Being Happy with an Unconventional Life | Girls Chase

Being Happy with an Unconventional Life

Chase Amante

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Chase Amante's picture

A reader writes in with the following question:

Hi Chase,

You are one of the best writers on the web about this topic. I am mainly sending this to thank you, and [because] I have something else to also ask, I will get right down to it. You obviously live a type of life that is not the typical 9-5. Society frowns upon it, but you seem to be embrace it. I would also love to do what you do, but I have this fear that I will fail. There is also all the pressure from family and friends to follow a traditional path.

So, Chase, please tell me: How do manage to stay unorthodox and happy?

Your student for life,
Arnold

unconventional life

It's a good question. I know plenty of people on both the "orthodox" and the "unorthodox" side of things who claim to be "happy", yet whose actions and behaviors betray a deep lack of satisfaction with their lives.

I think most people are lost, and looking, or have given up looking, and meanwhile resent the pressures that others put upon them - whether they kowtow to those pressures, or they struggle against them.

And the people putting those pressures upon them are just as lost and unsatisfied as those they press down on.

This cycle of confusion and dissatisfaction seems to be an inherent quality of human life, and has been down through the ages. One of the things I set out to do a long while ago, though, and seduction was something that fell under the umbrella of this, was not have to worry about this like other people did.

Comments

Anonymous's picture

Hey chase!
super article. Especially the point about keeping your mouth shut. One you know about but always need a reminder. Very very important if you want to be a maverick ;). But theres a point i would like your opinion on. It struck to me when read about the cybersatiation part. You have stressed again again the importance of sleeping with girls to get better with them . But what is also important is the hunger to sleep with them. Most of the guys like me are satiated with the responses that girls give . As in there are always 5 or 7 girls in my life which bounce around me and love my company to the extent they would sleep with me. But this creates a feel good factor of temporary satiation which kills my intent at the moment when physical escalation is needed. ( though i fret about it later and am all disappointed.) an article about keeping your intent at the moment so much so that the inner hunger that drives the game would be pretty interesting. What is that goes in the mind of a true seducer at the time of going for the kill? is he lusting over the night to come or is he still not overwhelmed by the situation? my question is because we always here every guy good with girls saying ' oh it just happened i didnt do anything ' the girl just came and fell on my johnson!!:D)

Long time reader's picture

Hey chase
Vey inspiring article. I have also been through some rough times in my life, times that I wasn't sure I was going to make it. But through those times I have become a better man, I myself have not noticed the changes but people around me or people I have not seen in a while notice and comment how much I have changed. I want to some day open up my own business and am currently in school trying to fulfil those dreams. He one thing that I have noticed is that I become very stressed out over things that are challenging especially with my school work/ job/ social balancing. It seems I am quick to obsess over a way out but I want to finish school but at the same time I'm not sure if I want to follow "societies guidelines". I was curious if you had any advice on following through challenging situations because as previously stated I have gone through some rough times but I uncomciously pushed through and followed through. It seems differerent when I am the one trying to decide what to do with my life compared to me knowing what I have to do to accomplish something. For example if I want to squat 300 pounds I have to work on my form then take baby steps progressively stepping up the weight till I reach 300 pounds all the while monitoring my diet and stretching.. Easy right! But with life I find it's hard to compare. I go to school take the necessary courses then hat get a price of paper. There's nothing set in stone and i know that sounds kinda naive of me to state the obvious but I constantly wonder if I am making the right decision. Or if I want to quit just because I find the class hard. It's difficult for me to see my pregression as compared to something like weightlifting.

Ps. I also do not have Facebook or any social media outlets I find they will only distract me and consume my time which will keep me from reaching my goals.

Long time reader

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Long Time-

Yeah, I've been there. I had a few classes in college where I felt like I ought to just drop out and quit wasting my time doing this stupid school stuff... I was used to getting easy good marks in everything, but every now and then I'd end up in a class that just boggled me for whatever reason, and that was always extremely frustrating. Some of those classes I dropped, while some of them I rallied, stepped up how hard I was working on them, and finished with a passing grade (or sometimes even an A, with a strong enough rally, and figuring out how the teacher taught and tested).

Succeeding at more amorphous goals is greatly facilitated by creating metrics for them, just as you have with weightlifting. So, just as you can say, "My goal is to squat 300, and I'll do that by adding 20 lbs to the rack every week until I get there," you can say, "My goal is to beat this class with at LEAST a B, and I'm going to do X number of extra problems / assignments each weekday and take Sunday afternoon to always read one chapter ahead of the class in the text book so I can know exactly what the teacher is talking about and ask questions about anything that I'm not 100% clear on," or, "My goal is to start my own business, which means I need both marketing and product-building skills; I'm going to focus on learning how to build products first with [programming language if you're building apps or video production if you're building information products], then plunge into marketing. My goal is to take X program and make it through the entire program in 3 months while maintaining my studies."

At some point once you plow through enough of the hard stuff at the beginning, these can actually become fun - I distinctly remember classes in college that destroyed me at the beginning, but I started reading ahead in the book and asking clarifying questions when we got to the material in class, then re-reading with the new context, and found I was soon obliterating everyone else, all of whom still thought the class was really hard, while now it'd suddenly become easy for me - it gets REALLY fun when you're able to do that. Then you actually LIKE reading ahead, because your competitive spirit kicks in and the emotion is, "Ha, I'm going to go in and beat everyone in class at this all over again, and they're going to be left scratching their heads wondering how I did it."

Same deal with learning entrepreneurial skills - harness goals and use competition to motivate yourself to achieve heights you previously struggled to. Competition is really the great motivator.

Chase

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Anon-

I'll put that down for a post - that'd make for an interesting two-part topic.

Might even make that the next one I write on!

Chase

Andrewww's picture

Hey Chase,

Great article! I really like the advice on keeping your mouth shut. I've doing self development for some time and I keep catching myself telling people about my traveling plans and future business ventures that I'm working on. I feel like I'm bragging because my plans are so awesome and as of today I plan on giving people a vague/generalized answer when they ask me about my future plans. I also like to tell you that I admire you a whole lot. I can tell from your articles how well educated you are and the vast amount of knowledge you carry. In the last year I've been doing crazy amounts of self development and my views of life have changed dramatically. Most of your views are pretty well alined to mine and I want see what you think of marriage. I know that if I were to get married it wouldn't be until the age of 35-45. Ever since I was a boy I wanted of follow that "orthodox" path you mentioned and this last year I've realized that it's definitely not for me. I'm not sure how I feel about marriage anymore; it was something I always wanted but now I'm questioning myself. Right now I like the idea of having multiple long-term girlfriends (2 to 4) that would be like my wifes and adopt several underprivileged kids and raise them with the help of my GFs. Please tell me how you feel about marriage, what age you would consider it and anything else you'd like to add about your thoughts on the topic. Whatever you say will not necessarily change my views but I have a really open mind and I'll like to know what someone like you thinks about it.

Thanks in advance my friend,
Andrew

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Andrew-

My opinion on marriage is actually a little different from either the things you'll read in the mainstream media (where it's the be-all and end-all of men being responsible to women) and the men's dating advice community (where it's a thing of horror to be kept away from like a plague victim).

I have a thread on the forums here discussing fairly in-depth my thoughts on and experiences with marriage: "Marriage: Not a Big Deal (to You)" - you can read my first and second posts in the thread for a more complete view of my feelings on the subject.

