How to stop being single!

How to stop being single!.

Good advice from another blogger. Hey, if someone else is saying it, I don’t have to.

Chance and Venus help the daring

Chance is always powerful. Let your hook be always cast; in the pool where you least expect it, there will be a fish. – Ovid, Ars Amatoria III:ix

Chance and Venus help the daring. – Ovid, Ars Amatoria I:xv

So, two points here from our Ancient Roman dating guru.

First of all keep up your attraction skills wherever you happen to be. Be pleasant to everyone, not just to beautiful women, because it’s pleasant, because you need to keep practicing light-hearted chat, and because women can smell a false-hearted creep a mile away.

Practicing light-hearted chat with everyone, not just beautiful women, enables you to practice your skills in situations in which your fear of failure is not evoked. You will begin to experience success and get smiles. Those skills are transferable, so that next time you really do want to start a conversation with a woman you fancy, you’ll be able to do it without becoming tongue-tied.

Which brings us to the second point Ovid is making – chance and Venus help the daring. There are few things so attractive for a woman in a man as confidence. Not brashness but quiet confidence. And one way to develop this is to keep practicing light and pleasant repartee with everyone you meet!

Is it me that I don’t get dates?

First of all, be quite sure that there isn’t a woman who cannot be won, and make up your mind that you will win her.

Thus says Ovid, our Ancient Roman dating guru.

Sooner would the birds cease their song in the springtime, or the grasshopper be silent in the summer, or the hare turn and give chase to a hound of Maenalus, than a woman resist the wooing of a youthful lover.

Maybe so, although it is my experience that if you master the secrets of attraction you don’t need to be youthful either.

Once upon a time I was love-lorn and kept falling in love without the slightest idea of how to attract and keep a woman. I would meet beautiful women or see them at a distance and have no clue how to approach them. I believed from a very young age that I was not attractive to women – and that turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Then, through advice from friends and reading all kinds of hints, tips and strategies and actually trying them out, I began to have success, leading in the end to finding and keeping the love of my life. I started this blog and wrote Dating – the missing manual because I see too many of my male friends fail in this area – men who have good qualities any sensible woman would admire. I now know what these men are doing wrong and how they could fix it.

Think it’s because you’re too old? Wrong. Because you’re not handsome? Wrong. Because you’re not rich? Wrong again. The young, rich and handsome can and do get these things wrong. Behaviour is key. Be yourself and at the same time learn to be confident in who you are. Then learn the arts of attraction.

Ovid says:

Perhaps you think she doesn’t want to yield. You’re wrong.

Well, there will be quite a number who aren’t interested for perfectly good reasons. But if so, move on – it’s nothing to do with you and there is no shortage of attractive women out there.

How do I find my soulmate?

Strategy. Finding your soulmate can be difficult. Finding someone for a quick fling is easier if you know how – the rules of attraction are the same. But how to find the one?

You can be great at chat-up and attraction (of which I have much more to say some other time) and still this part can be very difficult. You can go on date after date and nothing works out for the long term. You can even have dates that pall after the first ten minutes.

Why not start working on strategy now?

Let’s cut to the chase. Yards of verbiage are not needed to explain this. Go to places where the kind of woman who might be your soulmate would hang out. Sure, if you just want a quick fling, go to a bar or club (comedy clubs are fun too), and apply the techniques. But if you are (for example) into art, go to a gallery or join an art evening class (if there are no hot women there, join another one – join several – simple).

If you don’t like noisy nightclubs, why would you expect that your soulmate would? It’s possible, but you are lengthening the odds unnecessarily. Go to the places she might go to.

Your criteria for a soulmate are, or should be, pretty strict. Don’t compromise. Learning confidence will give you plenty of choice, so you don’t need to compromise. It then becomes a numbers game. Don’t waste time looking in the wrong places.

Love from abroad?

Some men imagine they’ll find true love abroad. If you do any internet dating you will get the occasional message from some attractive woman in some remote part of the world. I’m not saying it can never work out, but with the right techniques you can attract women right here on your own doorstep. And if you can’t attract a woman in your own home town, how are you going to work the magic on this exotic woman, once you meet up?

Incidentally (off topic, but hey…) the same applies to overseas property investment. If you can’t make money in property investment within easy travelling distance from where you live (where you can keep an eye on things and make sure you’re not being ripped off) how do you imagine you will make money investing in a resort a few thousand miles away?

Anyway, here’s a short extract from my book, Dating – the missing manual:

Don’t be taken in

Remember that on the web no-one can see who you really are. Since you are on a genuine quest, you have no reason not to be honest. But there are some strange people out there.

Hot babes from other countries who allege that they just want to find an honest man to settle down with may be genuine, but then what’s wrong with the men in their own countries?

