What’s Up Arielle
December 2, 2008
Hey, fun partying with you on Monday night at Greenhouse. I was exhausted when we left!
Since I know that you cornered our mutual friend and asked for my website, you might have found your way to this blog.
And I remember you saying, as you got out of our cab, that if I wanted to see you again, I should figure out a way to find you again.
I’m assuming you meant in the non-creepy way, rather than just hanging out at your street corner.
So rather than just ask our friend for your number, I thought I’d find you here.
So now its YOUR turn to find me.
XOXO
JCH
Friday Night Fire - Turkey Day Edition
November 28, 2008
Ready to make the most of the holiday weekend? We’re headed out to see two of Christian’s favorite DJs, Deep Dish, with a few new friends. What’s going on in your world?
Recommended background music tonight: Human by The Killers.
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Are You Motherf*cking Kidding Me?
November 21, 2008
Its when I see garbage like this that I HATE HATE HATE being in this industry. The following has been pulled from a sales letter that is as idiotic as the idea of bailing out the auto industry with TARP money:
Are you ready to discover one of the biggest secrets in building DEEP attraction with women?
No, it’s not to have good lucks, tons of money, or being famous.
As a matter of fact, it’s something that will completely blow your mind once you hear it.
Are you ready for this…
Confuse them!
But before I tell you how to do it, I want you to know something personal about me. Something guarnateed to make your jaw drop…
Uggghghhhhghghghghghghghghghgh.
I’m serious, this is exactly how the letter reads.
Its funny, but also realllly sad that someone might actually buy this.
Women: Don’t Do These Things
November 19, 2008
It has come to my attention that quite a few women read this blog. Perhaps this shouldn’t surprise me, but after years of thinking exclusively on behalf of men, its nice to expand the creative consciousness. So I thought I would share a few thoughts on female behavior that I find, well, annoying. I have a great number of great girls in my life - some friends and some romantic prospects - and usually get one or two calls or texts a day from a girl who is interested in me. Whether or not a woman sees me as a “high value” guy is relative to her experiences, but in general, I get chased. So with that as a background, here are some things that are absolute deal-killers.
Failing to Make Friends with My Friends: I cultivate my friendships very carefully, and when a woman sees my friends - male and especially female - as competition, its an instant deal-killer. I will always ask my friends if a girl genuinely tried to get to know them. And if we’ve all hung out more than once, I expect that she’s becoming part of our social circle, not circling on the outside waiting to be pulled in by me as my new queen bee. I’m still shocked at how bad some women are at this. Yes, my friends are judging you - as I expect your friends are with me - so show them that you’re a cool person and pass their judgments. There are no end runs on this one.
Mistaking Empathy for Romantic Interest: I love listening to people, hearing about their situations, and wherever I can, helping them. Most guys who have a lot of women in their lives are good listeners. But don’t mistake my listening as an indicator of romantic interest. It feels good to be understood, but when a woman is attracted to me because I understand her problems, its a huge red flag. Problems that deep need to be resolved independent of a relationship.
Making Characterizations: This one is subtle but particularly revealing. I’ve noticed that people like to make simple, almost derisive characterizations of others when they’re jealous. Example: I had a few absolutely stunning and wildly fun girls over a few weeks ago, who were also cultured, very intelligent individuals once you got past the party-girl exterior. Another girl, clearly jealous of them, kept referring to them as a ‘party in a box’. And while she could claim plausible deniability with a statement like that - “oh, I was just being fun,” - I know people too well to see her actions as anything other than a way to belittle the girls of whom she was jealous. Sadly, I’ve done this before with guys of whom I was jealous, but its a behavior I’ve since cut.
Acting Special When, Well, You’re Not: Some girls try to act like they’re doing me a huge favor to spend time with me. That’s never the attitude to take when you’re hanging out with someone, especially someone with lots of options. My rule is that if I feel like I’m doing a girl a favor to spend time with her, then I just shouldn’t be spending time with her to begin with. And in my experience, 100% of the time a girl does this, it is insecurity masking itself as high value. Play games if you want - I’ll play along if you’re fun and make me smile - but don’t be crudely difficult.