Chase

Troy's picture

Hey Chase,

Nice article. It's similar to the comment i made on "Whats the Difference between a Lover and a Loser? article about dealing with failure and setbacks. You said that you'll do a post on failure and setbacks. Ok so Thanks Chase. I just completed the newbie assignment and it was ok. Not too hard but not too easy either. I saw a reply to edd on (getting started on your article,"We Are Not Having Sex Tonight: What Happens When You Dont) about you and the girlschase team working on a "Getting Started Category" for the site on making it easier to get started and improve our lives. I've posted a comment on "How to Use a Wingwoman to Pickup Truckloads of Girls" article, and yeah i think thats the main thing that is going to get some of your readers, including myself on to effectively using these articles. There is a lot of things on here now and thats great. However it's difficult to know how to go about from easiest to hardest in learning this seduction procedure. So a getting started addition to the site is greatly appreciated. I Have a question though:
1) Persons have told me that i sound a little too demanding over text on a screen. Do you get that impression when i make a request and how do i not seem too demanding to people to do this or that for me without raising there alarm bells? Just by reading this comment from me, is it too demanding of me to ask that you write an article? And how do us readers not be over dominant to people and end up wearing them out.
An article on failure would be great, yeah and help remind us to keeping pushing in the time of doubt would be great for your readers. And i just have to tell you that your chase framing and push-pull has been giving me some success. I've tried your examples and made up some similar to yours. It makes girls now chase me harder from the beginning of the interaction. Im a newbie and its going to be hard but im sure ill get more successful as time goes by and ill be sure to let you know about it. Also, im planning to purchase your programs on sale but right now im short on cash. Hopefully when your relationship book comes out then ill get everything same time. Please to shout ricardus for me. i havent seen him on here but i know he is doing the phone coaching. so now im just going to keep pushing.
Thanks for your help, Troy!

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Troy-

Props on completing the Newbie Assignment - I hope you saw some progress out of it. Yeah, I think the getting started guide is going to be quite awesome - it's looking pretty slick at this point, and we'll be presenting it on the site in a novel way that should be a lot of fun for guys and also make sure they're ending up in the right category / working off of the right advice.

Dominance over text - it's better to be a little too demanding than a little too UN-demanding, so you're not necessarily doing anything horrible here, but if you're being told its a bit much you need to add a little social consideration and wiggle room into your text conversations. What you're going to write in a comment and what you'll write in a text message or email are very different (I'm assuming texting / email is where most of the criticism is coming from?), so hard to tell from this, but typically a too-demanding text message looks like this:

"Meet me at Brothers Bakery at 7 o'clock tomorrow."

… while a "just right" text message is more like this:

"Let's meet at Brothers Bakery - it's nice, comfortable, and pretty convenient for both of us. If that sounds good, how's 7 o'clock tomorrow?"

That shows consideration for the other person by:

  • Using "let us" and "both of us" (together) vs. "you meet me" (separate)
  • Including a short explanation of why this spot is a great spot for the meet
  • Leading while not outright assuming agreement ("If that sounds good")
  • Asking for confirmation on ONE of the details (not place AND time... just time)

You still handle all the details, but you ask the other person to confirm them and give her the option to counteroffer if she wants to (she almost never will, but she'll appreciate the gesture, feel less "cornered", and be more likely to show up and more likely to view you as an attractive, socially savvy guy).

Glad to hear you're ramping up interest with girls with chase framing and push-pull, Troy. Keep chipping away at it, and you'll see this only go up with time.

Chase

Anonymous's picture

Hey Chase,

How do you isolate a girl that you fell in love in, who you moved to slow, didn't hit escalation windows, etc. within a social circle? And when I mean social circle, a girl that you are forced to see everyday, such as having the same class, work, etc.

There's this one girl who I've like for a very long time in my class and after reading your articles, I wasn't the "shopping guy you talked about, nor did I supplicate to her. We're really good friends, and in a social environment she acts all happy, goofy, comes up to me first and acts like I'm her boyfriend (touches me, hugs me, etc), but when I try to ask her out, she kindly gives me excuses, and even if I try to persist, she still refuses.

I read your articles on how to ask a girl out and reactions vs. results, so I came to the conclusion that she just wants me as a friend. I still do love her, but its causing some serious emotional troubles on my half, and I want to slowly isolate her. I'm meeting other girls as well, but I just can't seem to get my mind off of this particular girl.

So I guess my question is, how do you slowly isolate a girl you love who doesn't have any interest in you as a lover/boyfriend, when you are forced to see her everyday? And how do you refuse her attempts to keep you around (gives you hugs, etc), without making it seem obvious?

This came out to be a lot longer than I expected, haha. I love and appreciate the work you do, and I'll continue to follow your material, and hopefully one day I'll be good and happy with women as much as you are.

Cheers

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Anon-

I've only had a similar experience once, but in that case, what I did was to talk to the girl and say, "Hey Jennifer, you're a really awesome person and you're really pretty and nice and I've really enjoyed our conversations together, but I think I've got the wrong idea about you and I and it's causing me a lot of emotional distress and preventing me from moving on with my own dating life. I think it's best if we mostly cut contact and stick to living our own lives - I'm sure you're going to be fine without me, and it's going to be much healthier for me to have some emotional separation."

You can still be social with her when you see her, and be nice, and say "hi" and ask her how she's doing, but keep this to the bare minimum and otherwise just ignore her and talk to other people. It's quite cathartic to do, and you may even notice you've shifted the sullen, brooding obsession about the other person from yourself over to her instead, as she starts to keep a closer eye on you and monitors you and wonders how she didn't even realize how much emotion you had for her and how cool you were in handling it and how to get back what she lost (but don't be tempted; you're likely only to get sucked into another soul-draining platonic relationship where you chase after her forever if you go back to before).

Chase

Gem 's picture

Chase thought this was brilliant. I felt like I could relate to so much of this article and see much of it as parallel to my own life.

I grew up afraid and anxious as a child like you. I had to conquer my fears (of big things but small ridiculous things too; fear of heights as well as fear of movie theaters to give a few examples), and actively embarked against whatever I feared living by the ideal that if I can’t do it, I must do it and that I would have to work up to it until I could one day do the impossible (now possible) deed.

I spend a few hours every day reading and I always want to be more, learn more, progress more, and be further and further ahead than the rest of the pack. I am fiercely competitive and wonder how you think competitiveness and competitive nature falls into play relative to this article.

Also do you think it can be or should be depressing to know too much? I relate often to fictional characters of this nature that have found out too much and lose some ability that they once had to relate to the everyman (from a casual angle but also from the angle that they can’t help the other person who doesn’t know or understand something that they do).

Chase I had a few questions about gaming in college that maybe you could help with.

I have been running many street approaches essentially for the first time because this is my second year of college and majority of last year I was in a relationship. I would usually only do slow approaches because fast approaches did not theoretically seem effortless enough to me, but then, a few weeks ago I realized that I should fast approach, that I was being afraid of it. And I worked at it and pretty much killed any AA I had after doing a lot of approaches on street walking.

1. I’ve killed my AA of fast walking approach completely but now am at a point where I am like trying to figure out how many is too many. I tried your 8 approaches 4 times a week and in addition to this also continued with slow approaches in select spots of mine at school, in class, and at gym (my favorite :) ). And it gets to be too many girls Chase! You probably know who Paul Janka is, my situation at school is a lot like that. I like Janka, and something that he would say is that I can make meeting like 8 girls a day having sex a few times a day because my sex drive is really high. Mine isn’t quite that high, and so was wondering what you think is a good number of approaches or the ideal way to proceed forward for someone in my situation with pretty girls everywhere around him?

2. My second question is off of my first, and that is in a university setting do I risk running into the same girl twice or having say a girl notice me with a different girl or other risky things/ potentially disastrous things happening if I approach too much. I have a school of 20000 roughly in California, and many are commuters so yeah I’m wary of that you can say.

3. I haven’t had sex with any sorority girls yet and wonder if this might be something I should tread in carefully or if there is anything important I should keep in mind. Also, if I slept with a couple of sisters would that be dangerous or something that I would need to be worried about.

