An aspect of your demeanor that you've corrected

[Dash of Englishness]

What's an aspect about yourself that you've managed to become aware of and get under control? Whether it be a habit, a mannerism, or a trait to your personality. We know what other peoples' are but we'd never tell them, in spite of how much it would help them get on in life.

I would prefer (though I can't dictate the thread) that if people were going to give their own examples, that they aren't vague. A vague example would be "as I've gotten older I've stopped giving a sh1t what other people think of me" or "as I've older I've manager to get over the fear of failure". I prefer nuances. If it's not a specific example then we'll have heard before. A vague example might give someone a spike in emotions when reading, but it's less likely to be the thing that someone will remember in the moment when needed. Here are my examples listed out... random and unrelated as they may seem to be!

1. One thing I've learned is that if I ever make a good joke, and happen to be interrupted at that exact point in time, that it might be best to just leave it go rather than trying to repeat it. If there was a bang made by cutlery (or whatever) at the exact time you made the joke, then you can't be sure whether or not someone failed to hear, or pretended not to hear, but it's best to just let it go and put it down to unluckiness. Someone can look desperate when they repeat their quip.
2. It happens to me rarely, that when I hear someone say something that is flat out unfair/cruel or incorrect, I won't say anything. This is because I sometimes feel like what I say has to be the perfect zinger, or else that it's not worth saying. I'm in fact quite good at having the perfect zinger, so I'm often left confused when I can't think of something good. In such a case, I may sense that any comment I make might be rubbished away anyway so what's the point? And I then afterwards find myself thinking "how come I didn't say anything?". I think it's best to speak with whatever's on your mind.... even if all you have is something weak or boring like "hey that's not nice". Yes someone who's in the middle of their stride could easily handle or mock such a remark, but never-the-less! There's a good chance someone else who's staying silent will admire it of you.
3. When I was younger in college I used to ask questions in class thinking "this sounds like an intelligent question, I'll ask it". Where as now I'm more inclined to ask myself thinks like "do I really want to know anyway?", "am I just slowing things down?", "am I being a suck up to the lecturer?", "am I just showing off my knowledge?", or "what do I really expect the answer to be?". I'm now more able to ask myself if maybe there's a good reason the teacher didn't venture into the area of such a question in the first place. Or maybe it was something that I thought was relevant when I first thought of the question, but now doesn't seem so much so at a later stage when I get the chance to ask it.
4. I'm a very directional person. Often I notice that when explaining something to someone that I might point in the direction of something of where something happened. It can be hard for me to realise that they don't necessarily know (or need to know) the location of the incident that I'm talking about. They just need to know what happened. But I do it without thinking. It mightn't be me pointing. It just might be me tilting my head. Another similar thing to this is that often when talking to someone, in knowing what I'm about to say next I can sometimes start giving the associated gesture slightly ahead of time.
5. The ability to turn from being nice to being firm very quickly. Or at least that's what I'm trying. Often when you're in the head space of being nice, you can continue being nice towards someone who was unexpectedly rude. In that sort of moment it takes a while for me to adjust. For example, the other day this work colleague of mine returned to the office with three cans of coke. I was pretty sure one of them was for me, and was dreading it. He gave the first can to my other colleague. There was just me and an electrician left for the remaining can. The electrician wasn't really one of us and would only be in and out of the room, so I was pretty sure it wasn't for him. Anyway, standing on the other side of my monitor, the dude hands the coke to me. I say "oh, no thanks; I wouldn't drink coke". He says "you don't drink coke?" acting all surprised. Still playing nice I say "no no... I appreciate the thought though". He still keeps his hand held out, putting pressure on me, but before he even gets the chance to look at me like I've two heads, I firmly say "now take it away from me" in a lower register. I did feel a bit mean doing that! He then turns to the electrician and says "John, will you have a coke?" which was basically his way of saying "come on John, lets show this guy what a rigid twat he is". John also turned down the can of coke! Now the coke dude didn't take it too badly... he joked at us saying something like "well how ungrateful". Now if that electrician had taken the coke, then the moral of the story - in the mind of the coke guy - would have been very different to mine. He would have thought that he'd just thought me a lesson. He'd have been wrong, but it still would've made me feel awkward in the silence afterwards.
6. I had to ask myself, have I ever had my head down like in the below image, during a discussion? and yes I think I might have - https://postimg.cc/LqMq5HLs - You can see that Jordan Peterson puts his head way down in the middle of discussion as he gathers his thoughts while being unaware of how bad it looks. He then continues talking with the head down which could look slightly autistic... he should be sitting up straight. I can understand why he does this gesture due to the pressure being put on him from the opposition at that point in time in the debate. This is an aspect about myself that I will need to be aware of myself. You can see this in various parts of the below video such as 8:20. I have also noticed that if I'm about to say something that'll disappoint someone, I'll bow my head slightly! ........................................................................................... youtube.com/watch?v=fAAMuH5908E&feature=emb_title
7. Or often if I bump into someone I might find that they'll talk crap for three minutes, and then just as you decide to go, only then do they bring up the one thing you're actually interested in. And later on you're left scratching your head wondering "how did I end up talking to that twat for so long when I promised I wouldn't after last time?"! I've also adapted the habit of sometimes saying my last words of conversation as I walk off. Here is a beautiful example of what I'm talking about at the 4:00 mark:
8. Sometimes when making small talk with a person, and there's that moment when there's nothing to say, I find it hard to say something typical. Like last week for example, there was a new guy on the job. I was talking to him and all I could think to say was "how are you finding it?". I thought to myself he's probably sick of being asked that question, and secondly he's not going to answer honestly anyway. But if I feel I can't say that, then what's left to say? Nothing! And it can be worse to just leave an awkward silence.
9. Being up front about the true nature of a call, text, or visit is something I've got better at. Sometimes if I wanted to say two matters, I'd try and act as if one of those matters was the main reason for contact, and put the real issue second to that... as if to act like I just happened to think of it at that moment. It probably seemed more obvious than I thought! As a result, the matter that I really wanted a response about would either go unnoticed, or be selectively ignored... leaving the onus on me to re-ask it!
10. Pointing the finger at others when you weren't the one who made the mistake is something I kind of gave up on doing. I remember once in training at a company I worked in we were told never to do a particular task on our own. It was our last day of training the supervisor wasn't yet present and we pretty much knew what we were doing anyway. My colleague said "should we start without him?". I said "gee I don't know". He started anyway. A few minutes later the supervisor walked in... he could just as easily have been pleased at us taking the initiative, but he instead gave a light giving to us about how we should never start that without him as we'd already been told. I felt compelled to point the finger at my colleague at the time. Having thought about it, I'd now know not to this now... because I know that the trainer would somehow know which one of us it was. They'll nearly always know. So given that they do, you could actually take the blame and show how you're willing to be the bigger person!
11. Another thing I have realised about myself is what it actually looks like to other people when I have a confused look on my face. Whenever I looked at myself in the mirror over the years I of course wouldn't have had this look... and therefore never questioned it. I often hesitate to ask a question when I'm confused, or I might pretend to understand something that I don't. That's what we all do if we've made the mistake of not listening. So now that I have seen what the facial expression looks like on me, it made me realise that the other person might actually realise that I'm pretending to understand something I don't. Now If that other person were a bully they would probably get a sense of ownership out seeing my hesitation and confusion on your face. But I definitely reckon it's sort of like the look that would leave a bully thinking "I could mess around with this guy so easily". I'll be weary of when I'm showing this expression in future.
12. Making sure that I don't get caught looking at people. I like to look... particularly at pretty girls. It's a lot easier to get caught looking than what you'd think. It's amazing how quickly someone's head can turn around, and you never know when their going to do it. And even if you're fast enough to move your eyes away, they'll still see that your head was pointed towards them. I've often thought that someone is too preoccupied to notice that I'm having a look at them, and have been wrong. I've had a few times when I was caught looking at people, and I've told myself that it'll never happen again. It's not that you can't look at people... it's that you have to glance. I love to have a good look though, but unfortunately it's not worth the risk. Other times you might be just staring into thin air and next thing they look back at you and think that you were looking at them and it's a bit awkward. If you do get caught though, it's best to look away slowly rather than straight away... the latter shows guilt. I've had times where I've looked away by looking down. This looks submissive.
13. Another thing I've learned is that anytime you unexpectedly win an argument with someone who you feel is more dominant than you, you need to be careful afterwards. You need to think ahead after such an experience. It always reminds me of the last scene in 'Malice' for anyone who remembers... where Alec Baldwin's character gets shot after winning an argument. He looked like he'd everything under control until then.
14. When dealing with 'superiors' at work I have had a few times where I felt that I couldn't point out their wrong doing when they were in front of other managers. I'd go away thinking "oh I would've but I couldn't really get into that in front of the other person". Sometimes the tactful way of phrasing something won't come to mind in such a moment, so it's a question of whether you're willing blunt or say nothing. If I've no choice but to do the dirty laundry out in public then I will. Recently a manager (who's a bit of a tyrant) and myself were trying to organise something and at some point he'd asked me to ring him morning about one of the issues. The next day as I entered work, he shouts out "Joe, you never rang me" even though the call wasn't answered! Now if I were younger I would've just said "I did" and gave the guy the chance to deflect from the subject when he realised he was wrong. But this time I said "never say that to someone without checking your own phone log first". He said "what?" basically meaning 'how dare you!', which I ignored as I got out out my phone and told him to get out his. He obviously didn't get out his, but then I showed him the unanswered call I'd made that morning. Luckily for me the other manager present was laughing! It's no harm to make them realise that they've only so much power.
15. Being able to walk away from someone is a trait I've developed. You've got to value your own time and not worry too much about whether you seem rude. It's a beautiful thing to be able to do. Before I always used to hang around feeling as if there's something else left to say at the back of my mind... which there can be., but sometimes it's still best to just leave. Yes, there's always the chance that they'll call you back just as you decide to go... which could possibly be a way of figuring out how much power they have over you if you stop and come back! If I don't have the nerve to continue walking away from them I'll at least say "can't you see I've to go".
16. Lastly, I have sometimes been a bit sneaky. I'd sometimes try and "land people in it", as in construct a situation that would allow someone to make a fool of themselves. I used to do this because I'd think that they wouldn't know. For example once there was a guy who I knew had been given out to by a certain lady at work. So without looking desperate for the gossip and asking this guy what he thought about her, one day I instead pretended that she had given out to me too... in hopes of getting him to rant about her. Anyway, the only thing that made me question how obvious this trait of mine appeared, was when I heard another person giving out about someone else for doing the same thing!

