Ask the Social Man : Ex Love

January 6, 2010

Today’s question comes from Erik on Facebook. He was working toward getting back together with an ex, when all of a sudden a wrench got thrown into his plans and asks what to do:

Posted by Nick Sparks | Filed Under Dating Done Right | Comments 

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Ask the Social Man: Meeting Girls at Work

December 30, 2009

New user StumptheChump from our forums recently asked us about attracting women while he was working.

Here is my response from my ’shoebox’ in Chinatown ;)

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The Universal Secret – And why we can’t live without it

August 26, 2009

Could it really be that simple?

Could the answer to all of our consistency issues be right under our noses?

Why is it that sometime’s we can light up a room, while other times members of the opposite sex turn away in disinterest?

I’ll tell you the answer right now but I’ll have to explain myself for it to sink in. The difference between really connecting with people and not – the thing that every ‘natural’ is always doing in spades but can never quite put into words – is simply speaking the universal language.

Cliché tells us that love is the universal language, however this is only partially true and and isn’t helpful for people looking for the translation – the Rosetta Stone – so to speak.

I actually have to thank an old smoking habit for helping me stumble upon it. Quite a few times in college I had the pesky habit of bumming cigarettes. In fact, I did it so much that I got really good at it. I even developed my own little method.

Despite having the best method in the world, it became clear that whether or not I got a cigarette really depended on one thing:

You can try it yourself and get front row seats to the effects. First, go up to 10 people, ask them for a cigarette, and avoid eye contact and look indifferent. Next, go up to another 10 people, ask them for a cigarette – only this time look them directly in the eye and act although you are in intense pain and that they hold the key to your freedom.

Everyone reading this who’s ever been a smoker is with me on this.

When I look into the eyes of a smoker with a look on my face that he or she can fully relate to – that I really need a cigarette – they feel that same pain as they are reminded of their own times of distress. When they feel that pain and can’t help but want to relieve it in another.

Ages before complex systems of naming and describing objects came into human existence, humans beings were still communicating. Although the vast majority of us have an incredibly firm grasp over at least one of these systems, all of the communication that matters the most happens in the same way as it has for our entire existence of our humanity.

A quick look at an on-line thesaurus gives us over 30 words for ‘angry’, however if a 300lb man has the look on his face that says he’s pissed, everyone who gets even the quickest look at him is getting out of his way.

We need language to hammer out the fine details of a business contract, however how many people would actually do business with someone they didn’t trust, who didn’t give them the feeling that they had ulterior motives?

With that in mind, here’s how you always “get your openers to stick”:

The phrase, “you can tell a lot about a man by his handshake” has been around for awhile. More recently though, the phrase has been taken to advise that one should attempt to squeeze another person’s hand as firmly as possible to show how “confident” they are.

When you greet someone, you can tell a lot about them by their handshake, or more specifically, whenever they greet you in general. The ‘firmness’ of the greeting, however, isn’t how you can tell; even though a firm handshake will often happen as a byproduct.

You can tell this by looking right at the person to see if his eyes are meeting yours and if he has a look of warmth on his face. If you approach a woman, and they look at you and your eyes aren’t meeting hers (theirs) and you don’t have a look of warmth on your face, she will get the same feeling you get when you’re working with a person that you just don’t feel right about, you just don’t trust, and you decide not to work with him.

Let me make two things clear:

If you are thinking about your ‘opener’ when you approach a woman, or maybe just feeling shy, you will not be looking into her eyes, you will not have a warm expression on your face, and she’ll get that feeling that no human likes to feel.

If you start thinking about what to say during a conversation, or question whether or not she likes you, your eyes will drift, your face will become expressionless, and she will definitely get that feeling.

Plus there’s one more important factor to consider:

Women are much better at feeling this stuff than guys, and herein lies the apparent solution, and also the new problem.

