Thanks. I did hear about some of those books, but I am VERY wary of a lot of things that have a PUA feel to them, since the PUA stuff has been the biggest problem to me in my social development (as I noted) and I am very hesitant to return to any such material as long as I know they might carry that label. I did read The Charisma Myth (and I need too look at it back again), but I will look them up. Models kinda has that trigger to me right now. But it could be that I am confusing it for something else since I did hear it.
you did mention Inner Game of Tennis, but I assume that you are the one who replaced ‘flirting’ with it, and it can work. I am not a 100% beginner, and like I said, there’s been some very strange things happening to me lately, and they’re kinda on the good side… but I can’t be sure yet. Seeing your results in finding sex on tinder is encouraging, but my experience with Tinder has been very discouraging. I went on Tinder from May to November 2015 and I only got one date, one other girl to date, and after I turned 32 in October, despite expanding my demographic to include everyone from 18 to 35, I got ZERO matches despite hundreds of swipes. It was almost like I had expired after 32. But seeing you get what you wanted after just a few months was good… but for me, due to a plethora of other factors (I was stalked and cyberbullied by many PUAs online and they even harassed my family for months. One guy was actively trying to get on my facebook page for 4 YEARS after the fact) due to my panic factor probably being far, far, far higher than others and my sheer insecurity at being an early something wanting a younger girlfriend. I hope that this time it doesn’t take me 18 months to find a girlfriend or go on dates. I was mostly doing ‘day game’ and ‘night game’ which was never the thing for me and the absolute worst crap I ever did. Also I had a tremendous amount of stress at my old job when my emotional state became apparent and they just tried to fire me immediately when I mentioned I was having dating issues and my whole issues with sex. People didn’t talk much about sex at the job, but when they did they mentioned dicer stuff than that… but apparently I struck a nerve and everyone thought I was a predator and needed to be gotten rid of immediately. They spent nearly 3 years trying to firing me and the stress from all that was physically killing me like cancer.
Fun fact: It was only when the stress got so bad that upon my Union representive’s recommendation that I go on a sick leave was when I was finally relaxed enough and… yeah, that’s when the one girl I met said yes and we went dating. She was 19 and I was 33, but you’d think I would be the more mature one but… nope. She was in full control of absolutely everything. In fact she was kinda surprised how I managed to reach my age and maintain a positive disposition towards people after a lifetime of suffering from incredible abuse, as she would have expected me to be an intensely closed-off person if I was ‘normal’ under the circumstances. I wanna make it clear that this girl did more for me in the few months we dated than anyone else in my life did in decades, and I will never forget her and I will never say that I don’t feel anything towards her anymore, because she is that good. This is considering when I was 25 I lost my virginity to a 31 year old… virgin girl, and that experience was one of the most shattering and destructive experiences I had in my life. Even one of the PUAs I spoke to (the type of guy who I legit believed really did bang over a 100 girls before the age of 24) said that if he had an experience like that now, he would give up on women and becoming a monk. That experience is also one reason why I am kinda hesitant to date someone older than me even though it was probably that she was a one-off and not all girls older than me are like that.
I am mildly apprehensive about online stuff, but at the same time I do want to try. While before I was focused principally on younger girls, and while I am going to be expanding my horizons and putting my age range from 25-45, I don’t want to be left out by any group. I had a lot of problems in my life and I felt robbed and left out of so much time for a million reasons that I just feel like any group that puts in an age limit is a personal affront to me, even if it isn’t that.
My current job is also highly supportive and I am going to get my sex therapist through it. I don’t talk about dating on the job, but I have a feeling that if I did bring up the topic to my boss, he would be OK with it. So I know I won’t be under ANY stress from my job, and that stress along with other stuff in my life previously is what was the biggest hinderance in finding a date/girlfriend.
I think you do kind of need to get over resistance to engaging with some PUA material. The reality is, male sexuality is demonized in mainstream society, and so any frank discussion of how to improve your dating life as a man gets pushed underground. It’s like buying drugs - there are lots of people in the drug world who are honest and reasonable, and just want to help others have a good time and make some money. But because their product is illegal, they are always going to be mixed in with seedy crooks. So try to think of “PUA” stuff as more of an ecosystem than a monolith. There are some people giving really terrible advice. Some people who have some good tips mixed in with their toxic bullshit. And a few people, often hidden, who have a lot of really good, solid advice that can help you.