Essentially I think all these questions stem from the fact that while there are lots of pretty girls at my university, it is a closed environment and I will see the same people over again and whether or not that may or may not be a problem.

This ended up plenty long but thanks once again for your time Chase

thanks for taking that unconventional path ;)

-Gem

Mr. Rob's picture

I was thumbing through the comments just now Gem and I think I might be able to help you out. Dude its sounds like you and me have a similar problem and that is the fear of rocking the boat. I to this day need to get over that fear. If you want to be successful your going to make someone unhappy for whatever reasons and that really isn't your problem (as long as your doing so in an ethical manner). You have to learn to rock the boat and be okay with it. I'm going to recommend you watch these two short videos and implement the mindsets that this guy shares. He's quite an inspirational guy and one of Australia's top dating coaches, these two short videos answered for me the same questions your asking. Check em out!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cj9z_HY7bYI&list=TLOBuD-Z64H6wLf4jGCUKpeZ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_dSmUpqokk

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Gem-

Competition's key to success in anything, really - male or female, the people who get what they want are the ones with the highest competitive drives and the most iron wills. Some of the best business and life advice there is, I think, that it's hard to understand until you're there already, is to "always have enemies" that you're trying to vanquish. Once you stop seeing yourself as the underdog, you move into a far more placid, unmotivated "maintenance mode" type deal that's death for doing anything other than treading water.

I think knowing too much is depressing up to a point - there's a point at which you know so much that everything looks kind of pointless and futile and everyone else seems so clueless and ignorant. If you push past that mark though, you kind of come full circle, and into a kind of almost childish hopefulness and enthusiasm again - one religious quote I've always loved was Jesus's advice in the New Testament to "seek to be like the little children." One example might be thinking about the universe - the really knowledgeable guy realizes the universe is probably likely to end someday, in which case, what's the point of anything? The even more knowledgeable guy realizes that when he thinks this, it's pure conjecture, and he truly knows nothing - for the universe to even begin in the first place, for example, there must have been something before it - but how did THAT thing get started? Well, there must've been something before THAT. And it goes back infinitely - but things HAVE to start SOMEWHERE, and yet there can be no starting point because something always has to start the starting point. That doesn't make sense at all, and makes existence itself seem laughably nonsensical, and suddenly you realize you're every bit as clueless as the little child, and that all you can do is simply make peace with that fact that you don't know and never will know. You might say that the pinnacle of knowledge is un-knowledge: realizing that you still know absolutely nothing, at which point you go back to simply embracing discovery and not worrying so much (or at all) about the future because the future is largely unknowable. Everyone THINKS he knows what happens (whether he's religious, or fatalistic, or whatever), but all this is just speculation based on a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of the total picture - it's not worth getting excited or upset about.

Relating to the everyman may have to do with how frequently you interact with him, or how much of his life you led - I've done pretty much everything the everyman does, and I've lived his life, and I can distinctly remember each maddening or exciting or depressing or defeating moment of it, and whenever I have trouble relating, I stop and recall how I felt in a similar situation. That makes it much easier. Might also be helped for me because I'm constantly writing for, in part, the everyman - the article here I try to have enough new information in that they're useful even to really advanced guys, but be approachable enough that someone who's never read anything other than mainstream dating advice can hit any article on the site, read it, and say, "Whoa. That makes sense - I never thought about things like that," without having his sensibilities offended too greatly that he closes off to it. That requires me to be constantly in the everyman's head, which maybe keeps me grounded too. If being able to more easily relate is a priority, I might recommend finding some outlet where you're interacting with and speaking to the everyman about fairly complex topics and having to translate the difficult into the mundane - a great example of this is something like Stephen Hawking's The Universe in a Nutshell.

On the "too many girls" problem from doing lots of approaches - too many for what? If you're engaging in long conversations with them or drawn-out dating processes, this could be too much if you're getting lots of phone numbers that don't flake, yeah. If you're proposing a date before a phone number, and using texting purely to set up dates though, and then converting those dates to sex as quickly as you can, 8x4 should be sustainable unless / until you start taking on girlfriends or lovers you're seeing regularly. At some point you'll feel content enough with your abilities with women that you won't see a reason to push yourself anymore, but so long as you're not hitting home runs as often as you'd like, you should be continuing to approach often and see what you can make happen. If you're at the point where you're sleeping with lots of women off your phone numbers and you really don't need more, you might start inviting excess girls you're less crazy about to parties and hooking your friends up with them - you haven't experienced loyal friends until you've gotten those friends laid.

On chance of running into girls again - the smallest I've done lots of approaches in was a school of 40,000 in a town of 80,000 (including school students), and I don't recall ever once having a girl say, "This is the SECOND time you've approached me, you creep!" You'll certainly see girls you recognize from time to time, and if you're always taking the same path to the same classes at the same time of day, you're going to start seeing the same people again and again, but if you don't recognize a girl, it's probably safe to approach her. Worst case scenario, she maybe giggles and tells you you came up to her before, a few weeks ago - and maybe THIS time you get her number.

I wouldn't worry about any danger of sleeping with sorority girls - they tend to be pretty casual about sex in general, and unless you're flaunting having slept with them in the middle of a frat party with the girl's frat boy mate present, you should be fine.

Maybe think of it like this: life's short, and the lessons you get from approaching girls in college are going to benefit you for the rest of your life. If you've got a chance to milk some good girl skills out of it (and some unforgettable experiences to boot), do it.

Chase

Dave's picture

Hey chase, great article. I was wondering if you could do a post on vibe/character archetypes. I'm a pretty quiet person, and I've been working on developing eye contact flirting and presence to make up for it. I'm trying to develop and intense, quiet character that draws people in with intrigue, without me having to expend much visible energy. I don't care for the type of magnetism that comes with being a great conversationalist(though I am working on this some), I'm more interested in attracting attention with a simple vibe or aura that says"I'm hiding something,but you're going to have to dig for it." Is there a particular actor or movie I could watch to get a feel for this? I'm trying to figure out how I should carry myself and interact with people. I would really love to see a comprehensive analysis of different "characters"such as the one I've described that you can assume for yourself.

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Dave-

This one's already on my list - so stay tuned.

In the meantime, I'm having trouble coming up with any quiet/sexy examples off the top of my head - these are usually the sullen, broken down men that a girl swoops in to save. If you keep your eyes out for them while you watch movies you'll find them... I'm normally not paying as much attention because they're different from the archetype that works best for me. I'd recommend going on a bit of a romance movie binge to find these guys - they're usually younger (teenagers, college students) - if I remember right (but not 100% sure), the teenage kid the girl falls for in American Beauty fits this bill, and Edward Scissorhands is a weird but kind of accurate example - maybe ask around a bit (or if anyone reading this has examples, feel free to post those here too).

Chase

Bar's picture

That's one great of an article. I should say that you are changing many people lives but you probably already know it.

You just remind me when you talk about SAFTEY: ("having the knowledge that I could disable attackers and win in a fight in almost any reasonable situation; also knowing how to talk my way out or at least intimidate my way out of most tense situations without having to risk injury or death in combat")

I'm not that big size man, actually quite slim person. Anyway, I noticed some interesting fact about it. When you are just start at understanding the society act, you DO get people who threaten your life, but that’s just for propose of money or quick fame jump.
Because you still submissive person (at least as I was back then), these life threaten events end safety because you flow with what they want from you naturally.

But then, when you get develop with girls (and with society act too), these life threaten events occurs less frequent (because you express more confidence and people prefer deal with submissive persons with is easier). But, when they do it's usually really dangerous situations:

I have been in these kind of situation before and after I get progressed with girls and when it happens now, I REALLY fear that something will happen. I actually understand that I don't know how to act to these events, socially speaking. I normally thought that I need to implement SOCIAL PRESSURE in situations that some male trying to get fame on your account. But it's just backfire because it's just force the person even more to save face.

