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What else do you want to be said to you? You go on and on about "personal development" as if pickup was a fucking religion. It's just a way to get laid more often. That's it. It isn't about work, school, health, travel, etc. Pickup is about fucking women.
You talk as if fucking women and every other area of life can be separated. Even on this forum there's far better advice that acknowledges that every part of you plays into your success with women or lack of it.
When I said PUA doesn't take into account a person's overall development, I wasn't suggesting that it should be PUA's job to fix every area of your life (much as people do credit with providing help in lots of areas, and I would agree). It's that you need to reach a certain point of maturity before you can go on a fucking spree and do it like an adult and not ending screwing up yourself and a bunch of other people (again, I'm hardly saying sex is bad or I wouldn't be here).
And to make clear, my point is that when someone says they're having trouble with any area of adult life, whether it be sex and relationships, career or anything else, the first question asked should be "have you made a complete break with childhood?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJ9VBMBS3qE
The reason I spoke about the importance of "getting in touch with your inner child" is that there are things about us that are essentially us, and that's what the child is. For me, it's been my lifelong dream to be a musician, it's at the core of who I am, and if I had not pursued this and taken it all the way, that emotional part of me would never have forgiven me. This is only right. We have to have something that defines us, that separates us as individuals. We can't be squeezed into just any mould.
This is also why I spoke about abuse and neglect as things that need to be dealt with. Telling someone who has been badly abused "hey just tell some DHV stories and it'll all work out" is wrong and irresponsible. People do need nurture, and if they didn't receive it in childhood, they need to find a way to receive it later. I repeat, becoming a man from the boy you were is not an easy or overnight process, especially if you've had it rough.
In my original post I was saying that there needs to come a point where we all say goodbye to our childhood past and become men aka grow a pair. It's just strange to be told repeatedly that this is what I need to do when I was the one who first suggested it. I'm not saying I'm there, fine. I'm saying I clearly recognise the distinction between the two ways of life and am working to put the former behind me.
I posted this thread though precisely because telling someone "grow some nuts", while good for shocking someone out of their complacence, is not nuanced enough to deal with the issues. You don't need to berate someone for being emotional, feeling scared or finding things difficult. You just need to find a way to get them through those things. If you meet someone who's been badly hurt in life and is looking for reassurance, telling them "grow a pair" will only alienate them. Furthermore, talking to people in this way is not what being a man's about. When I first started my current job, there was a guy there who told me to "man up" many times a day. He wasn't harsh about it but playful, and the message got across.
I talked about a lot of the behaviour on this forum being "the inner child seeking validation" and DJ_Z misinterpreted that to mean that I think that's what PUA is. Maybe I wasn't clear enough. I'm saying that many individuals who post on the forum are coming from that kind of place and that this is their problem, in terms of getting with women and in terms of life generally. I'm saying that perhaps AFC is just another term for manchild, because everything that makes a person AFC comes from the inner child - neediness, reactiveness, investment in outcome. None of these are behaviours of a man, and I think a lot of the time you'll get into it and find that a lot of what's driving people is rooted in childhood. This is not the same as saying:
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nyone trying to get laid more is an emotionally scarred little boy trying to reconcile with being diddled by his weird uncle and proving his manhood by lying to women in order to bed them.
First of all, PUA is not synonymous with "trying to get laid more", which every man does to some degree. PUA involves a specific set of assertions, many of which I agree with, and practices which are more or less helpful. And where did I say anything about how I think PUAs are liars? This is just irresponsible posting.
I acknowledge that many people on this forum display attitudes that are appropriate to men, such as being thick-skinned, detached from outcome, non-needy, non-reactive, able to provoke emotion in others while not being ruled by it themselves. This is all good stuff and stuff that isn't taught in our culture anywhere else.
What I'm suggesting is that we're not currently framing the issue as it should be framed. The issue is that people aren't leaving childhood behaviour. I think this is a wider sociological issue. We increasingly idolise youth and disdain age as a culture. It's increasingly acceptable for people to engage in behaviours that more traditionally would have been left behind.
That's why it's all the more important to recognise the child in each of us, what it is, what role it should play and where limits should be imposed on it. For me, I've realised that a lot of symptoms of anxiety that I experience (including physical tension) are the result of not letting go of an identity that I can no longer be congruent with (a man who still sees himself as a child is the definition of incongruent). So there comes a point to let go.
And since we're talking about getting laid here, I do think that putting that child state behind you is 100% of what you need to do to be successful with women. I think that the child state is something that, when continued beyond its natural life, actively sabotages what we would otherwise be doing as men. And you don't need to learn a bunch of techniques. You just need to shift your identity. Letting go of that child state will allow you to be the man you should be, to be confident, to have the effective sexual presence that you should have, and so few people let go of it entirely, which puts anyone who can miles ahead. But in order to leave it behind you have to know what it is you're standing apart from.
I hope that may clarify things for anyone who didn't find my message as clear as Izumi did.
CHAT