Could they be after a bogus marriage and a residence visa? Could they be after the thousand pounds or more that they need for a visa application and air fare so that they can some and see you? And oops! There was a last minute problem with the authorities so I cannot come my darling. (Needless to say the air fare was non-refundable.)

And could it be that the lovely Maya doesn’t exist, but some middle-aged man has found a nice photograph on the internet and is pretending to be Maya with her tempting body and pretty face, in order to extract money from you?

You are searching for something very important to you, and in this condition you are very vulnerable to believing whatever you are told.

Don’t be daft. Your chances with women in your own country are at least as good as they are with someone from elsewhere. If you follow the advice in this book you can have a lot of fun verifying this and at the same time minimise your risk of being taken for a ride.

This is simply because you will learn that you are a man with choices. If something isn’t quite right, you don’t have to settle for it, because you are not desperate.

How can I attract a woman? – the magic of makeover

If you, like me, have a romantic view of life you may be thinking that it’s the inner you that counts, and a woman should be attracted to you for that. But the inner you isn’t what’s on public display. It’s like thinking that a shop will make money just by selling quality goods and therefore doesn’t need to bother with a window display. It doesn’t work like that.

I’m going to contradict myself, because the inner you does count and is absolutely crucial in the game of attraction. But we’ll come to that another time.

Presentation is important for two main reasons.

First, because first impressions count. To find your dream woman you have to attract her first.

The woman who became my wife told me much later that her mother had advised her to check a man’s shoes. No doubt that wasn’t her sole or even her main criterion for going out with me, but there it was anyway. Perhaps we’ll return to the topic of shoes and what they say about you later. Obviously there’s a lot more to it than shoes.

Second, presentation changes the way we feel about ourselves.

All along I’ve been emphasising the importance of confidence. I don’t mean swagger or conceitedness, but confidence. We need to develop the kind of confidence that stops us worrying about the impression we’re making (because without thinking about it we know it’s a good one) and focusses instead on other people, including the woman we are trying to attract.

Here’s the thing: a makeover can instantly change how we feel about ourselves.

Ok, it involves some expenditure. But it gives us a massive head start. If you look good, you feel good, and if you feel good you’ll be radiating the kind of energy that attracts women.

If you’re not sure where to start, ask a female friend or sister (assuming she has good taste and likes you enough to want to help) to sort out your wardrobe and put all the rejects in a box for the charity shop. Next, ask the female friend or sister to go clothes shopping with you. If you’re on a budget you can take this a step at a time. But make a start on it, because it’s really important.

How can I attract a woman? Dealing with rebuffs

Why are we so scared of just going up to a woman we are attracted to and saying “hi”?

Of course, common sense says we don’t do this when she is in the company of her very large and scary boyfriend. (Disclaimer: you follow any suggestions on this blog entirely at your own risk.) But that isn’t what I’m talking about.

There is a woman you find instantly attractive and you want to start up a conversation, and fear makes your blood run cold. What’s that all about?

I think it is the fear of rebuff which hits at our own insecurity. We think: she’ll laugh at me because I’m not handsome/ attractive/ whatever. Why would she want a worm like me, to paraphrase one of John Betjeman’s poems? This hits at our most basic idea of self-worth – that a woman wouldn’t want us.

There will be many occasions in which the woman who catches your eye will not be interested. She may already have a boyfriend or permanent partner. You may not be her type. Some women like older men, some don’t, some prefer tall men, some don’t, some like muscled men, others are put off by them, and so on. One key thing to understand is that a ‘not interested’ response should not be taken personally.

There are two ways of dealing with this, and they go hand-in-hand.

One is to learn how to make light repartee, so that we don’t get rebuffed. If she isn’t interested, you’ll still have had a fun though brief interchange, nothing lost on either side. If she is interested, so much the better (there is more to be said on what to do next if that occurs).

The other is to build inner confidence. The kind of confidence that says to itself, she wasn’t interested, well, no matter, her loss, there will be other women and other times. And one very good way of building inner confidence in this area is precisely to practice light repartee, because you will not be rebuffed (or so rarely it won’t matter). Every time you do this, confidence builds.

There is a whole section on how to practice light conversation and repartee in my new book.

Officially published today!

Dating – the missing manual:

you can attract and keep the woman of your dreams

(if they had taught this in school alongside algebra and French irregular verbs, my whole life would have been different)

US Amazon link here: Dating – the missing manual (paperback, 130 pages) – $9.50

UK Amazon link here: Dating – the missing manual (paperback, 130 pages) – £5.50

Attracting a woman – practicing repartee

What do you say after you say “hi?”