I know you deal with martial arts, but I don't have time to do this yet (as well as I don't want to be beaten from double my size muscular males while training).
I thought about some self-defense tools, but gun is too much of a hassle and other tools like teaser or self-defense spray will probably just look weak if anyone see it.

So I just have idea for future article for your article list: "How to deal with life threaten situation that originate for gain status, social technique to deflect it" (not robbery or something like that).

Thank you.

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Bar-

I have an article on street smarts on the list - I'll add a note next to that one to include a bit on dealing with potentially very dangerous situations there, too.

Chase

Curtis's picture

This is the most important article I've ever read on GC. Thank you, Chase.

Curtis

Riz's picture

Hey Chase, great article. It's always nice to read the thoughts of someone else who has a similar outlook on life, it's nice to know that there
are people out there who see things in more or less the same light.

Life really is crazy when you take a minute to sit back and actually consider.

We have this one life and yet so many people choose to spend that life doing what everybody else is doing, just because... that's what everybody else is doing. People do this without taking into respect what they themselves as
individuals really want and seek and what makes them or will make them truely happy in life.

I really believe that when it comes down to it that whilst we as humans function at the base level on equal wiring because of our pure anamalistic nature, but as concious human beings with complex and advanced brains and reasoning we do seek different things, based upon both internal and external variables of past present and future. Such seemingly small events in life can cause us to seek, think and behave in different ways, and whilst genetics obviously play a large role, we are largely products of our environment. The fact that we can be shaped so much both internally and externally is one of the most beautiful things which truely allow us to be unique, individual and human.

But of course too many choose not to embrace their own uniqueness in desire and outlook at the expense of happiness and freedom. These people seemingly unaware of the matrix that they operate inside.

Whilst I think the hierarchy diagram that you used to illustrate what we all seek in life is true in essence, I think it is important to consider the degrees to which people seek these certain things ie: wealth, women, comfort, material etc etc. Not everybody wants or perhaps even needs these elementary fundamental aspects of life in equal proportions and amounts, as an effect of our our true human nature.

But that's just the thing. The black and white, yes or no driven society and it's blueprint usually doesn't take into account or allow for different degrees. In many ways its a one size fit all system, which I believe saps happiness and freedom from us by not considering our unique nature and individual tendencies.

In short, it fails us as individual human beings in place for the prolification of our species as a whole and the continuation of what is actually a pretty effective society in which we operate.

--------------------

So it's a funny one, whilst society does give us a good arena in which to
operate, if taken too seriously can have adverse effect on our levels of contentment, happiness, ability to improve, achievement, success and understanding. It really can inhibit our individuality and potential.

I guess the key is to reap the benefits that a effective social blueprint and arena can offer, whilst maintaining yourself on the periphery of its rules and traditions
to ensure that you take all the good parts and receive all the rewards but suffer none of the restrictions.

Which leads me to the conclusion that it is all about a good balance at the end of the day.

Chase, what are your thoughts on the following

A) If everybody stopped following the blueprint of society and started following their own dreams what would happen to the world? I would guess society would fall apart and it would actually have negative effects on everyone. As unfortunate as it is Chase, I believe that people like me and you need the rest of the world to be in check to allow us to operate.

B) To allow people to accept your liberal and 'dreamer' like stance on the world it is necessary for you to have something very attractive and fundamental about yourself so that people see the rewards of a life lived differently. How do you go about developing that Charisma?

C) Do you believe that girls who have a similar outlook on life and society would be the ones most compatible for men like us? Such a shame they are few and far between :(

Thanks :)
Riz

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Riz-

Some very nice perspective in your comment. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. The role of even small events shaping future perspectives and inclinations, mixed in with inborn preferences, is one I'm a fan of talking about with friends too, and society's subjugation - to an extent - of individual wants and needs for greater collective success is a fascinating topic in its own right, analogous to how many other systems work in nature - from the subjugation of individual body cells' most selfish desires to produce one more collectively successful whole (your body), to the subjugation of individual organelles' wants and needs to produce those cells themselves, it's one that crops up again and again.

Civilization does require the majority of individuals to "follow the plan", yes. Fortunately, things are set up in a way that for most people, the best way TO get what they want is to follow the plan, and if that started to change, "the plan" would change to better meet people's needs.

Case in point: let's say everyone decided to go become an entrepreneur, because working for a boss is too constricting. Well, a couple of things would happen: one, most businesses would raise their pay rates to attract more of the (increasingly rarer) people willing to trade time for money. Two, most people starting a new business would fail, as most do today, simply because they're unable to overcome the competition of all the other people out there doing the same exact thing as them in the same exact niche, and eventually realize that working for someone else is their best path to securing the kinds of resources they need to live the lives they want. In fact, most people are already making these calculations - they figure they'd fail at business, so they stick to what they know and work in the corporate world, because that seems to be (and, probabilistically speaking, likely IS) their best chance. It's similar with things like learning pickup and tightening up fundamentals - some guys are going to do it, because they CAN do it, or they at least want to try, but a lot of other guys just don't have the motivation or the resolve, and they'll put their energy elsewhere (or spend it relaxing) and eventually fall into a relationship someday with a girl who's "good enough" for them and for whom they too are "good enough."

Charisma is necessary for people to accept dreamers, yes, but the two often come together - the more you strike out on your own, the more charismatic you tend to become. For learning charisma specifically, Ricardus has an article on this up here: "The 3 Things to Know If You Want to Be Charismatic."

Re: women with similar view points - you want similar to an extent, but if you get together with women who are TOO ambitious, and YOU are very ambitious, those relationships tend to break down very quickly, simply because what you need is someone who's going to support you in achieving your goals and put her goals second, while what SHE needs is someone who's going to support HER in HER goals and put HIS goals second. The best partners are usually women who are ambitious enough to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, but who believe in your vision and will support you and not detract from the chasing down of your dreams. The über-ambitious women are loads of fun, and probably make for ideal breeding partners if you want a super dynamic success-machine kid at some point, but those relationships usually end in flames and glory after a not-so-long period of time.

Chase

deliberater's picture

Fascinating article, Chase. More balanced than other articles or books out there on similar matters that do a poor job of taking into account the perspective of people pressuring you.

The adaptive nature of society is an interesting discussion. I, for one, would prefer one where part-time jobs are more common, granting people an option of spending more time in creative and entrepreneurial endeavors. If more people would take on freelance or entrepreneurship, corporations would not be expanding as fast as they do now, and that could perhaps lead to an economy composed of many small companies, or corporations operating as a conglomerate of smaller, more dynamic companies, preserving some of the entrepreneurial mindset. More in line with the way it's been throughout history, perhaps.

kerempg's picture

i really love this post. There are some questions in my mind
1) is it better ro leave the house if you are living with your parents?
2) doing the things that are interesting to me do not make money, and i am really afraid to perform them. what to do?
3) what is wrong with settling down except not to be able to see around?

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Kerem-

If you can afford it and it's not going to put you deeply into debt or lock you into a job you despise, I'd advise not living with your parents, yes. There might be some who can pull it off, but I'm 30 years old, and whenever I stay with MY parents, even for a few weeks, I notice a marked decline in motivation, independence, testosterone, and sex drive. At least in my case, it's like being permanently reverted to and stuck within a child-like role while living at home, and most of the men I know who live with their parents seem similarly child-like.

If you're afraid of doing things, unless they're harmful or dangerous, you should probably go do them, at the very least to not be afraid of them anymore. If they're not monetizeable at all, I'd think hard about investing significant time in them, unless you're certain that money is not necessary for you to live the kind of life you want to live for the rest of your life. Sometimes things that aren't usually monetizeable can be monetized with the right approach, however.