Failure to Accept Where You Fit in My Life: This is a bit of a follow-on to the last point: Some girls are friends. Some girls, a little more. Some girls, a lot more. If we’ve known each other for awhile and we’re not dating, you’re my friend. Don’t act needy or difficult when I ask you to hang out. Don’t make me chase you, because there are five other girls who are more fun and less work. Either accept that we’re friends and deal with your feelings privately, or stop hanging out with me - I’ll understand, because I’ve done the same with girls for whom I had unreciprocated feelings.
Taking Stuff: I’ll let you borrow my things if you really want them, but don’t do it just to make sure that you see me. If I really want to give you something, I’ll offer it to you, and the fewer the strings attached, the more likely I am to let you borrow it. I had a girl walk off with a t-shirt last week, then send me an email message that she’d taken it. “That’s just great,” I thought. “This has made me like you less.” If you really want to roll like that, then “forget” something at my house. Its much less presumptuous, and depending on how I respond when you inform me, you can try to gauge how interested I am in seeing you again - do I suggest that we exchange it face to face, or do I tell you that I’ll leave it for you with my housemates/doorman?
Invade My Personal Space: I love to be close to people who I love to be close to. But don’t take a mile when I give you an inch. I see this with guys, too, especially at the bar, who interpret any response from a girl that isn’t a rejection as carte-blanche to get within six inches of her and start touching her everywhere. Its gross when it happens to you, isn’t it? Well, men don’t like it when its not asked for. It bespeaks neediness and is wicked unattractive.
Don’t Be Judgmental: Yes, I have a weird job. But if you dig into it, you’ll find that there is a real respect for my clients and for women, and that it is as much about identity development as it is the “what to say.” That Mystery guy you see on TV? Smart dude, but his character on the show is a caricature, plain and simple. I can’t tell you how many women I meet who think they’ll out-smart me or give themselves a little platform to be high value by being too judgmental. But these days, I just walk away from conversations with girls who are disrespectful or ignorant about my work and my clients, because it indicates a lack of intellectual curiosity, and a bit of insecurity that I couldn’t deal with. What I’ve found is that really cool girls - the ones who EVERYONE likes - are very supportive of this kind of work. And while this “don’t” has some extra weight for me given my job, it is never a good idea to form blanket judgments of a person based on their profession. I know girls who adulate bankers and lawyers, and just as many bankers and lawyers who hate their jobs. If you want to really get to know a guy, ask him why he does what he does, and if he loves it - you’ll learn much more about his character.
Clearly, all of these are based on experience. And I think that some of the frustration you may sense in these points comes from my desire to genuinely want to be friends with certain women who push for more. In other cases, I sensed romantic potential and maybe even began to get intimate with girls who then became weird or unreasonable. It is truly a disappointment to see potential with a person, then realize that they really aren’t as they initially represented themselves.
And I can say that from being on the other side of the coin - being a fun, successful guy with great people skills, who had some pretty bad insecurities that didn’t come up until I got more comfortable with a girl. It resulted in some heartbreak. And while none of us are perfect, we all want to be more impressed as we peel back the layers of the onion of a person’s character, not the other way around.
Hopefully this is helpful. My situation is a little different than that of many other men, so if you go for men like me, then these are some of the things to think about. There are plenty of other men out there who don’t have as active social lives and who aren’t privy to as many choices as I have. They’re no better or worse - I want to make it clear that they’re probably SAFER relationship choices and I claim absolutely no high ground here, moral or otherwise - but hey, we can’t always choose what we’re attracted to.
Scrub Status
November 17, 2008
I sat depressed and alone in my dorm room overlooking NYC’s cherished Union Square, with Radiohead’s “Creep” sulking in the background.
