Threats and Opportunities: The Difference These Make in Seduction

Hey Anon,

Right - the toughest part of the process is simply being more aware of the thoughts and emotions running through your head. Once you're aware of what's going on in there, you can properly attack it, instead of being slowed down or stopped by it.

Best way to do that any time you have something you want to do or think you ought to do but you're hesitating doing is to ask yourself, "What emotion am I feeling right now?" That gets your mental gears turning in the right direction and puts you on the path to solving the problem.

Cheers,
Chase

Howdy Student,

Getting asked for your phone is one of those things there's not much way around, you've pretty much just got to put your foot down. The first couple times you get asked this, just stare at the girl like she's said the most ridiculous thing in the world, and hold eye contact until she breaks it. If she keeps asking, eventually just laugh and say, while laughing, "You are NOT going to look through my phone." When she asks why, you can continue laughing and say, "Because you are NOT." It's important that she understands this is a ridiculous request (hence the laughing), rather than a scary request (if you were serious / uncomfortable).

If she continues to press, that's when you put your foot down hard, look her hard in the eye, and say, "Look - nobody looks through my stuff. Not my parents, not my best friend, not any of my other friends, not you. I don't go through other people's stuff, and other people don't go through my stuff, and that's just the way it is, case closed."

Colt's off on vacation in Thailand, living the good life; haven't heard from him since he sent the last article, so I suspect that means he's having a great time. Anyway, he was pretty excited about the series; I'm sure he'll get back sometime soon with a few more updates for it.

As far as Tactics Tuesdays, I decommissioned it for now, but it's not out of the question that you may see it again in some form or another in early 2013.

Cheers,
Chase

Howdy Jester,

That's another one of those where you've got to shut up the mind loops by just deciding and going, "Well, here goes anyway," and just getting to it.

One of the biggest things happening here - probably something that deserves its own article outright - is simply making a decision. Most people spend all their time deliberating and not acting. Learning how to decide quickly and decisively is a much-underrated skill, necessary for clearing a lot of headaches and hassles that are going to drag out over a long period of time out of your way. Decide to do it, then do it.

I'll do an article on that, maybe next week, but for now think of it this way: the instant the two voices start deliberating, force yourself to immediately decide: it's either YES or NO, and if it's YES you're going right NOW. That shuts up the mental dialogue pretty quick.

Chase

Hey TMP,

I've been out of the scene for a while, but if you look at how a lot of guys make it into the industry is by blowing up on mixtapes. 50 Cent's a mixtape success story - after Power of the Dollar fell through, he went back and stayed with mixtapes until "Wanksta" started blowing up in New York, and Aftermath picked him up. For every guy who gets big on mixtapes though, plenty more get noticed and even signed but never amount to much... e.g., Stat Quo, Saigon, Lil' Flip, etc. Getting a hit single out that really takes off is another good way - B.I.G. got "Party & Bullshit" on the soundtrack for Who's the Man?, and pretty soon he was hanging out with Puff Daddy and Tupac and well on his way to becoming a rap legend.

A lot of it's location - being in the right areas and around the right people. So many guys have come out of New York that you know that scene's churning out rap talent by the boatload. If you want to make it, it's probably best to get up to NYC and get in the community where all the real rap's coming out of, to get tested and trained and eventually build up a following and strong supporters.

Other than that... start a website, put out tons of great tracks, and get on technology - e.g., iTurnes, YouTube, etc. Make it easy for people to find you and listen and buy, and if your stuff is good, they'll tell your friends.

Cheers,
Chase

Stef,

Glad you like the post, and absolutely - viewing things as a challenge is a great way of turning them into opportunities to be capitalized upon. Can really get you motivated to test your own limits (and running's a good place for doing that, too).

Cheers,
Chase

Howdy Vaughn,

Are these girls you're seeing repeatedly? If they're girls you're taking out on multiple dates, this is fairly natural... a guy who's going to take her out more than once is auditioning for the boyfriend role (whether he likes it or not!), and the more often he takes her out, the higher the expectations become that he will fulfill the expectations of the role, and the more pressure women will begin placing on him to do so.

When you're getting called "cheap," it's an indication you're clearly in a dating / courting frame. e.g., you're not hanging out with her because you're just two people hanging out; you're out with her because it's a Date, and it's Legit. So now you're under close examination to see if you perform your role as expected (be gentlemanly, pay for things, etc.) and she'll perform her role as expected (be coy, let you chase, act like a good girl, etc.).

Best alternative is to stop giving girls indications that dates are dates, and instead make them just you and the girl hanging out and relaxing together. Then when you start getting "pay pressure," you can simply say, "Whoa, what's this? Are we boyfriend-girlfriend? I'm pretty sure I didn't miss any steps along the way..." and then just tease her on it; when she asks again, you can say, "Okay, so if I buy you a soda, what's that get me with you?" and then laugh it off.

She'll get the hint pretty quick: NOT boyfriend material.

Chase

Hi Jon,

Pleased you liked the post!

You've got two options for handling rejection well:

1. Throw it back to her and walk away

2. Persist

If you do #1, that's where you're effectively throwing the towel in, but in a graceful way. This is with a girl you don't care much about / you can tell isn't really interested in, and you just don't want to put the work in to try and force something through. In this case, when she says, "Maybe next semester?" you'd just say, "Well, that's a long way off... I'll have half-forgotten by then! I'll tell you what, drop me a line when we get back next semester and we can set something up. Cool?"

Surprisingly, when you do this well, you'll actually get a fair number of girls who DO follow up, though they're usually coming at it from a "hey, let's be friends!" angle and you've got to negotiate the terms of the date fairly hard to get them investing and change the tone of things. You should expect not to hear back from her though... do this one when your emotion is, "Hey, if SHE wants to do the work to set this up later, great; otherwise, I'm not going to worry about it."

If you do #2, that's where you refuse to take "no" for an answer because next semester is USELESS to you and if something's going to happen you know it's got to be now. So she says, "Maybe next semester?" and you laugh and say, "Hey, how about I just call you when you're 70 and we can go out for a wheel through the park. No, next semester is useless; that's never happening. When are you free during finals week? I know you're not studying dawn til dusk." Be laughing as you do this, so she realizes how ridiculous her, "Maybe next semester?" counterproposal sounds and that you're not taking it seriously.

Either one of those works well for responding to polite brush offs like this - and you can often translate these into actual dates (although you've got some ground to gain back... these dates won't be a walk in the park!).

Cheers,
Chase

Hey Balla,

That's a pretty interesting question, I haven't heard that before. Didn't know anything about Jordan or Pippen or Rodman's late / fortuitous growth spurts, and that does seem a little unusual. Could be them tapping into their brains (your growth is controlled in part by the pituitary gland in your brain) the way Tibetan monks (and Wim Hof, for that matter) access their hypothalamuses via tummo to raise their body temperatures significantly and survive virtually unclothed for long periods of time in extremes that kill an untrained man in a parka.

Or could also just be confirmation bias; e.g., you hear about the legends who had late growth spurts, but you don't hear about the guy bagging groceries at the local supermarket who did, or the guy sitting in a cubicle at an accounting firm who did either (and you don't hear about all the basketball players willing themselves to grow taller who don't).

Anyway, it's hard to say, although I do personally have some natural tendency to believe in a strong enough belief and will bringing above-average results into the world... of course, that may be just magical thinking on my part though - nothing but superstition. But it's a useful superstition - most of the giants of industry, the arts, governance, and everything else were guilty of possessing that one, so whether it's real, or whether it's simply a thought artifact that arms you with the sheer confidence and stubbornness and willpower to MAKE things real, it may not really matter.

Chase