On settling down - absolutely nothing! It's just a personal preference for me - a fear of becoming too settled leading to the leading of a less impactful life. If settling down is what you WANT though, so long as you do it at the time you want to do it and with the woman you want to do it with, there should be nothing in the world that stops you from doing it.

Chase

Hrnek's picture

Hello.

Your latest articles leave me thinking about and analyzing a lot of things that happened to me and trying to find a path.

I was shopping today with my sister for 8 hours. To extend my wardrobe, hers and just look around. And in malls you usually encounter a lot of people even though you dont talk to 99% of them. It got me thinking that no matter how fashionable I will look there is still this personality aspect. I was fairly well dressed and girls of my age checked me out, passed me very closely and slowly, stopped talking when I was sitting down.

Basically, every person is a book. My book has great cover, but shitty content for life as it is. It keeps getting me how personality is the most important thing you can have. I dont want to start with how each traits affect your life as it is. I mean like your past success makes you confident, how your desirability of your dreams makes you driven and goal oriented...

I used to work as a financial consultant, you set meetings with clients, talk about how it works and how can you help them and such. I like the job as it was but communication with people was hard. And our manager told us, how many people who quit always say "I am not the type of person for this job." And this is how I feel about life.

One more example: Yes, I want to meet a great girl, that is why I am here. My view has completely changed thanks to you guys who write here. So I force myself to talk to people more, to girls, to watch my nonverbals, fix my style, be more "in the society". But there is always some situation, some moment that makes me feel - I am not the right person for doing this, it is making me feel bad. I push as hard as I can but at some point I just go back to my comfort zone, reanalyze whole work and realize nothing really changed. I mean personality-wise. It is like I went on a vacation to Italy. Bam and I am back here now. The lack of successes and wins in this area of my life makes me feel horrible and I live in this "seasons" - happy - sad - happier - horrible - ok - happy - normal - sad - super sad. You get the idea.

My question after all this text may be weird, but because you know a lot about psychology... Would it be better for me to find something that completely exhausts my mental energy? Like doing advanced math for an hour a day? I see I am creating things that are not there by analyzing situations in my life. And I dont do that if I am really exhausted and I wonder if it would make me less misserable. Because like the "loser vs lover" article... I am a lover by exterior. But I am loser as a person. I have cover, I look like something I am not. And knowing this puts me down every 3 or 4 months after my hard work not going anywhere near of my little goal, that one little step. I can not achieve my goal if I cant even step up the first stair.

Hrnek

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Hrnek-

It seems to me your core problem is not feeling like you've built any noteworthy abilities or achieved success at anything worthwhile to-date. Exhausting your energy would be a good thing to do, but you'd want to exhaust it in pursuit of learning something valuable and useful - something that will allow you to become the guy with a great cover, and a page-turner on the interior.

I'd advise that you sit and think hard about what your definition of success is. A man at 85 years old, who's sickly and decrepit and will never be able to accomplish anything else of note before he dies because he's on death's door already, looking back on his life - what would you count as marking him as a "success"? Would it be if he had a beautiful family? A big bank account? If he'd spent a lifetime helping or teaching others? If he'd become a master painter, or sculptor, or violinist? If he'd invented some world-changing new device that altered mankind's trajectory for the better? That's going to depend very much on you, but whatever you see as a "success" for that man is what you should probably sit down and begin to devote some of your time to learning how to do.

Once you start having success in the ways that you consider important, the concerns about being an illusion fade. The better you get at things, and the more successes you begin to stack up, and the more clearly you can differentiate where you are now from where you were when you started out, the more confident about the content of your book you begin to feel - and this seeps over into your life and affects you in everything you do for the better.

Oh, and as for "I am not the type of person for this job" - I've never been the type of person for ANY job I'VE ever had, but after a few months or years of slogging away at it, one day, I turn around and realize I am EXACTLY the type of person for the job. No one starts off the ideal candidate - he becomes it.

Chase

Mr. Rob's picture

Please Chase just call me Rob.
A couple questions on value.
You talk about how your very selective of your friends and that you only wish to befriend high caliber people that bring high caliber value to your life. I noticed (and read) that you own the habits that your friends own, my friends a year ago were substance abusing hedonists that truly believed they were destined to mediocrity because of their situation (that they put themselves in but won't take responsibility for). Basically unaccomplished other than a decent lay here and there and winning a fight they picked for no reason to prove how "gangster" they were/Thug life wanna be's. Super negative environment to surround yourself in. I extricated them completely from my life and now am extremely picky of whom I surround myself with to the point I really don't hang around anyone but my parents and girls I meet/go on dates with. 10 months later It would be nice to have a friend other than my mom and dad to share a common goal of pick up (note: my dad doesn't share a common goal of pickup with me) with and I need someone better than me at pickup to learn from but in a city of 30,000 I feel like I'm one of the only guys doing daygame, thus making it extremely hard to find someone doing what I'm doing.

My question is
1. How do I go about finding a mentor in a small city? My first guess would be find a forum online with members registered in my city. Or find people that are good a night game and put them on to day game (since most people aren't aware its possible to day game). Suggestions please.

And kind of related.

2. You talk about having friends that are multimillionaires. I really admire that you have built yourself to have so much value that you can befriend people of such success and value. How does a not successfully rich yet aspiring person, like yourself befriend successful multimillionaires and have them want to actually spend time with you to share their wisdom. I know you do it by dumping your value that you offer on to them but don't multimillionaires already have all the value they could possibly want? What makes you different then the average chump trying to get chummy with these people to be in their presence (I guess most people want to just be seen in their presence rather than soak up and share wisdom/build a real connection, but I want to hear it in your own words)

3. How do you assess what value you offer to other people? For example I feel like I have value to offer but don't know exactly what that may be.
What kind of value are most people looking for/how do you know what kind of value they want?
Sorry for the protracted comment (you seem to get quite a lot, but I presume its better than reading some long comment of some guys story of one girl and how to get her back, I cringe when I read those) and always appreciate your wisdom.

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Rob-

Yeah, poking around on forums is one way you can potentially meet great new people. If you're in need of new friends, you've basically got to treat it the way you would if in need of a new girlfriend - just go pound the pavement HARD, meet TONS of people, and attend as many different kinds of events as you can possibly get your hands on: archery classes, networking events, happy hours, bars, chamber of commerce meetings, conferences, Spanish lessons, bar tending class, acting lessons… anything and everything. The more things you do, the more people you'll come in contact with, and the more quickly you'll find high caliber friends. If you see a guy dong well with women, after he's finished with a girl approach him and say, "Hey man, I really admire how ballsy you are at just going up to girls and flirting with them and having it go pretty well - can I buy you a drink and pick your brain a bit?" Also, if you want to meet REALLY ambitious people, you'll probably need to move - ambitious folks don't stay in small towns for long… there simply isn't the opportunity there.

Re: people who are reasonably wealthy - the more successful you become, the harder it is to find people who are also successful, whom you can talk about things and have them be on the same page, and who aren't going to lose their shirts or start begging you for advice or handouts. It's a similar deal in the dating advice niche - I help out guys on the site, because I like doing it here and I think it builds the community and it keeps me sharp, too. But when I'm away from GC, I don't want to be around people who are just trying to get me to explain this and that and the other thing endlessly, or who want to talk about some issue that I moved on from five years ago but they're just starting to struggle with now, because you don't grow any. However, if I meet a guy who's really good in business, or who's crazy good at martial arts, or who's amazing at making music, for instance, when you meet these people, they're rare, but they're kindred spirits. Even if your success has come in totally different niches, you GET it - you hate it when new DJs come up to you and want to suck up all your time asking beginner questions about DJing that you haven't thought about in forever because they're so basic, so it's cool when you meet this chill guy who respects your skill but isn't awed by it, asks you a few insightful questions, and otherwise is just laid back because he has his own success to a high degree under his belt and he knows all you want is someone you can chill with without pressuring you to be an encyclopedia or a teacher or a performing monkey.