I looked down with longing at the plethora of social interactions and couples that plagued that rugged Square, as musicians jazzed, bikers and skaters flew, and farmers and artists came to proudly display their respective masterpieces as the autumn leaves decorated the brick floor. Down there was a vast and diverse multitude of colors, art, vegetables, music, leaves, painted even more beautifully with human interactions that engender the most authentic emotions such as anger, depression, hate, joy, curiosity, and more importantly, love. Simply put, the square teemed with life…
But I sat, looking down, alone, void of emotions, in the darkness…
When I started college, I thought I was going to be a “baller” or a “player”. I thought I was going to have so much fun and get so many girls. Especially since I was entering a school in NY, New York, which is famous for a diverse set of the most beautiful women in the world. Since most of the male population going to my school is gay, I thought the chances of getting the girls that I used to only dream of in high school increased tenfold.
But after a pretty lame freshman year, I realized that NYC social scene was a totally new and mysterious world, and when I did go out to bars and clubs, I would be trapped on the side, watching people have fun, as I tried to pretend to be busy looking at my phone or pretended to be too tired as I sat in a corner radiating negative social energy or in PUA terms, demonstrating lower value. In class (and various other academic settings), in the gym, in the cafeteria, or in other social gatherings, I would be the guy that minded his own business and talked to my own friends. All I could think of when talking with girls was school work. (What a Loser!) If it was a pretty girl that I liked, I would keep the conversation very safe and formal, as if not to offend her. I was happy by the fact that she was taking her time acknowledge my presence, but relieved when she left because when she was around, I would be so tense. Worse off, I would go home and think about her, frustrated, knowing I could never get a girl like that to even be a friend. I oozed neediness, desperation, and depression, like I have a sign on my back with AFC written on it. Every weekend, I would have to depend on my friends who were a little better with girls to find where the next party was and be ready to drop mad money, because there was probably no way I could bring girls with me. After a couple weeks of leaching off my friends, they started to not pick up my phone calls. Two years have gone by in college, and I am no where near having the fun I thought I would have when I began as a eager young freshman. I found myself becoming more desperate and more frustrated with myself. To mark my inner depression and disappointment with myself, I started wearing hoodies covering my face, didn’t shave, smoked pot all the time, and started to stay in on weekends to play computer games, listened to depressing and slow rock and R&B about rockers and singers who had their hearts broken or just cried out in sexual frustration. Who knew that the complexities of the feminine mystique could so utterly break a soul of a man? I had officially hit the lowest point in my social life ever. I am a tool. This was absolute scrub status.
I had always been cool in high school. Everyone liked me, as a friend. I was a three season athlete, pretty good looking, tall, wide shoulders, kind of scrawny, and doing well academically as well. One huge selling point was that I had the whole house to myself senior year of high school, and I threw mad parties, but looking back, I felt like I was being used to throw parties and thus started the makings of one of the biggest tools/scrubs in history. I realized that when all of my sudden new found friends left me alone to clean the house by myself after almost every party. In the day, I realized I did not make an attempt to go out with friends, but stayed in and played computer games. I never had a girlfriend, but there were always some cute girls that showed interest in me, but whenever it came time to socializing with them, I was a failure. To hide my fear and pretend like I had something to offer them, I said I partied with college kids a lot when I really didn’t party or know that many college kids, and created this identity for myself as a “way too cool for school” kid. This resulted in never having a girlfriend during high school and not even having a prom date. I pretended like the girls were too low level for my taste, and played it off like I didn’t have any money for prom. Inside though, it stung like a bitch. But whatever, I thought that once I got to college in NYC, I would make cooler friends and meet hotter girls, and my high school friends would beg to visit me in the city and take them out. Up till now, none of my high school friends have shown a remote interest in visiting me.
That is absolute scrub status.
I tried to use the same game that I used in high school for college, pretending like I had a lot of offer, to friends and girls so that they would look up to me and respect me, when I really didn’t. And when compared to the promoters and millionaire parents’ children I was up against, there was no chance in hell. That was when I finally acknowledged that I was a scrub, a tool; someone that had been hiding behind a false mask of greatness when in reality, all there was behind that mask was a fearful boy who just wanted to be loved.
