## Models ### Models  #### Metadata * Author: [[Mark Manson]] * Full Title: Models * Category: #books #### Highlights * "The great question that has never been answered, and which I have not yet been able to answer, despite my thirty years research into the feminine soul, is 'What do women want?'"- Sigmund Freud, Psychologist (Location 144) * The amount in which they desire it varies from culture to culture and from age group to age group, but the desire for it is universal. Women want men who are more successful, popular and powerful than they are. This is clear. (Location 187) * Studies show that women are equally attracted to men that they believe have the potential to be extremely successful as they do for men who are already successful. (Location 204) * This would also explain why women find men who display great strength and skills to be attractive, even if they're dirt poor. It explains why the starving artist has no trouble finding girlfriends to support him, and the college athlete can date super models even though he can't afford a hamburger. (Location 205) ^607f7a * These are the three tenants of being a high status and a highly attractive man: treat others well, be treated well by others, and treat yourself well. Later, we'll see that these make up the Three Fundamentals that much of this book is based on. (Location 211) * It had long been thought that female arousal was tied to ideas and the display of security, investment and commitment, particularly from high status men. Unfortunately for psychologists, women don't light candles and lay in their bathtubs masturbating to the idea of commitment and a white picket fence. They fantasize about far different things. The new conclusion is that female arousal is somewhat narcissistic in nature. Women are turned on by being wanted, by being desired. (Location 224) * By the end of the next decade, a multi-million dollar industry had ballooned selling men's dating advice ranging from old rich men selling platitudes such as "let her come to you," to a computer programmer's "emotional acceleration model" that promised to use calculus to determine how attracted she was at any given moment. (Location 253) * The answer is to be high status and confident. And it doesn't require being rich or being successful. It requires a new mindset, and from that mindset will flow new and attractive behaviors. (Location 294) * It may still irk some people's political correctness bone when we say, "the man would never become more invested than the woman," but remember, a woman unconsciously bases her evaluation of a man's fitness and status by how little or much he's affected by the emotions and intentions of those around him, particularly her. (Location 327) * The minute he let's her dominate him emotionally, he demonstrates a lack of status. He's no longer dependable. He loses his ability to make her feel secure. And his attractiveness goes out the window. (Location 330) * Women, as if with a sixth-sense, detect Jeff's low level of emotional investment. Within moments of speaking to him, and often before even speaking to him, they sense that not only does he have a strong sense of identity, but he's unwilling to compromise that identity for her. This sub-communicates his high status to (Location 352) * Ask women and they will tell you, they can immediately tell if a man's "got it," or if he doesn't. They don't know what "it" is, but they know if he has it or not. That "it" that they intuitively know in their gut the second they see him walk, hear him talk, or look him in the eye is his level of neediness, how much he's invested in her opinion of him versus his own. "It" is often referred to as confidence or self-esteem or being dominant. None of these terms are wrong per se, but they've been used in so many contexts and have so many definitions that I've foregone them in favor of calling "it" exactly what it is: not being needy. (Location 355) * Guy meets girl. Guy shows less investment than girl (or induces more investment in girl), sex and/or relationship occurs, guy becomes more invested than girl, sex stops and/or relationship falls apart. (Location 452) * In this way, vulnerability represents a form of power, a deep and subtle form of power. A man who's able to make himself vulnerable is saying to the world, "I don't care what you think of me; this is who I am, and I refuse to be anyone else." He's saying he's not needy and that he's high status. (Location 565) * This behavior implies high status, a man who is dependable, comfortable in his strengths and weaknesses, a man who can be counted on and who is likely to rise through the ranks and provide for his family. He's likely to succeed and likely to be a dependable father. (Location 588) * Many men, like you, and like me, were raised in such a way as to not express our emotions freely. For whatever reason -- maybe our home situation, maybe childhood trauma, maybe our parents didn't ever express their emotions either -- we've grown up with habits embedded deeply into us to keep us stifled and bottled up. Don't be controversial. Don't be unique. Don't do anything "crazy" or "stupid" or "selfish." (Location 602) * This all may sound hokey and new-agey. Trust me, it's not. Connecting with women in this way, by being vulnerable -- as opposed to compensating or becoming a fake alpha -- will result in the some of the best interactions and relationships of your life. (Location 608) * Vulnerability is the path of true human connection and becoming a truly attractive person. As Psychologist Robert Glover says: "Humans are attracted to each other's rough edges." Show your rough edges. (Location 614) * Tags: [[favorite]] * Vulnerability short-circuits the paradox. A man comfortable being vulnerable will not behave in a needy way. And when desire is shown without neediness, it is attractive. When desire is shown with neediness, it is unattractive. (Location 680) * Romance novels are basically pornography for women. There's a reason they follow the same general themes and story-lines the same way real pornography follows the same general themes and (lack of) story lines. (Location 704) * high status male -- a "doesn't take shit from anybody" bad boy -- but they want