I think that having disappointing, sad and painful relationships definitely had an influence on me discovering the pick-up/seduction community. When I felt that kind of pain or rejection, I would feel it so strongly that I would say, “No more. I will never leave myself vulnerable to this happening ever again.” As a result, I would close down more and more of myself to guarantee that I would not be hurt again.

At the same time, I believe that a relationship can only go as deep as to the degree that you are open and vulnerable to it. In other words, if I do not put myself in a position where I are risking anything… if I do not put myself in a position where I will feel anything for a girl… if I give nothing and only take… then I will have no depth to my relationships.

Sure, I may have women who are very attracted to me. Sure, I may have sex and women throwing themselves at me. And make no mistake, I am NOT saying these are bad things – they’re great! But this is not depth. It’s only narcissism.

Depth in a relationship, I believe, comes from taking risks and exposing vulnerable parts of myself to the other person. Granted, this is a mutual exchange – if it’s one-sided, then it’s puppy-dog infatuation and neediness. When it is a mutual exchange, and both the woman and I are expressing deeper parts of ourself, who we truly are, what we really think… that is what creates depth.

One thing that I have had to remind myself is to continually open myself up and not try to be impervious to getting hurt in a relationship. In the past, when a relationship fell apart or things didn’t work out with a girl I wanted, my natural reflex was to seek out ways to protect myself from getting hurt.

Now, I am not advocating the idea of dumping fears or insecurities on a woman. Negative belief habits (such as insecurities, fears, worries, jealousy, bitterness, anger, etc.) are things that I should work out myself and if I need to talk about it with somebody, I should talk to a guy that I trust about it, not a girl.

What I am talking about here is removing layers of bullshit in my communication. Not saying the “smooth” line, but the line that is true and authentic for me. Being authentic and honest is vulnerable – when someone resists or argues against your truth and authenticity, it can feel like you are being attacked. That is why this feels risky.

On the other hand, spitting out crafty PUA lines is not risky. Why? Because if she rejects you, she’s just rejecting the line. She’s not rejecting you (or at least, it doesn’t feel that way). So there this definitely makes learning pick-up techniques attractive because it allows the PUA to feel invulnerable to taking any risks.

Now, am I against pick-up techniques, lines, tactics, etc.? Absolutely not. I love this stuff, it’s a great body of knowledge and it works wonderfully for creating attraction AND for learning how to improve skills with women.

All I am saying is that focusing on pick-up techniques and things to say will only take a PUA so far. I think that in the beginning, it was useful for me to approach pick-up in this fashion, where I was invulnerable to being “rejected” so that I could learn the ropes and really get a handle on creating attraction in women.

Now that I have it down, I have shifted my focus to having high quality interactions. Not just creating attraction, but having a deeper, more memorable, positive interaction with the women I come into contact with. As a result, she gets more from it and my conversations are juicy and fun, instead of hollow and superficial.

This is a topic that I will be exploring in greater depth in future posts, but I wanted to put this out there and get some feedback from you guys. What do you think? Does what I’m saying here resonate with any of you?

No related posts.

The other night I had a conversation with my ex-girlfriend. Doesn’t happen often – frankly she’s been cold with me for many months now and it’s clear that even the friendship that we once had has gone sour. I’ve wanted to hold onto the hope that we’d be able to at least stay friends and have some kind of closeness, but it’s clear that it’s time for me to let go.

So what is letting go? Letting go is refusing to feed the thoughts about another person anymore. Just refusing to entertain them. Whether that means just being unreactive when the thought comes up or thinking about something (anything) else… When I stop entertaining thoughts on anything, it takes the emotional wind out of that thought’s sails and it disappears.

In my mind, I still remember all the great times we had together. I remember the ups and the downs and I don’t regret any of it. Sure, there were lessons learned on both our parts and things each of us would have done differently, but really the relationship was amazing. I still hold her in the most loving place in my thoughts.

But in her mind, I am not that. When we talk, she’s been cold and barely says anything more than a few sentences on the few occasions where one of us messages the other. And I know she knows exactly how she’s coming across – I know she knows she’s being cold. She’s made enough displays of “not caring” to sufficiently demonstrate that she no longer has any lovingness left in her heart towards me.

And realizing this disturbs me. It disturbs me because I’ve had people who I was very close with fade away over time until we drifted apart completely. I never expected one of her to be one of those people.

But feeling disturbed is not that bad in the grand scheme of relationship pain. Breaking up with her was really painful and took me a while to really, legitimately move on from her. Sure, I met other women even before I “moved on”, but I did not have my shit together. My lifestyle had been molded to being in a relationship with her and having her around. Living alone was a new situation and I had to adjust.

But in April, I decided to start finally pursuing my dream of shaping my life on my terms. After a month and a half, I started Pick-up Evolution to start tracking my thoughts and journey.

I’ve spent the last 8 months developing myself, meeting new women and formulating new projects to improve my life situation. It’s been amazing and I am quite happy, inspired and content with my life as it is.

Even still, I never totally gave her up. We’ve been apart for about a year now, but I never ejected her from the place in my heart where I hold someone that I love and see as my one and only partner in crime. I’ve held onto it because I hoped that we would be able to stay friends and still have at least a piece of what we had in the past.

The truth is, I am wasting my time and energy. I have tried, time and again, to reconnect with her and she is not receptive to it. I wanted to have her in my life, but I definitely don’t need it.

When I say this, it’s not out of anger or frustration. Sure, I think it’s a little sad, but I’m over it… The fact is, by keeping her in that place of my mind, I am making myself vulnerable to someone who no longer has my best interests in mind. Whatever her reasons are, they are not my problem. But she is putting herself first and it’s only sensible that I do the same.

Am I shutting the door on her? No, she is always welcome in my life and will always have my support. But I am all tapped out of my hope (or at this point even my caring) for whether or not she comes back. I have a line for what I will accept from another person (especially someone I have opened up to) and unfortunately leaving myself open to her is no longer a good option for me.

I do want her to be happy and I want good things to happen in her life. But it’s time for me to clear her out of my mind completely – I can’t carry around someone in my mind who doesn’t want to be there.

So this was more of a journal post than most of what I’ve posted on this blog, but hopefully it is helpful to all of you out there. In future posts, I’m going to talk about how I’ve made it a point to stop romanticizing heartache/pain and also about carrying around mental baggage in general.

Thoughts?

No related posts.