On one hand – success in communication, in being charismatic or a ‘natural’, lies in your ability to express emotion vividly on your face and in turn make others feel that emotion. Without that, we’re merely self aware computers exchanging information; and the last thing a woman wants when she goes out is to exchange information – she wants to feel.

On the other hand, it’s never that simple.

Human beings, especially women, have a keen intuition for when someone has their own self interests in mind rather than hers. It’s the same as when you can just feel that a bad salesmen has his commission in mind as he’s talking to you.

It just feels off.

It’s not just selfish thinking that can give another person that feeling, it’s thinking about anything other than the person that you’re communicating with.

And you can’t just act like you’re feeling something for this to work. Try to look happy while you’re thinking negative thoughts, it’s just weird. You actually have to feel these things yourself for them not to trip her bullshit meter.

Of course again this isn’t always the easiest thing to do. Often, when we’ve been hurt in the past, we don’t put ourselves ‘out there’ as much in order to reduce the risk of additional pain. One of the ways people do this is to become more soft spoken, and to withdraw emotion from their face when they speak and “act cool”.

Most of us found out at an early age that it doesn’t really sting when someone shoots down our words, but if we put our heart into something and get rejected, then there’s a pain that can make a child cry. As an adult, we are strong enough to take this pain, but many of us fear that it will be as bad as when we were still developing psychologically.

In order to relieve this anxiety, our society has made it increasingly easier to retreat from putting yourself out there.

Email and social networking sites are amazing advancements in communications and quite incredibly make our world much smaller. The problem arises however, when we use these technologies as a form of mental crutch to avoid actual human communication.

That’s why I wasn’t surprised in the least to hear about studies that show that the people who are the most active on Facebook often report feeling the loneliest.

As easy as it would be, we can’t simply blame Facebook. How many people that you work with on a day to day basis do you try to connect with, and how many do you shoot a couple passing words to without strong eye contact and a warm expression on your face?

If you don’t do it as a natural habit with everyone you meet, it’ll be even more awkward to try and do it with women.

Pay attention the next time you’re out at a bar and here’s what you’ll see:

There will be some people having a good time. They’re laughing, moving around, speaking at a higher decibel than everyone else, and looking each other in the eyes with genuine emotions that they’re definitely feeling on their faces.

On the flip side of the coin, you’ll have people, usually around the outskirts of the ‘fun people’, who have that look on their face that they’re not quite ‘there’, that something’s on their mind, and that it’s probably not the most positive of things.

It’s easy to identify these people, their faces are are lacking all but forced acts of emotion, they’re not moving, even if they are talking to a friend they look as though they’re not really enjoying the conversation, they’re eyes are looking down more than at their friend, maybe they’re looking at their phone – not really to communicate with an absent friend, but simply to take their mind off of the anxiety they’re feeling.

The thing is that they came to the bar for the same reason as everyone else.

They want to be the ‘fun people’. Just about every person has been there before and it’s amazing. You’re having the best time, lighting up emotionally, talking more loudly, and of course attracting more of the opposite sex than ever before – you’re “in the zone”.

The next morning though, we’re usually a bit hungover, we know we just had the most amazing time the night before; the only problem is we can’t remember how to get that back. We search high and low, trekking out to the bar night after night – both men and women – and start drinking with our fingers crossed that it’s going to happen again, maybe with some lines that we believe will do the work of getting it back for us.

The thing is, we know how to get that feeling back, we’ve simply forgotten.

When we see a baby crying or smiling, only the most emotionally checked out people cant help but feel upset or happy, respectively. When we see genuine emotion in another person, we can’t help but feel the reflection of that emotion in ourselves, and we subconsciously drawn to those who make us feel positive emotions, and repelled by people who make us feel negative emotions.

Love-hate relationships are especially dangerous because they literally tear us apart.

Now here’s the fun effect of all of this:

By looking straight into another person’s eyes with genuine emotion while focusing strongly on her emotions – unless she’s feeling an equally strong negative emotion – you will cause her to feel that emotion and subconsciously become more drawn to you. If you don’t, she won’t. This should clear up any questions routine guys have as to why they’re having inconsistency issues. Sometime’s she’s feeling you, literally, sometimes she’s not.

