Dating & Attraction Archives - Inner Confidence

Does She Want Me Or Not? 10 Ways To Test For Attraction & Know When To Make A Move

Most guys don’t have a mental model of the process of seducing a woman. Our culture tells us is it should come natural but I’ll tell you in a minute how that ones out for me.

Spoiler Alert: NOT GOOD

lI’ll speak from my own experience and admit that until my early 20’s I was 90% the boring nice guy or 10% of the time the aggressive creepy guy in the club.

This was my modus operandi between 1997-2005 age (15-23)

– In social circle situations with girls I was interested in (high school and college) I erred heavily on the side of caution and acted as the wallflower. It was safer to do nothing and avoid looking bad by showing interest and taking a risk. (This was possibly caused by my first attempt at love failing miserably and resulting in a ton of embarrassment.) If I found a girl to be “girlfriend material” I’d perfectly navigate my way into the friend zone for many months, only to eventually profess my love to her, which resulted in a painfully awkward exchange, and the ending of the friendship. It was never a true friendship to begin with, so this wasn’t a bad thing, and it ended all the self-inflicted emotional torment.

– The only place I felt comfortable taking risks was on the crowded dance floor at a party or club. But the only thing I knew how to do was approach dancing girls (sometimes from behind) and start grinding with them. They would either grind with me, spin away, or get their friends to save them. This lead to the occasional drunken club hookup. I was afraid to approach the girls that I was most attracted to so I’d set my standards lower to avoid rejection. This resulted in me never wanting a relationship with any of my dance floor hookups.

What allowed me to escape from these two certain outcomes was (1) learning that women aren’t attracted to inauthentic nice guys, (2) how to test and read attraction, and (3) how to navigate the subtle mating dance (some people call this push/pull)

1. Don’t Chase Women –

When I didn’t know what to do, I either did nothing, or I attempted to connect with a woman through conversation. I wasn’t a terrible conversationalist so a connection would often result. But I had no idea how to make the conversation “sexy” or switch from talking to kissing so I’d end up stuck and clueless. The more interested I was in her, the more careful and inauthentic I acted. If I thought she was really hot, I always self destructed.

Solution: Stop chasing by jamming her into useless conversation! This will give a girl the chance to be attracted to you because you’re displaying non-neediness and setting yourself apart from most guys who immediately chase every beautiful women they see. She won’t know anything about you, aside from your fashion/body language and nonverbal tells of confidence. If these non-verbal signals are working for you, she will make up a story about you in her head and it will probably be a good one. This is what girls mean by “He’s so mysterious.” This process can happen in a matter of seconds. If she’s interested she will send you signals in the form of flirty or prolonged eye contact. Think of this as her invitation to approach.

In an environment when the ratio is stacked in your favor, not chasing is often the only thing you need to do. Especially if other guys are chasing. Even if they aren’t, you’re banking on the fact that the girls will party, get turned on, seek attention and want someone to hook up with. The better the ratio, the more likely you’ll be their best option.

How do you know if she’s chosen you or she’s considering it?

Rather than thinking about how to impress people by being interesting, making jokes or thinking about what to say, you should instead focus on embodying and displaying valuable characteristics and test for attraction. Sometimes you can create those opportunities, sometimes they fall in your lap.

2. Testing for Attraction

10 Ways To Test For Attraction:

1) Does she hold eye contact?

2) Does she engage you in conversation and ask you personal questions?

3) Does she touch you back or initiate touch?

4) Is she comfortable being in isolation with you?

5) How does she respond to your touch?

6) Hand Hold Test – If you lightly squeeze her hand, does she squeeze it back?

7) Whisper test – If you lean in and whisper something into her ear, does she lean in? This simulates a kiss.

8) How does she respond when you enter her personal space? Does she lean in or move away?

9) Dancing – Very easy to tell because it often simulates sex and allows you to get close/touch. Does she square off her hips toward you? Does she make eye contact? As you close the gap between your lips does she move in or pull away?

10) Any other situation where physical touch is mandatory or created… does she move toward or away from that situation with you? Examples are games like Spin-The-Bottle, Truth or Dare, riding motorcycles or jet-skis together.

Notice that 9 out of 10 of these tests are physical, not conversational. The only way to learn them is to stumble upon them, emulate another guy or study this stuff. It’s kinda puzzling that our culture thinks that studying attraction is strange, but oh well, that’s a totally different conversation.

Girls that are more comfortable with their sexuality will respond more overtly to your tests of attraction. Either positive or negative. If she doesn’t give you much information either way, you can test more aggressively or conclude that she is very shy and give up.

Peoples actions and sexual openness is highly correlated with the behavior and attitude of the group or in a venue. If everyone is hooking up, we will feel more comfortable to do the same. If very few are they will be less inclined to do so out of fear of looking low value and cheap/easy/etc… Think sex party versus church mixer. You can test a bit more aggressively in the former. lol

Often times, I’ll invite guys to come on party trips with me for model photo shoots. When it’s their first time, they often feel like a fish out of water. Imagine its you, a few other guys and 3x the number of models. The number one mistake every guys makes is attempting to hit on everyone by engaging them in conversation and exchange biographical information. This is a tragic mistake because the ratio will do all the work for you.

