Powerful Connections

When I recently found myself faced with a very important question from a female friend that I hold very dear, I found myself baffled. We talked for a short while and I noticed that she was evading eye contact at certain key points. Now, I’m a no bullshit kind of guy when with friends and I demand complete honesty from those closest to me, so I asked what was going on.

The Question

Honestly, I had no idea how to respond to her next question and I know deep inside that the words that came out of my mouth were both impulsive and completely lame. At least, they were very honest, too. 

The question she put forth was: “Do you have a crush on me?” 

At first, I went inside, as my inner dialogue repeated her question over and over… “Do I have a crush on her?”

If you have read my previous blog post about my friendship with said girl, you will know that flirting for fun has not been banned in our world. Maybe her question was an expression of her feeling that I flirted too much, even though I feel I have gone several miles to underline that I have in deed been holding back, consciously. Maybe it was something else - Maybe something was going on inside of her and not me… I don’t know.

What I do know is that I don’t know, and not knowing is sometimes worth more than knowing.   

The Girl

Had it been any other girl I would have handled the question for what it is in terms of seduction terms; a shit test. But, I have made a promise to myself. A promise that I have extended onto her: I am not a PUA when I am with her. Perhaps this promise is the sole premise of the sanctity I feel in our friendship, which is why it is one I am completely focused on keeping.

In my hierarchy of values she has risen to become one of my most valued friends in no time at all. I have experienced some immense insights over the course of our discussions. Because of it, and due to her unfiltered openness, I hold her at the utmost regard in terms of human quality. In knowing this, I decided to attribute her question to a desire of wanting to keep things 100 % out in the open.

On the other hand… 

The Rules

A friendship of this level of depth with someone of the opposite sex is new to me and - at least that’s my belief - it is unprecedented within my circle of friends, many of whom are some of the most hardcore PUA’s I’ve ever come across. Where I have been in life, friendship with a girl is shallow and has served one of two purposes (or both):

1. Use her as a pivot to meet other girls when out
2. Convert her later and shag her

Those are the RULES that a PUA lives by. Whether your focus is specifically on entourage game or on recovering from a LJBF you did not purposely end up in, these two little sentences are the LAW. 

The Answer

Actually, I have trained, advised or coached the vast majority of the guys I now call friends. The focus has been how to become better at social communication in one way or the other, so I’m not surprised with them pacing me along. I have felt misunderstood with every step of my journey into this friendship with the sole comfort in the knowledge that SHE got it; she saw me. Feeling this deep in my stomache, I responded with a complete disregard of everything I have learned over the last 10 years of being a PUA: 

“Well, I thought you were attractive, and I still do. I have asked myself that same question a few times, and I found out that the attraction is there. However, I have made a conscious choice that I value our friendship a lot more than I would value the thought of escalating the notions of attraction, as I feel that friendships endure longer than relationships. I feel completely comfortable with the way things are right now.” 

How on Earth I came up with that answer I do not know. Things moved along fine after that. I shared, she shared. It was pleasant, and yet I had a distinct feeling that our degree of openness had reduced by a slight margin. Was it all inside of me? Did I overthink her intent? Where did the question really come from? What really happened? I don’t know. 

What I do know is that I don’t know, and not knowing is sometimes worth more than knowing.   

Epilogue

Our conversation moved along and we went our seperate ways. I had a ton of questions racing inside of me, my head was buzzing ominously. Like I was the host of a dark sorceror’s convention or a formula 1 race or something.

I responded briefly to an e-mail she had sent, and she responded yet again with something I clearly interpreted as doubt towards my intent, so I threw back a quick one-liner, yet again attempting to communicate my priorities in our position towards one another.

As I went out that same day, my head was still spinning… I decided to do what I do best and hooked up with a girl. Made out with her to clear my system, took her number. Then, another girl. After that I went to a new place and met 2 more girls. 3 hours had passed by, and I was on my fourth girl. I vaguely remember visions of sexual acts with doubtful quality… I went to a third place, got hammered beyond recognition, and went home.

