Blog Archives - Page 2 of 22 - Inner Confidence

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

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.”

Check out the rest of the article on Elite Daily!

The texting mistake most guys make

by Robbie Leave a Comment

cellphone Text game isn’t really an effective strategy to get girls attracted to you. It’s designed for one thing: to get her face to face with you again.

After you met when you got her number either in person or online,she feels some way towards you on. Let’s put it on a scale of 1-10, with 1 being she has no interest and it was a pity number, and 10 being she wants to have your babies.

If she’s not flirty back, doesn’t ask any questions, or doesn’t drive the conversation, then you have to guess she is somewhere between a 3-6. A 1 or 2 wouldn’t respond, would reject you, or be extremely curt. A 7+ would be much more engaging. If she’s between a 3-6, there’s a good possibility she’s talking to a bunch of dudes and you’re not at the top of her list of interest.

Trying to force conversation and humor over text will have the opposite effect many times because you’ll be overgaming which looks needy and try-hard.

The best approach in this situation is to avoid overgaming and gauge her interest based on how she responds to going out with you. If she is a yes, she’s probably a 5-6, and the needle will move favorably when you see her if you don’t suck.

If she isn’t very receptive to the date, she’s a 3-4, and you’re basically dead until your paths cross again randomly or she re-initiates contact. Another approach, which is even stronger but takes tighter game, is to never ask a girl out in the first place who is below a 7 on this scale.

Instead I attempt to stay top of mind via Instagram/Snapchat and see if they engage in a flirty enough way to warrant an invitation. If I feel like they are 6-7 I will invite them to group things. If it’s 7+ I’ll be more inclined to invite them out solo.

Once a girl is investing, your texts don’t have to be super witty and over the top. In fact, once she is attracted to you and considering meeting up, it’s actually disadvantageous to continue joking around.

Meet her where she’s at: mirror her level of investment.

Think of the tone of your texts on a spectrum of cool and casual to over the top witty. Where you are on the scale depends on how the in-person interaction went and how attracted she was. If you had a solid connection in person, it isn’t as necessary to be witty, so you should be more casual and send more vibing texts.

On the other end of the spectrum, if you had a short interaction either at a bar or during a day game approach, you need to sell her on your personality and give her a reason to be interested and wanting to meet up. This is where the wittiness, memes, and entertaining texts are useful. Being needy is a killer, but you need to invest more in this situation.

What does it take to be a man?

by Tyler W Leave a Comment

There’s a lot out there in self-help media for men and popular culture about what it takes to be a man. I have a simple definition for this that I recently heard from an interview with Tucker Max, and I agree 100%.

Reach between your legs. What do you feel?

If you have a dick, you’re a man. It’s that simple.

If anyone gives you a definition that’s more complicated, see if you can identify what their hidden agenda might be. It’s most commonly an attempt to do one of two things:

1. Justify their own insecurities

Self-acceptance is a rare trait because it takes consistent hard work over a long period of time. But who needs genuine confidence when you can instead justify your own insecurities by pushing your own view of the way the world works?

The guy who’s spent his whole life on his career to the neglect of the rest of his life can say “a real man works for himself and doesn’t have a boss” to justify his decisions to himself. Or the guy who spends all his time the gym can say “a real man has abs like Brad Pitt in Fight Club” to hide from the the fact that he has no meaningful relationships. Be careful of this in the dating space and don’t base your image of manhood on what some “pickup guru” tells you.

2. Sell you a product

A common sales technique is to target peoples’ insecurities, accentuate their pain, say that only you have the solution, and get them to buy whatever you’re selling. In modern Western culture, many guys grow up without masculine role models or father figures, so it’s incredibly easy for marketers to take advantage of this phenomenon and use it to sell products. “Don’t feel manly? Well, let me tell you my definition of what a man is. By the way, I have a product that can help you achieve exactly what I’m telling you that you need to achieve.”

Choose Your Own Masculinity

Confidence looks different for everyone based on the combination of their personality traits and life experience. Are you naturally shy? Introverted? Working on your social skills? Recovering from past trauma or negative experiences? Depending on where you’re coming from, your path to success looks different.