One of my few close friends started talking about “the Game”, and how these methods have improved so scrub status men into stars with women. I didn’t believe it at first, but in my desperation, I hoped something like the game did exist, and decided I would work on it in hopes that just possibly, I could accomplish my dreams. That was when I finally decided to get this area of my life handled. I saw an ad for “Conquer Your Campus”, priced reasonably, and decided to buy it. Seeing my credit card being charged for something that I might not be able to trust, written about an elusive topic by an unknown author was probably, in my mind, the most degrading thing I had ever done. It was like a proud acknowledgement to the financial institutions that run credit card companies and whoever was on the other end selling these self-help books that I am officially scrub status. After reading through the book, and re-reading it, and after a few months of trying to implementing the theories in the book, I realized that I didn’t improve that much. I blamed it on the NYC setting, which was very different from the campus college settings of the CYC e-books. But once again, I was trying to find a way to justify getting a refund for my money.
In fact, everything that the book said was true and I hated it. It exposed me for the coward I was. I realized I had been living a lie, a life with no substance. When I viewed myself as something not cool that I had to create a false identity with those I considered my friends, then something had to be wrong. In the process of trying to be this elusive cool, I had decayed into a scrub. But now that part of my life is over, and my mask is coming off. I realized that cool is a subjective thing. All my life, I had been trying to be cool according to other people’s view, when in reality, it was I, and only I, who had the power to define something as cool. So over the summer I spent a lot of time with my real friends and family just being me, exposed as naked for them to see, and I realized that to them, I am cool and they love me just the way I am. Now, with the help of some friends, Christian Hudson and Nick Sparks, I want the world to see how freaking cool I really am. And I know they’re going to like what they see…
Friday Night Speech 1
November 14, 2008
Nick’s Friday Night Speech for November 14. Recommended background music: Mr. Brightside.
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A night out with nick sparks…
November 11, 2008
So what is a night out like with PUAs?
Shawty wanna thug? Bottles in da club?
I’ve always wondered what it would be like to party with these guys. Are they chill and cool guys, or are they just so focused on the game that they vibe out creepiness… I remember trying my first canned routine openers and attraction methods, and feeling the frustration of trying to run all these seduction programs locked in my head.
If you read the Game, they call going out with “wingmen” as “sarging” which makes the whole process something with a given set of rules with a clear winner and loser and an established goal. This was what I expected when Nick Sparks said lets go out. He also added the fact, “I’ve got a little bit of energy tonight.”
As a college student, its common knowledge that the more girls you bring out with you, the more fun you’re going to have… The Game calls the girls you take out with you while you’re sarging as “pivots”. Girls automatically demonstrate that you’re a man of higher value. However, on that night, there was just one girl, making the ratio of girls to guy, 1:2. Not a normally good ratio.
We started the night out by meeting at Nick’s place, had a couple 40’s, but no music. But despite this not being the normal pump-up, “party”, pregame scene, Nick compensated for all that. He was like a ball of energy! He just started talking, and I would just lean back, get comfortable, relax, and laugh and make jokes about the craziest things. Like before that, I did not know how making fun of a girl’s hometown could be so interesting. He would be touchy (Nick knows nothing of social boudries), upbeat, jumpy, with a smirk on his face that would never waver for a second.