Thanks for reading!

 

[Will_V]

There's quite a bit of stuff I've had to correct over the years, having ended up in a pretty bad headspace as a teenager and younger adult for a variety of reasons.

The most useful thing I could ever say about the topic is to focus on emotional control and awareness as preconditions for change. Emotional control because emotions can literally blind you, and since emotions control learning unconsciously, you can effortlessly learn to become completely disfunctional when emotions run amok. Awareness of oneself and the true nature of the mechanisms that you are surrounded by, because whoever tries to fight reality will inevitably suffer and fail. Whatever ability and willingness I have to accept the truth about anything, no matter how painful, difficult or how long it takes, has dragged me out of more pits than I would care to remember.

Since you seem to be focused on social aspects, here are a couple I've dealt with:

1. Learn how to have a good walk. Walking is the most basic movement that a human being does, and it tells others so much about who you are. The way you walk not only greatly influences the way people perceive you, but it influences your own sense of self, your sense of purpose and internal unity. Walking bridges the gap between any decision and action, and the way one experiences walking toward one's destiny is responsible for pretty much everything they do on the way there.
My walk was pretty bad and probably looped in with a lot of the social anxiety I had growing up (in fact positive and negative emotions give you a completely different sense of the mechanics of your own body). I practice my walk for an hour or so a day, and it's probably the thing that does the most for my mind out of any habit. It's also very very good for getting IOIs, and women can get hypnotized and start veering toward you and all sorts of silly stuff.

2. When someone asks for something, always ask for something in return, even if it's small and irrelevant. As logical as it may seem to be in the moment to just do someone a favor, the human mind simply comes with certain ways of perceiving one-sided investment.
This is something I often have to remind myself about, because sometimes I simply want to enjoy seeing someone else benefit from something that doesn't take a lot of effort on my part, but it ends up damaging our dynamic and making it hard for me to steer things where I want them to go, and makes later actions that I take appear inconsistent.

3. Avoid making enemies, especially enemies that are easily made, because there's nothing someone won't consider when they feel like they don't have anything to lose. But if you have no choice, be as ruthless as possible, because then they can at least respect you.
I've been lucky to come out of some pretty risky situations unscathed, and after learning how to fight and realizing what I could do if I wanted to, I have learned to look at conflict with disgust, because in reality people who engage in it are either too stupid to be kind, or too cowardly to be ruthless, or even worse, both.

4. Emotions and self-expression cannot be stopped, they can only be replaced. If you try to blockade any emotion, what comes out is anxiety, lack of intent, and internal conflict. Don't try to look cool, be cool. Don't try to look like something doesn't matter, but experience it as inconsequential. Don't try to look like you are about to do something, but be about to do something. There are only two good reactions to find within oneself: the right reaction, and readiness. And the first thing about being ready is having emotional control.

5. If you want to live in a certain reality, you have to create it yourself. When younger, I used to be a bit of a leftist (in the hippie/environmentalist sense, not the woke sense) and have a lot of angst about the world and all its failings, and then I realized I was as useless as everything else in it. I realized that when people have a problem that they don't want to fix, it's because they don't really believe in fixing it. As soon as I began to take control of my life (with self improvement, money, girls, etc) my perspective on what was ok or not about the world shifted very quickly.
At a more social level, I learned that this meant that I had to manage other people's perceptions of me much more carefully, because when you no longer take or expect your reality to come externally, but create it yourself, you can never be too sure that it won't alienate you from your environment.

 

[Kaida]

@Will_V Your list is very relatable. As a teen right now pretty much everything there is something I have in my list as what I’m currently working on.