That’s why you should make your best effort to avoid comparing your inside to someone else’s outside. Every high achiever has experienced setbacks and challenges that you can’t see just by examining them on the outside. You see yourself at your lowest points, but you only see others based on what they choose to show the world. This is why you need to pay attention to the social media experience you’ve curated for yourself: the people you see on a daily basis influence your self-image.

It’s important to recognize that despite anyone’s (including mine) advice to be internally validated, we’re social creatures with an innate drive to be accepted by our peers. We all still crave external validation to some degree. You can’t shut it off, but what you can do is be conscious of when that process is operating in your mind.

Choose your own version of masculinity that’s effective in your own life. Don’t define your own success by what other people say success means, because you’ll be constantly trying to live up to the expectations of others. You start living by the illusion “When I achieve this goal, then I will be successful.” But what that does is postpone your happiness to some hypothetical future that’s perpetually just around the corner.

Define Your Own Success

A better definition of masculine success is living by your values. This version of success can be instantly achieved by determining the tiniest action that you can perform that’s consistent with your values. If your value is to be a grateful person, you can express your thanks for someone important in your life. If you value is to always push your comfort zone, you can go out and make a day game approach. You’re living by your own definition of success, and it’s instantly achievable.

The best part about the living your values version of success is that you can achieve success even if you don’t feel good, positive, motivated, optimistic, inspired, psyched up, or in the mood. It doesn’t matter what’s going on in your mind. Just take that next positive action and in that moment, you’re successful.

By doing this, you can avoid the trap of the high achiever. High-performing people in any field are often susceptible to fragile self-esteem. This is when they have a strong positive self-image based on how well they’re performing. This is great when they’re doing well, but when setbacks occur, as they inevitably do, their self-esteem comes crashing down as well. They stop seeing themselves as a “winner” and become a “loser”.

Both loneliness and neediness are helped by living your values, especially when your values are centered on meaningful work that impacts the world positively and close relationships. When you’re following your own masculine path, you’re more grounded and don’t crave the approval of women.

Live by your own rules. And choose your rules consciously rather than passively accepting what society, your family, whoever has chosen for you. If you don’t consciously choose your own rules than you’ll be living by someone else’s rules.

Dealing with discomfort

by Tyler W Leave a Comment

What I’m about to say is sad, but not very controversial: most people would experience mild discontent with their situation than face the discomfort that’s necessary for improving their lives.

People just don’t want to tolerate discomfort, even if they have a guarantee it’s temporary.

Getting into shape is a prime example. Unhealthy people tend to know that getting into shape requires eating healthy, and physical exercise. The failure to act isn’t caused by a lack of information. It stems from an unwillingness to feel uncomfortable. Eating healthy is uncomfortable. Working out causes physical pain. Both of these are a struggle, and only when you choose to accept that the process is not going to be comfortable can you get into shape.

Most people make decisions based on how comfortable they think they’ll feel in given situations. This is why most people aren’t satisfied with their lives. Comfort is a terrible metric for pursuing a life of fulfillment.

Making excuses

Originally I intended to write about how you need to stop making excuses, but that’s not even it. The better advice is to stop letting the excuses you make prevent you from taking action.

Making excuses is normal. It’s a function of the human problem-solving mind.

What’s key is taking action despite those excuses. Don’t let excuses keep you in your comfort zone. People often think they need to be confident before they can face rejection or discomfort, but that’s backwards. First you do the thing outside your comfort zone, then you gain the confidence.

Especially when we’re talking about forcing yourself out of your comfort zone to improve your dating life, there is NO reason to hide any part of who you are from the world. You’re not doing anything wrong or shameful and you’re not violating the rights of others. You can make the decision to be completely honest and open with everyone. Vulnerability is tough, but it’s empowering. It’s how we grow. And if others are not upportive of your decision to improve your life, then the only thing they deserve from you is distance.

Get specific about your discomfort

When I advise that you should be willing to be uncomfortable, it might make sense but it’s still an abstract concept. To make it actionable, it’s helpful to put yourself in a difficult situation then ask yourself: “what sensations am I experiencing right now?”