this bad boy to have a depth and a sensitivity that they only open up and show when they're around her. (Location 705) * totally OK with the idea of you rejecting me, otherwise I would not be approaching you like this." Think about it, if a guy wasn't comfortable with the prospect of a woman rejecting him, he wouldn't have been honest in the first place. In fact, he would have pretended that he wasn't (Location 747) * You can say the lamest and grossest (or funniest, depending on your perspective) thing to women, and if the sub-communication is, "I really don't care if you laugh or run away horrified, but here's who I am, take it or leave it," this sub-communicates a rock-bottom low level of neediness, and an incredibly high level of vulnerability. (Location 783) * This is because the truth is always shining through. You can't fake vulnerability and you can't fake honesty. By their very definition, it's impossible. (Location 794) * But neediness is relative. That's why I say it's about being less invested than women instead of not invested in women. It's an important difference. (Location 872) * I know at the beginning of the book I made the promise that being less invested in any particular woman is invested in you will make her perceive you to be attractive. Well, that's true, but just because she perceives you as an attractive man, doesn't mean she'll immediately want to jump into bed with you. (Location 995) * As we mentioned earlier, women who are neutral and who stay neutral tend to eventually end up Unreceptive. The way to get them to become Receptive is to demonstrate that you're less needy than they are. You demonstrate this by expressing your vulnerability and your identity to them freely. (Location 1211) * If you express your truth and demonstrate not only that you're not needy but also frictionless for her (similar interests, values, life situation, etc.), then she will become very Receptive. (Location 1216) * This is the plight of the Nice Guy. He's afraid of inciting an emotional response in anybody, much less women (and especially himself), therefore he'll play it safe and elicit Neutral reactions from woman after woman. And when women are neutral for too long without being polarized, then they will make themselves Unreceptive. (Location 1222) * The two go together. You CANNOT be an attractive and lifechanging presence to some women without being a joke or an embarrassment to others. You simply can't. You have to be controversial. You have to polarize. It's the name of the game. And getting good at the game is learning to open yourself up enough emotionally, learning to express your honest self enough and be comfortable enough with your vulnerability to take those embarrassing moments with the moments of passion. A willingness to polarize is not easy. But it's necessary. It's why you're here right now. (Location 1250) * The men who employ this strategy employ it because they're trying to avoid confrontation and controversy. Many of these men have been avoiding confrontation and controversy their entire lives. It's part of their fear of vulnerability. (Location 1261) * In my experience, the more polarizing a person is, the more they are flooded with opportunities to have sex and date women. (Location 1283) * The reason men fear rejection is because they're operating on other peoples' truths, not their own. In fact, men who fear rejection tend to be oblivious to their own truth, because if they were aware of their own desires, needs and values, what would they have to be afraid of? Why would they ever hesitate to expose their vulnerability to others? (Location 1333) * Dating is random. It's a slot machine made of women. We're shooting for that 5-in-a-100, so the faster you move along to a woman who is receptive to you, the better off everybody is going to be. (Location 1406) * Success = Maximizing happiness with whichever woman/women we prefer (Location 1469) * the Three Fundamentals as: Honest Living, Honest Action, and Honest Communication. (Location 1500) * When I'm in a random bar in Texas, I rarely meet women who have traveled. But when I go to a European wine-tasting in New York, I almost meet nothing BUT women who love to travel. Or even better, if I actually get up and go to another country and meet other people traveling in that country, I'm going to have an extremely high hit-rate with those women. (Location 1673) * way, this is good. But it's also going to be a little bit (Location 1880) * Or as the old saying goes: "Tell the beautiful girls they're smart and tell the smart girls that they're beautiful." (Location 2021) * binary system of 1 or 0. A "1" is a woman you'd like to be with. A "0" is a woman you wouldn't. Why you want to be with her or not, how she looks, whether she's just OK looking or the most beautiful woman on the planet -- none of that matters. Either you're interested or not. The rest doesn't matter. (Location 2028) * Here's an easy way to get started. Go out and buy a "black set" and a "brown set". Buy a nice pair of black shoes, a nice black belt, and a black jacket. Then buy a nice pair of brown shoes, a brown belt, and a brown jacket. (Location 2124) * Dark Skin Tone – African, Indian, Middle Eastern, Darker Latino: You want to wear brighter colors to contrast and accentuate your features. What works: White, Grey, Pink, Light Blue, Khakis, Yellow. (Location 2135) * Look through magazines and get on the internet. Find people who look like your personality. Then model after those people's appearance. (Location 2173) * The other way you can model people's looks is by going out and observing people. Go to bars and clubs and look at the guys… (Location 2177) * For instance, I weigh about 180 pounds. 