A much better course of action is to look for ways you can add value to the group. Every group values leaders and decision makers. If you are clueless, then be the “mysterious guy” and wait for girls to initiate interactions with you.

In environments where the ratio is 50/50 or against you, the opposite strategy is the most effective. You need to take risks and initiate interactions with women because there is no need for them to come to you if they are getting tons of attention elsewhere. Start as many conversations as possible and weave in the physical tests throughout. Daygame is the most abundant and efficient option for this in most cities.

You always want to look for ways you can demonstrate value and stand out amongst the competition. If your competition is a group of ass kissing nice guys, doing everything for the girls all the time, you’ll gain value by not doing those things and attempting to make the girls work for you. If all the other guys are already doing this, you might gain value by leading and supporting the girls. Go against the pack in essence to stand out from it.

3. Navigating the subtle mating dance.

Once you’ve tested for attraction and gotten a positive response, you’ll feel a lot more confident about making a move. As you get more and more comfortable with this process, it creates a self-fulfilling prophecy. Confidence will be the result.

Here are some guidelines for push/pull and what to expect:

Start with tests 1-5. If she’s asking you personal questions, initiating touch with you, and reciprocating touch, she is very likely attracted to you, and as time passes, attraction will increase as you both become more comfortable and connected to each other.

From there you can use tests 6-8. If you pass these she is ready to be kissed.

Steps 9 & 10 – These are great because they can occur at any stage of the interaction and you can create them to expedite the process. Remember, dancing was my only move back in the day, and the only thing that ever worked because I was so clue-less. The better dancer you are, the better the results. My first ever kiss was in a game of Spin-The-Bottle. I think my next was a result of Truth-Or-Dare. Now, I’m the self proclaimed worlds greatest party host. I can always tell who is attracted to who and I expedite the process for them by getting everyone to play and making sure the right people end up in the right situations.

Once you’ve kissed her, the cat is out of the bag. The relationship immediately and magically is established on a romantic level. I don’t care how many amazing conversations you’ve had, if she cuddles with you every night and walks with you hand and hand. If she hasn’t kissed you, you can’t conclude how she feels about you. No exceptions. This is where guys will torment themselves for years in the friend zone.

Escalating from kissing to sex is easier for most guys because the anxiety of not knowing “if she likes me” is gone. Some girls are ready to get naked from the get go and others need more time to feel comfortable. On the other hand, most guys are instantly ready for action.

My best advice is to chill out and don’t push too hard. The sex will be better when you both are really craving it. If you push, you might get it faster, but she may also get buyers remorse, which means, that will likely be the only time sex happens. That really sucks because sex will almost always get better the more times you have it with someone.

18 Reasons Why Rock Climbing Is The Best Date Idea Ever

by Robbie Leave a Comment

Why you should be rock climbing (for dating)….

I googled ‘rock climbing gym’ then hit images. Notice how many girls are in the images.

18 reasons why you should do this:

There are days I’ve gone to a climbing gym and there have been 42 girls and 26 guys.
Groups of 2-4 girls often go climbing.
Climbing is very social. It’s totally normal for one group of randoms to make friends with another group of randoms.
In one session you could in theory talk to 20 people. You could also talk to zer0 if you choose. Both are common.
If you meet a girl and she climbs, she’s in shape or getting in shape. Climbing while out of shape is not easy.
It’s an amazing first date because you really get to know someone.
Imagine your in a relationship with a climber… If she sucks to climb with she will suck in real life. The end. It can expedite things for you.
Climbing is the most amazing couples thing to do: its problem solving and working together for hours. It’s a work out. It’s a fun atmosphere.
You get into sick shape.
There are a bagillion climbing gyms everywhere.
Once your a part of the climbing community you can go on ‘climbing trips’ to national parks.
You don’t wake up hung over.
You don’t spend much money.
The climbing community tends to be a bit geeky, so competition goes down like 95%.
If u want someone at peace, mentally healthy, non judgmental- climbing doesn’t guarantee that, but climbers are 500x more likely to be that vs a girl doing cocaine in a club bathroom.
Climbers are insanely friendly. It’s sort of a part of the deal.
It will grow some hair on your chest.
If you know how to climb you can demonstrate value helping others solve a route/ you can teach a girl/date.

In summary:
Girls love climbing, less competition, Get in shape, save money, make friends, have a blast.

There’s no reason not to do it. Well, one, afraid of heights.

I had a crippling fear of heights and overcame it. If I can over come it anyone can. Besides, you can ‘boulder’ which is what I do mostly anyway. Boulders are like 10-20 feet with no ropes and huge soft landing pads. Fear of heights aren’t an issue with bouldering.

And for those of you in a relationship- there’s not a single thing I’ve enjoyed doing with my girlfriend more than climbing.

Not even close.

Her answer is the same.

