More than Just Sex (14 page)

When you get out of the way of your thinking it will be exactly the same for you. Here’s how it will affect you.

Think about it like this: when you are in a relationship, not looking and feeling quite content with yourself, you
walk up to the till to pay for your shopping and the girl serving is just not your type at all. Can you chat to her? Yes, of course you can! You can be witty, funny, calm and relaxed. The following day you split up with your partner and go shopping in the same store. Can you chat to the girl now? Yes, of course you can! The day after that you are back and she’s on lunch and has been replaced by Miss Supermarket Cashier Girl of the Year, and the small paralysing voice in your head says, ‘Wow, she’s hot!’ Can you chat to her with the same ease now… or even at all?

I know you do it. If you are reading this book, then you definitely do it. Go on, be honest with yourself – what’s the phrase that you use when you see a hot girl? ‘Nice! Wow! Sweeeeet! Gorgeous! Fantastic!’ What is it for you?

You’ll likely even have the same phrase that you use every time. You do, don’t you? Perhaps you’ve never noticed before, but you will now. The phrase that triggers your interest, and also the highly charged emotional state that goes with it.

I want you to think of these outbursts as SHiT (Small Head is Thinking). Now, ‘small head’ is NOT to be trusted, and will only ever get you into trouble but rarely into her bed. Small head is that part of you that wants but never gets. Small-head thinking is the biggest enemy of your chances with the opposite sex.

Even though you are (hopefully) keeping your SHiT to yourself, it’s as damaging to your chances as walking right up to the object of your desire, picking your nose and saying, ‘Hey babe, get your coat, you’ve pulled!’

Remember, all your behaviour is a product of your state of mind at the time.

Imagine you are sitting at the lights when a new hot hatch pulls up next to you. You fancy your chances, your mate in the passenger seat eggs you on and so you look across at the other driver with an expectant ‘shall we?’ She looks back with a sexy ‘you’ve got no chance!’ smile, and so you’re committed. You know your car well, you know the biting point and where the power band peaks, but now you’re wiping your sweaty hands on your jeans, your heart is racing faster than the engine is revving and your only thought is ‘the green light’.

In just a few seconds you will be hurtling towards glory or humiliation, and all you can do is hold on and see… OK, let’s rewind a bit. You have done all this to yourself and I don’t mean by initiating a traffic-light Grand Prix in the first place, although you did do that, too; I mean creating the state of adrenaline-rush anxiety you now find yourself in. If you tried that story on for yourself, I bet you are probably feeling slightly anxious now. Maybe it brings back memories. I mean, how humiliating would it be to lose? And especially in front of your mate, who you know will never let you live it down.

But it’s all in the mind. Whether you are feeling anxious now or whether you are that guy sitting at the lights, nothing real has changed, nothing in the physical, real, reach-out-and-touch-it world has changed. The only thing that has changed is that you have gone from
the
right state to
a
right state faster than any supercar and with much more dangerous consequences.

Your internal dialogue (whether conscious or subconscious) is your worst enemy in so many situations, but especially where women are concerned. And it’s all to do with the way you
frame
it in your head.

Think back to that initial, small-head thought, ‘Wow, she’s gorgeous, NICE, sweeeeeeet! Gorgeous! Wow!’ What does it do to you? OK, sure, it lets you know that you are attracted to her, but I think you could have figured that out for yourself. The only thing it brings is a very real sense of pressure to the proceedings. Whether you like it or not, that ‘small-head’ comment has put the girl in question on a pedestal just high enough to be out of your reach. Any other ‘helpful’ comment from your thoughts is only revving up the mental pressure, so that if you do somehow manage to overcome your anxiety and actually approach her, you are in no fit state to do anything more than blurt and drool your way through an awkward and ultimately fruitless exchange of anything but bodily fluids.

YOU’VE GONE AND BROKEN IT NOW – GOOD!

The exercise we have done (just sitting and closing your eyes and allowing thoughts to come and go) will really help you break your emotional attachment to thought forever. But I don’t know exactly when that will happen for you. I do know, however, that it’s a bit like waiting for a bus. You don’t know exactly when the bus will come, but you definitely have a much better chance of catching it
if
you are at the bus stop when it shows up. Doing this exercise
for 15 minutes every day will keep you at the bus stop. Do it, and the rest is inevitable.

But until then we need to GOOOW!!! (get out of own way) and into another way. There is lots more learning and transformational stuff for you still to come, but while you are clearing your thoughts read on and practise all the tips and tricks (especially in the MAN-ipulation section) with women for whom the ‘small head’ does not toll.

‘You’re an evil genius’ the text began, grabbing my full attention. ‘I just pulled two nights in a row and one of them was really hot!’ As I replied with ‘yeah… that’s what happens’, I laughed to myself at the simplicity of what had led to my new ‘evil genius’ status. You see, the texter was a client who had come to see me to help him to improve his confidence with the opposite sex and given I was writing this book at the time I seized my chance to put some of the principles into action again.

