Confidence

I previously said (in this post) my next article would be “How to Be an Alpha Provider”... however, I’m going to switch things up today. Today’s article is about sex symbols: those of the past and those of today. And we’ll get back to the alpha providers again next week. Onwards, then.

Today’s article comes in response to a question from Byron on my article about self-cultivation regarding my preference for older male sex symbols over the more current ones Hollywood has to offer. Here’s what Byron had to say:

“Hey,
I’ve recently come across several comments where you reference Sean Connery and Harrison ford as the epitome of raw sexiness. I was wondering if you could elaborate on this and why not the plethora of modern sex symbols, ie what makes them so different? Or if you could write an article on their appeal or a series on famous seducers/ role models I think that would be very interesting and relevant. Again just suggestions, I realize you are very busy. Thank you for this site!”

That’s a fantastic question. Why do I recommend the older guys more than the newer guys? I had a few reasons, but part of me kind of wondered if maybe I just had some kind of nostalgia-bias when this subject’s come up in the past... maybe I’m simply guilty of thinking older is better.

Fortunately, this article’s forced me to really get down to nuts and bolts, and in the process of writing it, I learned a lot. Let’s dive in.

Think about your old school, old fashioned male sex symbols. Men like:

• Gary Cooper
• Cary Grant
• James Garner
  
• Sean Connery
• James Dean
  
• Harrison Ford
  

Compare them to the sex symbols of modern cinema. Men like:

• Brad Pitt
• Ryan Gosling
• George Clooney
• Ian Somerhalder
  

Do you notice anything?

I like all the guys in both of these lists. All are masters of their crafts, and there are buckets you can learn from watching the facial expressions, body language, and little nonverbal tics of each, as well as studying the way each man uses his voice and his overall demeanor.

However, there’s a clear difference between these two groups of men (that span about two generations each)... a large enough difference that while I personally suggest you take the time to study all of these men, when it comes to my own preferences, the only ones I ever find myself wanting to model outright are the ones from before.

And I sat down today and the one question on my mind was, “How do I best explain this difference?”

Why do you never hear from what the Internet’s dubbed ‘alpha providers’ – men who keep the pants on in their relationships, even over the long-term?

The morose tales of men who have become ‘beta providers’, who have gone through the ‘betaization process’... men who’ve lost the drive, strength, and ambition of their youths and become punching bags for their women... these men’s tales are all over the Internet.

Yet, you hear nary a peep from their opposites, those men in provider roles who remain the captains of their ships.

Is it because they’re quiet?

Or, because they do not exist?

A commenter named Insidious Sid, weighing in on Alek’s post on sexual economics, remarks:

“This “lover turned provider” idea is the biggest load of blue-pill nonsense ever to hit the internet. Once she “has you”, no matter how alpha you were, you now have provider status. She “conquered” you, and now she will be sexually attracted to OTHER alpha males who she has yet to conquer. Women like conquest just as much as men do. Men get bored after they conquer the trophy wife and cheat on amazing looking women – and most men think “Wow, I’d never do that.” Well, he’ll never get the chance. Conversely, the female will cheat on even a high value male and people will gasp “But he’s such a high value male, why would she cheat on / divorce / ruin a good man?” Same reason. Once a person, man or woman, has a member of the opposite sex in the “co-committed long-tern relationship (tm)” this is a whole new power dynamic. One part of “red pill theory” I think has it wrong is that you can “game your own wife” and alpha-up and keep the other alphas out the door. It’s a great theory, but my theory is once she gets the ring on your finger and you sign up for the house, mortgage, the full meal family deal, you also sign up for divorce, alimony and child support. Guys, let’s be real. Decent, handsome and successful lawyers, doctors and athletes are going through the divorce and family law meat grinder just like regular men are, albeit likely in smaller numbers. The point is the institution of marriage and being a provider is a sour deal for a man of ANY status. He’s got more to lose than gain regardless of his position in the mating arena.

*REAL* Alphas have nothing to DO with ANY of that crap. They bed the top females and move on. They’re not there to pay, they’re there to play.

There is no such thing as an Alpha Provider. He’s the mythical creature all women want, and they know he *does not exist* so they try to convert Mr. Alpha into Mr. Alpha/Beta hybrid and what happens? She will ultimately fail. She will be the subject of many a rom com – the Cinderella trying to turn the successful handsome worry free aloof guy into the exact same man, but also loyal, sweet, caring... think a shirtless Matthew McConaughey... rocking a swaddled infant in the baby room he just painted. This is the fantasy of every woman alive. Alpha looks, money and prowess with the servitude and commitment and *caring* of the beta provider. This is mother nature’s cruel joke on women – letting them think in their hamster-driven minds that such a feat is possible.

