause him to walk away.
If a woman is actually low value, and has proven that through her actions, then the last thing he’s going to do is actually pursue her hard, especially for a relationship.
He may pursue her for easy sex, but he will not put in the effort to win her love and affection again.
So, I recommend showing up low value to men at all costs.
There Are 7 Common Signs That A Woman is Perceived as Low Value to All Men. Do You Know What They Are & How to Avoid Them Like the Plague?
(Why is this important? Because men and women perceive value very differently and you don’t want to be making mistakes that would cause quality men to dismiss, abandon or alienate you.)
#4. He’s Confused About Exactly Why
Next up in the answers for how does a man feel when a woman walks away, is that he feels confused.
Many times, a man may simply not be aware of why a woman he is pursuing or dating has broken off contact or left him.
This is particularly true if he’s been ghosted, but can also hold true if the woman has left him for vague reasons or for her own motives that she’s never expressed.
In other words, say a woman leaves a man because she is going through a personal trauma that has nothing to do with him and simply needs time and space alone:
This can be extremely hard for a man to accept.
He will want to know what he did or didn’t do that led to this disappointing outcome.
Sometimes, even if he’s not that interested in a woman, a guy will still be dumbfounded about why she walked away and pursue her solely out of a burning desire to know what caused her to pull the plug.
The fact is that guys in particular, but also everyone, find it hard to consider a partner’s inner perspective independent of their relationship to them.
What this means is that even if a woman has walked away for reasons unrelated to him, a man is going to be extremely confused if he cannot relate the breakup to himself in some way.
Was he deficient? Too needy? Too many issues? Too unavailable?
He’s unlikely to accept any vague answer and will want to find some way to relate what happened to himself in some way.
#6. He Feels Desperate For Another Chance
On a related note, if a man really didn’t want to lose you when you walked away, then he’s going to feel a bit desperate.
If he has quite a few other options, then there’s a chance that he won’t let one person leaving bring him all the way down.
But there’s no doubt that most men downplay how impacted they are after a woman walks away, and try to pretend it’s no big deal to them even when it is.
This can manifest as increased attraction, as I noted earlier, but it’s also often combined with a fair bit of resentment.
Guys don’t like being desperate or being seen as needy.
Feeling desperate to regain a woman’s attention is going to likely increase his desire and the woman’s perceived value…
But it’s also going to likely be twinned with a fairly strong emotion of frustration and anger.
This is part of why intentionally playing hard to get for a woman can backfire so badly.
Sure, she may get this guy wrapped around her little finger in response, but he’s also probably going to have a bit of a vendetta against her.
Not good.
If you want to make a guy chase you for all the right reasons, then read this article on How To Make Him Chase You And Value You [High Value Women Secrets].
#7. He Feels Sad and Angry (or He Feels Relieved)
How does a man feel when a woman walks away?
He feels sad and angry if he liked her…
And he feels relieved if he was not interested.
In some cases, a man simply isn’t that attracted. In these cases, walking away will not increase his attraction, just as staying and showing interest will not increase his attraction.
I entirely agree that attraction can grow and decrease with specific actions taken by either the man or the woman.
Both men and women can optimize themselves and become very high-value, sought after individuals.
But just walking away or playing hard to get is not going to do it. He has to feel genuine emotional attraction and emotional connection.
And a huge part of becoming a truly high value individual is learning to recognize when that emotional attraction is there or not.
This helps enormously in avoiding awful rejections or having to dish out awful rejections.
You choose your love battles wisely when you recognise real emotional attraction and connection, because without these two things, a man is not going to perceive enough value in the relationship to pursue it.
In fact: these are the two main things that will make him see value in the relationship.
If you’d like to learn how to create that emotional attraction with any man you wish, I recommend using the dark feminine art of high value banter.
CLICK here to discover why you as a woman need to use the dark art of “High Value Banter” in order to quickly weed out the wrong types of men and create emotional attraction with the "BEST of MEN"! (...Even if no man has ever given you any love and all you've encountered so far are pen pals, ghosts, booty calls, and incredible duds!)
Don’t know what the dark feminine art of “High Value Banter” is? CLICK to find out.
A Crucial Note On Unrequited Love and ‘Neediness’
Whether a guy truly cares when a woman walks away depends entirely on his investment in her to start with, and the status of their connection.
If he was dating her seriously and she walks away, he’s going to be gutted.
If they were just starting to get to know one another and she walks away, he’s likely to be frustrated but also have his desire and interest piqued.
If she’s pursuing him but he’s not that into her, the woman walking away is going to honestly be a relief to him, because she’s more of a burden on his time and energy.
This is the brutal truth about unrequited love:
The more you try to chase it the more you can’t have it.
And the more you look low value in the eyes of the guy.
You can lead a heart to love but you absolutely can’t make it fall. This is one of the hardest - but essential - facts of life and love.
The same goes for “playing it cool.”
Remember the last time you had a strong attraction for a guy and had real feelings for them.
You hung on their messages, loved looking into their eyes and craved any attention, approval or validation that you could get from them.
Now imagine this same guy gave you too much attention. Well, his actions might come across a bit low value and needy for sure, but by then you’d just want more of a good thing.
But if we’re talking about a guy you weren’t into to start with, that’s a whole other story.
Any attention he passed your way might have felt burdensome, annoying, or freighted with expectations.
Ugh, not him again!
No matter how relaxed or sparing he was, you felt overcrowded by him and more or less just wished he’d leave you alone.
It’s the same when it comes to how a man feels when a woman walks away.
If he’s really into her then he feels awful, on fire, desperate…
If he’s not that into her, he breathes a sigh of relief.
How Does A Man Feel If A Woman Walks Away When He’s Falling in Love?
Here’s a nightmare scenario for a guy:
He’s falling in love with a woman right at the moment she withdraws and walks away.
It’s happened to me far too many times to comfortably admit, and it hurts like hell.
Right when you’re about to dive in the pool, it starts draining and you flail and fall onto the concrete, breaking a leg (and also your heart).
It’s awful.
However, if you’re still wondering how a guy is going to feel when you walk away, know that it depends how into you he was.
But there’s no doubt that most men are much more impacted by breakups and romantic disappointment than they like to outwardly display or admit.
There’s a reason that hard alcohol sells so well among the male demographic and that so many therapists now have offices full of men.
Rejection hurts, and losing a woman you care about is a gut punch.
If a guy is confident he’s going to try his best to get that woman back or at least let her know he’s still interested.
If he’s got lower self-esteem he’s going to get more down on himself and likely spiral into a pattern of self-criticism and negativity.
Keep your head up, folks, it’s a rough world out there in the trenches of romance!
Paul R. Brian
Paul Rowan Brian is a freelance journalist, author and writer from Canada. He's written for Ideapod, Hack Spirit and Love Connection and is focused on culture, relationships and self-development. You can follow him on Twitter @paulrbrian.
Renée Shen
Author & Editor For National Council for Research on Women. Founder of the popular women's dating & relationship advice website, The Feminine Woman.
P.S. I hope you've enjoyed this article. Here are some other articles that I think you'd really like too...
Why Is He Ignoring Me? 13 No BS Reasons Why He'd Do This
19 Lame Signs Your Ex Is Pretending To Be Over You
© Copyright National Council for Research on Women. All Rights Reserved