When someone asks for something, always ask for something in return, even if it's small and irrelevant. As logical as it may seem to be in the moment to just do someone a favor, the human mind simply comes with certain ways of perceiving one-sided investment.
This is something I often have to remind myself about, because sometimes I simply want to enjoy seeing someone else benefit from something that doesn't take a lot of effort on my part, but it ends up damaging our dynamic and making it hard for me to steer things where I want them to go, and makes later actions that I take appear inconsistent.

I went through a phase like this recently where I always asked people for things back because I wanted to be more of an asshole. Thing is, it felt weird with super small requests. Like if someone told me to hand them the pencil next to me, i would fond it weird to ask for something back. What would you do in that situation?

Emotions and self-expression cannot be stopped, they can only be replaced. If you try to blockade any emotion, what comes out is anxiety, lack of intent, and internal conflict. Don't try to look cool, be cool. Don't try to look like something doesn't matter, but experience it as inconsequential. Don't try to look like you are about to do something, but be about to do something. There are only two good reactions to find within oneself: the right reaction, and readiness. And the first thing about being ready is having emotional control.

This is definitely true, and I’m discovering this more and more. I’ve been getting better at letting self expression show itself, so i somewhat understand what you mean. But it sounds like u have a way to almost control what the emotions are. Do you mind going more in detail and any practical tips on how to do that

 

[Will_V]

@Will_V Your list is very relatable. As a teen right now pretty much everything there is something I have in my list as what I’m currently working on.


I went through a phase like this recently where I always asked people for things back because I wanted to be more of an asshole. Thing is, it felt weird with super small requests. Like if someone told me to hand them the pencil next to me, i would fond it weird to ask for something back. What would you do in that situation?

Getting someone to hand over a pencil is not a big deal. If this kind of thing happens many times, simply call it out and/or refuse. It's also a good idea to use your attention as a way to devalue it, so you might hand over the pencil lazily (make them reach for it a bit) without looking at them or while talking to someone else. Gotta play around with these things, don't be afraid to make 'mistakes'.

This is definitely true, and I’m discovering this more and more. I’ve been getting better at letting self expression show itself, so i somewhat understand what you mean. But it sounds like u have a way to almost control what the emotions are. Do you mind going more in detail and any practical tips on how to do that

It's very simple, I am focused on the long term. When I was younger I was concerned with my reactions, now I am concerned with my reality. For example, when you are afraid of something, it is a real indicator of your inability to deal with it, it literally means that there is a weakness in you. Even if you manage to cover it in one instance, it is always there, ready to be exploited, until you fix it.

Something I also abide by is the idea that any deception is certain to be found out at some point in the future. Sometimes you have to deceive someone about something to protect yourself, but you have only bought yourself slightly more time, at more or less personal cost. Life is a race against time to become the reality of the values you uphold, and moving forward in that race is ultimately the only thing that will benefit you.

So if someone exposes negative emotions in me such as fear or anxiety, it's easy for me to accept the reality internally, and be ready to learn not just how to control it but fix the underlying problem, because I know that the only true value is what I can become, and that anyone who isn't aligned with that ultimately has no value to me.

 

[Dash of Englishness]

Another one is realising when people are hoping that you'll take the initiative for them, and that they don't always mean what they say. I had this the other day when I wanted to swap shifts with another employee of the company I work for. When I rang the schedule office to let them know (as we're supposed to) I was told by one of the supervisors that this guy was swapping a shift with me that he'd already swapped with someone else, which isn't allowed. After the supervisor told me this, there was a slight moment of dead air space and he then said "I'll ring him and explain it to him" about why he couldn't allow the swap. This was followed by some more words that I forget and at the end of the phone call he again said "yeah look, I'll ring him and explain it". After I put down the phone I realised that that mightn't really be part of his job and that he might have been hoping I'd take the initiative and say "don't worry about it, I'll ring him". It would have been a nice touch. Truth be told I don't particularly like the dude I was swapping a shift with, and thought that he might somehow blame me for the fact that the swap didn't work out... so all I was thinking was "oh great, I don't have to talk to him".

Another example: Had guests over recently and decided to offer tea... the usual thing offered. One of them said she'd have tea but then said "I prefer the taste of coffee, but tea will do". Tea is kind of my specialty so I knew I could do it well and therefore the brief mention of coffee kind of irritated me until she finished the sentence with the words "tea will do". I took the view that if she wanted coffee she'd surely have said it. Later the other guest (who had no tea) thanked me for making the tea and lady who drank the tea said nothing while she heard this. It's bloody good tea... most others make a comment when they drink it. I think it was her own fault for not asking straight out for coffee, but never the less, I could have clarified with the comment by saying "is that your way of saying you want coffee instead? coffee's fine if you want".

 

[Dash of Englishness]

Another thing is that if someone walking in the opposite direction is walking towards me and looks like they're about the walk into me with their shoulder, is that I make sure not to move myself slightly to the side in order to avoid impact. I will either say "hey watch it" or make sure I collide slightly with them. It doesn't matter if I'm the one who gets knocked slightly off balance. I think people will notice you move out of the way of that person more easily than what you might tell yourself, and that this might actually be seen as more of a sign of weakness than someone seeing you get moved more by the impact.