When I feel anxious about approaching a girl, the main thing I feel is a racing heartbeat. Sometimes my throat gets dry and my hands get sweaty. It’s so much easier to approach if I can ask myself “Are you willing to feel a racing heart and sweaty palms for a couple minutes in order to get better talking to girls?” That’s an easy yes. When you can get very specific about what being uncomfortable means to you, it’s way easier to face than a big abstract concept like “approach anxiety.”

Emotional avoidance is an important idea to think about. When we do not want to feel our emotions, we try to push them away. It works in the short term, but emotions are like water in a pipe. You can block the pipe, but the pressure only increases until it eventually bursts.

Clean emotions versus dirty emotions

A great concept from the intersection of mindfulness and psychology is that of clean emotions and dirty emotions. Clean emotions are the feelings that come up for us naturally. Dirty emotions are what we get when you try to fight those clean emotions. The concept borrows from the Buddhist concept that while suffering is optional, pain is an inevitable part of life. In short, as turn our pain into suffering by resisting it, we turn clean emotions into dirty emotions.

For example, if I experience a rough breakup with my girlfriend, it’s natural and normal for me to feel sad. When we experience loss, we grieve the loss with a healthy sense of sadness, a clean emotion. However, if I were to fight that sadness by getting angry I feel sad, or worry about it and cause myself anxiety, that’s turning it into an unhealthy dirty emotion. One definition that distinguishes between sadness and depression is that when we fight feelings of sadness we become depressed. Depression is sadness plus avoidance.

An example from dating: it’s normal to feel fear when you’re approaching an attractive woman, but when you tell yourself that you shouldn’t feel that fear, it multiplies it.

Instead of classifying emotions as positive or negative, try classifying them as clean or dirty. Every emotion can be useful, even the painful ones. If you use your emotional intelligence then they can provide you with information about how you’re responding in your situation.

Research has shown that the people who are the most successful are those who have a 5:1 ratio of positive to negative emotions. Seeking psychological flexibility and wholeness is always better than blind positivity. Attempting to be happy and positive 100% of the time is a recipe for delusion and failure. Remember the ratio: 80% should be your goal.

Along the same lines, a study published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology has shown that emodiversity, or a life in which one experiences a balance of different emotions, is associated with better mental and physical health.

Get better; don’t be good

Top performers and athletes from all kinds of endeavors or sports tend to have one psychological factor in common: a growth mindset.

A growth mindset is built on the goal to “get better.” The opposite of a growth mindset is a fixed mindset, which centers on the thought “be good.” When facing a difficult task, beginners often want to “do good,” coming at it with the mindset of worrying about how well they’ll perform.

There’s a great quote 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.”

Your challenge is to approach with the goal of “getting better.” Forget “being good,” because everything you do provides feedback. Every approach you make puts you one step closer to becoming a social beast. Every time you experience discomfort, you make it a little bit easier for the next time you’re in that situation.

The satisfaction, inspiration, and motivation that comes with going after your goals is an order of magnitude more valuable than actually achieving them.

What’s the point?

Connection and companionship are what bring purpose and meaning to our lives. If there’s anything in this world that’s worth experiencing some temporary discomfort for, it’s learning how to create genuine connections.

Oneitis and the 3-Step Cure

by Robbie Leave a Comment

Let’s talk about oneitis. This should feel familiar to every guy: you fixate on one specific girl, put her on a pedestal, and imagine the mental or logistical hurdles you need to overcome to get her. Often it occurs with a girl who isn’t fully sold on you yet, or maybe even has rejected you already. It leads to added pressure and makes it almost impossible to succeed.

In his book The Erotic Mind, Jack Morin details the “erotic equation”: attraction plus obstacles leads to excitement. Guess what happens when you create this kind of excitement with a woman you aren’t in a committed relationship with? Painful mental anguish, and worse, a halt to your progress as a man.

1. Recognize it for what it is

In the first six months of dating or meeting a woman you’re attracted to, you don’t actually fall in love with her. You fall in love with your idealized image of her. Truth be told, you don’t even fully know her.