By the time everybody was comfortable with each other, slightly tipsy, and all upbeat, we hopped out onto a bus to head to the bars in the lower east side. Normally, on a bus, people stay seated and quiet, minding their own business, and talk to each other in whispers. Buses can, in fact, be mood killers. But not so with Nick. As soon as he got on that bus, he spoke loudly, making his business everybody elses, but he didn’t care… He was having a blast- on a BUS…? It was obvious that we became the center of attention on that bus, and cute girls on the bus started looking our way, and I lost track of the time or stops. Some people would call this shameless behavior, but everybody else on the bus that we could potentially have been disturbing were looking our way grinning and smiling so call it whatever you will, but everybody was having fun… Yes, on a bus…
We walk into a bar, and like any other guy, I start looking around, observing the enviroment, checking out which girls are hot, and where the center of attention is. But not so with Nick… I don’t think he realized that people were standing around him. I think the only thing he noted was where the bar was and where the bathroom was, and started walking up to random people and next thing you know, there would be a bunch of cute girls surrounding him laughing and giggling. He didn’t analzye or nothing or run canned lines or openers. He just went in, and similar to the bus situation, that’s wehre the party was at. He didn’t care he who the center of attention was- he is the center of attention. The dude is just so freaking comfortable in his own skin. Next thing you know, girls were buying him drinks, touching him, sending him IOIs. To me it looked like magic because I could not understand what was going on. Just the fact that I was standing next to him was bringing me attention and getting me drinks and lap dances and IOIs. My favorite moment was when this fiesty and rather intrusive blond just grabbed my ass from the back when I was standing by the bar. Nick saw her and automatically started spitting his game, and next thing you know, she was grabbing him until she ripped his necklace right off his neck. He looked back at her in utter shock, (though I think he had it all planned out), and the girl looked at him in utter horror. She ended up being cool and buying each of us a shot. By the time we left, we were seriously the gravitational center of attention.
Then Nick moved us to a close place nearby, and made me start practicing my social magnetism. I thought that there was no order to the madness of Nick’s game. But in fact, there was some structure to the Nicks alluring methods. It became relevant when he made me open a set of 3 girls. He told me to go in, sit down, and tell them that they look like they are having the worst time of their lives in this place. I did, and lo and behold, there were opening up, talking, telling me some boring stuff about their lives. I realized that unlike Nick, I didn’t know how to escalate groups, and when things started to die down, I just said, “nice to meet you” and left. Nick scolded me for leaning and caring too much about the outcome. The best thing to do is just be so comfortable in my own skin, that I could talk about anything I want and cause people to get hooked into what i was saying. In order to overcome my fear of caring about the outcome, he made me go up to a random group of girls and say something that would automatically get me shut down like, “Hey, I really want to mack with one you now…” I went up, looked at all three of them, grinned, and said, “Yo, I really want to make out with one you now…” I knew I was gonna get shut down, and as soon as one said, “Ewww… NO!” I laughed and left. Then Nick went up to them, used the exact opener I did, sat down next to one of them, and within 30 seconds, despite using that horrible opener, had them laughing and enjoying themselves. I was like wow…
That night opened my eyes… I realized that “game” does exist… And it has nothing to do with looks and money. In fact, girls were throwing us drinks by the end of the night. Moreover, the misconceptions about gaming were totally thrown out of the window. The game is not a neurotic program that runs through the head, where there are rules, winners, losers, and goals, where there are equations where A + B = sex. The game is a characteristic, a built or natural trait, that allows people to lean back, have fun, and get the girl.
The game is not a sequence of events that takes place between a man and a girl, but rather, a different way viewing oneself, that changes the way other people, especially women, view you as an object of attraction.
Scared of Rejection?
November 5, 2008
It’s the silent killer.
And chances are it’s destroying your success.
No matter how many books you read, no matter how many techniques or tactics you learn, no matter how much inner game stuff you do - if you don’t stare this beast right in the eye, it’s going to hold you back.
In fact, the difference between a guy who wins in the game and you, right now, is this one simple thing.
FEAR OF REJECTION
Man is it powerful. It’s like an imaginary pair of handcuffs that come out of nowhere right when things are about to get good and make it so that you literally can’t do anything. And then you lay in bed wondering where you went wrong.
But what if I could kill your fear of rejection in this post?
Is that something you’d like?
Good. Let’s get into this…
In my own personal experience and in coaching over a thousand guys, the main thing i’ve come to realize is that you are probably more scared of what other people think as they watch you get shot-down, then what the girl thinks.
So fear of rejection is really a two headed beast. If we only cut off one of its heads, as most guys try to do, it will still kill us.
So we’re going to attack it from both angles.
Attack Point #1: Caring What Others Think
Ok, so here’s the deal - you’re about to escalate, maybe kiss her or tell her its time to leave the party but then you see your friends watching you, or maybe you imagine them watching you. And you think about how big of a loser you’re going to seem like if you get rejected.