Maybe think of it like this: people of a certain success level in something find people at similar levels of success who are of a pleasing disposition and not otherwise going bananas over those other people's success, yet can appreciate it and give them their props for it, to be a refreshing change from the vast majority of other people, who don't understand what it's like to be successful and don't understand how much pressure and discomfort most people will put on you when they realize that you have something they want (success in XYZ field).

As far as assessing your value, really the only way is by the feedback you get from people. If you're performing, how much do people like your show, how avid are the fans, and how often do they come back? If you're selling a product, what kind of reviews does it get? If you're bringing value as the life of the party, how excitedly do people praise your party-hosting prowess? If you're bringing value as the guy who connects with people and gives them great advice, what do they have to say about your advice, do they ever come back and say, "I did what you said, and it WORKED!", and do they start treating you like they feel like they owe you (because you've provided just so much value to their lives that they've begun feeling indebted). All these are reliable ways of gauging whether you've reached the point of providing tremendous value in some way, or if you still have a ways to go.

Chase

Richard Wendell's picture

By far my favorite article Chase.

Really brought me back to my life of pre pick-up, and really had me feeling nostalgic there for a minute ;)

Maslow's hierarchy of needs eh? Ever since my senior year of high school, I've been living my life to become self-actualized.

Cheers,

Richard

Knight's picture

Any reason you're learning to fight so well these days Chase? I imagine you have fitness sorted and you're against fighting for the sake of trying to boost your reputation - are you finding it's just an interest to pursue these days? I can respect that.

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Knight-

Mainly I've just been feeling like I've been taking the "dumb brute" route too long, and focusing just on lifting and trusting in my muscles and my ability to take a pummeling and keep going to carry me the distance, but there are plenty of guys with much bigger physiques than me and plenty who can mete out more damage than I can take, and it's really started to bother me that I'm as poorly trained as I am at self-defense. I've gotten girls handled, and I'm getting money handled, but defending myself is one where I still have to feel my way through and just throw some punches and take some hits and hope I hit harder than the other guy and have a stronger resolve and can take more punishment and that he gives up before I do, and that's not a very good game plan against someone who knows what he's doing.

It's been a while since I've really been in a brawl, but I've had a couple of threatening situations over the past few years where I successfully backed the guy down and gave him the impression that he'd be biting off more than he could chew if he took me on, but not having any certainty I would've actually been able to win those matches is concerning to me. Nothing's ever 100%, but I like to get to places where as little is left to pure chance as possible, and self-defense is still one I'm lagging far behind (but, getting better).

It's more a "other things are handled or being handled, and this one is moving back to the fore" type deal.

I also decided to take a break from lifting for a while and focus on self-defense, figuring I can always drop self-defense training and go back to lifting later and build a more impressive body then, and self-defense training, once you've got it, is there for good. That one seems to be the one to work on more before working on the other again. Muscles come and go, but knowing how to defend yourself is forever. Sounds kind of cheesy, but you know what I mean.

Chase

Bob C.'s picture

Hi Chase.

Another great article (just like the one on the Purpose of Life from a Practical Point of View)!

I wish that getting advice on bettering oneself in order to improve the choices one has with the ladies was far from taboo. I hide my screen whenever I read your articles from public view because I am afraid of what others may think. I wish I could share you site with your site with other people so that they may grow and be happy.

Your articles are not just about getting better with the ladies and realizing that a man has an abundance of choice (most men would rather capitulate to scarcity). I do live in an area of with a severe shortage of available ladies (it's the small towns you were referring to!). So, until I am able to move, I am improving other aspects of my life, such as fashion, getting a sexy walk, bodybuilding, finding a purpose in life, and in general learning to be happier than I ever had been.

I guess everyone just wants you to be on the same level of misery as they are so that when they fail to make it, they can look comparatively at where you are and feel less bad about themselves.

I may suck with the ladies, but that comes mainly from just lack of an available dating pool. At least in the other areas of life that you mentioned, I am doing fairly well. In large part, this is thanks to your advice. And, in case you are wondering, I have the ability to defend myself and respond with lethal force if necessary. (Yes, I have a CCW permit.)

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Sounds like you're going about it just right, Bob. All those improvements you make beforehand you really end up being grateful are in place once you're in position to start meeting new women - they just make it so much easier than it'd otherwise be - and the motivation of knowing that you'd building up this foundation in order to go out and get women more easily when that comes into your circle keeps you working hard and remaining resolved.

I used to always carry an 8-inch tactical knife with me wherever I went, but I had a few more knowledgeable people than I advise against doing so unless I really got trained and knew what I was doing it with - taking out a weapon escalates the situation, and if you're not careful, you may even lose that weapon and have it turned back on you. If you know how to use it though, carrying a weapon absolutely affords a feeling of safety you otherwise wouldn't have - whether legitimate or not, I used to feel unassailable when carrying because if worst comes to worst, you've got your trump card there to pull out at a moment's notice - I still take my knife with me when in more dangerous parts of the world. At some point, getting proper weapons training to carry a weapon and be able to handle it safely and responsibly is on my list as well.

Chase

Anonymous's picture

You sir in the section entitled 'Accepting "Separateness" and the Need to Belong' have put into words, feelings I could only describe in parts.

It's really nice to see someone out there who understands

-Santa Claus

Anonymous's picture

Hey Chase,

When u say that most girls don't go to bars and clubs are you including girls from cities like New York and Los Angeles?because when i was in those cities every girl I met talked about going to a club/bar on the weekend,or some wild party,rarely did i hear a girl say im just going to read a book and call a friend this weekend.But i guess its possible that they wouldn't reveal such information to somebody they don't know really well.The vibe in these cities makes it feel like everybody is going out on weekends.

This article above really written at just the write time,as I have been thinking a lot about this subject lately.I would really like to be location independent,it's a big goal of mine.I find it interesting that your living in Asia.Are you living there because of the low cost of living,and because you don't have to deal with westernized women there?What are the benefits?

Also where im at now it's about to get really cold,and in your location article you mentioned that people tend to settle down in relationships when the whether is cold outside.Also in a smaller town where there is less distractions,I would think that would make people more prone to getting into a relationship..So what do you think is the best way to use these differences to your advantage ,if you want to get into a relationship with a girl?In other words,because there are probably more lonely girls that live in cold climates where there isn't a lot one can do outside,should you still disqualify yourself as a boyfriend,even though the girl would be more willing to get into a relationship with you quicker?

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Anon-

NYC, from the data I can find, has somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,500 to 1,800 open bars / pubs / lounges / nightclubs at any given time. If you estimate an average of 150 patrons per night on peak going out nights (smaller places will only have 50 people all night, while some big nightclubs might get 1,000 people going through in a single night), that's 270,000 patrons maximum... if you assume (conservatively) that 30% of those patrons are repeat patrons among different establishments (e.g., you pre-game at one bar, then hit a big nightclub, then go to the after-hours place), that's 189,000 patrons on a peak night. Because in my experience bars and nightclubs tend to be more male than female, let's say that's 45% female, so 85,050 women out on a given peak night (Friday or Saturday). If you assume that, say, 25% of those women are coming from outside the city - tourists, New Jerseyians, etc. - that's a little under 64,000 women going out on a peak nightlife night in NYC... somewhat less than 10% of the total single female population of NYC. Not every girl who goes out goes out every night, of course, but even if we say that there's ZERO overlap between who goes out on a Friday and who goes out on a Saturday (pretty unlikely), that's still only 20% of the NYC single woman population.

