The "be you" advice is trotting out a platitude and is of little practical help.
Because everyone has several versions of the real "you".
Including holdiay mode, chilling out, relaxing you. Hard working investing for the future you.
Focused on self and the inner world you. Focused on the people around you and forgetting yourself you.
Behaving according to emotions you. Behaving according to logic you. Etc etc etc.
Why Men Love *****es by Sherry Argov is a great guide on what version of "you" get's the best results in dating and relationships. I think it's a misnamed book (understandable for marketing purposes). Argov says that the you should be self confident, assertive, positive, well behaved, non-supplicating, selective, time efficient. That's not a ***** to me at all. That's a woman I (and the majority of UK men) can respect, admire and fall deeply in love with.
Live for your own approval. Don't live for the approval of others. It's self destructive to let dating setbacks get you down. Try to cut out the self destruction from your life. Aim to be self constructive.
Disastrous dates make great anecdotes.
Moderate to great dates are you "living in the moment" when you are on them. IE pleasurable and a highlight of the week as you are on them.
Speaking personally as a man. On a first date, I expect the person I'm meeting to be different to how I imagined her. I try to keep an open mind. It's this unknown factor that make first dates so exciting.
These guys going on about romance don't have a clue. Sometimes fantastic relationships have a slow build up and can be like a Mills and Boon romance novel. Where the protagonists are initially not sure about each other. And via a series of episodes get to fall in love.
The best people to be in relationships with can be the ones that aren't great at the initial attraction thing. But as you get to know them you discover more and more strong points.
There will be a lot of men that have a "type". A rigid idea of what sort of woman they're looking for and what sort of first date they will have.
There's also a proportion of men that are like a huge flexible virus cell with loads of keys and shapes on the outside that they can rotate and use to fit in with a wide range of first dates and women. The sort of guys that don't sweat small stuff. That are flexible, open minded, adaptable.