We have an image of our ideal woman, and the type of person who can “make us happy.” Oneitis occurs when we find someone close to that image and we subconsciously squeeze them into the mold, trying to force the relationship. If she has a healthy relationship style (what social psychologists call secure attachment), she’s not likely to reciprocate your feelings because she barely knows you.

It’s crucial to remember that these are other human beings with their own flaws and their own internal worlds. During the first six months you can’t possibly know everything about them. You can’t accurately project what a future with them would be like, no matter how crystal clear that image may appear in your mind. Jumping into a relationship with someone quickly because your mind is telling you she’s “the one” is a perfect recipe for a toxic relationship.

So stop and say to yourself “Okay, I know she seems awesome right now, but I don’t know everything about her. She’s also just a normal person, and these feelings will change over time. If we dated for a long time, there’s a good chance we’ll get to a point where we argue over who has to take out the trash like so many other couples. Or maybe she has a dark past that I know nothing about.”

2. Flirt with everyone

You need to play the numbers game so you develop an effective abundance philosophy. You should be hitting on every girl you see, ALL THE TIME until you stop doing this. Face rejection over and over until you’re not afraid of it.

Flirting takes practice and you need to be doing it consistently to see results. Flirt with everyone. Playfully tease your friends, be sarcastic (but not condescending), lie and get caught, and use every other tactic we discuss for flirting. Practice this stuff and it will come out when you need it.

You’ve heard me say it over and over, but if you expect to get results and you’re not crushing approaches or already dating multiple women, it’s just not gonna happen.

The more I think about it, the simpler it gets. Being a guy who can get girls requires a mixture of the right amount of vulnerability and assertiveness, and the skill to recognize which situations call for which. Guys who can’t attract women aren’t being assertive enough. Guys who can’t connect with women aren’t being vulnerable enough. Oneitis is a clear indicator that you’re not being assertive enough.

I know that when you’re feeling oneitis, this is the last thing you want to do. I know it’s painful. You’re not the first guy to experience this and you’re certainly not the last. Not a lot of guys will admit they’ve experienced it, and it’s more common among young guys than you might expect.

It’s part of the process, and you ultimately determine if you want to learn from it and move forward or get stuck.

3. Strengthen your friendships

The hard truth is that you’re experiencing this because you’re lonely. Loneliness might not be the singular cause, but throw an intriguing woman into a petri dish of loneliness, and oneitis is sure to grow.

Craving the affection and the attention of one specific girl is a mental strategy to combat loneliness. Everyone experiences some level of social disconnection; it’s simply part of the human condition. You experience oneitis when your mind creates a fantasy world to fight that sense of disconnection, and you project that fantasy on the women you meet.

Step 2 was to begin approaching other woman, and that works because it creates a philosophy of abundance. Strengthening your friendships with both men and women works in a different way: this strategy attacks your pervasive loneliness.

Cultivate meaningful relationships in your life other than dating relationships. You need to fill the void in yourself (that can’t be filled by another person) with meaningful pursuits and fulfilling friendships. Connect with guys who share your interests. Focus on your hobbies and do them with other people.

Build your own sense of identity, community, and purpose, rather than hoping for a woman to take away all your problems.

Putting it all together

Frantic obsession over someone you barely know is not healthy.

Yes, that feeling of meeting someone new who seems AWESOME can be fun. But don’t let that feeling cause you to place others on a pedestal. It’ll only prevent you from improving as a person: it makes you self-conscious, worry that you’re not good enough, not commit to approaching, walk on eggshells, and get desperate.

The best thing you can do is express yourself and be as sincere and authentic as possible. Be vulnerable, express yourself, and be assertive. That can filter out people who you wouldn’t be happy with, and take off your rose-colored glasses.

What a former club promoter can teach you about game

by Robbie 3 Comments

What happens to a club promoter’s social life when he leaves that world behind for a regular job?

Today we’re checking in with Ben, a Leverage moderator and master networker who has likability down to a science. You may remember Ben from the Leverage Podcast, where he discussed how he got started as a promoter and his approach to meeting women. If you haven’t listened to that episode, check it out.