180 x 15 = 2700. I must eat 2700 calories a day to maintain my current weight, 2200 a day to lose weight and 3200 a day to gain weight. If you weighed 150 lbs, you would eat 1750 a day to lose weight and 2750 a day to gain weight, etc. (Location 2217) * Unless it's 20 degrees outside, treadmills are for pointless. You get half the work out as running on a hard surface. Find a track or run outside. Don't run more than 3 times a week until you've been running for a long time. Running takes a big toll on your joints and bones. You have to build up some tolerance to it. (Location 2253) * There's a popular study that says that only 13% of communication comes from the actual words we speak. The rest is body language and tonality. Think about that for a second. That's almost 90% of all communication. (Location 2267) * Don't ever look down at the ground unless you think you're about to trip. Look people in the eye as they walk by – particularly attractive girls. You'll catch people making eye contact with you. You'll feel the urge to look away. Don't. Always make other people break eye contact with you before you break it with them. Do it until it becomes habit. (Location 2292) * Try this exercise. Just hum a note, then slowly raise it and then slowly lower it. It should sound like a siren, up high, down low, up high, down low. As you do this, pay attention to where the air pressure in your body is. As you shift from high to low, it goes from your head to your chest, and then back up again. As you could guess, we want to develop that chest voice. Again, the only way to do this is through conscious practice – reminding yourself countless times to speak from your chest voice until it becomes habit. Here's a cool exercise that you can do. Read the following sentence aloud: "Why don't you come to the party with me?" Now, hold your nose and read it again. How different is your tonality? If it's not very different, you already speak largely from your chest and probably have good tonality. If you suddenly sound very nasally when you hold your nose and say it, you need to work on speaking with a deeper voice. (Location 2308) * Cadence – Another problem guys have is they often talk too quickly. This comes from a subconscious belief that if we don't get everything out quickly, people won't listen to everything we have to say. Forget it. It's MUCH better to speak too slowly than to speak too quickly. (Location 2317) * Eliminate Hesitations – Try to eliminate any "uh's", "ah's", "um's", "like's", and "you know's" from your speech. (Location 2325) * Artistic Taste: When it comes to deciding what one likes and doesn't like, most men have very lukewarm reactions one way or the other. "Yeah, that movie's awesome," or "Yeah, I like that one," or "No, I don't like that show." It rarely goes beyond that. There's no sharing of why one prefers one type of music over another, one movie over another, one author over another. And there's no connection to the emotions driving that preference. For instance, a random Joe may say, "I really liked Terminator. It was pretty cool." (Location 2382) * particularly to women, is if you've not only expanded your horizons, but made your own decisions about your personal tastes, your experiences and what you think about various types of art. (Location 2389) * We want to shape you into a man with taste, a man with opinions, and a man who can explain exactly why he likes or dislikes everything from 70"s Motown records, to German films, to 19th century literature to impressionistic art. Don't get me wrong, I'm not about to go tell you to take a bunch of art classes or whatever. You don't need to be a super-intellectual snob. This is about developing your own opinions and enriching your life. (Location 2393) * Oscar for "Best Picture." That's a good start. It blows me away how many guys in their 20"s (or 30"s for that matter) have gigantic DVD collections, but have never seen The Godfather, Citizen Kane, Casablanca, or The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. How can you truly appreciate modern movies without understanding where they came from? Watch these movies and try to pick out what makes them so great. If it doesn't click, it may not be because it's a "bad movie," but because you don't get it. This is like when people try to tell me No Country for Old Menisn't good because it's slow and nothing changes. They completely missed the point. (Location 2424) * One one side, I want you to take 10 minutes and list unique things that you have done or experienced that most people haven't. It could be everything from climbing a mountain, to writing your school's play in high school, to recovering from cancer, to going on a 10-day meditation retreat, to starting your own business in college. Write things that you've done that no one or almost no one you know has done or experienced. Now, turn the paper over. Take 10 minutes and write all of the the things you want to do before you die on it. Assuming money and time wasn't an issue, list everything you would do before you died. Some examples from my list: write a novel, see the pyramids, learn to box, live in Japan, speak five languages, climb a mountain, etc. Go nuts. Write until you can't think of anything else or the 10 minutes are up. Now, take a look at your lists. If your first list has fewer than 10 things, you REALLY need to get out more. If your second list has fewer than 10 things, you need to put yourself out there and start trying new things and experiencing the world. You lack curiosity and ambition for quality experience. Pick three items from your second list and make it your goal to do them within the next year. (Location 2491) * Enjoyment of life comes from varied life experience, not from possessions. (Location 2504) * Defense Mechanisms There's a lot of unconscious fear bundled up in us and our sexualities. These fears usually manifest in a handful of very specific scenarios: Fear of approaching and starting a conversation with an attractive woman Fear of stating sexual interest either directly or indirectly (by asking for a phone number, calling a phone number, asking out on a date, etc.) Fear of initiating sexual contact (typically the first-kiss situation) Fear of actual sexual intercourse (Location 2653) * There are a lot of anti-pornography movements, and there're even theories about "pornography addiction" that are thrown around. Although there's no scientific evidence (yet) for porn addiction, here's something I can tell you that is absolutely true: porn kills your motivation to pursue women in real life. (Location 2858) * Napoleon Hill wrote a famous section in his classic work Think and Grow Rich called "Sexual Transfiguration." Hill noticed and theorized, that