 

[Dash of Englishness]

People who insist in letting (or should I say making) others go first through a door even though they are closer to it. Sometimes I've had this when I was the one to gesture first for them to go in, and when they are nearer... and then as soon as I did this they stop and decide to let me go first! And then I cringe as I hear myself saying 'thanks'! Now days if this happens I'll either nod my head in disappointment while going first, or else I'll be extremely petty and stop and stare at them with dead eyes as if to say "we can stand here all day if we have to". It's strange some people do this... usually men of course, although I have had one big butch girl try it with me. I've no problem going first if I'm nearer.

 

[Dash of Englishness]

1. Learn how to have a good walk. Walking is the most basic movement that a human being does, and it tells others so much about who you are. The way you walk not only greatly influences the way people perceive you, but it influences your own sense of self, your sense of purpose and internal unity. Walking bridges the gap between any decision and action, and the way one experiences walking toward one's destiny is responsible for pretty much everything they do on the way there.
My walk was pretty bad and probably looped in with a lot of the social anxiety I had growing up (in fact positive and negative emotions give you a completely different sense of the mechanics of your own body). I practice my walk for an hour or so a day, and it's probably the thing that does the most for my mind out of any habit. It's also very very good for getting IOIs, and women can get hypnotized and start veering toward you and all sorts of silly stuff.

Hang on, you actually practice walking for a full hour? Is that done as part of a walk that you'd have to do anyway, or would you go out especially to do it. When it comes to walking, I just try to make sure that my head isn't down, and to be aware of what's going on around me. Maybe my feet should be further apart or something in order to look more macho.

The most useful thing I could ever say about the topic is to focus on emotional control and awareness as preconditions for change. Emotional control because emotions can literally blind you, and since emotions control learning unconsciously, you can effortlessly learn to become completely disfunctional when emotions run amok. Awareness of oneself and the true nature of the mechanisms that you are surrounded by, because whoever tries to fight reality will inevitably suffer and fail. Whatever ability and willingness I have to accept the truth about anything, no matter how painful, difficult or how long it takes, has dragged me out of more pits than I would care to remember.

Well it's hard to disagree with any of that but isn't that the sort of stuff that one reads, agrees with, feels good emotions, and then forgets completely all about it. It's no good without examples.

Don't try to look cool, be cool.

Yes, but what's the point in saying that because we all know it's easier said than done. Everyone has read something like that at some point in their lives, but it doesn't mean they will all get to be cool. A person only has a certain amount of will power. But I love those situations, where because of my wisdom, I look cooler than what I know I truly am. These situations mightn't be that common, but that's sort of what this thread is about.

The original idea of PUA was to figure out a way to fake being cool. Then it became too mainstream and had to adjust itself to avoid being censored. So the advice changed from being things like "say this to give the impression that you're cool" into "dude, stop over-thinking things and work hard to make something of yourself". This confused guys as they essentially already knew this... they didn't need to be ridiculed for any lack of action they had in life.

 

[Will_V]

Hang on, you actually practice walking for a full hour? Is that done as part of a walk that you'd have to do anyway, or would you go out especially to do it. When it comes to walking, I just try to make sure that my head isn't down, and to be aware of what's going on around me. Maybe my feet should be further apart or something in order to look more macho.

Yes, it is both a walk I would do anyway, and also a walk that I intentionally practice.
It's not especially about looking macho, although a good long slow stride and swinging shoulders is part of it. But mainly it is about freeing my body from tension created by anxiety and any negative thinking, in order to free my self expression.

Take a look around when you go to the mall, at the way people normally walk. Many people scurry around with closed off body language, trying to blend in and not attract attention, using their disconnection from the outside world as a shield against everything around them. This is the default behavior. Even if someone is more self-confident, and with a decent posture, they are still typically very unexpressive. This is normal, because the idea is to pass as many other people as possible with a minimum of interaction, this is what makes people feel comfortable.

The way I walk is designed to capture attention, to elicit reactions, to create tension and ambiguity and also to be an invitation. This is the way that an actor might walk in a movie, the goal is to make you subconsciously focus on them and feel something, an emotional reaction to what you are seeing, and to create a feeling of drama and suspense. This excites girls because they are instinctively attracted to a fearless man who is not hiding away but inviting everything toward him.

But even when no one is around, your movements are your thoughts which become you. If you move a certain way, you end up thinking a certain way. If you think a certain way, you end up moving a certain way. That's why you can look at someone you've never seen before from 100 metres away take half a stride and you have a strong first impression of what kind of person they are. So my goal is for my walking to represent the way that I wish to move through life, so that I become more that way, and people see me that way.

