I think that girls like to be approached by confident guys, and that most guys who are trying to learn PUA skills are not as unattractive to women as they probably think they are, physically, because of low-self esteem. Therefore, any routine that enables a guy to approach a girl confidently is going to have some success. All the PUA tricks are really just ways to do what comes naturally to the people that don't need them, which is to exude confidence and fearlessness when meeting new people.

There is really no difference between an Oceans Eleven opener and "Hey, what are you up to?" as long as you have the conversational skills to reply to her answer to the latter with something interesting and take the conversation from there without going "Cool. Cool. Where are you from...do you come here often...are you in school....blah blah...boring...goodbye." These openers just kind of spark a conversation into something fun and interesting the way that some people can spark a conversation naturally.

I think this statement is directed at Henry, but my approach is also a bit different from you. I will approach any girl I like (if I am in the mood, other things are important as well, I have a business to run for instance).

By no means I think I can get any girl I want, but I am not afraid to give it a shot, but sometimes things just don't work out, for whatever reason.

Bottomline is, if I do not get the number/kiss/whatever I want from her,

I

just

do

not

care.

She has bad taste, and you simply cannot win every time.

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.” - Theodore Roosevelt

Ok that makes it clear. When someone says practise I assume they mean something done in preperation. I thought there was something you were suppose to do at home to get better.


That is actually a very good way to put it. There is no reason to expect anything. The problem is not drink buying but this expectation.

Exactly.



Was no in the group successful?

No idea. When I was in university a friend of mine started marketing his own. He was always starting some stupid project to make a few bucks. He gather a bunch of stuff to compiles his own. We'd pre-drink at his place every so often so occasionally we'd read some of it for a joke. A lot of it was just horrible.

[quote]
So how come I *do* fit the description, yet did *not* know these plainly obvious things? [quote]

Either no one in your group was successful with women or you never though it would be beneficial to observe and mimic the ones that were.

It actually occurred to me that PUA is very similar to financial advice books. The material is plainly obvious yet these awful books like Rich Dad / Poor Dad sell millions of copies. I can't explain it.

No. My point was that in any situation someone should be able to identify which individuals have the behaviours that lead to success and quickly mimic those behaviours. This is a more general point and doesn't just apply to dealing with women. For example, a few years back I found myself in a very foreign environment where pretty much everything I know about social interactions was completely different. I had no idea what behaviour I should employ so I just lay low for a day and watched everyone else until I could identify who I should be mimicking and what behaviours I need to adapt. Nobody is born with innate knowledge about every social situation but we all do have the ability to watch and adapt to the behaviours of those that do know the rules.

i think it is valid.

i also think there is a pronounced tendency for pick up artists to exaggerate how successful they are, which is a big part of the reason many people think it is a load of ****.

Nope. I just went out there, got rejected over and over, posted on PUA forums, learned from my mistakes. Sarged a couple of times with guys in my local area, which helped a lot (kinda like hand sweating in poker maybe). It sucked and it used to bother me a lot. I used to internalize every rejection and blame myself, thinking that there must be something wrong with me because A girl or B girl didn't want me on that night. Wrong way to think about it. At least half the girls my age (23) are in relationships, right? So most of those girls are not going to be receptive. Some will but it takes way more work than on a single girl. I haven't bagged a girl in a relationship. Maybe I could and maybe I couldn't, but I just don't see the point. But that's one reason you get rejected. Another is just if the girl's in a bad mood, or another is that she just isn't interested. It's not a reflection on the guy, **** happens. Just play the numbers. I've improved tremendously since starting out whereas now I don't have to talk to 5 girls a night to try to get one to go home with me-usually I can succeed with the first set I open.

Books and forum posts and everything can help with PUA(as well as other subjects, obviously), but until you get out there and take your beats, you won't improve. Like I said in an earlier post, at this point it just comes naturally to me, like it probably does to some of you in poker. I know how to approach a girl, select an opener, how to defeat **** tests, formulating an appropriate mix of negs and weaving them into the conversation, and how to advance using kino into an eventual kiss test and then it's on from there. Sorry for using so many poker analogies but I feel like more people will get where I'm coming from if I do. If I'm wrong, let me know and I'll stop using them.

PUA and normal game is the same thing ?!?!?!

I think people are drawing borders that are completely unnecessary.

PUA has everything explained in detail, etc.
I think people who got normal game are doing wrong to people, who are trying to learn "the game" via PUA by saying everything is BS.
I mean it worked on a lot of people, why should it not work?

Denying the success of PUA, would be like saying online poker is rigged and all the big players are just a lot luckier in life.

How does PUA translate into long-term relationship sustainability?

It seems to me that either you at some point have to revert back to a normal "baseline" personality state (somewhere between PUA high and normal self I guess), or you have to keep up the PUA charade for the rest of your time with that girl.

Also, from what Ms. Slick said about my relationship in the other thread I get the idea that a PUA long-term relationship consists of a LOT of power-struggle awareness, and generally just worrying about making sure you always have the upper hand. That just doesnt seem like a healthy relationship to me.

I agree 100% with Henry about the PUA/Financial Self-Help book analogy

Just sort of wondering what OP is asking. There's a question in the title, but not in the post, and no definition of "valid". Are you asking if the PUA approach works? Is this just supposed to be a general PUA discussion thread?

ive done PUA stuff for a few years, which included 2 bootcamps and reading books. i have mixed thoughts on it at this point. sorry i dont have the time or inclination (after many debacles in the past) to get involved in this discussion here. i do want to state that almost everyone who criticizes it, doesnt have a good understanding of- NOT of the theory, that specific theory is almost besides the point, but of the PUA stuff in a more general way.

As a misogynist myself, I don't mean this as an attack-- but not a lot of the PUA talk seems compatible with respecting women. Am I off base here?

I don't really want to get into any kind of discussion about what the woman's role is in life, but I'm curious-- have you PUA guys noticed a major difference in the way you look at a woman now? Because a lot of the subject material seems pretty well based on the "women are dumb and don't know what they want" school of thought.

Isnt it pretty much accepted as fact (at least here on 2p2, which is the whole world obv) that women generally think they know what they want, but dont know what they actually respond to?

yeah it's true.

i was hoping to avoid using the word 'objectify' at all but the PUA language seems to reduce women to such a degree that I don't even understand the appeal anymore.

If I had to condense PUA material to one single sentence this would be it. Which is a sad state to me in. If someone is always working to have the upper hand then they never actually have it -- at best they can fool someone into thinking they do and that is a very temporary state of affairs.

The appeal is to get laid by hot girls. You don't understand the appeal of that? I understand why it wouldn't appeal to someone to have a shallow relationship. It doesn't appeal to me anymore either. It used to. But to some guys, all they want to do is get laid, and that is what PUA is for. There's nothing wrong with that IMO.

I think most people who knock PUA have no idea what they're talking about. It's not some crazy system of parlour tricks used to get one night stands. That may be a part of it and what the media shows.

Instead, at the core of it, it's about what makes a male attractive to females. What is the essence of attraction and how can we better ourselves so that we have more of what we want.

Sure, some ideas might not work as well as others, but that's the same as in any discipline. The only analogy that is popping into my head right now is Martial Arts. Asking if PUA works is like asking if fighting works. The question just makes no sense. Some martial arts and fighting techniques are more effective than others in various situations, just like in PUA. But just because some techniques seem unnecessary or ineffective doesn't mean the entire scope of PUA is wrong or worthless or anything else. Most people just don't understand how wide a scope PUA covers.

I, like many others, can readily attribute my success in various areas of my life to what I've learned from PUA and getting better with women. You learn life skills that are really invaluable.