extremely successful men also had extremely high sex drives. But not only did they have very high sex drives, but they channeled this sexual energy into their work and their accomplishments. (Location 2872) * They're just as lonely and frustrated as we are. They want to meet a guy. But not just a guy, a great guy. A guy who is confident, charming, fun and interesting. A guy who isn't needy, who is vulnerable, and who will honestly express himself to her. (Location 2917) * I still get nervous every time I approach a girl. I've approached probably over 2,000 at this point. I still get nervous every time I go to kiss one. And I've probably kissed at least 300 at this point. I still get nervous every time I bring a girl home. And I've slept with almost 100 women. (Location 3017) * actually use approaching more women as a form of avoidance. They'll have a beautiful woman totally enrapt with them, and instead of seeing how far they can push things they'll take her number and move on, because they tell themselves they want to keep "working on approaches." When approaching is not their problem. Getting sexual with women is! (Location 3089) * This is why if you're ever going to do something that is unusual -- approach a woman in a strange location, try to kiss her in a strange location, invite her out with you after just meeting her, etc. -- it's important that you communicate that you realize what you're doing is abnormal. "You know, I've never done this before, and I know we just met, but why don't you come to the restaurant with me." "Excuse me, this is kind of random, but I thought you were cute and wanted to meet you." (Location 3123) * The more bold your action, the greater attraction you're going to create. The more bold the action, the more vulnerability you show, and the more you polarize responses. (Location 3127) * This is yet another argument for behaving in an aggressive manner. This is also why one of my mantras that I tell guys is, "Always err on the side of aggression." (Location 3134) * Whenever you're in doubt of what you should do, err on the side of aggression. (Location 3135) * We listen, we just don't speak the same language. (Location 3169) * This is also why a man can study and learn the best pick up lines and routines, walk into a bar and deliver them perfectly and have none of them work. The woman hears his lines, but she's listening to his intentions. And if his intentions are saying, "I want to impress you, please like me," then it doesn't matter how good the lines are. She's not going to listen to him. (Location 3170) * There's no such thing as a man who is good with women who isn't also creepy some of the time. The fact of life is that if you are a man who expresses his sexuality freely (and you should), some women, some of the time, are going to find you creepy. It's simply unavoidable. No matter how cool, rich, good-looking and charming you are, at some point, somewhere, a girl is going to be creeped out by you. (Location 3206) * This is why I say that at some point you have to accept that you're going to creep some women out and that's OK. Because the alternative is to hide your sexuality and hope a woman comes to you... and well, we all know how well that works out. (Location 3238) * Another classic situation is flinging harsh teases immediately followed by sincere compliments. For instance, you could make fun of how indecisive she is ordering her drinks and tell her that indecisiveness isn't going to lead her anywhere in life. When she responds with some indignation, you could then compliment her on how beautiful her eyes are when she's mad. This absolutely bamboozles women in a very, very good way. They don't know whether to laugh or cry, hug you or hit you. And ultimately that conflict of emotions turns them on. It's a lot of fun. Try it. (Location 3292) * Ultimately, this is what every woman wants. If you look at romance novels -- basically the female version of porn -- they all follow more or less the exact same pattern: hard and rugged bad-boy type male hero is troubled but strong, and as he slowly opens up and shares his true emotions and desires with the heroine, she's able to support him, to save him and ultimately fall in love with him. Of course, they live happily ever after. (Location 3340) * Wow... that's a little intense, right? That's the idea. If you feel uncomfortable just reading that and imagining yourself saying something like it, then that's good. That's vulnerability. And ultimately, that's what's going to make you an attractive man who can emotionally connect with women. (Location 3373) * Men feel more comfortable talking about things OUTSIDE of themselves: sports, politics, cars, movies, girls, etc. Women on the other hand are only engaged when they ARE talking about themselves (or each other). This is why they're constantly gossiping, creating drama or people watching. (Location 3663) * Take out a sheet of paper and write down three things for each of the following: Your passions and favorite things to do. Your dreams, ambitions, life goals. The best/worst things that have happened to you. Your childhood, family life, and upbringing. (Location 3669) * Be willing to share any part of yourself to anyone at any time and on any level. You have nothing to lose by sharing yourself. (Location 3676) * Ideally, sharing these aspects of yourself will encourage her to share them in herself. You want to get her to talk about her passions, her ambitions, her best experiences and her most vulnerable experiences. These are the topics that define us as humans and make us unique – i.e., different from the last 20 guys who talked to her. (Location 3680) * If you find yourself having a lot of trouble with humor, I recommend watching a lot of stand up comedians. Some of my favorites are Louis CK, George Carlin, Bill Maher, Bill Hicks, and Chris Rock. (Location 3780) * From now on, you are a sexually aggressive and dominant guy and you have no shame … We'll also discover that women actually prefer you to be this way. (Location 4037) * Ex-girlfriend dumped you and left you for another man. What if it was a gift? (Location 4382) * A woman makes fun of your hair and calls you ugly. What if it was a gift? (Location 4384) # Models  ## Metadata - Author: [[Mark Manson]] - Full Title: Models - Category: #books ## Highlights - "The great question that has never been answered, and which I have not yet been able to answer, despite my thirty years research into the feminine soul, is ‘What do women want?’"