Ben has left the club promoting world but still manages to maintain an amazing social life. He’s back to share with you his insights from his transition.

When Ben was a full-time club promoter, he was constantly surrounded by hot women. Contrary to most pickup advice, he found that the less work he did, the better results he got. It’s a unique scenario that depended on being surrounded by hot women, but anyone who consciously makes friendships with lots of women instead of trying to hook up with all of them can use the same strategy.

Even though he’s no longer promoting, he has still found that with his current lifestyle, he also “games” very little and keeps it extremely simple: “I like to think my ‘game’ nowadays is just being a decent human, connecting with and adding value to others. This generally leads to beneficial long term relationships if you pick the right people.”

Ben’s experience resonates with mine. I’ve also found that the better I’ve gotten over the years, the less I need to “game,” which can be described as trying to impress someone rather than expressing yourself.

His current approach consists of several simple, yet important components.

Be genuine and engaging.
Bring the fun and experiences.
Tell stories to convey that he has an interesting life.
Subtly demonstrate value and social proof.
Poke some fun at them once in awhile in a jovial, non-threatening way.

Ben uses these components to surround himself with hot women despite avoiding nightclubs, spending his time in yoga studios, and no longer drinking.

Ben continues, “I usually consciously ‘friend zone’ girls to see what happens later. Friend zoning girls generally drives them nuts and makes it ridiculously easy to turn it into something later, on your terms, if you actually find she’s worth your time. That said, this is only the case if YOU make the decision to friend zone her. That must be clear to her, not the other way around.”

The takeaways:

Be a normal human being who values others, and you’ll build the connections and relationships that you want.
Don’t overgame. Instead, focus on being friends with people and providing them value.
Express yourself instead of attempting to impressing others.

An easy way to step up your style

by Robbie 1 Comment

In Ukraine you must be serious. It’s a serious country and colors are not serious.

Recently I’ve been using a new method to drastically simplify my wardrobe, and getting more compliments than ever. It’s the easiest system I’ve found so far to make fashion (or more accurately, style) easy. But first, why is the way you dress even important? Why should you even care?

A lot of men have the misconception that the clothing they wear only matters to “shallow” women, and the women they want to date aren’t “superficial.” They’re mistaken for a variety of reasons.

If you don’t know how to dress, it immediately sends out a signal you’re not dynamic. Your appearance is the easiest and fastest way to communicate a message to others as to whether or not you’re worth spending time with.

Humans make social judgments about others subconsciously. While it’s tempting to say your clothes and appearance shouldn’t matter because it’s a superficial judgement, the reality is, we all judge each other based on appearance.

It’s important to remember this happens subconsciously. Women aren’t into your clothes per se. They’re into what they convey about your personality. The way you dress conveys your lifestyle, profession, passion and character traits. Everything you put on is a billboard advertising to women who you are as a person. This is why it’s crucial to send the right signals through the way you dress, and why this isn’t about superficiality.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, what’s the new strategy I’ve been using?

Dress in all blacks and greys.

I switched to this wardrobe about a month ago. This is a basic strategy for someone who travels a lot, wants to make their life as easy as possible and still look good without knowing much about fashion.

I started using this method based on the advice of one of our Leverage fashion consultants, but I also just recently came across this blog article advising the same technique. I have to agree with the author’s points:

It means traveling with less stuff.
Blue jeans are ugly. Brown shoes are pointless.
It simplifies your life.
It doesn’t get dirty.

It’s money and so much easier than maintaining my previous wardrobe. I pretty much do only black and grey. Grey is a good addition to all blacks as described in the article because it also goes with everything and gives you a bit more variation. You can play around with different textures of grey clothing too.

What if people notice you’re wearing the same close every day? They won’t. Dark colors are a classic look. You just need some variety with your shirts, pants, jackets, and shoes.

Getting more advanced

Not everyone wants to use this strategy, and I get that. I’m more nomadic and more minimalist than the average guy. So how can you simplify a more advanced wardrobe?