Please note that everyone says ‘I have rock climbed’. I am not talking about what you did. You walked up a simple route that required zero planning and zero technique.

I am talking about one climb taking hours or days or weeks.

Having to work on one specific move.

Needing to build your flexibility to execute one move at one point on one climb.

Learning proper technique.

Building your core and finger strength in a way you had never imagined.

I am talking about intense puzzle solving and requiring several sets of eyes (the social aspect) to map out the route and exactly where to put your feet on ever single step the entire way up.

***When I say rock climbing- imagine a choreographed dance up a wall with the intensity of cross fit while playing chess***

For more info on how to build massive charisma and improve your dating life check out this webinar.

Cheers,

Robbie

What Women Really Think About Your Beard

by Robbie 1 Comment

My friend Wesley, over at iManscape. wrote an article around that subject that focuses on what women really think of men with beards. He broke down information from many studies into an easy to read article covering the topic and threw in some tips for the men.

Some of the data might surprise you…

https://imanscape.com/what-women-think-about-beards/

Meeting women through nightlife

by Robbie Leave a Comment

My buddy Drew is on the short list of people I respect in the world of nightclub promoting. He’s the newest moderator in the Leverage Program, and he has a great story of how he stumbled on club promoting and became wildly successful at it.

Last week I had him on the podcast where we talked about his story. He shares his tips of how normal guys can be successful in the nightlife scene. Check out the episode here.

This week, I’m bringing him back to discuss how you can use nightlife networking skills to meet women and have fun when you go out. Meeting women through nightlife can be easy when you’re using the right skills.

Enter Drew.

Guys often ask me how they can get started in promoting. They know that it’s probably the easiest way in the world to meet hot girls, and that you can even get paid doing it.

The fact is, it’s a lot more straightforward than most guys think. You can start doing it without even having any connections. What you need to do is make sure you have at least 5 hot girls that will go out with you consistently. If you don’t have girls your first night, or you do and they’re not up to par, you’ll have a tough time.

But that’s not as hard as it sounds, because getting your first 5 girls is a great way to practice casual conversation as your opener instead of “hitting on” them. Create a friendly back and forth and if you think they fit the bill, end with “Some friends and I got a table tonight at so and so club, you should join us. Feel free to invite a friend.”

Having her invite out one friend creates a non-threatening hang out scenario since it isn’t one-on-one. If she has fun time with you maybe you even get laid, but I don’t recommend this if you can’t constantly pull in new groups of girls because if anything goes wrong she stops coming out with you and so do her friends.

Be careful with asking her to invite more than one friend because almost every group of girls has a DUFF: the Designated Ugly Fat Friend. But most likely a hot girl has a hot best friend, so it’s cool to ask for one friend. In a nightclub scenario, if she brings an ugly friend she might not get in and she probably knows that if she’s hot and been to any nice club before.

Once you have a solid group, it’s really as simple as going to the club. Nine out of ten times even just a decent looking dude with a few hot girls will get in with no problems.

From there, find a promoter table. Promoter tables are easy to find. Look for tables that have the most girls and the cheapest liquor, and a guy who looks like he is auditioning for an H&M campaign (even I was guilty of this). That guys is probably the promoter in charge.

Politely introduce yourself and say you have a group of girls and you were just looking to join a table. If he’s not a douche, he will invite you to join. Promoters always love more girls at their table, and will always try to flex on other promoters based on quality and quantity.

Now, if promoting for you is strictly for your social circle, you don’t even have to mention to the guy that you want to promote. Just say something like “dude, I always have girls with me looking to go out. I’m not looking to get paid, but would definitely like a consistent group to go out and hang with.” If he knows anything about promoting as a business he’ll bring you in. We call them “key guys”. It gives the girls another guy to talk to at the table who isn’t a creep and it frees up the promoter to stop babysitting, roam the club, and grab more girls/shake hands/bullshit with staff, and everything else he’s expected to do.

If you are looking to get paid for some side income, just ask. “Hey man, I’ve been looking to get into this and I always have girls that want to go out. Any chance I can work with you”? Again, promoters love this. Sub-promoters allow the main promoter to do half the work and they only have to pay you on what you agree to.

Most importantly, after you’ve done all of this, don’t get to wrapped up in the party. Remember, this is for your social circle. Talk to everyone, shake hands, suck up to the client next to you and always be looking to make new associates. They’ll invite you to other events and parties, and each time they do so you level up, since you’re constantly meeting new people. Most of the time they have lucrative careers which helps social validation to a girl you’re talking to (because how many rich guys hang out with broke dudes that don’t work for them in some capacity lol).

And also a PS for if and when you’re invited in to the table- always remember you’re a guest at that table. Don’t double pour your drinks, don’t hit on the girls you don’t know, don’t be rambunctious. 99% of girls will tell you they prefer a guy who keeps their cool in party situation: somewhere between having a great time and you couldn’t care less about being there. And finally, you don’t want to drink too much and embarrass yourself because that limits your access to the table in the future.

I hope you enjoyed that writeup from Drew. For more on how to optimize your experience at clubs, check out this article I wrote on the Unspoken Rules of Bottle Service.