And when you meet a girl, the way you talk, the way you move your hands, the way you balance your weight, it all tells her subconsciously how you deal with life. And it can either excite her or turn her off. That's why being aware of your movements and aligning them with your self expression is so useful.

Well it's hard to disagree with any of that but isn't that the sort of stuff that one reads, agrees with, feels good emotions, and then forgets completely all about it. It's no good without examples.

The way I see it, information is there for the right person at the right time. And it doesn't need to be some logical dissertation with detailed examples but just a phrase or concise statement to be effective, at least that's the way it is for me. Because words that influence someone are only the last link in the chain of events that result in that change, and words can never be the beginning or the middle of that change.

But maybe you can explain more about what you are looking for?

Yes, but what's the point in saying that because we all know it's easier said than done. Everyone has read something like that at some point in their lives, but it doesn't mean they will all get to be cool. A person only has a certain amount of will power. But I love those situations, where because of my wisdom, I look cooler than what I know I truly am. These situations mightn't be that common, but that's sort of what this thread is about.

The 'coolness' that I'm talking about is not something that you gain or lose by some external circumstances but by winning the battle of your own mind. In my mind it's only a weak person who wants to hide from themselves while enjoying some position of coolness provided by society, or even worse, hiding while pretending to have that position of coolness while being an absolute mess.

I am sympathetic toward guys who want to get women at all costs, when I started myself I had nothing besides my desire to get laid, although my personality was never faked. But I found that women liked that personality, that personality that came alive when I had my back against the wall, that willed itself to go straight from A to B without having to conform to the path set out by anybody else. In a sense I was never (and still am not!) the typical 'high value' guy, but women are very perceptive and what guys often think is 'high value' is not actually what a woman finds useful to herself and attractive. I can talk with anyone and they will feel like I am some kind of standout individual - but it's not really faked, because I am everything I communicate that I am, I just know how to communicate it in ways that are very different from what people cognitively believe needs to be done to come across that way.

Besides, I've always loved women, they really do make me very happy and give me a lot of energy and pleasure. So why not find a way to win them by reflecting that back to them? I've found that girls really do love to be enjoyed like that, when it's real and is communicated well. So that's always been my goal when I seduce them, and it comes back to alignment. I've not always been a very well aligned person and that is mostly what resulted in my 'social anxiety' and general social disconnection as a teenager, and so everything I do is at least as much about purifying my self expression as attaining some material goal. I have no interest in maintaining a persona that is any different from what I really am. It just does not give me any satisfaction.

The original idea of PUA was to figure out a way to fake being cool.

If that's what it was to other people, it's certainly not what it is to me right now. All courtship involves some amount of 'show' and intentional skill, but going out trying to look like and come across as someone you're completely not is not something that interests me at all.

Then it became too mainstream and had to adjust itself to avoid being censored. So the advice changed from being things like "say this to give the impression that you're cool" into "dude, stop over-thinking things and work hard to make something of yourself". This confused guys as they essentially already knew this... they didn't need to be ridiculed for any lack of action they had in life.

Not to point at you specifically but this is a very common concept among people trying to achieve something, they believe they've 'done the work' when they have not, or they have done it but in a way that is disfunctional.

The world is not as complicated a place as people make it out to be. It's not as hard as people think it is to achieve anything they want. What I have found is that most of the time, it is their minds which do not allow them. The mind is a contraption of thoughts and beliefs produced by lots of different experiences and influences, and it desperately holds on to any concept of reality it can put together with those pieces that allows the person to feel like they understand themselves.

The problem is that what they want to achieve is usually outside that concept of themselves, and so the mind barricades them from reaching it because it will upset everything they thought and believed about reality.

This is part of the reason why not living a lie is so important, because internalized lies (and consistent lies always become internalized) can sometimes help you but they obfuscate reality, so that when you suddenly need to understand the truth of what's going on - of why you are hindered in some way - they help keep that truth far away from you.

I prefer to suffer reality for as long as it takes to get as far as I can toward developing myself into the person I actually want to be. That is my goal for this life and I don't see any better one.

 

[Dash of Englishness]

Yes, it is both a walk I would do anyway, and also a walk that I intentionally practice.
It's not especially about looking macho, although a good long slow stride and swinging shoulders is part of it. But mainly it is about freeing my body from tension created by anxiety and any negative thinking, in order to free my self expression.

Take a look around when you go to the mall, at the way people normally walk. Many people scurry around with closed off body language, trying to blend in and not attract attention, using their disconnection from the outside world as a shield against everything around them. This is the default behavior. Even if someone is more self-confident, and with a decent posture, they are still typically very unexpressive. This is normal, because the idea is to pass as many other people as possible with a minimum of interaction, this is what makes people feel comfortable.

