This is long, but it's imperative that everyone in the community - especially veterans, read this pseudo-treatise.

PUAs tend to think that by becoming masters of picking up chicks they've somehow liberated themselves from servility. They imagine that because they control the girls, they've mastered the girls. This is false. They have merely become slaves to the girls. You see, an AFC considers his value to be partially determined by the attention paid to him by attractive females. It's ingrained in the biological functioning of humans and is normal. What AFCs do wrong is that they too often place that valuation in the hands of one unobtainable woman. They say "If only I can get HER to go out with me, my life will be complete". Invariably this will turn out to be false.

The PUA thinks that he's mastered this belief. But he has merely dispersed it. A PUA devotes a significant part of his life to picking up women. He is probably better at it than the AFC (or should be - if not, he's doing something very wrong). But at the point where a man has invested significant time and money into learning how to pick up chicks, he's integrated that task - seducing women - into a key part of his personal identity. In other words, he's forced to value himself based on his ability to obtain women. It is inescapable.

Consider an analogy: many men consider their ability to play basketball a key part of their manhood. In other words, you're somehow 'cooler', more 'macho', or 'manly' if you can dunk over your friend or beat him in a friendly match. But when we talk about LeBron James or Michael Jordan, do we say that they've vanquished their reliance on basketball for self-validation? The opposite is probably true. A man who has devoted countless hours to the sport of basketball is more than ever dependent on his basketball skills to provide him with a feeling of self-worth.

This is why most PUAs are more dependent on women than any AFC ever will be. In Style's book, he talks about how Mystery becomes dependent on his pick-up abilities. He discusses how he becomes obsessed with finding the perfect girlfriend(s). A normal man would never be depressed over an inability to find a pair of bisexual magic assistants willing to be in an open relationship. Mystery needs to conquer such inconceivable tasks because he's become reliant on his skills to generate self-worth.

If you wonder why the pick up community inspires such endless drama, backstabbing, stealing of secrets, infighting, and the like, it's because most pick up artists are deeply immature. They traded their entire life for hot women. They tell themselves they are not supplicating, but they're tacitly doing so. Their entire life revolves around doing exactly what it takes to get a given woman. When they go sarging four or five nights a week, they're spending four or five nights a week doing whatever it takes in order to get women. They're doing the worst kind of supplication. AFCs know they're supplicating. PUAs do it and lie to themselves about it.

This is why I propose a new ethos: every PUA must move beyond women. This is impossible. People enter the pick up community to get women. They enter it because they want to worship at the altar of womanhood. They want to supplicate. They will do it willingly. They trade their entire lives for better lays. The only way to become a Post-Seduction PUA is to do what Style did at the end of The Game and walk away from active duty. You can tell me all you want about how PUA makes someone a better person, gives them more personal skills, gives them more charisma, and the like. But the fact is - people enter the PUA community by dedicating their lives to doing whatever it takes to get a girl. It might not be a specific girl. But it is always a girl. While the PUA mentality dictates that no girl is special, this attitude is merely replaced by the notion that girls collectively are special.

I'm not saying that pick up skills are useless. They're not - but spending the time to learn them is an indicator that you're poisoning your life. Obsession on women - which entering the PUA community necessarily entails - is toxic to your general outlook on life. Spend less time fretting over what opener you're going to use and more time having fun in clubs. Women are just one aspect of a healthy life, and pick up artists too often ignore this crucial fact.

Thus, you must move beyond seduction and pick-up. From someone who has spent the last years of his life getting to this point, realize that there is nothing worse than a realization that all your conquests and exploits have merely deepened your dependence on the fair sex.

I don't agree that this attitude is developed among all PUA's. I know it's not my attitude. IMO, some are special, most aren't. The special ones get to stick around with me a while, whereas the others don't. And, when I figure out they aren't special after all, they are gone. I've had that happen a few times.

I will say, some girls are actually worth our time, but they are unfortunately few and far between. So, we weed through them and get rid of the ones that aren't worth our time.