RECAP!

Externalize the real you, get out of your own way by not engaging in your scary self-doubt thoughts, go where a guy like you is desirable and know what to do when she bites.

That’s it! Easier said than done, you might think, but trust me… it’s easier than you think – you are halfway there already.

But until your thoughts are calm and you are comfortable talking with intent to anyone, practise with people who
don’t provoke SHiT (the women that don’t attract you) in situations that don’t really matter. Don’t be a jerk and take advantage just because you can. This is about finding a meaningful relationship, remember, but before you jump in the race car, it might be an idea to learn to drive something a little more forgiving, if you see my point. So go ugly early and practise your art. The art of being the natural, real relaxed you in every situation and with anyone, no matter how hot they are.

If the first part of your new success strategy is to quiet your thoughts and stay out of your own way, the second part is making it not matter anyway…

Every girl likes to feel like she’s beautiful, like she’s ‘very special’ (and not in a sleazy way, either!). She wants to feel like she is gorgeous and interesting, and that she has your full and complete attention, that you are really listening to her and what she has to say; that you are genuinely interested in
her
, not just in getting her into bed. Trust me, if you get the rest of it right, she will be just as interested in that as you are.

But the trick (as you know) is to not be the guy who is chasing, chasing, chasing. Chase anything and it runs away, and the more you chase the more it runs. Simple.

For most guys that struggle to meet women comes down to two things: either getting in your own way and tripping yourself up or being so keen to impress that you come across like a used-car salesman.

I’m sure you’d agree that if you asked any woman what characteristics she would least like in a date, a nervous salesman would come out top every time. You ARE NOT that guy, so why the hell would you ever want to come across like that? You wouldn’t, and it’s time to stop right now.

Much, much better to approach, intrigue, connect and then let her come to you a little. Always remember that even when you are fishing it is the fish that bites the hook… and that can only be done when you are in flow and it doesn’t really matter.

I cannot emphasize this enough: if there is one thing that is even more likely to ruin your chances with the opposite sex than sweaty pits, bad teeth and a comb-over, it’s if she smells your desperation. Left unchecked, it’ll kill your love life faster than a Semtex sandwich and if this is you, you probably don’t even know if you are doing it. You remember when you did the ‘Who do you think I am?’ fieldwork that I pointed out the danger of listening to your self-saboteur, don’t you? You know the small voice that said, ‘No way, they’re too hot, I couldn’t possibly…’ Remember?

Fieldwork

Now I have another street exercise for you. Next time you are out and about, and I don’t necessarily mean on a Saturday night on the pull, I mean just out and about, notice the nonsense and the way you talk to yourself in your head.

It has been shown time and time again in many research studies that anxiety is directly linked to how much you think
it matters. Doesn’t matter whether it is in sport, exams, the dreaded best man’s speech or dating. It’s a case of mind over matter. If you don’t mind then it doesn’t matter…

You are absolutely at your most intelligent, witty, charismatic and attractive when YOU are not looking.

FINDING YOUR KEYS

Love usually comes when you least expect it. So, could it be that the secret lies in that ‘least expecting it’ part? When you get out of, and stay out of, your way for long enough, you tend to do just fine, remember? Now it’s time to do that for your own good in your love life.

High involvement and low investment are going to be the keys to your happiness and success. Fishing while not really caring if you catch anything; watching the game but not really minding about the score.

How many times have you found yourself yelling at the TV, willing your team to score that last-minute winner? Did it make a jot of difference? Thought not. There are only four combinations of investment and involvement, and only ever one winner. Which has been your default setting until now?

HIGH INVESTMENT – LOW INVOLVEMENT

This is exactly what you will see with any spectator sport in any country around the world: groups of guys yelling at other groups of guys when they can do absolutely nothing about the outcome.

I know people (I’m sure you do, too) for whom their team losing will cause a mild state of depression, which lasts until at least Wednesday when the build-up to the next game starts again. I know others for whom bragging rights on a Saturday night are coveted higher than anything else they know. And sadly, growing up in the west of Scotland, I have seen people maimed and even killed because of the colour of their scarf and the Saturday score. One of my neighbours has even received death threats, and the police car that is permanently parked in our street serves as a reminder of just how far some people will go to exert their personal emotional investment in the outcome of a football match.

But this high level of investment can also go another way. The way in which you are totally emotionally invested in the outcome, but paralysed and just as unable to do anything about it as if you weren’t even there. You see this all the time in nightclubs. The guys who REALLY want a girlfriend (OK, who really want to get laid) but are terrified to even dare to talk to a girl, so instead stand at the side or circle the dancefloor like shy sharks circling an elusive prey. You can almost hear their internal dialogue screaming at them, egging them on and keeping them stuck at the same time. Maybe you have been one of those guys? Next time you are out, just observe. Then watch out for the other guys, the ones who don’t get in their own way or trip themselves up.