Upon first developing this ancient skill, one will often feel awkward or clumsy with it, as with any other skill they would develop. With practice though, things slow down.

People will say that you give off this energy, and it’s as if you can read their mind, probably better than they can read their own.

It’s what every natural is doing without knowing it – and through this development than one can become a natural.

Because it is a skill that, like any other, takes practice; one should practice as much as possible. Start with family, friends, co-workers, people at the corner store, everyone. Soon people that have known you forever will be saying those words that we all love to hear:

“There’s something different about you”.

When you go to the bar, instead of scanning the bar for an ‘HB9′ that you can approach in 3 seconds or less, get in a circle with your friends and do what we at The Social Man affectionally call the ‘bro circle’. Whether there’s 2 or 10 of you start emoting. Remember, you’re only as strong as your weakest link, so make sure that everyone is pulling the line. Talk at a higher decibel, move around, talk with your hands, have looks of genuine expression on your faces and look each other in the eye.

The great thing about this is half the time, you forget about the bro circle and actually have fun with your friends when one of you remembers this story you forgot to tell – by acting as though you have emotion you’ll actually feel the emotion. Try smiling for a minute and not feel happy.

Then you’ll start to notice the looks.

All of the girls that are around the periphery will start emoting, themselves.

They’ll talk more loudly, move more, have more expression on their faces, and yes, start to glance in your direction. They now want you to approach them.

They probably don’t rationalize what just happened. But they felt a little hint of that feeling they all came to the bar in the first place to feel, and they’re drawn to it.

Don’t get me wrong, social skills in approaching strangers and escalating interactions are very important skills to develop, and that’s why we’ve developed ‘Say Hello’ and ‘Irresistible’, however if you’re not developing this universal skill that will allow you to powerfully communicate with anyone, anytime, anywhere, then you’ll always face inconsistencies in your interactions.

Also, don’t be surprised that when, through tapping into this, you re-realize your infinite power to strongly connect with anyone, and things start going much better in every other aspect of your life.

As you begin to pay attention to everyone again, you’ll notice that the majority of us are a bit withdrawn and often appear anxious or lost. There is no better time to remind people of what we are all looking for.

Before we’re all on “2nd Life”, remind people that the answer we’re all looking for is right in front of us, and yes, don’t be surprised when you’ve loved a woman or two along the way and your friends in the community say you look like a natural.

Posted by Nick Sparks | Filed Under Women And The World | Comments 

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Sparks Rapid Escalation Method

December 15, 2008

By (very) popular request, here it is:

The S-REM is a complete breakdown of all of the non-verbals that go into creating sexual tension between you and a woman who are attracted to each other so that your interactions will not fall flat but instead will be taken to the next level.

 

Posted by Nick Sparks | Filed Under Pickup Your Game | Comments 

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Friday Night Fire – Dec 12

December 5, 2008

[originally posted at www.thesocialman.com/blog]

Are you ready to make the most of your weekend?  Take three minutes to get Nick’s advice on how to make tonight the best night ever.

Recommended background music tonight – a true party classic: Love Generation by Bob Sinclar.

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Friday Night Fire 2

November 21, 2008

Nick’s Friday Night Speech for November 21. Recommended background music: Touch the Sky by Kan-yeezee.

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Friday Night Fire 1

November 14, 2008

Nick’s Friday Night Speech for November 14. Recommended background music: Mr. Brightside.

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I’m Not Rich

August 10, 2008

I’ll be honest, no matter where I go there are men who have much more money than me, have nicer cars, wear nice clothes, and can give a girl more material happiness, i.e. flying her down to Costa Rica for the weekend.

A lot of men try to play this game, try to impress a girl with material things. Here’s the thing: it works, plenty of women will sleep with you for these things. The problem is that unless you’re .01% of the population, there will always be a man who can give her more.  We call that the Bigger Better Deal.