Now, sure 99% of the guys that get into PUA do so in order to figure out how to get either one specific girl or get any girl he wants. That's true. After all, there are tons upon tons of AFC's out there that have NO idea what to do, so obviously they need help in figuring it out. And SOME of these guys do end up becoming slaves either to the girl(s) in the end or slaves to PUA, but I don't agree that this mentality applies to all PUA's.

This is why inner game is SO important. When you KNOW beyond a shadow of a doubt who YOU are, you are NOT dependant either upon a girl validating you or upon the ability to pick up girls validating you. You know who you are, period. We can got out when we want and pick up girls and we can just chill when we want, not worrying about picking up girls, just enjoying life. Either way, our self-worth is still intact. That is the essence of the true PUA. IMO anyway.

Inner Game is no different. Inner game still requires you to phrase your entire internal world view in terms of women. You still have to say "women are unimportant - I don't need them". PUAs, even those who have 'mastered' inner game still focus on women far more than AFCs. True alphas don't think about women - it never even crosses their mind that they're getting all the chicks because of their world view or so-called "inner game". The instinctiveness of it prevents it from becoming a central point of their conscious identity.

Inner game, as touted by the community, is no more than a women-centric approach to self-improvement. In other words, it's Dr. Phil with an emphasis on getting laid.

(As an aside: think Fight Club or Wanted rather than the Mystery Method. Becoming an alpha male should not involve an emphasis on women but rather a detachment from them.)
You say that, but yet you devote time and money to learning and perfecting the art of pick up. You obviously value the ability to pick up women. This is a form of supplication - you have granted women as a collective group some form of overriding value that they do not merit.

agent, you missed my point. I said when guys get INTO PUA they DO get involved FOR the women. But some guys go beyond that. Sure, when I got involved, it was for the women, just as apparently was your reason. However, my worldview, as you put it, now is different from that. I have options. I don't need any particular woman that crosses my path, period. If she interests me, then fine. Maybe I'll play around with her, have some fun with her, maybe she'll earn a stay for a bit in my life. Whatever. On my part, it doesn't matter. On her part, she enjoys my company, so she wants to stay. BUT, that doesn't mean that all I think about now is women. On the contrary. There's a LOT on my plate, not the next pussy.

When a guy starts PUA sure he values the ability to pick up women. If that wasn't so, PUA wouldn't be as big as it is. And, there's a legitimate reason for that. Because most guys don't know how to pick up woman. Again, the reason PUA is as big as it is. So, why argue that it's a bad thing. It boils down to the survival and replication factors. Sure, we all want our line to continue on. And, most of us like sex. And there's nothing wrong with either of those desires. In fact, they are both good desires.

So, you want to judge us as not being true alphas because we are involved in PUA? That doesn't make sense. In case you haven't noticed, we are literally teaching guys how to BE true alphas.

You can give me the whole run-around about how you don't need any woman in particular. But you need women collectively - and this is my point. You've integrated your ability to get women into your persona so critically that it is NOT true Alpha-ness. True Alpha Males don't consider women as actively as anyone who's ever been in the pick up community will.

In his book, Style mentions how every group of women became sets to him. This is exactly the problem. Alpha males do not think this way. They will never think in terms of sets. True Alphas are liberated by their lack of self-awareness. They do not consider themselves Alpha males on a daily basis. They do not post on internet forums on how to become Alpha. By actively working towards Alpha-ness in the context of the seduction community, PUAs have become supplicants to the overall goal of obtaining women. No amount of 'inner game' can change the fact that they define their world view in respect to women.

AFCs would like women but it isn't a critical part of their persona.

Aspiring PUAs NEED women and this is a critical part of their persona.

"Inner-game" PUAs tell themselves "I don't need women", but this is STILL a critical part of their persona. Women are more central to his life than they ever were to an AFC. It is inescapable. The entrance step (through the path of Aspiring PUAs) makes this unavoidable.