Sometime during the next day my head cleared. Sticking to my self-imposed identity of a no bullshit kind of guy, I decided to write a quick email, stating my doubts and inner dialogue. Just a brief one, or so I thought. The point: To let her know how much I value our friendship and how stressful I felt about her doubting my intentions, as I felt it hindered me in my freedom towards her. 

I ended up spilling my gutts, thinking to myself: “If anyone can handle it, it’s going to be her.” In fact, I don’t really know that for sure. 

Don’t get me wrong, … I still feel great about my friendship with this girl. Sure, there are certain aspects that I need to look into - I am learning something new with every sunrise these days. There are so many things I do not yet know.

What I do know is that I don’t know, and not knowing is sometimes worth more than knowing.

A lot of people I meet have pre-conceptions about who I am and the life I live as soon as they hear me answer the question: ”So what do you do for a living?” with the words ”I’m a pickup coach.”

I’ve met a lot of different people over the years and most all of them have been fun to witness as the above sentense alone would make them take one step back from me, either physically or verbally.

One of the things that entertain me the most is that the majority of the people that have learned about my profession have a biased idea about the implications of my job and they are never scared of sharing their points of view.

”Oh, so you must be hooking up with a lot of girls?”

”How do you feel about being so manipulating?”

… And more questions along those lines. It was just a few days ago when a girl actually accused me of being easy… I found that extremely amusing since I was screening her to find out whether or not it would work between us and I had refrained from making any moves on her what so ever.

I am often accused of being arrogant, simply because I do not believe in the possibility of me being rejected. Many people have a hard time of understanding this mental strategy, so they choose to label me: Arrogant, full of it, smart-ass.

That is the go to strategy for most of us when we don’t understand something: We distort input and fit it in with a label that we DO understand. So I am perceived as arrogant on many occasions. And I have no problems with it; I respect other people’s perception of the world.

Through the last 7 months of being single I have learnt that the world is what we make it to be. I have been through lows and highs along the way. I have met several new friends and interesting girls and I have been through a journey of commercial ups and downs.

Every step of the way I have held my core principles at heart: To me, life has become all about contributing to other people, even those that do not hold you at highest regard.

What most of us do not get, what we fail to miss, are the feelings behind other people’s behavior. I’ll be completely open with you: I do not live the life of a rock star. I do not hook up with girls every day of the week. I do not manipulate with people to make them do as I want them to. Yes, I CAN – No, I DON’T.

I live to serve others to the best of my ability and I do not want to hook up with a girl unless she is extremely special. That, to me, is what being a pickup coach is all about.

Only one person can ever be responsible for the standards you hold for yourself, and I will always choose to raise my standards and be open to input from people with an open mind and heart, whenever I doubt what is the right level to aim for… What are your standards?

Is it possible for a man and a woman to be good friends? I mean, is it really possible that we can experience one another as friends on an exceptionally deep level of understanding without at some point re-arranging our set of priorities and transform the relationship into something physical?

Before attending my first NLP training I was 120 % inclined to reject the possibility of a male / female relationship based solely on non-sexual intentions. At some point, I believed, one of the parties will always turn towards our genetic purpose. Sexual attraction will build. The feeling of friendship will either develop into something physical or it will perish. 99 % of my communication was pre-processed and pre-designed to achieve a certain outcome inside the other person. I was effectively denying myself from living in the moment.

Throughout most of my adult life this belief has defined which friends I have chosen. My friends have all been male. And then… all the sudden… I met this amazing woman that really got me thinking. I’m actually still thinking the topic through, deciding whether or not to completely let go of my old belief that was adopted through years of focus and application of seductive communication principles. Or, well, … I have decided to surrender myself completely to the flow of the moment.  

Adapt yourself to the life you have been given; and truly love the people with whom destiny has surrounded you. - Marcus Aurelius

When I first met this woman I found myself doing several transderivational searches as we talked for about two hours. My initial thoughts were that this was a very hot and to me very attractive woman with great self-esteem, and I couldn’t quite figure it out; her level of density and ability to communicate with no filters baffled me. Don’t get me wrong, I have met several women along the way that have inspired and posed a challenge to me. This particular woman has a way about her though… As I walked home from our first encounter I remember asking myself if I was dreaming. Could she really be as straightforward as I had perceived? What was she doing that made it so easy for me to choose to listen, I mean really listen, to her person rather than just searching for ways to escalate our relationship into something more?