- Sigmund Freud, Psychologist (Location 144) - The amount in which they desire it varies from culture to culture and from age group to age group, but the desire for it is universal. Women want men who are more successful, popular and powerful than they are. This is clear. (Location 187) - Studies show that women are equally attracted to men that they believe have the potential to be extremely successful as they do for men who are already successful. (Location 204) - This would also explain why women find men who display great strength and skills to be attractive, even if they’re dirt poor. It explains why the starving artist has no trouble finding girlfriends to support him, and the college athlete can date super models even though he can’t afford a hamburger. (Location 205) - These are the three tenants of being a high status and a highly attractive man: treat others well, be treated well by others, and treat yourself well. Later, we’ll see that these make up the Three Fundamentals that much of this book is based on. (Location 211) - It had long been thought that female arousal was tied to ideas and the display of security, investment and commitment, particularly from high status men. Unfortunately for psychologists, women don’t light candles and lay in their bathtubs masturbating to the idea of commitment and a white picket fence. They fantasize about far different things. The new conclusion is that female arousal is somewhat narcissistic in nature. Women are turned on by being wanted, by being desired. (Location 224) - By the end of the next decade, a multi-million dollar industry had ballooned selling men’s dating advice ranging from old rich men selling platitudes such as "let her come to you," to a computer programmer’s "emotional acceleration model" that promised to use calculus to determine how attracted she was at any given moment. (Location 253) - The answer is to be high status and confident. And it doesn’t require being rich or being successful. It requires a new mindset, and from that mindset will flow new and attractive behaviors. (Location 294) - It may still irk some people’s political correctness bone when we say, "the man would never become more invested than the woman," but remember, a woman unconsciously bases her evaluation of a man’s fitness and status by how little or much he’s affected by the emotions and intentions of those around him, particularly her. (Location 327) - The minute he let’s her dominate him emotionally, he demonstrates a lack of status. He’s no longer dependable. He loses his ability to make her feel secure. And his attractiveness goes out the window. (Location 330) - Women, as if with a sixth-sense, detect Jeff’s low level of emotional investment. Within moments of speaking to him, and often before even speaking to him, they sense that not only does he have a strong sense of identity, but he’s unwilling to compromise that identity for her. This sub-communicates his high status to (Location 352) - Ask women and they will tell you, they can immediately tell if a man’s "got it," or if he doesn’t. They don’t know what "it" is, but they know if he has it or not. That "it" that they intuitively know in their gut the second they see him walk, hear him talk, or look him in the eye is his level of neediness, how much he’s invested in her opinion of him versus his own. "It" is often referred to as confidence or self-esteem or being dominant. None of these terms are wrong per se, but they’ve been used in so many contexts and have so many definitions that I’ve foregone them in favor of calling "it" exactly what it is: not being needy. (Location 355) - Guy meets girl. Guy shows less investment than girl (or induces more investment in girl), sex and/or relationship occurs, guy becomes more invested than girl, sex stops and/or relationship falls apart. (Location 452) - In this way, vulnerability represents a form of power, a deep and subtle form of power. A man who’s able to make himself vulnerable is saying to the world, "I don’t care what you think of me; this is who I am, and I refuse to be anyone else." He’s saying he’s not needy and that he’s high status. (Location 565) - This behavior implies high status, a man who is dependable, comfortable in his strengths and weaknesses, a man who can be counted on and who is likely to rise through the ranks and provide for his family. He’s likely to succeed and likely to be a dependable father. (Location 588) - Many men, like you, and like me, were raised in such a way as to not express our emotions freely. For whatever reason -- maybe our home situation, maybe childhood trauma, maybe our parents didn’t ever express their emotions either -- we’ve grown up with habits embedded deeply into us to keep us stifled and bottled up. Don’t be controversial. Don’t be unique. Don’t do anything "crazy" or "stupid" or "selfish." (Location 602) - This all may sound hokey and new-agey. Trust me, it’s not. Connecting with women in this way, by being vulnerable -- as opposed to compensating or becoming a fake alpha -- will result in the some of the best interactions and relationships of your life. (Location 608) - Vulnerability is the path of true human connection and becoming a truly attractive person. As Psychologist Robert Glover says: "Humans are attracted to each other’s rough edges." Show your rough edges. (Location 614) - Tags: [[favorite]] - Vulnerability short-circuits the paradox. A man comfortable being vulnerable will not behave in a needy way. And when desire is shown without neediness, it is attractive. When desire is shown with neediness, it is unattractive. (Location 680) - Romance novels are basically pornography for women. There’s a reason they follow the same general themes and story-lines the same way real pornography follows the same general themes and (lack of) story lines. (Location 704) - high status male -- a "doesn’t take shit from anybody" bad boy -- but they want this bad boy to have a depth