I know I can’t even compete at that game, so I don’t play it. The game I choose to play is to show a girl that those things aren’t that important, that feeling amazing and having true passion in her romantic encounters is by far more important than those material things. The material things I provide are a nice compliment, but it’s not what defines me to her. This game I can win.

The high echelon social scene in modern cities reminds me very much of the scene painted in The Art of Seduction of France during the Renaissance. The stories highlight the adventures of notable rakes and seducers of the time. In almost every story, the woman involved is a beautiful woman of the upper class. These were women surrounded by the most affluent men in the country and used to being wooed by the “finer things in life”.

Rakes saw this opportunity and re-ignited the passion in the lives of these women. It’s no wonder these stories are as historically popular with woman as with men.

There are many beautiful wonderful women who have been surrounded constantly by men who play the material game and try to be the highest bidder for her attention. Don’t play that game because you can never really win. Instead, remind her of the more important things and unlock a passion and happiness that every woman deserves. Those material things are then a nice compliment when things start to get more serious.

Cheers,
Nick

Posted by Nick Sparks | Filed Under Crank Your Confidence | Comments 

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Sneaky Dating Tricks: Cont…

August 7, 2008

Christian started an excellent discussion here and I couldn’t help but jump in on it.

The main thing I want to do here is give some guidance on how to react if you find yourself in a situation where a girl is using one of these “sneaky dating tricks” on you so that you don’t fall victim to it yourself.

To prep this, I want to say that not every girl will do this stuff. I have been lucky to meet many wonderful women who are very genuine and if you look at everything they say to you as some sort of trick or test then you will be playing yourself right out of their dating lives.

Moreover, there are guys out there who say, “well I just don’t want to play games, and I don’t want a girl who plays games”. Here’s the thing guys: a very large number of girls do set up tests. The simple reason is that a woman of high value has a lot of people pulling here in many different directions, and she has to set up a system that makes it easier for her to decide how to allocate her time. There simply aren’t enough hours in the day for her to spend time with everyone who desires her company.

Now when a guy says, “I don’t like games”, what I’ve found he really means is, “I don’t like losing games”. Face it, if you won all of the games and tests that girls put forward you won’t have the distaste for them that a-lot of guys express. So with that in mind, here’s how you can identify when a girl is using these “tricks” and how to respond appropriately.

The neediness card:

You’ll hear all sorts of stories – about how she’s been hurt, about how lonely she is, about her unfulfilled sex life, about something she wants to do with which you can help… and they’re all meant to trigger that desire in a man to provide for and take care of a woman.  Some women do it subtly, others are more direct: I know (but am not friends with) a girl who told a guy with whom she was living that her mom had died and that she needed to go to the funeral.  She went to see her other boyfriend instead.  99% of girls aren’t this crazy, but the neediness card accounts for a lot of second-guessing that we as men do.  “Maybe I should call her again, maybe if she sees that I really like her she’ll feel comfortable turning to me.”

As Christian points out, girls play this one in order to trigger your “provider” instincts. Guys hear this and think, “wow, I can show this girl how much I care by offering my sympathy and she’ll like me”. Big pitfall.

When you’re first getting to know a girl, never ever ever fall into the roll of councilor/shoulder she can cry on. Of course as your relationship grows stronger feel free to support her in whichever way you choose, but in the beginning your asking for trouble. I’m reminded of a great line from the one and only David D which is something like, “I have full confidence that you’re strong enough to handle this”. That’s it, change the subject to something more fun, and throw up a point for yourself.

Making future plans:

When she spends time with a guy, she talks about all the things she’d like to do with him.  Girls with good game like to suggest a lot of plans quickly, from jogging dates to how quickly they want to see him again to cultural experiences they would enjoy together.  And girls with really good game will make those plans match up to interests and hobbies of the guy’s.  As a man, its hard not to fall for it.  “Wow, this girl LIKES me!  And I didn’t even have to work too hard for it.”  It can come subtly, as in “Yeah, there’s this play I’ve been wanting to check out,” or it can be more direct, like “So would you want to go see this play next week?”  And hey, sometimes its genuine.  But other times it is very calculated. You don’t know until you start to get a better picture of the girl.