The way I walk is designed to capture attention, to elicit reactions, to create tension and ambiguity and also to be an invitation. This is the way that an actor might walk in a movie, the goal is to make you subconsciously focus on them and feel something, an emotional reaction to what you are seeing, and to create a feeling of drama and suspense. This excites girls because they are instinctively attracted to a fearless man who is not hiding away but inviting everything toward him.

But even when no one is around, your movements are your thoughts which become you. If you move a certain way, you end up thinking a certain way. If you think a certain way, you end up moving a certain way. That's why you can look at someone you've never seen before from 100 metres away take half a stride and you have a strong first impression of what kind of person they are. So my goal is for my walking to represent the way that I wish to move through life, so that I become more that way, and people see me that way.

And when you meet a girl, the way you talk, the way you move your hands, the way you balance your weight, it all tells her subconsciously how you deal with life. And it can either excite her or turn her off. That's why being aware of your movements and aligning them with your self expression is so useful.



The way I see it, information is there for the right person at the right time. And it doesn't need to be some logical dissertation with detailed examples but just a phrase or concise statement to be effective, at least that's the way it is for me. Because words that influence someone are only the last link in the chain of events that result in that change, and words can never be the beginning or the middle of that change.

But maybe you can explain more about what you are looking for?



The 'coolness' that I'm talking about is not something that you gain or lose by some external circumstances but by winning the battle of your own mind. In my mind it's only a weak person who wants to hide from themselves while enjoying some position of coolness provided by society, or even worse, hiding while pretending to have that position of coolness while being an absolute mess.

I am sympathetic toward guys who want to get women at all costs, when I started myself I had nothing besides my desire to get laid, although my personality was never faked. But I found that women liked that personality, that personality that came alive when I had my back against the wall, that willed itself to go straight from A to B without having to conform to the path set out by anybody else. In a sense I was never (and still am not!) the typical 'high value' guy, but women are very perceptive and what guys often think is 'high value' is not actually what a woman finds useful to herself and attractive. I can talk with anyone and they will feel like I am some kind of standout individual - but it's not really faked, because I am everything I communicate that I am, I just know how to communicate it in ways that are very different from what people cognitively believe needs to be done to come across that way.

Besides, I've always loved women, they really do make me very happy and give me a lot of energy and pleasure. So why not find a way to win them by reflecting that back to them? I've found that girls really do love to be enjoyed like that, when it's real and is communicated well. So that's always been my goal when I seduce them, and it comes back to alignment. I've not always been a very well aligned person and that is mostly what resulted in my 'social anxiety' and general social disconnection as a teenager, and so everything I do is at least as much about purifying my self expression as attaining some material goal. I have no interest in maintaining a persona that is any different from what I really am. It just does not give me any satisfaction.



If that's what it was to other people, it's certainly not what it is to me right now. All courtship involves some amount of 'show' and intentional skill, but going out trying to look like and come across as someone you're completely not is not something that interests me at all.



Not to point at you specifically but this is a very common concept among people trying to achieve something, they believe they've 'done the work' when they have not, or they have done it but in a way that is disfunctional.

The world is not as complicated a place as people make it out to be. It's not as hard as people think it is to achieve anything they want. What I have found is that most of the time, it is their minds which do not allow them. The mind is a contraption of thoughts and beliefs produced by lots of different experiences and influences, and it desperately holds on to any concept of reality it can put together with those pieces that allows the person to feel like they understand themselves.

The problem is that what they want to achieve is usually outside that concept of themselves, and so the mind barricades them from reaching it because it will upset everything they thought and believed about reality.

This is part of the reason why not living a lie is so important, because internalized lies (and consistent lies always become internalized) can sometimes help you but they obfuscate reality, so that when you suddenly need to understand the truth of what's going on - of why you are hindered in some way - they help keep that truth far away from you.

I prefer to suffer reality for as long as it takes to get as far as I can toward developing myself into the person I actually want to be. That is my goal for this life and I don't see any better one.

I agree with you on the walking thing, but it's the swinging shoulders which I kind of cringe... and that was what I suspected you meant. I'm not saying everyone out there who does it has an ego problem, but I couldn't picture myself pulling it off. I see a lot of teens doing it when they're trying to be cool. Think Pierce Brosnan Bond... he didn't swing his shoulders. Don Draper doesn't swing his shoulders. Surely you don't have to swing your shoulders to look confident when walking. If Don Draper suddenly started swinging his shoulders his colleagues would be laughing at him behind his back wondering who's he trying to be! There are so many other factors the one's demeanour than whether they swing their shoulders or not. You don't have to tick every box. Don't a lot of people with this walk just look like they're looking for a fight?

"The way I see it, information is there for the right person at the right time".

That's basically a roundabout way of agreeing with what I said... that the information doesn't need to mean anything and just has to give a spike in emotions to give the person the motivation they need. The problem with that is that people aren't able to put their finger on the fact that they haven't learned anything from it (whatever it is, speech, conversation, etc) for the long run. That's why so many peopel get away with being bullshitters.