Alpha males can become beta providers. Beta providers can stop *CARING* and *PROVIDING* for women/children, get in shape, get fashionable, get a better crib, get some game... but perhaps they are just physiologically wired to provide. Perhaps they will never *naturally* exude the kind of confidence a real natural-born Alpha does.

Interesting and well written article, but I think it’s got some major blue-pill philosophy in there, stuff that’s already been disproved in the field, so to speak.”

Another way of putting what Sid’s weighed in here with is like so:

You only have two (2) options-

1. Be the single bachelor forever, and forever bounce from girl-to-girl
   
2. Take a girl long-term and become a doormat
   

Sounds depressing. You’re either trapped perpetually in hedonism, which is fun until it gets stale a decade or so in (usually sooner), or... you’re somebody’s doormat.

Well, spoiler, I’m going to tell you that’s a whole lot of hooey... but so are the mainstream ideology of “the man’s REALLY in charge, even if the woman bosses him around a bit” and the pickup ideology of “you have to game your wife”.

Instead, I’m going to tell you about something else. Namely, being a legitimate alpha provider.

What are the differences between how a beneficial, robust mental model works, versus how robust-yet-harmful mental models (like victim mentality) or non-robust mental models yet clung-to models work?

I’ve been analyzing mental models a lot recently. In particular, how people can have extremely different, yet robust or at least unyielding mental models, and how each different kind of mental model produces different kinds of results.

For instance:

• Victim mentality is actually an extremely robust mental model. Individuals who view themselves as victims – and such individuals are extremely common across societies, of every sex, race, age, and creed – continually find reason to view themselves as the recipients of misfortune, find justification for their models, and receive feedback from the world that reinforces rather than disabuses them of their models

• Conversely, what I’d call winner, or success-driven, individuals also have extremely robust mental models. Individuals who view themselves as successes tend to be quite good at finding ways to pull victory out of defeat, at avoiding situations where they would suffer setbacks, and don’t spend much time dwelling on setbacks, other than from a problem-solving mentality. As a result, they spend little time in defeat and quickly dust themselves off even after most reasonably catastrophic failures
  

But it’s not just someone’s victim/winner orientation. It’s also the reliability of his predictions.

For instance, someone who sees himself as a victim has confidence in his mental model because his predictions are either correct, or he explains them away if they aren’t. He sees a pretty girl and says, “Well, she’ll reject me, of course,” and if he approaches and she does reject him, he says, “See? I knew it. Women always reject me.” If instead she’s friendly, he’ll be inclined to explain it away: “She must’ve been drunk” or “She doesn’t really like me... she was probably just being polite.”

Both victims and winners make predictions and their predictions either come true, or they attempt to explain to themselves (and others) why in this case the prediction failed, yet the failure does not violate their mental model overall. This makes these models robust.

Obviously, if they receive enough feedback to crash the model, they’ll be forced to reassess. But most people adopt models that seem to justify their experiences, and avoid experiences that may invalidate their models.

However, prediction is only the surface here – largely because it doesn’t give us a way to qualify the differences between different mental models (like victim and winner mentalities). So we need to add two more pieces.

I propose any robust, success-oriented mental model is comprised of three (3) bits:

• Predictive accuracy,
• Confidence in the model, and
• Harmonious choices and outcomes
  

“What are you WAITING for!?”

The question runs through almost all the advice I mete out on seduction. Big part of the advice I see other guys give, too.

A student from a coaching session stands around, hesitating to approach.

“What are you waiting for!?”

A lover complains about how she’s unable to live her dream of being a professional dancer.

“What are you waiting for!?”

A friend is hung up on a single girl, and unwilling to move on with his life.

“What are you waiting for!?”

People sure spend a lot of time waiting.

You could grow old waiting for most people to finish waiting. Or you could even meet a girl, sleep with her, and have an entire wonderful relationship with her during the same time other men spend looking for the “right moment” to chat with that girl from work or class or wherever she’s from.

But, you know – “What are you waiting for!?” – if you can internalize this utterly electric anti-procrastination attitude, you will be 90% of the way to becoming the man you know you really can be.