How to get more dates

by Robbie Leave a Comment

As you know, the best way to get the dating life you want is to optimize your strategy as much as you can based on your lifestyle and personality. But just because you’re being efficient and optimal doesn’t mean you shouldn’t also be exhausting as many funnels as you can to meet chicks and other cool dudes.

This was inspired by one of my students, Jeff. Jeff is in his mid 20s and he’s a solid likable guy who’s got his life together and is fun to be around. The problem is that he’s not getting nearly the amount of dates a guy in his shoes should be getting. I have reason to believe that this is because he’s not exhausting his resources enough.

In a perfect world if you wanted to maximize your exposure you should be using these avenues, in this order of relevance:

1. Social Circle. The honest truth is that if your social circle sucks, it’s a reflection of you. Either you aren’t that fun, cool, interesting or valuable to be around.

2. Day Game. This is the easiest, cheapest and most efficient way to meet girls. It takes almost no time and you grow as a person every time you approach. If you suck at this, it’s because you haven’t done it enough and you’re scared. Face your fear, or sit around and get old and die with regrets 🙂

3. Social Events. Go to any environment where people are expected to be social, like festivals, bars, clubs, happy hours, or classes. If you’re doing poorly in these situations then just like Social Circle you aren’t that fun, cool, interesting or valuable to be around, OR you are too scared to talk to randoms and you need to approach more to get over your fear.

4. Hosting Sites. An awesome way to meet people is to host them in your city. Airbnb for your house, Turo for your car, ShowAround if you want to give tours and Couchsurfing if you can’t Airbnb. DogVacay if you have a dog or want to make extra money watching them. They make good wingmen too. These will also generate cash so you get paid to be social.

5. Dating Sites. You should have profiles on all of the relevant sites. Tinder, Bumble, Happn are obvious apps, but you should also be on Match, OkCupid and Plenty of Fish. If you’re older really want a relationship you can use eHarmony. If you’re religious use a niche site like JDate or Christian Mingle. Seeking Arrangements if you like sugar babies, models and girls who want to travel and have some money in the bank. And lastly, Lifestyle Lounge and SDC if you’re into group sex.

I guarantee that one site will be a lot more fruitful to you than others, so it’s important you get multiple profiles out there and measure which site gets the most responses. Otherwise you may be wasting your time on a site that doesn’t fit you best.

Profile Tips:

The pictures hold the key to whether a girl is going to read the rest of your profile. While women like to go off on a laundry list of qualities that include “sense of humor” and “kindness to animals,” they are almost as shallow as men when it comes to online dating. They sit back and watch the dozens of responses that come in and take their pick of the guys who look the best.

If you’re not a great looking dude then make sure you have some pictures that show your other qualities that women find attractive:

Travel
Social Proof (having a picture or two with hot girls, but make sure it doesn’t look like you’re trying too hard to show them off)
Lifestyle (partying in exclusive places)

Make sure you’re swiping and sending messages. My favorite line to use in America on any app where you have to match with someone is “So does this mean we’re exclusive?” followed by the Tinder Marriage Roleplay (which we discuss in the Leverage Program). If she doesn’t think it’s funny, she’s probably not worth talking to. If you’re outside the U.S., she might not understand the humor.

Be cocky and funny in your profile to give off the vibe that you’re not taking online dating too seriously. Women want guys who other women want. You need to have the mindset of a guy who is already successful. Successful guys don’t take online dating seriously because they meet women offline.

Why is this girl being flaky?

by Robbie Leave a Comment

flaky You meet a girl and things start out well, but she starts getting distant or flaky. It’s a situation we’ve all been in. Steve, a Leverage Program member, posted a great question in our private members area about this very situation. Here’s his question:

A girl I’m enthusiastic is being flaky about our third date. Our conversation has always been smooth and to me it seems like we share mutual chemistry.

We met on Tinder and got drinks on our first date. Our second date was a cooking date at my place. We made out, cuddled in our underwear, and I cooked her breakfast the next morning.

We had plans to hang out, but she canceled because she said she has “so much to do” because her mom will be visiting. It feels like a BS excuse. If she wanted to see me I can’t imagine preparation taking that long. She also invited me to her birthday party, but then rescinded the invite and said it’s “too soon to introduce me to her friends.”

I like this girl a lot and thought we had a good connection. However, her flaking makes me feel shitty. Am I making too much of it? Am I being too pushy? What’s my optimal next play?

There are a few possibilities in this scenario and it’s likely a mix of all three. Let’s go through each one.

1. She’s not into him

From the way him described the situation, it sounds like he’s in chase mode. It’s 100% normal to be offended, feel shitty, and be salty when things turn out like this. Connecting with and liking a girl that doesn’t pan out sucks.

Why does this situation make most guys irrational? Because you didn’t just invest the time you spent with her. You invested years of dreaming up a relationship with a certain kind of person you hope to have, and this person matches years of daydreaming. You get excited. Then poof. She’s not into you.

Do not let the above affect you emotionally and act irrationally. It never ends well with this kind of girl. Ever.