It doesn't need to be a 'dissertation', but it does need to be logical. You do need examples, but they only need to be as detailed as necessary. Otherwise what is the advice? It's nothing!

"Because words that influence someone are only the last link in the chain of events that result in that change, and words can never be the beginning or the middle of that change".

I'm not sure I know what you're talking about here, but why on Earth can't words be the beginning step in the chain of events?? If the words mean nothing and are quickly forgotten, then aren't they more likely to be the affect the first link in the chain?

Maybe I was wrong in saying that old school PUA was all about faking being cool, but what it did do was throw out a bunch of tactics. If only one in ten such tactics you were exposed to suited your personality, then it would be more power to you. You'd find a tactic that you hadn't been able to put your finger on all along. New style PUA doesn't show you that... it just says "hey man, work hard", and you're thinking "yeah, already doing that".

"The world is not as complicated a place as people make it out to be. It's not as hard as people think it is to achieve anything they want. What I have found is that most of the time, it is their minds which do not allow them. The mind is a contraption of thoughts and beliefs produced by lots of different experiences and influences, and it desperately holds on to any concept of reality it can put together with those pieces that allows the person to feel like they understand themselves."

I don't know whether that's true or not, but I do know that there's a lot of people out there pretending they think the likes of that are true in order to make money. No one will ever know for certain whether what you just typed there is true or not, so it's very pretentious of you to claim you know for certain that it is. You're basically saying there's no point in analysing anything. Also, nothing is black or white... you can't just say something to the effect of "oh the mind is your worst enemy, so ignore your own instincts". The way your mind tries to make sense of experiences can help you a lot too.

 

[Will_V]

I agree with you on the walking thing, but it's the swinging shoulders which I kind of cringe... and that was what I suspected you meant. I'm not saying everyone out there who does it has an ego problem, but I couldn't picture myself pulling it off. I see a lot of teens doing it when they're trying to be cool. Think Pierce Brosnan Bond... he didn't swing his shoulders. Don Draper doesn't swing his shoulders. Surely you don't have to swing your shoulders to look confident when walking. There are so many other factors the one's demeanor than whether they swing their shoulders or not. You don't have to tick every box. Don't a lot of people with this walk just look like they're looking for a fight?

One of the best truths I learned about seductive body language (can't remember from where) is that a man moving his shoulders is like a woman moving her hips.

It must be subtle of course. A woman walking along gyrating her hips exaggeratedly is going to look weird, the same way that a guy swinging his shoulders too much will look ridiculous. But have you ever had a girl walk past you, and as soon as you both become fully aware of eachother, her hips just seem to move with that little extra tantalizing swing? That's how you use your shoulders. Just a subtle accent to your slow, long stride.

 

[Dash of Englishness]

Another thing is when someone unexpectedly labels you in some form as they ask you a question. It could be 'kiddo', pet', 'sweetheart', or a shortened version of your name (like Paddy instead of Patrick). If you don't like this, then are you quick enough and brave enough to correct them instead of answering their question. You might think that they don't even realise that you're accepting their frame when you answer to them, but they indeed do.

Last time it was a neighbour whose house I was passing when joking. She was walking to her car in the front yard and as I waved, she said 'how are you Conor?' which is my father's name! I answered without correcting her. Now we wouldn't have spoken to each other in ages before this, but seeing as we would have been in primary school together, I find it unusual that she'd mix me up with my dad. This one has always been a bit stuck up so I was wondering if it could be some sort of dig at me. If I made the equivalent mistake I'd definitely realise it within a second or two, and correct myself, but she didn't correct herself as I continued passing.

Came across a similar thing recently in the supermarket. I asked the lady at the checkout about a deal on the mandarins I was buying because they'd had the wrong label over their location in the aisle. As she didn't hear me properly, her response "what's that lovie?". I joked "I was just saying not to call me lovie, that's all" as I smiled! She looked surprised and even slightly scared, and I then said "only joking..." and re-asked the question. I was half expecting her to look at me like I'd two heads when I'd said it. She later said "I call everyone that". I joked "part of the training, is it?" and she laughed. I do find that it's the older (native) female cashiers that tend to do that to customers. They're acting as if it's affection but it implies that you're young and helpless, and I guess makes you feel a bit that way too. It's technically unprofessional and I've no doubt there is in fact something in their induction manual about such. I don't think as much a big a deal of it when I realise that nearly all customers get called it too. But if I'd found out that I was only one of 10% of people that get called this, then I'd probably find it more offensive. I actually probably would've let her address me as that if it hadn't been in that particular form, but the thought of answering her question and accepting that frame in the process made it more irksome. I would indeed like to put a camera their to see who she does and doesn't address as 'lovie' and learn more about why so.