I talked before about repartee – making light conversation. It can be about anything. Just pick up something in the situation that seems natural to talk about. Be creative, but don’t spend too long thinking about it or the moment will have passed.

Example: you go into a wine shop and luckily you are served by an attractive woman. You ask advice about what wines might go with the meal you are planning. You want advice anyway, that’s why you’re in the shop. You might then say, “You seem to know everything. Do they make you taste all the wine in the shop?” Silly conversation opener, but it has the merit of (1) being lighthearted and (2) being about her.

Top tip: people love talking about themselves.

I’m not going to talk you through how to turn that into a date right now. You may not be ready for that yet. The point of this post is to say, practice. Practice even on women you wouldn’t want to ask out on a date. Practice on the till girl in the supermarket, even if she isn’t your type. Even practice on men too.

The point of practicing on people you don’t necessarily fancy is that it removes the fear of rejection. You will find that you are seldom rebuffed and this will build confidence. You are honing your skills for the moment when it will count. You are practicing becoming a fearless master of light conversation.

Don’t imagine the right words will just come into your head when you see that really hot woman you want to talk into a date. Most likely fear will freeze your mind and by the time you’ve worked out the perfect thing to say the moment will have passed. You need to practice. Don’t worry if it’s a bit clunky at first, but keep practicing and give yourself a mental pat on the back every time you do this.

One more thing to make this easier. Stop worrying about yourself. Your aim is to make the other person smile.

Rush-hour crush 2

Another one from Friday’s morning paper:

To the girl with sort white hair and pink streaks reading her Kindle on the westbound Piccadilly line: you are the prettiest girl I’ve seen in a long time. Our eyes met, we both smiled but I regret not saying hello. Any chance I could buy you a drink? – Guy wearing yellow polo shirt

Ok, what did he do right, what should he have done and what should he do now?

First of all, let’s emphasise what he did right, because this is important and it gives him a head start.

Think about it a moment. What gives this guy a chance?

He made eye-contact.

Now of course if you stare at anyone on the tube or in a bus, something tells them they are being watched and eventually they will look up to see what’s going on. This is very a very basic instinctive reaction and it has to do with survival. The other person will eventually look at you and therefore eye-contact will inevitably occur.

If you continue to stare this may be taken as creepy and threatening. This is not what I am advising at all. So what did he do next that made it ok?

Easy isn’t it? He smiled.

How did he know that she didn’t feel freaked?

She smiled as well.

Now as always, caution. Smiling can be defensive. It is not possible in a blog entry to analyse at length different kinds of smile. You have to have a certain amount of emotional sensitivity, and I can’t give you that if you don’t have it (although most of us do have it if we are not blinded by desire, frustration and self-deception – a topic for another time perhaps – for now let’s just point to Malvolio in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night for those who know the play).

People also smile because we are hard-wired to copy what others do (we have so-called ‘mirror neurones’ that help us do this). She doesn’t necessarily fancy him just because she smiled. BUT…

But he’s in with a chance.

What he should have done of course was what he now regrets not having done. He should have gone up to her and said ‘hello.’ If she wasn’t interested after all would the sky have fallen in? No, of course not. She’d have made an excuse, smiled again and left. No problem. There are other women and there will be other times.

What he should do now is obvious isn’t it? Assuming he’s lucky enough to be on the same carriage of the same tube train as her again.

Rush-hour crush

Big mistake:

“To the girl with dark hair eating an apple on the bus. You took the 13 bus to Clapham at 7pm on Tuesday and I think you took my heart with you. I wanted to approach you but you were with your friend. Fancy a coffee sometime? – Shy Guy in the red tie”

(Adapted from entries in the section in the morning newspaper where such people write in.)

How does the woman’s friend stop Shy Guy from offering a meeting over coffee? Answer: she doesn’t.

What’s Shy Guy’s chance of getting a date with this woman? Probably close to zero.

What should he have done instead?

It’s obvious isn’t it? Yet every day there are a handful of these messages in the newspaper, from women too. I’ve read these in Canada, so it’s not just a London thing.

Think about it. Shy Guy goes up to woman and says “hi.” No smarmy or creepy or clever lines. Especially not, “You’re so beautiful, please go out with me” (which will never work unless she’s desperate). Just “hi.”

Of course, he’ll have to follow through with something further, depending on what she says. But his back stop line could be as simple as, “I just saw you and thought I’d say hi. My name’s Shy Guy, what’s yours?”

If she’s not interested, he can pick up the cues and not be annoying, smile and withdraw gracefully. What’s to lose? We act as though the sky will fall in if some woman isn’t interested. Done properly and lightheartedly, this incident will brighten up her day – even if you’re not her type.

One more comment until I return to this topic in due course: being confident and saying “hi” gives a much more powerful message than a line in the newspaper.