The number one rule that covers 80% of the way is to always buy classic garments in neutral colors with a somewhat modern fit where applicable. This means you don’t attempt going fashion forward based on a single piece, but on the full combination (from “nice jacket” to “you look great!”).

There’s only a handful of classic garments you need. With the basics covered, picking them in neutral colors like navy, khaki, charcoal, olive, etc., you can pick up some colors and patterns, like pastel colored v-necks and tees, a colored chino or two in pastel or dark hue for maximum flexibility, or some buttoned-down shirt patterns. Depending on where you live, you may need winter/summer specific garments. Or just get more grey and black layers for the winter.

Go to Target, Zara, H&M, Nordstrom or wherever, and look at what the mannequins are wearing. Most of the time, you can simply buy those clothes. Get 7 or so outfits, and cycle through them in your day-to-day life. It’s not difficult, and it’s a great way to get started.

If you want, pick a fashion piece every six months. This is something that follows a current trend that will sooner than later fade (e.g. the bright colored chino or crazy pattern shirts crazes) and deepen your seasonal game.

Fit is crucial. Your shirt should gently hug your rib cage; your jeans should angle slightly down toward the floor and lightly hug your quads. Style is more important than fashion so you don’t have to read GQ every season, but know the general trends. Baggy jeans are done. Throw them away. They’ve been done forever, and they make you look like an idiot. Black, shiny, square-toed dress shoes aren’t a great look, either. Your Kenneth Cole Reactions should go in the garbage.

The lesson: Women don’t date guys who dress poorly, unless they’re rock stars in some other area of their lives. Go buy some clothes that fit your body and are in style to give off a more dynamic vibe, and wear blacks and greys for maximum simplicity.

Which is more important: looks or confidence?

by Robbie 1 Comment

I’m 5’8 and almost obese. I’ve never received attention from women the past year despite becoming more social. 3 years ago, when I was almost 40 pounds slimmer, I took a summer class and I noticed the prettiest girl in class hitting on me. However I was too aloof to notice that she was interested. Why do people keep saying that attracting women relies on confidence when my experience proves otherwise?

When people say that being attractive to women relies on confidence, they’re correct. But being attractive isn’t solely about confidence. A healthy sense of confidence isn’t enough to overcome deficits that make you unattractive, like being out of shape. The only guys who can get away with being out of shape are exceptionally attractive in other crucial categories. I’m talking celebrity status, being a multi-millionaire (a sign of career success), or being off the charts in charisma and likability.

Ranked by importance, not being unattractive comes before being attractive. This means that unattractive traits will disqualify you before attractive traits even have a chance to make you a qualified candidate.

A preference for men being in good shape is not a superficial desire by women, by any means. It’s actually an effective way for them to gather information about you as a potential partner, short-term or long-term, because your physique is an accurate indicator of deeper physical and psychological traits. It demonstrates your overall physical health, your ability to be conscientious and maintain a healthy diet, and your self-esteem.

This has roots in human evolutionary history, where the men whose genes with the highest likelihood of being passed on were those who could effectively hunt, fish, protect their family, and survive in the wild. As a result, women have an innate preference for guys who are in good shape. They aren’t looking for a bodybuilder or powerlifter type body- that would have been a disadvantage in our evolutionary environment, and could even be interpreted as a sign of sexual insecurity. They’re just looking for low body fat and developed musculature. Picture a swimmer’s physique or a lean Crossfitter and you’re on the right track.

As with everything in dating, context matters. Women’s preferences will vary depending on your audience. Looks matter more to girls who are young and inexperienced with dating. As women get older and look to settle down and have a family, looks hardly matter at all, taking a back seat to personality and confidence. If you’re going for girls who are mature enough to see past the Billy Biceps of the world, looks may give you a slight boost in attracting her interest and attention, but that’s about it. I’m guessing that the girl in your class was younger and less experienced with dating, so she would tend to favor the more superficial traits like pure physical attractiveness.

Regardless of your audience, getting in better shape remains one of the easiest things you can do to improve your attractiveness. You said you’re almost obese, which means that if you clean up your diet and get on a good exercise regimen, you’ll quickly make progress on your physique and become more attractive.