In my experience, this holds about true - even in big cities (even in New York), only a minority of the women I meet go out much. It's also dependent on where you're meeting women - if you're meeting professional women at work, they're often higher drive, higher testosterone, and more likely to go out to bars and clubs, or if you're meeting women in certain social circles this can be the case as well.

On Asia - Asia's great because it's such a roundly different cultural setup that your brain REALLY has to do some adjusting, which a learn-o-phile like me finds incredibly stimulating and addicting, and also because the women are much thinner on average, which means less competition for even the prettiest girls, and better returns on any individual ounce of effort extended with women. You also get an "obviously different" bonus from just not looking Asian that makes you stand out and start off with more instant "novelty" attraction than you do in North America or Europe, making your opening go more smoothly more of the time - a nice plus, and one that makes meeting new women even more enjoyable. Learning how to meet girls in the United States and then going to Asia is kind of like training for a marathon in the mountains of Kenya, where the oxygen content is lower, and then going and running down at sea level, in a much more oxygen-rich environment - your performance just goes from "solid" to "even more solid". And then you come back to the States, and you can tell women you come from a faraway land, and you get another exotic-ness boost and you're living the life they've always dreamed about living but haven't had the courage to and instantly things get easier again. I don't really have much of a preference for Asian women in particular, although they do make great girlfriends, and have been wanting to spend a bunch more time in Europe or South America for a while now, but I have some obligations with business and the like that require me to continue to hop back and forth between the U.S. and parts of Asia.

Re: winter - when winter's approaching, I find that adopting a more thoughtful, romantic (but still sexual) tone with women serves you better. You might opt for date compression rather than trying as much for first-date lays or one-night stands. In contrast, being romantic and boyfriend-y as spring and summer approach is usually a bad play - you want to lean sexy, energetic, and fun then instead.

Chase

Danny's picture

Dear Chase,

Mind if I ask you how many articles does your site has? It seems endless.....Do you have 1000?

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Danny-

Nope - not at 1,000 yet.

Including the just-posted article "How and Where to Move Overseas as a Single Man", we're at 645 articles.

Chase

Danny's picture

Dear Chase,

I am also wondering which one is your first article? Like the first article on your website when it first established?

I am just really curious and want to read your first article.

Author
Chase Amante's picture

If you go here, Danny, you can click the "Last" link to go to the very beginning of the site in chronological order, and page through it that way if you wish: "Insights from the Mind of a Seducer."

Chase

Peacer's picture

What to say, I have no idea..
After I read it, I felt that this is the one I have been searching for a long time..
You are great chase.. !
Thank you.
So far, learned ton of things here, but this the the
Best ever article.

Anonymous's picture

Chase can you explain some ways to create an "us vs them mentality" ,especially with your family.Sometimes my family and close friends feel like its "me vrs them",and i want to change this..What are some things I can say to change their perception of me in this area?

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Anon-

Before you can move to an "Us vs. Them" scenario with people who are treating it as "Us vs. You", you must engage with them and defeat their arguments. That means going on the offense first, and beating them at their own game. I talked about this in the article on moral superiority.

Once you have them on the retreat, you can then dial things down and reframe the problem as in fact being an "Us vs. Them" scenario, which, painted properly, they'll accept. But they won't accept this when they're firmly on the offensive, because it'll just come across like pleading / deflection on your part to them - they'll merely take it as a sign that they have you on the retreat, and will push ahead harder. You have to knock them on their heels before you're in the position to start setting the tone of the debate.

Chase

The M's picture

Hi Chase,

I really like this article - it addresses some lifestyle and social questions that I'd had in my mind for a while.

But I noticed that you didn't seem to address the top level of Maslow's hierarchy much in this article - comfort, women, safety, wealth, and contribution all fall into the lower levels.

Creativity, as far as I can tell, comes from having done the SAME thing a BILLION times, and then finally discovering that there's a better way to do it. It's of course the backbone of the work of scientists, for instance. And great seducers, too, I guess - I think that's why so many people love how refreshingly original and insightful your site is, including myself.

And if you start trying to become a great scientist when you're 25 or 30, plenty of other guys will have started when they were 15 or 20 or even much younger, and if they continue to work hard, they'll stay ahead, exceeding you in the second level of Maslow's hierarchy as well as the first. You generally don't HAVE time to run off and do something crazy if you want to successfully compete there.

Those guys have focused their entire lives on the "office desk" jobs of academia (or art or acting or whatever), but I think they're the ones who will succeed in the top level of Maslow, and it's only through succeeding in the top level that they'll be able to find success in the second level - their career - as well.

I know that in business it's probably OK to take a bit longer and do other things before starting business, and that plenty of successful guys started quite late in life. But even there, when I've read about the top guys in business, pretty much all of them had an entrepreneurial streak when they were young (possibly from growing up in difficult conditions), or parents that strongly valued entrepreneurship. So even in business it seems that it would be hard to compete with someone who's been thinking HARD about this stuff since they were 10 if you start when you're 25, say.

I should say a little bit about myself so you know where I'm coming from. I've spent a lot of my life so far developing a career as a scientist. From the point of view of becoming a scientist, I've followed a largely "conventional" path. Most of what I described above is from personal experience - the people around me who spent their youths and beyond exploring life and following more unconventional paths are less successful now than those of us who started focused and stayed focused.

Of course, the relatively small (compared to unconventional lifestyles) travel and social experience I've built up over the years has been very fulfilling (actually it only became truly fulfilling since I found your site), and I'm sure I would have become burnt out and unhappy if it had been completely not present, or present but unfulfilling. What I'm saying is that the more I increase that experience from small to large, e.g. the more time I take to run off and explore the world, the less likely I am to fulfill my top level of Maslow, and as a result, probably my second level as well.

By the way, people with less conventional paths in science, art, etc. often receive more media attention than those with more conventional paths - they're much more interesting to write and read about. But they're often not the top, most creative people in their fields.

In fact, I'd say that the people who knock Maslow out of the park, including the top level, i.e. achieve both creativity and esteem - are the ones who first master the conventional path, which can take decades of concentrated work, then later in life (e.g. in their 30's or 40's) start branching out. The ones who don't or clumsily branch out later in life are still satisfied in the top level of Maslow, but possibly less satisfied in the second level - esteem - than they would ideally like, e.g. they earn the respect of colleagues or fellow artists, but perhaps not so much of the world at large.

So...after all that, my question is: if you want to become an Innovator, i.e. succeed in a creative field, and satisfy all of your Maslow needs, wouldn't it be best to largely follow the conventional path first, and only after you've achieved success in that consider more unconventional paths? In other words, doesn't the stock phrase "you have to succeed when you're young" have some truth in it?

I hope this doesn't come across as me trying to impose my current beliefs on you. I'm ambivalent about some parts of what I wrote. I'd like to hear the perspective of someone who has lived a different lifestyle than I have, and seen more of the world than I have.

Best,
The M

Author
Chase Amante's picture

M-

That's a good point on self-actualization.

At its absolute CORE, what Maslow really is about is taking care of dire needs - if you're starving to death, or can't get laid at ALL, self-actualization is the furthest thing from your mind. But you can still be working on handling food - maybe you're relatively sated, but you'd LIKE to be eating banquets - and this frees up enough space to work on self-actualization.