Had I met this woman in the distant past, I would not have been ready for this thought process. I have been on a long journey and I have explored many relations to get to where I am today. I feel enlightened, not superior. I feel genuine, and this story would not have been possible if I had not made a conscious choice to be open and thankful towards the world. Thank you Steve, thank you friends, for providing me with the questions I need to really look inside of myself.

As a pickup artist I was used to communicate on several levels, and the women that have managed to challenge me by calling me out for being in my head have traditionally won my heart fairly quickly. Even though I have managed to learn how to communicate mainly from my heart and not my head - or crotch - I have always, to some extent, been applying some sort of analytical sense and evaluatio of the social dynamics between myself and the woman with whom I was engaged in conversation. You may think of me as a cynic, and in hindsight I completely agree. It is one of the oldest PUA paradigms in play: Man and woman cannot ever truly be friends, because one of the parties will always seek to fulfill their genetic purpose in life over their conscious efforts.

But, as I think this through - I find this paradigm to be one that inhibits the PUA from the freedom to really FEEL the woman he is communicating with. If we are to extrapolate on this thought, everything a PUA does is hindered by an invisible filter inhibiting him from truly opening up to other people. We fail to understand what Shakespeare did long before us:

“Hear the meaning within the word.” - William Shakespeare

So, there I was… at a bar with an amazingly beautiful, intelligent and feminine woman thinking to myself that I was completely fascinated by her spirit and drawn to her “glow.” We had talked about a ton of stuff, I felt as if I had known her core person for years and I had communicated something to a woman that would previously transcend beyond my wildest dreams: “I appreciate you as a friend.”

At one point during our talk the other night I actually felt completely naked. I was in my right element, showing who I really was and listening to who she really was, as I was feeling completely relaxed about the whole thing. And then my brain entered the arena… Reminding me of the physical attraction, encouraging me to seek beyond the level of friendship we had built in just three conversations. At that very moment this extremely special woman said something that would shatter my belief like a glass breaking into a million pieces.

“You are so cute when you just speak what you are thinking.” - meaning when I communicate using my heart. Amazingly enough, she was picking up on my deepest darkest thoughts. I was extremely confused, my heart feeling, my brain acknowledging, my pickup artist mindset filtering and my desire levels going through the roof. During that talk we both managed to communicate attraction to one another and a desire to seperate things. Now, if you know me, if you have met me in the past, you will most likely be scratching the back of your head going “what the heck..?!?!” - and that is what intrigues me; I am utterly attracted and in some way we have managed to establish a frame where it is OK to be attracted… period.

“It is as easy to draw back a stone, thrown with force from the hand, as to recall a word once spoken.” - Menander

I remembered the words of Menander and decided not to act on my level of physical attraction as my consciousness took over for yet another second: “You can go do what you have always done, or you can trust this woman with your life and share your biggest fears and highest hopes while letting her heart inspire you to grow your own.” My insides were, and are, revolting. I understand the background and limitiations of the PUA paradigm because I am experiencing deep attraction and flat out emotional surrender at the same time. I hope for your sake that you will allow yourself to feel equally confused and calm at the same time. It’s breath-taking, I can tell you that much.

This whole experince reminds me of a friend of mine that recently suggested me to take on celibacy. As he did, I frowned… And now, I actually understand the intent behind his suggestion. I know that, amongst many other things, he knew that the man / woman friendship paradigm of the pickup artist is one of many that has prevented me to see people clearly.

I have no idea where the journey with this woman will take me, or us. However, I do know that I will follow my heart completely and do or say whatever comes naturally.I have always made a point of letting people know when they are attractive to me - now I will make an even bigger point of being completely open to truly communicate using my heart.

Confused? Welcome to my world. What are your thoughts about cross-gender relationships?