If only you stopped putting everything off till tomorrow though, or got up on time, or got that job... then you’d be ready to buckle down and really get to work... right?

Wrong.

The other day, one of the advanced members of our Girls Chase forums asked me about how you root out scarcity in all its forms, and how to resist the sometimes overpowering urge to give into it.

Scarcity can spring naturally from the situations you find yourself in, but it may also be engineered: individuals (and organizations) who understand the value of scarcity can also use it to make themselves more in-demand and attract higher value friends, mates, and associates. It’s all around us, pervades what we do, and we use it on each other, intentionally or inadvertently, non-stop. As you become an increasingly valuable individual socially, there will be more and more people who feel scarcity interacting with you (or trying to), and usually there will still always be someone or something you yourself continue to feel it with or for.

Scarcity takes many forms:

• You meet a girl who’s super hot and perfect for you and you can’t help feeling nervous around her and acting different around her

• You reach a point in a relationship where you find yourself going back and forth over whether staying with this girl is what you really want, but feeling unsure whether you’re ready to give her up
  

• You reach a point in a relationship where your girlfriend is clearly going back and forth over whether staying with you is clearly what she really wants, and it makes you feel helpless
  

• You find yourself working a job that’s pretty good, but not perfect, and while some part of you wants to leave, another part isn’t sure if other jobs are necessarily better... and you may be safer just staying right where you are

• You find yourself talking with a salesman who seems to be offering something you might be interested in, but he’s pushing you for a decision now and you’re not sure whether to take the plunge or beg off
  

In any of these scenarios and a whole lot more, scarcity, in one of its many forms, snakes its way into your heart and tightens its grip around your psyche.

Possibly on its own; possibly due to the machinations of those around you.

Sometimes you may fight free from scarcity, yet some of the time it gets you. And sometimes the end result is okay and you get the thing you felt needy toward and the thing turns out to be worthwhile, while other times you realize sooner or later you settled for something less than what you could’ve had... had you been a little braver. Or you tripped over your own two feet in your attempt to secure it, and chucked yourself out of the running in the process.

How do you combat the creeping feeling of neediness you get whenever you wind up in a truly scarce position, and instead remain calm, measured, and effective?

In straightforward parlance, a ‘warm-up approach’ is an approach you make to get your social gears lubricated for a day or night meeting new women.

The warm-up approach is a simple concept to get one’s head around, but a lot of men still don’t use it. It’s one of the best tools out there though for beating approach anxiety and upping the consistency of your outings.

Want an easy way to defeat your fear of talking to strange women and work up the nerve to go say hi? Warm-up approach.

How about a simple way to make your days and nights out go from a range of “sometimes they’re great” to “sometimes I don’t talk to anybody at all”, to, instead, a much more consistent “they’re almost always pretty good”? Warm-up approach.

Or, a really easy way to build social momentum early on in the night at bars, lounges, nightclubs, and parties, while making early approaches you can then capitalize on later by reopening women you met before or leveraging the preselection and social proof you built earlier to meet new girls? Warm-up approach.

The warm-up approach is a terrifically handy device for nabbing all these benefits and a bunch more... and all you’ve got to do to do so is start using it.

There’s a truly wonderful post (and equally wonderful comment section discussion) on LessWrong titled “Why startup founders have mood swings (and why they may have uses).” The authors describe the mood swings startup founders tend to go through, vacillating between euphoria and despair. I can certainly relate; in the course of running startups (such as Girls Chase), I’ve had plenty of opportunity to sit at both points on that spectrum. It’s kind of a taboo topic (nothing to make you sound unmanly like talking about mood swings), but hey, let’s tackle it.

The authors of the post above point to other examples when people are likely to experience similar mood swings:

• Early on in their first ever romantic relationship

• When deeply invested in furthering a devoted cause

• Whilst struggling to create a first great work of art or achieve something notable

And it stands out to me there’s another place endeavor I’ve experienced these same mood swings I’ve felt during my startup career, and that was during my first two or three years actively seeking improvement with girls.

I know a lot of other men go through this too, especially the men who have a burning desire to become ‘great’ with girls... or at least to improve their prospects markedly.

Yet many more men wash out of the seduction game early on, when the lows of the mood swing prove too much for them.

What I’d like to discuss in this article is why the mood swings get you, what you can expect when you apply yourself to improving with women, and how to stack the decks in your favor to prevent yourself from ‘washing out’.