You’re afraid to be EXPOSED
What’s going to be exposed? Your secret…
What’s your secret?
The secret that nearly every guy harbors…the one that no one talks about is…
I’M BAD WITH WOMEN AND I WILL DO ANYTHING TO HIDE IT FROM OTHER PEOPLE
Now here’s the thing: 99% of the guys out there have this fear. Just realizing this renders it powerful. How can everyone “be bad with women”? It just doesnt make sense.
It’s just not true.
But it’s a deep-deep fear and everyone holds it in. Would you ever tell another guy that you sucked with girls?
HELL NO
You’d be exposed.
So now I want you to realize something: getting rejected IS NOT BEING EXPOSED.
There is nothing to be exposed - it’s fake, it’s imaginary, and everyone has the same goddamn fear in their head.
Here’s the second thing:
NO ONE IS WATCHING YOU
You need to realize that everyone is in their own damn head when they are out and trying to get laid/socialize. And everyone THINKS that everyone else is watching them - but really, they’re not.
So when you get rejected, people won’t even notice.
But Mark, I always watch other guys - that can’t be true!
Wrong. You TUNE IN to other guys’ success - it’s an ego thing - it’s confirmation that you suck and that they are pimps….and it ’s dead wrong.
Truth is, the only time other guys will really watch what you are doing is when you SUCCEED.
Think about that.
So if “being perceived as a player” is high on your list of things to do (i’ll admit it…it was on mine.. but ultimately not a good goal) then you want to continually go for big wins.
Because…
BIG WINS ARE WHAT GET NOTICED
Remember that. No one remembers the loser. The brain just doesn’t really store it.
Ok moving on to the second head of this two headed best.
Attack Point #2: What SHE Thinks of you (and what she’ll tell her friends)
One you get this, you’re going to laugh at how simple it really all is.
Basically, every time you don’t ESCALATE…you think you’re “playing hard to get” but she KNOWS that you don’t have balls. And a man without balls…nope…not gonna cut it. So just realize that by not escalating you
are losing MAJOR points.
The fear of NOT ESCALATING should be wayyyyyy higher than the fear of escalation.
When you DO escalate it signals to her “I am a Man. I take what I want. I can lead”.
Do you want her to think these things about you?
Good. Then escalate.
Now here’s where it gets trippy…
SHE WILL PROBABLY DENY YOU
If things are going very well, you escalate a little bit and she denies you the kiss or whatever it is you are trying to do - HOLD STRONG.
She’s just testing you.
Testing for what?
She wants to know how persistant you are. How you handle failure.
She wants to know if her little rejection has the power to make you crumble.
She wants to know if you’re going to be cool about things and not cause a scene.
Now, obviously, use common sense. When I say HOLD STRONG, I mean emotionally.
Act like nothing happened, continue to game and have fun and just go for it again.
From childhood we idealized the way things work. We thought that when “its on” she will just accept every advance. And when it’s off, she will reject you.
So we see rejection as something that indicates “i’m not worthy” when really, it’s an essential part of the game!
Can you see how knowing this in the past would have helped you?
Are you starting to see how fear of rejection is basically something rooted in three or four MISCONCEPTIONS.
Good.
This was a long one.
I want you to read it a couple of times, maybe write out in your own words what you got from it, and put the paper in your wallet.
Carry it where you go and just always know that your biggest enemy…
Fear of Rejection.
…Was all bullshit.
It wasn’t even your fault - you just had some messed up beliefs which we’ve deconstructed here.
And now it’s all good baby.
So go get some and then report back.
Keep on Rockin’,
Mark
www.conqueryourcampus.com
How to Get Out of Your Head
October 28, 2008
Spain is beautiful. I’ve now visited France, the UK, Holland, Germany and Italy here in Europe, but something about this one has captivated me uniquely. I’m here with my family, and the cities (well most of the cities) we’ve visited, and the people therein seem to have some sort of way about them, a certain energy or vibe, that is at once warm, elegant, and beautiful.