Manson was a PUA. He blogged for several years about men’s dating advice, refining his ideas until he published Models. The latest edition is the most polished, and gives an excellent and fairly obvious framework for becoming a more datable person. If you read the forward to this edition, it is fairly obvious that his ideas evolved somewhat between the first edition and the second. The impression I get is that he wanted to rewrite several parts to emphasize the idea that becoming more dateable is about becoming more emotionally open and becoming a better person. But also the impression I get is that he simply removed some of his more controversial statements and coded others, because he was trying to sanitize his past for his move into mainstream writing for the upcoming publication of his next book. If you are hesitant to engage with his content because of his PUA history, I recommend reading a book called “Confessions of a Pickup Artist Chaser”, which was written by a female feminist, kink-friendly, rationalist-adjacent blogger. Her blog and the comments on it were also a very good read on the intersection between kink, feminism, and pickup - but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to exist anymore, and it looks like it was taken down from the wayback machine.
Anyway - you should read Models. Manson is a smart guy, and the title is a clever joke. It is meant to draw in the typical guy who would normally take PUA advice - the kind of guy who wants to fuck models - but then the book quickly explains what the title actually means. It is about creating mental models of what it means to be an appealing and dateable man. The book is, in large part, a response to the toxic pickup culture that Manson was a part of, and his attempt to create an alternative that is less toxic.
Tinder can be frustrating because you put in all your effort up front. Being successful on Tinder is all about having good pictures, and it can be a lot of time and effort to get good pictures. Like I said, my success on Tinder was a few months of direct effort, but 15 years of indirect effort. The indirect effort was all about cultivating a good lifestyle where I was physically healthy, had overcome some of my social insecurities, and was doing cool things I actually cared about. The direct effort was getting a haircut, putting on some nicer clothes, and shooting photos where I looked like a cool, confident dude who would be a good fuck. I can send you the guide I followed. Again, the author had a history in the PUA/red pill space, but has since renounced most of that.
So, there are 4 major arenas of dating that we talk about in men’s dating advice. Daygame/cold approach, night game, online, and social circle.
In my opinion, the PUA advice emphasizes CA and NG too much, when most guys have the most success in OLD and SC. I think this is because CA and NG are harder, and so guys like to talk about how successful they are at them to prove what hot stuff they are. If you don’t have much experience, you should make things as easy as possible so you can get experience.
In OLD, you know that every girl you message or swipe on is looking to date - that’s why they are there - so you are absolved of any feeling that asking a girl out or flirting would be inappropriate. If you get a rejection - even a harsh rejection - it is usually just through text so it stings less. And if you have a good profile, it is easy to set up multiple dates each week, so you can get a ton of experience really quickly.
Social circle is where you meet girls via mutual friends or in clubs or hobbies. In social circle, you benefit a lot from already being a known entity - a girl you meet already knows other people trust you, so she is more likely to trust you, and therefore be open to your advances. Plus, you tend to be more confident around your friends, or while you are doing something you enjoy and are good at - and confidence is sexy.
DG/CA and NG have their place, imo. First, they are good if you just want to make a hobby of chasing girls. If you just find you really enjoy walking up to strangers and introducing yourself, then go ahead and do it. Also, if you really want to date/have sex with the hottest, coolest women, then you will need to do pursue these avenues. First of all, because these women already have tons of suitors online and very booked out social lives, so if you don’t introduce yourself when you randomly see them you will never get the chance otherwise. And second, because walking up to a stranger and straight up asking if they are interested in you takes some balls, ie, confidence. And, again, confidence is attractive. Getting good at these avenues can also be good because then you are open to opportunities which arise even if you don’t specifically spend time pursuing them. For example, if you are spending time in a nightclub or a coffee shop just as part of your day to day life, and then you see a cute girl you are interested in, having DG/NG skills lets you confidently make a move on her rather than nervously glancing at her until you or she leaves and you think of what could have been. But finally, really the most important reason for most guys to do CA/NG is simply to overcome social anxiety and gain confidence - but this is for guys who are somewhat experienced already, who want to take their dating to the next level.
In general, I would recommend not talking about your dating life at work, at least until you are more experienced. It can be dangerous for your employment status, as you already know. Keep your conversations about dating to close friends who you can trust.