and a sensitivity that they only open up and show when they’re around her. (Location 705) - totally OK with the idea of you rejecting me, otherwise I would not be approaching you like this." Think about it, if a guy wasn’t comfortable with the prospect of a woman rejecting him, he wouldn’t have been honest in the first place. In fact, he would have pretended that he wasn’t (Location 747) - You can say the lamest and grossest (or funniest, depending on your perspective) thing to women, and if the sub-communication is, "I really don’t care if you laugh or run away horrified, but here’s who I am, take it or leave it," this sub-communicates a rock-bottom low level of neediness, and an incredibly high level of vulnerability. (Location 783) - This is because the truth is always shining through. You can’t fake vulnerability and you can’t fake honesty. By their very definition, it’s impossible. (Location 794) - But neediness is relative. That’s why I say it’s about being less invested than women instead of not invested in women. It’s an important difference. (Location 872) - I know at the beginning of the book I made the promise that being less invested in any particular woman is invested in you will make her perceive you to be attractive. Well, that’s true, but just because she perceives you as an attractive man, doesn’t mean she’ll immediately want to jump into bed with you. (Location 995) - As we mentioned earlier, women who are neutral and who stay neutral tend to eventually end up Unreceptive. The way to get them to become Receptive is to demonstrate that you’re less needy than they are. You demonstrate this by expressing your vulnerability and your identity to them freely. (Location 1211) - If you express your truth and demonstrate not only that you’re not needy but also frictionless for her (similar interests, values, life situation, etc.), then she will become very Receptive. (Location 1216) - This is the plight of the Nice Guy. He’s afraid of inciting an emotional response in anybody, much less women (and especially himself), therefore he’ll play it safe and elicit Neutral reactions from woman after woman. And when women are neutral for too long without being polarized, then they will make themselves Unreceptive. (Location 1222) - The two go together. You CANNOT be an attractive and lifechanging presence to some women without being a joke or an embarrassment to others. You simply can’t. You have to be controversial. You have to polarize. It’s the name of the game. And getting good at the game is learning to open yourself up enough emotionally, learning to express your honest self enough and be comfortable enough with your vulnerability to take those embarrassing moments with the moments of passion. A willingness to polarize is not easy. But it’s necessary. It’s why you’re here right now. (Location 1250) - The men who employ this strategy employ it because they’re trying to avoid confrontation and controversy. Many of these men have been avoiding confrontation and controversy their entire lives. It’s part of their fear of vulnerability. (Location 1261) - In my experience, the more polarizing a person is, the more they are flooded with opportunities to have sex and date women. (Location 1283) - The reason men fear rejection is because they’re operating on other peoples’ truths, not their own. In fact, men who fear rejection tend to be oblivious to their own truth, because if they were aware of their own desires, needs and values, what would they have to be afraid of? Why would they ever hesitate to expose their vulnerability to others? (Location 1333) - Dating is random. It’s a slot machine made of women. We’re shooting for that 5-in-a-100, so the faster you move along to a woman who is receptive to you, the better off everybody is going to be. (Location 1406) - Success = Maximizing happiness with whichever woman/women we prefer (Location 1469) - the Three Fundamentals as: Honest Living, Honest Action, and Honest Communication. (Location 1500) - When I’m in a random bar in Texas, I rarely meet women who have traveled. But when I go to a European wine-tasting in New York, I almost meet nothing BUT women who love to travel. Or even better, if I actually get up and go to another country and meet other people traveling in that country, I’m going to have an extremely high hit-rate with those women. (Location 1673) - way, this is good. But it’s also going to be a little bit (Location 1880) - Or as the old saying goes: “Tell the beautiful girls they’re smart and tell the smart girls that they’re beautiful.” (Location 2021) - binary system of 1 or 0. A “1” is a woman you’d like to be with. A “0” is a woman you wouldn’t. Why you want to be with her or not, how she looks, whether she’s just OK looking or the most beautiful woman on the planet -- none of that matters. Either you’re interested or not. The rest doesn’t matter. (Location 2028) - Here’s an easy way to get started. Go out and buy a “black set” and a “brown set”. Buy a nice pair of black shoes, a nice black belt, and a black jacket. Then buy a nice pair of brown shoes, a brown belt, and a brown jacket. (Location 2124) - Dark Skin Tone – African, Indian, Middle Eastern, Darker Latino: You want to wear brighter colors to contrast and accentuate your features. What works: White, Grey, Pink, Light Blue, Khakis, Yellow. (Location 2135) - Look through magazines and get on the internet. Find people who look like your personality. Then model after those people’s appearance. (Location 2173) - The other way you can model people’s looks is by going out and observing people. Go to bars and clubs and look at the guys… (Location 2177) - For instance, I weigh about 180 pounds. 