With that said, I’ve been doing a lot of work on this trip - a lot of “in my head” sort of stuff in advance of a few things that we’ll be releasing in November and December. And whenever I get in my head, I become, well… slightly off.
My head is a place where systems and logic take charge. Where if/then conditionals are torn apart, tested, and reconstituted. Sometimes notepads are involved. I have a slightly odd perspective on human relations - one that is able to analyze without emotion, even when I’m the subject of the interaction - that has perhaps come from too much time watching and coaching men to better interact with women.
But I’ve found one sure-fire remedy for in-my-headness. The haiku. A humble poem that attempts to encapsulate a moment in the briefest of words and tones.
If you’ve never before done poetry or haiku writing, I encourage you to try it. It really gets you out of your head and into the world around you. It makes me feel at peace while I’m doing it.
My favorite haiku ever, and always my inspiration, was authored by science fiction writer Neil Stephenson. If you’ve ever read something better than this, please share.
The leaves of Shanghai.
Pale doorways to a steel sky.
Winter has begun.
I won’t claim to be a great haiku-ist, but here are a few I penned on the train from Jarez to Sevilla today, regarding various people and experiences of the last week.
————–
Dusk’s gradient sky.
The train’s window a canvas.
She is coming home.
————–
The chill of Jarez.
Forever fall in this town,
its season and heart.
————–
She floats: an arrow,
Grace and beauty in motion,
deadly when she strikes.
————–
Perfume fills the air,
voices join; women in love
with life and friendship
————–
Family is home.
We merely fly, the world spins
and takes us with it.
————–
How to Become Calibrated
October 6, 2008
Last week I wrote about creepy pickup guy. He sees every woman as a target and he’s always trying to seduce them. You might make fun of the guy by asking a group “does this guy have an off button?”
I should have clarified, though. That guy is overconfident creepy pickup guy.
There are plenty of overconfident guys out there. They learn an opinion opener or two and take that knowledge as liberty to be too aggressive with women. They’re completely uncalibrated. They believe that they have a strong frame of reality, but other people see through the shtick. Those are the guys who need to learn to chill out.
But there’s another sort of creepy - a kind that doesn’t mean to be. In fact, its very well-meaning. Some guys are just too quiet, too timid, and too afraid to initiate any sort of physical contact. They’ve grown up learning to be “nice”, and they unfortunately mistake “nice” for “meek”. Needless to say, meekness can come across as creepiness too.
Nick and I have received a very small amount of notoriety for the bombing openers we teach on our bootcamps. We’ll come up with a ridiculous thing for you to say that, were it taken for its verbal content alone, would be sure to get you rejected. But it is a very useful tool for guys who’ve been too nice for too long and need to learn how to add excitement to their conversations. Moreover, if you present a bombing opener with the right attitude and energy, it almost always opens a fun conversation.
This past weekend, Nick introduced kino bombing, when he told a client to go sit on a girl’s lap as his “opener”. The client had been experience a lot of difficulty in making any sort of physical connection, so this exercise was both amusing and terrifying. But it worked; not only did the girl actually like the client, but it reset his guage for what is possible.
Very few of us are born with perfect social intelligence and calibration; developing those traits is a matter of trying new behaviors. These behaviors may push you well beyond your comfort zone, and you may surprise yourself along the way with just how much you can get away with. For many men, this sort of exercise is phenomenal - as long as they remembers that it is just an exercise. Bringing these sorts of behaviors into social groups and longstanding relationships is anathema.
Why do guys take bootcamps? They may come in looking for lines and things to say. But ultimately, getting better at socializing means adopting new behaviors and becoming more calibrated; this is why things like bootcamps and coaches exist - to guide you through the process in a controlled manner. And hey, you can do it on your own if you have lots of self-awareness, discipline, and well, balls.
But it all starts with awareness. If you’re feeling uncalibrated, my first thought is this: overconfident creepy pickup guy is no more calibrated than his meek counterpart. Figure out which side of the coin you’re on, and begin to try behaviors that are way different.