Also, think about what chemistry actually means. If she felt this “chemistry” to the extent that he does, she’d be taking him to all these things that she says he can’t come to. When a girl likes a guy, she makes it easy for him to see her (unless she’s being manipulative or there’s some other issue going on).

2. She’s too rigid

If it’s a big deal to meet her friends, imagine all the other things that aren’t actually a big deal that she will think is a big deal. Run from this kind of girl, because dealing with them is a full time job.

Don’t make excuses for women who aren’t into you. When you jive with someone, you hang out with them. If her birthday and her friends visiting are such a big deal, really think about how rigid this person is. Think how she will be a year from now. Good luck with that. Never mind that she did invite him- that’s some evidence that it’s not a big deal.

Introducing a guy to her friends is only a big deal in the movies. Seek someone who is flexible, not rigid, and not in their head. It’s hard to stress enough how valuable of a trait being flexible is in a partner, and most guys (and women) never even think about it.

3. There’s another dude in the picture

My instinct is that the un-invitation is not about her BS excuse, but rather another dude in the picture that will be at the party.

I ran this situation by a female friend of mine, and her conclusion is that there’s someone else: “She’s not hanging out with her mom. A guy visited her. If it was her mom, she’d find a way to sneak away for five minutes. She can’t do that with another guy around.”

It’s always safe to assume that you have some competition. Any hot woman will have exes, current guys she’s lukewarm about but who are pursuing her, guys in her social circle who are out of a reach but she’d gladly date, and the list goes on and on. Believing that she’s getting chased by other guys is good for you because it encourages you to keep approaching other girls. This gives you an abundance mentality so no matter what happens with any one specific girl, you aren’t phased by it.

The Lesson

If you’ve been following my newsletter for a while, you know that I like to make everything about attraction as simple as possible. I can’t stand dating coaches who overcomplicate things.

So strip away all the gaming, game theory, questions, guessing, and gauging. As cheesy or oversimplified as it sounds: is she being present and transparent?

Long story short: solid connections between people that are en route to building a deep connection or falling in love show mutual presence and transparency. When one of those things is missing, there’s usually an alarming reason why. It could be that one person is not interested, there’s someone else in the picture, or someone is a basket case. If a new relationship feels like a ton of work, it’s probably not on a path to anywhere positive.

I’m taking on a few new clients in the Leverage Program, so if you think you could benefit from coaching tailored to your exact situation, like what to text a girl back, apply here.

I look forward to working together.

The 6 Biggest Mistakes To Avoid

by Robbie 1 Comment

In my early 20s I sucked with women. I was fat. I wasn’t making any money. I didn’t know how to dress.

pen

No wonder I couldn’t get dates.

I wanted to change everything at once. I didn’t know what to do.

Things are different now. I date hot women. I choose what kind of relationships I want. I’m in shape. All of the problems of the typical American dude are solved in my life. I never have to settle.

castle

I don’t feel guilty bragging about my lifestyle because I hustled my ass off to get here.

So how did I get here?

I got here because I failed. A lot. I’ve made the same mistakes everyone has. But every time I fell down, I got back up again. I refused to stay down. I learned from my mistakes. Eventually I stopped making them.

I wasn’t naturally good with women, so I’ve lived the same journey you’re on. If you aren’t satisfied with your dating life yet, it’s likely that you’re making the same mistakes I was making. Here are the most common ones:

1. You love being comfortable.

Everyone understands that experiencing muscle strain is mandatory for bodybuilding. It’s painful. It hurts. But it’s a sign of progress and no one runs from it.

Unfortunately, everyone forgets this in others area of life, so they avoid discomfort and they keep struggling.

It’s not your fault. I love being comfortable too. Consumer society bombards us with advertising for products that remove any possible form of discomfort. Don’t like walking? Grab an Uber. Don’t feel like cooking? Go to McDonald’s. Feel bad about yourself? Buy a new Lexus.

I love being comfortable, but I won’t allow it anymore. To get good at anything, you have to embrace discomfort. Get HUNGRY for the strain that comes with leaving your comfort zone.

One of my personal favorite expressions comes from the military: “embrace the suck.”

With weightlifting, the suck is physical. With approaching women, it’s psychological. Embrace that shit. If you’re uncomfortable it means you’re growing. If you feel comfortable you should be afraid, because that means things in your life aren’t going to change.

People just don’t want to tolerate discomfort, even if it comes with a guarantee that the pain will be temporary. They trade short-term comfort for long-term misery. Separate yourself from the losers by embracing the suck.

Making excuses is a normal function of the mind. But don’t let excuses keep you in your comfort zone. A common misconception is that you need to be confident and overcome your excuses before you can face rejection or discomfort, but that’s actually backwards. First you do the thing outside your comfort zone, then you gain the confidence. This is because confidence is based on demonstrated performance.

Let’s get specific. When you’re uncomfortable, ask yourself: “What sensations am I experiencing right now?”