180 x 15 = 2700. I must eat 2700 calories a day to maintain my current weight, 2200 a day to lose weight and 3200 a day to gain weight. If you weighed 150 lbs, you would eat 1750 a day to lose weight and 2750 a day to gain weight, etc. (Location 2217) - Unless it’s 20 degrees outside, treadmills are for pointless. You get half the work out as running on a hard surface. Find a track or run outside. Don’t run more than 3 times a week until you’ve been running for a long time. Running takes a big toll on your joints and bones. You have to build up some tolerance to it. (Location 2253) - There’s a popular study that says that only 13% of communication comes from the actual words we speak. The rest is body language and tonality. Think about that for a second. That’s almost 90% of all communication. (Location 2267) - Don’t ever look down at the ground unless you think you’re about to trip. Look people in the eye as they walk by – particularly attractive girls. You’ll catch people making eye contact with you. You’ll feel the urge to look away. Don’t. Always make other people break eye contact with you before you break it with them. Do it until it becomes habit. (Location 2292) - Try this exercise. Just hum a note, then slowly raise it and then slowly lower it. It should sound like a siren, up high, down low, up high, down low. As you do this, pay attention to where the air pressure in your body is. As you shift from high to low, it goes from your head to your chest, and then back up again. As you could guess, we want to develop that chest voice. Again, the only way to do this is through conscious practice – reminding yourself countless times to speak from your chest voice until it becomes habit. Here’s a cool exercise that you can do. Read the following sentence aloud: “Why don’t you come to the party with me?” Now, hold your nose and read it again. How different is your tonality? If it’s not very different, you already speak largely from your chest and probably have good tonality. If you suddenly sound very nasally when you hold your nose and say it, you need to work on speaking with a deeper voice. (Location 2308) - Cadence – Another problem guys have is they often talk too quickly. This comes from a subconscious belief that if we don’t get everything out quickly, people won’t listen to everything we have to say. Forget it. It’s MUCH better to speak too slowly than to speak too quickly. (Location 2317) - Eliminate Hesitations – Try to eliminate any “uh’s”, “ah’s”, “um’s”, “like’s”, and “you know’s” from your speech. (Location 2325) - Artistic Taste: When it comes to deciding what one likes and doesn’t like, most men have very lukewarm reactions one way or the other. “Yeah, that movie’s awesome,” or “Yeah, I like that one,” or “No, I don’t like that show.” It rarely goes beyond that. There’s no sharing of why one prefers one type of music over another, one movie over another, one author over another. And there’s no connection to the emotions driving that preference. For instance, a random Joe may say, “I really liked Terminator. It was pretty cool.” (Location 2382) - particularly to women, is if you’ve not only expanded your horizons, but made your own decisions about your personal tastes, your experiences and what you think about various types of art. (Location 2389) - We want to shape you into a man with taste, a man with opinions, and a man who can explain exactly why he likes or dislikes everything from 70"s Motown records, to German films, to 19th century literature to impressionistic art. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not about to go tell you to take a bunch of art classes or whatever. You don’t need to be a super-intellectual snob. This is about developing your own opinions and enriching your life. (Location 2393) - Oscar for “Best Picture.” That’s a good start. It blows me away how many guys in their 20"s (or 30"s for that matter) have gigantic DVD collections, but have never seen The Godfather, Citizen Kane, Casablanca, or The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. How can you truly appreciate modern movies without understanding where they came from? Watch these movies and try to pick out what makes them so great. If it doesn’t click, it may not be because it’s a “bad movie,” but because you don’t get it. This is like when people try to tell me No Country for Old Menisn’t good because it’s slow and nothing changes. They completely missed the point. (Location 2424) - One one side, I want you to take 10 minutes and list unique things that you have done or experienced that most people haven’t. It could be everything from climbing a mountain, to writing your school’s play in high school, to recovering from cancer, to going on a 10-day meditation retreat, to starting your own business in college. Write things that you’ve done that no one or almost no one you know has done or experienced. Now, turn the paper over. Take 10 minutes and write all of the the things you want to do before you die on it. Assuming money and time wasn’t an issue, list everything you would do before you died. Some examples from my list: write a novel, see the pyramids, learn to box, live in Japan, speak five languages, climb a mountain, etc. Go nuts. Write until you can’t think of anything else or the 10 minutes are up. Now, take a look at your lists. If your first list has fewer than 10 things, you REALLY need to get out more. If your second list has fewer than 10 things, you need to put yourself out there and start trying new things and experiencing the world. You lack curiosity and ambition for quality experience. Pick three items from your second list and make it your goal to do them within the next year. (Location 2491) - Enjoyment of life comes from varied life experience, not from possessions. (Location 2504) - Defense Mechanisms There’s a lot of unconscious fear bundled up in us and our sexualities. These fears usually manifest in a handful of very specific scenarios: Fear of approaching and starting a conversation with an attractive woman Fear of stating sexual interest either directly or indirectly (by asking for a phone number, calling a phone number, asking out on a date, etc.) Fear of initiating sexual contact (typically the first-kiss situation) Fear of actual sexual intercourse (Location 2653) - There are a lot of anti-pornography movements, and there’re even theories about “pornography addiction” that are thrown around. Although there’s no scientific evidence (yet) for porn addiction, here’s something I can tell you that is absolutely true: porn kills your motivation to pursue women in real life. (Location 2858) - Napoleon Hill wrote a famous section in his classic work Think and Grow Rich called “Sexual Transfiguration.” Hill noticed and theorized, that