Confidence

When I decided to start gunning hard for significantly improved social skills in 2004, that was when I had to come to grips with how hopelessly miserable my current social skills were, and how hopelessly far behind I was socially compared to everybody else.

Some part of me enjoyed being the total outsider, because I enjoyed the independence of the man apart, the one cut off from society. I figured this would make my eventual triumph all the more poetic. It was only when I set about trying to bring that triumph about that I came to realize it would be even tougher than I’d estimated.

What I quickly discovered was that even some of the most basic social rules were alien to me. What do people talk about? How do they join conversations and move between groups? How do they not trip over their own feet socially and look dumb and find themselves excluded?

I’d already developed a good wit and the ability to tell an entertaining story by that point, so I wasn’t flying completely blind. But general conversation – interacting with other human beings in a setting in which I was not the guy on stage, cracking jokes or spinning stories or showing off my musical talents, was unknown to me. And was most human interaction... I couldn’t lean on jokes or tales or busting out freestyles to help there.

So, this one goes out to the social newbs, starting off hopelessly behind everybody else, realizing the rest of mankind has a 10+ year head start on them in learning how to socialize.

Let me tell you what I did, and give you some suggestions about what you can do.

Leaning forward on the counter, I listen intently to a friend of mine in the midst of a party. Her name is Ashley. We’d fooled around a few times and would often talk about having sex, but she’d always play a bit too hard to get or I’d get bored and move on to other bitties. We also shared a seductive annoyance at each other’s cockiness and respective bitchiness.

We discuss the recurring topic of our attraction for each other and the games we play to express it. I then joke about the absurdity of every social situation and how most people just act out the version of reality they tell themselves must be true (see, I talk to girls about more than just sex... sometimes).

She lightly teases me, “It always seems like you’re so calculating...”

“Is that right?”

“Yeah, I can see the gears turning in your head.”

“Am I that obvious?”

“Well no, but most people aren’t as perceptive as me.”

See? Cocky. She was also very direct, either blatantly spilling her mind or feeding you lies draped in sardonicism. So, I definitely crushed on her. I mean, we had so much in common.

We continue sharing ideas about all the charades people put on in social situations. As we talk, a girl passes by us to get some beer from the fridge. Ashley scans the girl up and down, then looks at me, pointing to the girl, squints, then mouths to me, “Who is that?”

I shake my head and shrug. Seeing that I don’t know, she looks back at the girl. Then she plops down from her perch on the counter and pours herself a drink near the fridge. The girl’s eyes and body are turned from my friend, so Ashley takes the opportunity to scan the girl closely. Though she stares harder than your average creep at a club, there’s a calmness and curiosity to it that makes it natural.

Then, as the girl turns towards her, Ashley widens her eyes and subdues her body language by shrinking her shoulders and nodding down slightly so that she has to look up to make eye contact. An instant transition from “shameless staring” to “politely submissive”.

“Hey, I’ve never seen you before. I’m Ashley,” she says to the girl, extending her hand.

The girl turns towards my friend and they shake hands. A few brief exchanges later and Ashley comes back.

I chide her, “I saw the gears turning in your eyes, too. Everything about that was so... mechanical.”

She laughs and gives an impish smile of guilt.

Over on our discussion forum, member Sneaky_Charm asks for help getting “unstuck” and making progress again:

“I realize that I’m looking for an easy fix, and in a way, trying to justify my laziness. As if looking for some magic! But, at the same time, I’ve read enough books to understand that self-image is a very real thing.

Chase, I know you said in one article that you were in the same place for years, and then your life started to change. So what did you do? Did you do anything, or it just happened?”

He says he knows “the biggest problem is taking action.” Yet, he’s still not taking enough. How do you stop running underwater when you’re not taking sufficient action in the first place?

Well, part of it’s just internal motivation. Sometimes until you really crater, you won’t feel sufficiently motivated to really step it up. Or sometimes you catch a lucky break (or perhaps you caused that break yourself by feeling around and exploring and testing stuff out) and you get a taste of what your true potential is or could be, and that’s all the motivation you need after that.

In my case, both sides played a role: I made rock bottom my home for a good long while and finally had enough of it, and then I managed to string together a bunch of lucky breaks over a period of time that gradually gave me tastes of what was waiting for me if I busted my tail. A beautiful girl unexpectedly gives me her phone number; I see a guy who’s light years better than me with girls, and watch him work, and understand. And I say to myself, “I can do this.”

But the art of self-cultivation can be boiled down to a simpler, and different, formula than just internal motivation + luck. We can also boil it down to this: draw some boxes, then start checking them off.

Once upon a time, a young man prepared to leave home and venture into the city to find a wife. Before he left, his father, a simple farmer, gave him some advice: “Along the way, there are many who will want your ear. These will give you much advice on securing a wife, but the advice will not be for good for you, and it will not be good for your wife. The advice they give you will be based on fanciful ideas

Having experienced the power of cold approach and the value of doing it in a rather systematic and calculated way (you will probably hear more about this in the next articles...), I am a bit surprised that I am actually writing this article myself.

I am a big believer in the efficiency of talking to every girl that I find even remotely interesting, because doing so puts me in a good mood. And, when I am in a good mood, talking to hotter girls becomes easier. Those who are not new to seduction advice know this principle very well. It is called state-shifting, and it basically consists in warming yourself up by talking to girls who might not necessarily turn you on, but that still give you that rush of adrenaline (due to the cold approach) that makes it very easy to do the next approach with the hotter girl.

While I still recommend the state-shifting approach for beginners (as a beginner you are still dealing with approach anxiety and a lack of reference experiences, so being too fussy can actually backfire), today I’m going to describe the benefits of being very selective regarding the quality of the girls you are going to talk to.

This article can be of value to beginners as well, but it is especially designed for intermediate/advanced guys who already have at least 500-1000 solid interactions on the street with women through cold approach.

Beginners are more likely in fact to have the problem of too-high standards than too-low ones; if you are a beginner, you should probably read this article first.

Hey everyone.

Today I wanted to discuss a very important form of confidence that is rarely mentioned, yet is a KEY factor in your success with women. We are here talking about sexual confidence.

I will first discuss what it is and how it will affect your success with women, then I will give some suggestions on how you can become sexually confident – i.e., tell you how to get there. So this post will be a mix of theory and practical elements.

“You wannafourfour?”

Around a year and a half ago, this Tinder message buzzes my phone as I drive back to school. I’m returning from a trial shift at a club I hope to work at for the upcoming summer.

Despite my good mood, however, I’m confused. What the hell is “fourfour”?

The girl messaging me is a cute blonde sorority girl who I’d set up a few dates with, but she always flaked. Save for a few run-ins on campus, we didn’t see each other much. Then we matched on Tinder, but it’d been days since I sent a message, with no reply. Now, at the tail-end of a Friday night, she’s messaging me to “fourfour”.

“She must be messing with me,” I think to myself.

As far as I can remember, I’ve always thought that the entire world was playing a prank on me. And women flirting with me and chasing me, well, that was just the cruelest of jokes. I feared that the moment I flirted back or asked them out, everyone around me, including the girl, would turn towards me, point their fingers, and laugh as they tease me “Oh you really thought she’d get with YOU?!” This was the insecurity that caged the seducer in me for far too long.