When I’m about to make a difficult approach, my heart races. Sometimes my throat gets dry or my hands get sweaty. I ask myself, Are you willing to feel a racing heart and sweaty palms for a couple minutes in order to get better at talking to girls?

That’s an easy YES. If you’re like me, you’d rather experience a racing heartbeat and sweaty palms every day than spend a lifetime watching porn and playing video games.

Keep embracing the suck every single day, and one day you’ll wake up and realize that things don’t suck anymore. It worked for me.

2. You’re obsessing over the outcome and ignoring the process.

Research has shown that top athletes have one factor in common: a growth mindset.

The goal of a growth mindset is to “get better.” In contrast, we have the fixed mindset, with the goal “be good.” When they’re facing a challenge, beginners often want to “be good,” coming at it with the mindset of worrying about how well they’ll perform. Their ego hurts their ability to learn.

There’s a great idea from Carlos Gracie Sr., one of the primary developers of modern Brazilian jiu-jitsu: “There is no losing in jiu-jitsu. You either win or you learn.”

I challenge you to approach with the goal of getting better. Forget being good. Everything you do provides feedback. Every approach puts you one step closer to becoming a social beast. Every rejection is a chance to laugh at yourself. Every time you feel discomfort, you make it 1% easier the next time you’re in that situation.

Focus more attention on the process than the results. Making an approach is something you have control over; getting a number is not. So instead of considering an approach a victory if you GET a number, count it as a win if you ASK for a number, regardless of what happens.

When you learn to love the process, the satisfaction and inspiration that come with going after your goals are more rewarding than actually achieving them. This is why top performers are able to easily bounce back from failure.

Guys who obsess over the outcome and ignore the progress typically aren’t approaching consistently, so they’re not seeing results. Because they aren’t seeing results, they don’t have the motivation to keep approaching. Which brings me to my next point…

3. You’re relying on motivation.

That lack of success/lack of motivation vicious cycle we just reviewed creates nothing but frustration, disappointment, and desperation.

99% of the time the solution is to approach more and fight through the suck. But I’ve been there and I know what it’s like: in the moment, that’s difficult.

Our egos are sensitive to change, especially major changes. No matter how motivated we feel, our brains will subconsciously resist any life changes we attempt. This is why people so often feel like they sabotage themselves and give up on their goals.

Let’s revisit the bodybuilding example. The most important part of bodybuilding is showing up at the gym, over and over. Major positive life change occurs as a series of tiny changes fueled by effective habits, not from a giant burst of motivation. Consistency beats motivation every time.

4. You haven’t changed your environment.

I’m an unhealthy food and leftovers addict. If there are leftovers in my fridge, I will eat them every time. If my Chipotle burrito falls on the floor, I’ll still eat it. What can I say, I’m still a fat kid at heart.

So when I do have an occasional cheat day (which my diet allows), I’ve learned that I must throw my leftovers away before I go to bed. I don’t rely on willpower, because it will fail every time. I design my environment to make success automatic. I remove thinking from the equation.

It’s the same with dating. You’ll succeed if you create an environment that makes progress inevitable.

Live somewhere where there are women around. Hang out with other guys who are good with women. Go out all the time. Get a second job in retail or bartending.

Guys have no problems moving to a different city for their career, but are rarely willing to move to a better market for meeting women. That’s despite the fact that the decision of who to marry is the single greatest factor for your overall happiness. It just doesn’t make sense to me. Shape your environment and you’ll get what you want.

5. You’re starting too big.

Our society teaches us to view life improvement in black and white, all or nothing. Either I’m going to stick perfectly to my new diet, or it’s not worth trying. Either I’m going to run 5 miles every day before work, or I’m going to stay on the couch. Either I’ll approach 100 women this month, or I won’t approach any. People view anything short of radical life change in every domain as a failure.

If you can relate to this, it means you have unrealistic fantasies about building habits. In reality, we improve our lives by making tiny changes consistently, not by drastically changing overnight. That’s why New Year’s Resolutions fail.

The way around this is to take small action steps that slip past the part of our mind that resists change. Do one pushup. Floss one tooth. Approach one girl. The funny thing is that when you have these small habits in place, they naturally sustain themselves and grow. Our brain gets used to doing a single pushup, so doing two becomes no problem. Flossing one tooth seems silly so you automatically start to floss more. Approaching one girl becomes natural, so you start to do more approaches without realizing it.

For success, momentum is more important than motivation. I’ll repeat myself: the most important part of bodybuilding is showing up at the gym, over and over.

Let’s take my example of flossing. For most of my life I hated flossing so I didn’t do it. A week before my dentist appointments I would start flossing. But it was too little too late: I’d get yelled at for not flossing my teeth, so I’d start again. That would last for about a week and I’d stop again.

But now I floss my teeth every night. It’s actually my favorite part of getting ready for bed. How did I do this? I started flossing one tooth per night. You read that right, just one tooth. You establish the habit small with one tooth, then the momentum builds up and flossing more teeth becomes automatic. Before you know it you’re flossing your whole mouth without even realizing it.