When I talk about Maslow, I'm generally talking from the standpoint of, "I don't want to have to worry about X thing AT ALL," rather than from the standpoint of, "I need to unlock X, because it's killing me, before I can move up to Y." All the things in the self-actualized peak of the pyramid are things you hear me harp on repeatedly here - being moral (empathizing with women, not hurting them, not being bitter), being creative in how you approach your life and the situations within it, learning how to be spontaneous in your decision making and action-taking, becoming a better problem solver and tearing things apart down to the nuts and bolts so you know how to put them back together in novel ways, freeing yourself of judgmentalism, and acceptance that "reality is how it is, and you've simply got to work within its framework" and not waste time trying to rebel against it unless you're seriously going to devote yourself to one important cause of trying to change X specific thing (rather than flailing about and moaning about EVERY thing).

As for following the conventional path first and branching out second, I think it depends on your paradigm and preferences. If you're conservatively minded, as I am and as you seem to be, you generally want a life of a degree of security and reliability, and getting a conventional path down first is important to lend your life the stability you require.

There are people out there though who do not care about stability, and are fine living lives of perpetual ups and downs - in fact, they enjoy this, cherish it, and embrace it; it is THE life for them. These are the people you hear described as "scrappy", and they're people like the Andrew Carnegies and Steve Jobses of the world, who dabbled in the conventional path, found it didn't fit, and struck out to forge their own paths. There are individuals who are never successful in the conventional sense here, and individuals who're outlandishly successful in the conventional sense here too, because their success eventually brings them full circle and they surround themselves with the more stable, conventional people they need to pull off enduring success instead of the roller coasters they'd ride on their own. I've tried to emulate the mavericks as much as possible in my own life, but I am a conventional path person by nature, so it's always a battle within me.

The flip side of the conventional path is that it focuses on intermediate term, more moderate success rather than the risk-taking gamble of GIANT future success or colossal future failure that the unconventional individuals go down. For every Andrew Carnegie who makes something of himself, there're a hundred down-on-his luck guys who've tried again and again and always come up short or had it blow up in their faces. The conventional path eliminates this high downside, as well as the cartoonish upside, handing you a more modest - but dependable - degree of success instead.

Remember, just like you're getting a head start in the conventional path in the time you put in it, there are people getting head starts in the unconventional path as well - things like cutting impossible deals, talking their ways into meetings with big shots they're nowhere near the level of meeting socially or professionally yet, failing repeatedly on endeavors and taking all the lessons there are away from these before the conventional path person has ever taken his first baby steps into the arena, etc.

It IS possible to take the more secure, conventional path, learn some vital stuff, then break away and get crazy success, though the conventional path is far more suited to the slow climb to success in a given field rather than the breakaway success of a maverick and rogue. There are just a lot of traits the mavericks and rogues spend years and years developing that essentially require you to be outside the conventional ecosystem because those traits only work when you're a nomad or the top dog, and will make you strain and break the machine if you're a mere gear within it.

I don't have numbers on it, but I'd BET that the TOTAL success seen by each group is roughly equivalent - the Everymen simply have it spread more evenly among them, while the mavericks have most of the success gathered into the hands of a few breakaways, with the majority of them failures or former mavericks who retreated back to stability of the conventional path.

On average, assuming stability is the main concern (as it probably is for most people), you're better off taking the conventional path for reasons of stability - you've built up a base you can always come back to, and are assured at least modest success in life (without COMPLETELY ruling out outlandish success at some future date), an assurance the maverick never gets.

Chase

The M's picture

Thanks for the reply, Chase! Very interesting - I never thought about the different skills that an unconventional life would require. I like stable success, but within the conventional path I've always had maverick tendencies, and they've brought me great success in ways that I wouldn't have had otherwise. So I think it's always good to have elements of both.

Either way, fundamentals like charisma, warmth, body language, etc. are very helpful, so it's good to spend time on those for life stuff, too. :)

Best,
The M

Anonymous's picture

Chase i read one of your articles on spazzatura and the law of least effort, and you had these catagories. Jester, Peasant, King, and Unknown. I would love to know more on having a king type mentality. Maybe you could do an article about it? Or elaborate in response to my comment?

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Anon-

Well, becoming the "King" on the sprezzatura chart is what this entire website is geared toward helping you to do! For some of the broader overview articles on what this looks like, though, I'd recommend the following:

Eric Reeves's article on becoming more efficient also paints a good portrait on the process of transitioning into the "King" role:

Chase

Balla's picture

Chase, there's very cute girl I've seen a few times at my job, which is a supermarket. I read your store pick up article and I was thinking of just opening with, I think you're cute, are you single, or Ill tell her ill be honest with her and tell her I think shes cute and I want to get to know her, then right after that ill introduce myself get the number and leave. I just feel its too fast and she might be overwhelmed, but I remember you saying no to conversations that are long.

Tell me how that sounds?

I also would like to know what would you do if you worked at a supermarket and saw a cute girl? How would you approach her?
Could you give me a brief conversation example of your interaction, just so I can get an idea?

So the overview is this,

1. How does the stuff I said ill say to the girl sound?

2. Can you please give me a scenario of what chase amante would do if he were in my shoes, and worked at a supermarket then spotted a cute girl he wanted to approach how would he do it?

3. Can you please give me a brief conversation example of what you would say, so I can have an idea?

4. I passed by the girl, and we were very far from each other, then I turned around to look at her, and as soon as I looked are eyes locked for a second before we entered are aisles, thing is she was already looking at me before I looked at her, as soon as I looked at her, her eyes were right on me, no head turn or anything.

I just wanted to know was this a sign to approach? Might sound dumb, but I read your comment on how what a beginner thinks is obvious interest, isn't.

Was her looking at me first from far away show an obvious sign of attraction?

5. I didn't go to her because I thought I'd be chasing, tell me if I should of just did it anyway?

6. Last question, I can approach, but can't be direct, im so nervous about customers thinking im hitting on them and taking it the wrong way so I don't get to the juicy questions, ill approach with light convo, just cant pull tbe trigger.

How can I grab my balls and stop worrying so much about these negative outcomes? What do I have to think to just approach for dates and stop being so nervous?

Thanks Chase, I respect you so much man.

Author
Chase Amante's picture

Balla-

To be honest, if I worked at a supermarket, unless I really didn't care about the job or could easily get another one / better one, I probably wouldn't approach, just because I don't like creating potentially messy situations at work.

That said, if it was some temporary job and I was going to be out of there soon and I was otherwise very respected at work so not too worried about the odd girl here or there complaining to management that one of the clerks was hitting on her and it made her feel uncomfortable, OR she was just about the most beautiful women I'd seen all year and I was going to approach no matter what the consequences, I'd go about it by:

  1. Finding an excuse to stock some items near where she was

  2. Then, make a witty comment or two about something in her basket or that she was looking at

  3. If that received a warm reception, I'd give her a compliment: "You have really pretty eyes" "Your hair is really quite beautiful" "You have a really well put-together sense of style there"

  4. After that, she's either going to give you an awkward / polite "Oh - uh, thanks!" in which case, you back off, because she's not interested, or she's going to be flattered and warm, in which case you continue

  5. Banter with her for a few minutes, and really warm her up

  6. If it's going well, tell her you can't spend too much time chatting and don't want to milk the company clock, but the two of you should grab food sometime when you're not wearing an apron - if she says yes, trade phone numbers; if she says no, tell her, "Yeah, I guess you've got all the food you need right here, huh?"

  7. To exit tell her something witty like, "Well, I've gotta go stock the baby food aisle, this town's had a lot of really hungry babies the past couple of weeks"

That's how I'd do it if I was going to do it. There are going to be some women who'll simply be turned off because you're a low status grocery store clerk, but some women won't care, so long as that animal attraction is there. The only way you clear away the former and find the latter is by making a little small talk and throwing out progressively less subtle pings and seeing how each girls responds.

Chase

Yink's picture

Hi Chase,great article.However there is a topic that you haven't laid much emphasis on which is "Precedent".You always talk about it but I don't really understand it.I would like you to write an article in order to broaden mine and other guys perspective on it.Thanks.

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