extremely successful men also had extremely high sex drives. But not only did they have very high sex drives, but they channeled this sexual energy into their work and their accomplishments. (Location 2872) - They’re just as lonely and frustrated as we are. They want to meet a guy. But not just a guy, a great guy. A guy who is confident, charming, fun and interesting. A guy who isn’t needy, who is vulnerable, and who will honestly express himself to her. (Location 2917) - I still get nervous every time I approach a girl. I’ve approached probably over 2,000 at this point. I still get nervous every time I go to kiss one. And I’ve probably kissed at least 300 at this point. I still get nervous every time I bring a girl home. And I’ve slept with almost 100 women. (Location 3017) - actually use approaching more women as a form of avoidance. They’ll have a beautiful woman totally enrapt with them, and instead of seeing how far they can push things they’ll take her number and move on, because they tell themselves they want to keep “working on approaches.” When approaching is not their problem. Getting sexual with women is! (Location 3089) - This is why if you’re ever going to do something that is unusual -- approach a woman in a strange location, try to kiss her in a strange location, invite her out with you after just meeting her, etc. -- it’s important that you communicate that you realize what you’re doing is abnormal. “You know, I’ve never done this before, and I know we just met, but why don’t you come to the restaurant with me.” “Excuse me, this is kind of random, but I thought you were cute and wanted to meet you.” (Location 3123) - The more bold your action, the greater attraction you’re going to create. The more bold the action, the more vulnerability you show, and the more you polarize responses. (Location 3127) - This is yet another argument for behaving in an aggressive manner. This is also why one of my mantras that I tell guys is, “Always err on the side of aggression.” (Location 3134) - Whenever you’re in doubt of what you should do, err on the side of aggression. (Location 3135) - We listen, we just don’t speak the same language. (Location 3169) - This is also why a man can study and learn the best pick up lines and routines, walk into a bar and deliver them perfectly and have none of them work. The woman hears his lines, but she’s listening to his intentions. And if his intentions are saying, “I want to impress you, please like me,” then it doesn’t matter how good the lines are. She’s not going to listen to him. (Location 3170) - There’s no such thing as a man who is good with women who isn’t also creepy some of the time. The fact of life is that if you are a man who expresses his sexuality freely (and you should), some women, some of the time, are going to find you creepy. It’s simply unavoidable. No matter how cool, rich, good-looking and charming you are, at some point, somewhere, a girl is going to be creeped out by you. (Location 3206) - This is why I say that at some point you have to accept that you’re going to creep some women out and that’s OK. Because the alternative is to hide your sexuality and hope a woman comes to you... and well, we all know how well that works out. (Location 3238) - Another classic situation is flinging harsh teases immediately followed by sincere compliments. For instance, you could make fun of how indecisive she is ordering her drinks and tell her that indecisiveness isn’t going to lead her anywhere in life. When she responds with some indignation, you could then compliment her on how beautiful her eyes are when she’s mad. This absolutely bamboozles women in a very, very good way. They don’t know whether to laugh or cry, hug you or hit you. And ultimately that conflict of emotions turns them on. It’s a lot of fun. Try it. (Location 3292) - Ultimately, this is what every woman wants. If you look at romance novels -- basically the female version of porn -- they all follow more or less the exact same pattern: hard and rugged bad-boy type male hero is troubled but strong, and as he slowly opens up and shares his true emotions and desires with the heroine, she’s able to support him, to save him and ultimately fall in love with him. Of course, they live happily ever after. (Location 3340) - Wow... that’s a little intense, right? That’s the idea. If you feel uncomfortable just reading that and imagining yourself saying something like it, then that’s good. That’s vulnerability. And ultimately, that’s what’s going to make you an attractive man who can emotionally connect with women. (Location 3373) - Men feel more comfortable talking about things OUTSIDE of themselves: sports, politics, cars, movies, girls, etc. Women on the other hand are only engaged when they ARE talking about themselves (or each other). This is why they’re constantly gossiping, creating drama or people watching. (Location 3663) - Take out a sheet of paper and write down three things for each of the following: Your passions and favorite things to do. Your dreams, ambitions, life goals. The best/worst things that have happened to you. Your childhood, family life, and upbringing. (Location 3669) - Be willing to share any part of yourself to anyone at any time and on any level. You have nothing to lose by sharing yourself. (Location 3676) - Ideally, sharing these aspects of yourself will encourage her to share them in herself. You want to get her to talk about her passions, her ambitions, her best experiences and her most vulnerable experiences. These are the topics that define us as humans and make us unique – i.e., different from the last 20 guys who talked to her. (Location 3680) - If you find yourself having a lot of trouble with humor, I recommend watching a lot of stand up comedians. Some of my favorites are Louis CK, George Carlin, Bill Maher, Bill Hicks, and Chris Rock. (Location 3780) - From now on, you are a sexually aggressive and dominant guy and you have no shame … We’ll also discover that women actually prefer you to be this way. (Location 4037) - Ex-girlfriend dumped you and left you for another man. What if it was a gift? (Location 4382) - A woman makes fun of your hair and calls you ugly. What if it was a gift? (Location 4384)