Stanford professor BJ Fogg talks about the power of flossing one tooth in his excellent TED Talk, Forget big change, start with a tiny habit.

6. You don’t have accountability.

You’re never going to improve without accountability. Create a challenge for yourself and talk about it with people who can hold you to it. Set a consequence for failure, like paying $1000 if you don’t complete 7 approaches in next week. Report daily on your progress. Ask you friends not to let you off the hook if you stop making effort.

This is the same method I used to lose 55 pounds in 2011. It’s what I use with my students to get them results: I put them on approach bets where they put a serious amount of money on the line. Guess what? Approach anxiety is no longer a problem. They embrace the suck and get it done. One of my students even dated the first girl he met on an approach bet for a couple years.

It’s tough to focus on getting better instead of being good when you have no one there to

laugh at your failures with you and make sure you keep showing up. My skills with women improved rapidly when I was younger because I had mentors who would not tolerate mediocrity or laziness. We had a team mentality that turned getting rejection into something a fun sign of growth rather than something to be avoided.

Putting it all together

By this point we’ve seen that success doesn’t happen in huge leaps. It occurs in small increments. We don’t go to bed unhappy one night then magically wake up and say “I’m different now, I made it today!” When we create the right small habits, we slowly become successful over time.

Our society loves the fantasy of the “overnight success.” But real overnight successes take years of hustling, and it’s a long, tedious process.

If I had to pick just one of these as the most important, it’s the final one: accountability. Even if you mess up the first six principles on this list, having accountability forces you to succeed. That’s why I’ve designed this element into the Leverage Program.

Our measuring stick, curriculum path, and end goal is what I call the Inner Confidence Belt System. Super creatively, the end game is to be a black belt. Equally creatively, the starting block is white belt.

Each belt level has accountability built in. From day one, you’ll be paired up with an experienced mentor. We’ll use approach bets to remove approach anxiety from the equation.

It’s so easy to claim we want to approach more beautiful women…we want to learn from successful mentors…we want to live a life where we can choose what kind of relationships we want. Even the most self-aware guys can SAY that.

But what are you doing about it?

I force my students to succeed, because if they don’t then that means I’ve fail as a coach, and I feel like a loser when I fail. That looks different for every guy. For newer students it’s often approach bets, accountability coaching calls, and some other tricks I have up my sleeve. For other students, it’s more hanging out with other guys in the group and getting coaching in person.

Here’s an example from Joel, a student who’s become an approach beast since joining Leverage:

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Try out Leverage and use my proven accountability system to make sure you start approaching more. I’m here to help, and I’ve been coaching guys professionally for a decade. I’m not going anywhere and I won’t let you settle. Even if that means you give it your best effort, find that it isn’t for you, and leave within the first 30 days for a full refund.

Day game is the best use of your time- Here’s why

by Robbie Leave a Comment

Last night I was discussing my client Cameron’s progress with him. Cameron has dates lined up for the next three nights with girls he met from day gaming. After walking home from the bars, he told me how almost all of his dates come from day gaming: “It’s just so much easier. I get way more love when I approach during the day from hotter girls than I meet at night.”

The reason for this is because the bar scene in LA is really competitive. Dudes here are fucking beasts. This is true everywhere, but even more so in LA. Before I moved away from LA, my game was nowhere as solid as it is now, and I got WAY better results from day gaming. Now I get really solid results at bars. This is because I’ve put in a ton of reps during the day so I’m better than the competition, and I always go out with a squad with awesome wingmen who are beasts.

If your wingman is a schlub, you’re going to get crushed when you approach two girls together. It doesn’t matter if you go in first and they like you; your girl is not going to just sit there while her friend is bored and uncomfortable talking to your zero-ball friend. Hot girls have a “dork forcefield” the same way that successful guys do.

Realize how important this is. The hotter the girls, the less bullshit like this they’ll put up with. If they see you with a guy who appears to be a dork they will turn away from you on the approach.

It doesn’t matter if you’re cool, well-dressed, and in shape. Desirable girls in cities like LA get the gig.

Cameron is going through the same transition that I went through a few years back. He’s using day game to scoop dates with way hotter girls than he could pull at the bars due to the lack of competition. He’s using those dates to build confidence and his harem. In a few months, I would not be surprised at all if the pendulum swings and the bars become more efficient for him.

Don’t waste your time online!

I’ll be the first to tell you that girls from online dating sites and Tinder blow.

Are one or two solid girls? Sure. The problem is that they get 788 messages a minute, so good luck standing out. If you are looking for a hot, cool, professional, mentally healthy companion, you are not going to find that from a dating site or an app. Trust me. If you’re curious, I discuss it more on this podcast episode.

Stop spinning your wheels and set aside time for day game. Treat it the way you treat going to the gym. Gains happen slowly over time when you focus on the process instead of the results.

Even if you’re getting rejected constantly, you improve your mindset by learning from each approach, which is the best way to get super direct feedback on how you’re doing.

To learn the easiest way to make a day game approach, check out this post I wrote here. It’s a lot simpler than what most guys do, and takes out the hardest part of a day approach. I also discuss it on my podcast episode about social media.