Thanks. I did hear about some of those books, but I am VERY wary of a lot of things that have a PUA feel to them, since the PUA stuff has been the biggest problem to me in my social development (as I noted) and I am very hesitant to return to any such material as long as I know they might carry that label. I did read The Charisma Myth (and I need too look at it back again), but I will look them up. Models kinda has that trigger to me right now. But it could be that I am confusing it for something else since I did hear it.
you did mention Inner Game of Tennis, but I assume that you are the one who replaced ‘flirting’ with it, and it can work. I am not a 100% beginner, and like I said, there’s been some very strange things happening to me lately, and they’re kinda on the good side… but I can’t be sure yet. Seeing your results in finding sex on tinder is encouraging, but my experience with Tinder has been very discouraging. I went on Tinder from May to November 2015 and I only got one date, one other girl to date, and after I turned 32 in October, despite expanding my demographic to include everyone from 18 to 35, I got ZERO matches despite hundreds of swipes. It was almost like I had expired after 32. But seeing you get what you wanted after just a few months was good… but for me, due to a plethora of other factors (I was stalked and cyberbullied by many PUAs online and they even harassed my family for months. One guy was actively trying to get on my facebook page for 4 YEARS after the fact) due to my panic factor probably being far, far, far higher than others and my sheer insecurity at being an early something wanting a younger girlfriend. I hope that this time it doesn’t take me 18 months to find a girlfriend or go on dates. I was mostly doing ‘day game’ and ‘night game’ which was never the thing for me and the absolute worst crap I ever did. Also I had a tremendous amount of stress at my old job when my emotional state became apparent and they just tried to fire me immediately when I mentioned I was having dating issues and my whole issues with sex. People didn’t talk much about sex at the job, but when they did they mentioned dicer stuff than that… but apparently I struck a nerve and everyone thought I was a predator and needed to be gotten rid of immediately. They spent nearly 3 years trying to firing me and the stress from all that was physically killing me like cancer.
Fun fact: It was only when the stress got so bad that upon my Union representive’s recommendation that I go on a sick leave was when I was finally relaxed enough and… yeah, that’s when the one girl I met said yes and we went dating. She was 19 and I was 33, but you’d think I would be the more mature one but… nope. She was in full control of absolutely everything. In fact she was kinda surprised how I managed to reach my age and maintain a positive disposition towards people after a lifetime of suffering from incredible abuse, as she would have expected me to be an intensely closed-off person if I was ‘normal’ under the circumstances. I wanna make it clear that this girl did more for me in the few months we dated than anyone else in my life did in decades, and I will never forget her and I will never say that I don’t feel anything towards her anymore, because she is that good. This is considering when I was 25 I lost my virginity to a 31 year old… virgin girl, and that experience was one of the most shattering and destructive experiences I had in my life. Even one of the PUAs I spoke to (the type of guy who I legit believed really did bang over a 100 girls before the age of 24) said that if he had an experience like that now, he would give up on women and becoming a monk. That experience is also one reason why I am kinda hesitant to date someone older than me even though it was probably that she was a one-off and not all girls older than me are like that.
I am mildly apprehensive about online stuff, but at the same time I do want to try. While before I was focused principally on younger girls, and while I am going to be expanding my horizons and putting my age range from 25-45, I don’t want to be left out by any group. I had a lot of problems in my life and I felt robbed and left out of so much time for a million reasons that I just feel like any group that puts in an age limit is a personal affront to me, even if it isn’t that.
My current job is also highly supportive and I am going to get my sex therapist through it. I don’t talk about dating on the job, but I have a feeling that if I did bring up the topic to my boss, he would be OK with it. So I know I won’t be under ANY stress from my job, and that stress along with other stuff in my life previously is what was the biggest hinderance in finding a date/girlfriend.
I think you do kind of need to get over resistance to engaging with some PUA material. The reality is, male sexuality is demonized in mainstream society, and so any frank discussion of how to improve your dating life as a man gets pushed underground. It’s like buying drugs - there are lots of people in the drug world who are honest and reasonable, and just want to help others have a good time and make some money. But because their product is illegal, they are always going to be mixed in with seedy crooks. So try to think of “PUA” stuff as more of an ecosystem than a monolith. There are some people giving really terrible advice. Some people who have some good tips mixed in with their toxic bullshit. And a few people, often hidden, who have a lot of really good, solid advice that can help you.