Its funny that Christian brought this one up because I actually use it myself all the time and never really thought about it. Why? Because shit, it works. Don’t let it work on you. (Note to any women reading this: I still completely mean it when I say it to you).

For starters, I truly believe that when a woman says this she’s actually not playing any trick, but rather really wants to do what she says at the time, however time and other things pop up and other things fill up her priorities and suddenly what she says at that moment isn’t reflected in her new state of mind.

So, the first thing that one has to do is identify whether this was just something said in the passing moment or if she really wants to do this. When you’re discussing these plans at first, go right along with them. Talk about how you can’t wait to do this stuff, and paint a vivid picture of the event and how much fun it will be for both of you.

Now comes the moment of truth. In your next text/phone convo, casually bring up the event that you spoke of. If you were planning on attending a rodeo, say, “I hope you know I’ve been practicing my bull-riding and you’re going to be amazed when you see these skills”. If you were going to see Batman, you can drop something along the lines of, “I saw that the lines for Batman on the IMAX are finally starting to die down, thank goodness”.

So, you throw this little tidbit out, and then gauge her response. If she responds with the same enthusiasm as your first discussion on the subject, then go ahead and get those movie tickets. If she kind of brushes it off, then just drop the subject and never touch it again unless she’s the one to bring it up.

Side note: if she does flake on this one a great thing to do is simply see the movie or do whatever anyway, and then the next time she asks what you’ve been up to you can inform her of your recent activities. She’ll usually get a bit irritated that you did that without her (don’t worry, she knows it’s bullshit). You can just tell her that you wanted to see/do it with he but that she’s just been kind of busy lately and that you’ll make it up to her very soon. Great way to win this game. Chalk up another point for yourself.

The apologetic flake:

I have seen this play out several times, and I have a good friend who is just masterful at this and who brought it into sharp focus.  She’s an attractive girl and she works on a trading desk, so she’s legitimately busy and has painfully early mornings.  From time to time, she just doesn’t feel like going on the date she has scheduled.  The guy isn’t that interesting to her, or another social event popped up, whatever…  So she’ll flake at the last minute, but she’ll offer her profuse apologies.  Sometimes these are interlaced with statements meant to inspire sympathy (”I slept like 2 hours last night, I’m barely functioning, I hate my job”), but in almost all cases, she attempts to lock the guy into rescheduling right there on the phone by telling him how excited she is to see him and how “seriously,” she can’t wait to hang out because they’re going to have such a good time.

This one’s simple. You just have to let her know that you’re just as busy as she is and your time can’t be allocated at her whims. If she’s apologizing and trying to reschedule for some other time; you’re busy. I don’t care if you’re plans for that Thursday night are to sit on your couch, watch Family Guy and eat Cheetos, you have plans and unfortunately can’t see her.

Now, if she really starts pushing the makeup date, ie “what are you doing Thursday night? Oh, ok, what about Friday? what about Saturday?”, then we’re drifting into genuine apology and interest and should be treated accordingly. If she keeps pushing, then you’re still busy on Thursday, but Saturday or Sunday you may have some time open and would love to see her.

Remember, if she does flake, the worst thing you can do is get noticeably annoyed with her. Simply say, “It’s really not a big deal, I actually have to run and (insert fun other thing) anyway. We’ll hang out soon.” Then excuse yourself and walk away. Wait at least 3 days without word from her to get back to her.

Of course the tests and tricks girls use are as numerous as the stars in the sky. Just keep in mind that she’s giving you the opportunity to prove that you’re a strong, high-value man. Relish in these opportunities and you’ll be happy that you have the company of a high-value women who won’t settle for just anyone’s time.

Posted by Nick Sparks | Filed Under Women And The World | Comments 

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