The good news about your dating life

by Robbie Leave a Comment

When I was a kid I spent 10 years doing nothing but practicing golf. I was a +2 handicap at one point (2 strokes better than scratch) and an All-American in college. I just thought I was just lucky to find a good coach because I worked with John Anselmo, who taught Tiger Woods from age 12-17. I also thought I was blessed with a natural swing thanks to my ice hockey skillz.

After I discovered The Game in 2006, I figured getting good with women and making crazy money would come easy too. I didn’t realize that I got better at golf by doing NOTHING but practicing and playing EVERY DAY for 10 years.

I was ready to hustle hard, but the more bootcamps I took the worse with women I got. I started doing goofy things like dressing like a weirdo, trying to jam girls into deep conversation and connect with them so hard they would cry. I started listening to stuff like The Secret, going to a million self-help seminars, making vision boards and even going to see psychics and visionaries. If someone was offering a magic pill I bought it.

As you can imagine, I got nowhere. I was trying to optimize everything at once, which meant I was neglecting the fundamentals.

But then I got tired of being overwhelmed by all the contradictory advice out there. Rather than spend endless hours sorting through it to identify the BS versus the stuff that worked, I picked one method and shut out everything else.

At this point I developed several skills that set me apart from other guys. I think the two game-changers were my willingness to do whatever it took to get ahead, and my focus on the fundamentals. I went out at least five nights a week for years, hitting on every single girl I thought was cute. I day gamed constantly.

The number of times I heard “I have a boyfriend” in a single year is higher than the number of times most guys even approach in their lives. By being willing to face rejection thousands and thousands of times, I eventually reached the point where I can attract gorgeous women simply by being myself, and I will never have to settle.

The Good News
So what’s the good news about your dating life? First, let me tell a quick story.

Two guys are walking in a jungle. Suddenly, they see a tiger in the distance chasing after them. But the first guy stops and pulls a pair of running shoes out of his bag.

“What are you doing? You can’t outrun a tiger,” the second guy asks.
“I don’t have to outrun a tiger. I just have to outrun you.”

You’re the first guy. You have running shoes, in the form of the advanced social hacking and dating skills that we discuss on the Leverage Podcast and the blog.

Every other guy is the second one, and he’s going to get eaten by the tiger.

The good news about your dating life is that you don’t have to be perfect to get the results you want.

Ask any woman about her frustrations with dating, and she’ll tell you that most guys are painfully terrible:

They don’t have their basic grooming handled, like shaving, cutting their nails. It’s way more common than you’d expect.
They don’t know how to dress, wearing clothes that don’t fit, or they follow outdated trends that give away the fact they don’t have hot women in their life, otherwise those women would help them dress better.
They compensate for being bland and boring by trying to buy a woman’s affection through gifts and spending money, or they brag about how rich they are.

Keep in mind that dating is a zero-sum game, which means that in order for you to win and get a hot cool girl, other guys have to lose.

But what that means is that you just have to be better than the other guys you’re competing with. You don’t have to be perfect at everything.

Being Dynamic
Author and cartoonist Scott Adams (the creator of Dilbert) describes two paths for attaining extraordinary results:

Become the best at one specific thing.
Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things.

Option 1 requires you to be world-class at one skill, which takes a lifetime to develop. For every Taylor Swift (my not-so-guilty pleasure) there are a million other wannabees who will never get there.

Option 2 is easier by far. I’d even argue that for dating, it’s more effective than Option 1. Being dynamic, or the top 25% in multiple categories, does enough to make up for flaws in other categories.

Real success is about becoming attractive to women, not just learning how to attract women. So if you’re not the richest guy but you’re an amazing chef with impeccable style, most women won’t be thinking about your (lack of) wealth. Or if you’re an amazing conversationalist with a minimalist travel lifestyle, you can get away without having a 6-pack.

A lot of the advice out there is aiming at perfection at the margins, like analyzing what you should say in conversations in rare hypothetical situations (the mistakes I made when I first started improving my dating life). Instead of getting hung up on minutiae, go about improving your dating life like a sport, where you’ll get the quickest gains from getting exceptional at the fundamentals (like what I did with golf):

being in good shape
being a good conversationalist
having a good social circle
traveling
having a solid career
having a good style
knowing how to orchestrate dates

Ignore the tiny, meaningless improvements, like memorizing countless opening lines for hypothetical situations at a nightclub. To take a metaphor from the financial advice space, it’s like focusing on cutting out $3 lattes when you’re neglecting the fact that you could ask your boss for a $5k/year raise or start a side hustle that could earn you hundreds of dollars every month.

Have you ever heard the saying don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good? Nowhere is this more true than when you’re learning how to be better with women. You don’t have to be perfect. You just have to be exceptional in a few categories and crush your fundamentals.

You Don’t Have To Feel Guilty If You’re Not Attracted To Your Partner 24/7

by Robbie Leave a Comment

“Love is one of the greatest experiences of the human condition. But it’s also a lot of work, and society makes that work tougher than it needs to be.”