Manson was a PUA. He blogged for several years about men’s dating advice, refining his ideas until he published Models. The latest edition is the most polished, and gives an excellent and fairly obvious framework for becoming a more datable person. If you read the forward to this edition, it is fairly obvious that his ideas evolved somewhat between the first edition and the second. The impression I get is that he wanted to rewrite several parts to emphasize the idea that becoming more dateable is about becoming more emotionally open and becoming a better person. But also the impression I get is that he simply removed some of his more controversial statements and coded others, because he was trying to sanitize his past for his move into mainstream writing for the upcoming publication of his next book. If you are hesitant to engage with his content because of his PUA history, I recommend reading a book called “Confessions of a Pickup Artist Chaser”, which was written by a female feminist, kink-friendly, rationalist-adjacent blogger. Her blog and the comments on it were also a very good read on the intersection between kink, feminism, and pickup - but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to exist anymore, and it looks like it was taken down from the wayback machine.
Anyway - you should read Models. Manson is a smart guy, and the title is a clever joke. It is meant to draw in the typical guy who would normally take PUA advice - the kind of guy who wants to fuck models - but then the book quickly explains what the title actually means. It is about creating mental models of what it means to be an appealing and dateable man. The book is, in large part, a response to the toxic pickup culture that Manson was a part of, and his attempt to create an alternative that is less toxic.
Tinder can be frustrating because you put in all your effort up front. Being successful on Tinder is all about having good pictures, and it can be a lot of time and effort to get good pictures. Like I said, my success on Tinder was a few months of direct effort, but 15 years of indirect effort. The indirect effort was all about cultivating a good lifestyle where I was physically healthy, had overcome some of my social insecurities, and was doing cool things I actually cared about. The direct effort was getting a haircut, putting on some nicer clothes, and shooting photos where I looked like a cool, confident dude who would be a good fuck. I can send you the guide I followed. Again, the author had a history in the PUA/red pill space, but has since renounced most of that.
So, there are 4 major arenas of dating that we talk about in men’s dating advice. Daygame/cold approach, night game, online, and social circle.
In my opinion, the PUA advice emphasizes CA and NG too much, when most guys have the most success in OLD and SC. I think this is because CA and NG are harder, and so guys like to talk about how successful they are at them to prove what hot stuff they are. If you don’t have much experience, you should make things as easy as possible so you can get experience.
In OLD, you know that every girl you message or swipe on is looking to date - that’s why they are there - so you are absolved of any feeling that asking a girl out or flirting would be inappropriate. If you get a rejection - even a harsh rejection - it is usually just through text so it stings less. And if you have a good profile, it is easy to set up multiple dates each week, so you can get a ton of experience really quickly.
Social circle is where you meet girls via mutual friends or in clubs or hobbies. In social circle, you benefit a lot from already being a known entity - a girl you meet already knows other people trust you, so she is more likely to trust you, and therefore be open to your advances. Plus, you tend to be more confident around your friends, or while you are doing something you enjoy and are good at - and confidence is sexy.
DG/CA and NG have their place, imo. First, they are good if you just want to make a hobby of chasing girls. If you just find you really enjoy walking up to strangers and introducing yourself, then go ahead and do it. Also, if you really want to date/have sex with the hottest, coolest women, then you will need to do pursue these avenues. First of all, because these women already have tons of suitors online and very booked out social lives, so if you don’t introduce yourself when you randomly see them you will never get the chance otherwise. And second, because walking up to a stranger and straight up asking if they are interested in you takes some balls, ie, confidence. And, again, confidence is attractive. Getting good at these avenues can also be good because then you are open to opportunities which arise even if you don’t specifically spend time pursuing them. For example, if you are spending time in a nightclub or a coffee shop just as part of your day to day life, and then you see a cute girl you are interested in, having DG/NG skills lets you confidently make a move on her rather than nervously glancing at her until you or she leaves and you think of what could have been. But finally, really the most important reason for most guys to do CA/NG is simply to overcome social anxiety and gain confidence - but this is for guys who are somewhat experienced already, who want to take their dating to the next level.
In general, I would recommend not talking about your dating life at work, at least until you are more experienced. It can be dangerous for your employment status, as you already know. Keep your conversations about dating to close friends who you can trust.