What a Alpha-male lacks in selfawareness can impeed him in many ways as well. While they are not actively in situations analyzeing things the way we do, neither are they able to later analyze and grow. If we did not posses this ability to self critic and be self aware...we'd never improve ourselves.

It seems what all this boils down to is a negative spin that you are placeing on self-awareness, and how it affects our view and thierfor need of women.

Thats like saying that the feeling and awarness of hunger impeeds our ability to function...while it actually allows us in the long run to function better. You dont think to yourself "im gonna get hungry later, omg what do i do?". Instead one of two things happens...you either get the feeling (become aware) and know how to react, or you take preventative measures. Had you not been aware you would fumble around going, "whats this rumble in my stomach, o well shiny object!"

Very few life forms on this planet can claim to be self aware, now im not a biologist and im not gonna break down which animals...but i think itd be safe to say that as a survival technique, as a form of intangible evolution...self awarness is a gift.

I think something most PUA's discover upon thier studies is that while intially women may have been the reason for needing to change, social dynamics is much more vastly diverse. Thus our concept of the importance of a women or women in general, declines to the points of realizeing they arent everything. We empower ourselves but we dont lose sight of the ultimate point...we need women in our lives. Our studies allow us to determine who we let into our lives and how.

_________________
-Ka-
"Be the same, only better."

If that were true, this community wouldn't exist . . .

What's your purpose here agent? To tell us we've all made a bad decision to improve ourselves?

False. AFCs who have high levels of desire for females enter the community. However, it's only after they've invested time, energy, and money into the PUA lifestyle that they adopt a persona focused around picking up women.

Look back to my analogy about basketball: someone who doesn't play seriously won't care about his skills as much as someone who spends a lot of time trying to get better.

In terms of what my point is, I made it in my first post and I'll make it again. The seduction community is inherently flawed. Yes, it is a mistake. The overarching goal of bettering yourself is not flawed, but as you pointed out, no one enters seduction so that they can make friends and influence people. They enter to get the chicks. It's how they define themselves, even after they've gone through inner game theory and the like. You can deny it endlessly, but you'll notice you're very careful to assure me in your initial reply that you can get quality girls. You have to point it out. It's a status thing in the community and it's become a part of your persona after logging in hundreds of hours at your obsession.

There's this concept called self-actualization. Now, it's a form of ultimate happiness - and it's posited that very few people actually reach it. It is the goal of all intelligent beings. But in order to self-actualize, one must first provide for more basic needs. [this is called Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs]

You have the needs like shelter, warmth, food - basic survival needs.

Next comes safety - security of those basic needs.

Then, you have needs like companionship and sexuality. This is outer game. This is why people enter the community.

Above that, you have self-esteem and confidence. This is inner game, and that's what the pick up community has realized is a better goal. However, as long as the pick up community is the "pick up and seduction" community rather than the "self-esteem" community, people will be hung up on the previous stage.

(The top point is self-actualization)

What I'm saying is, as someone who has practiced and seen the practice of pick up for years, it's time to move on. There's a better world out there. As long as you post field reports on a message board, you're stunting your personal growth and can not self-actualize.
Self awareness is not something we can control. We can not choose to be unaware of alpha-ness. We can choose, however, to reject a basic tenet of the pick up community: that we must pattern our behavior to "be alpha". You cannot choose to be an 'alpha' male - your self-awareness precludes it. The alpha male is happy because ignorance is bliss. You do not have that luxury.

False. Funny how you talk like you know every AFC out there, telling me I'm definitely wrong and all this stuff. There are some AFC's who are focused on women, because they can't get any women. It frustrates them to no end because they don't know how, yet they are "desperate" to be able to get a girl.

Again, if it wasn't for that, this community wouldn't exist, or at the very least wouldn't be as big as it is. Because if it wasn't for those guys, there'd be no one that would be wanting to learn how to make it happen. Think about it logically. I've been around women all of my adult life. I also know a thing or two.

Again, what's your purpose here? To tell us all that we're following a misguided path and that we should jump ship?

And as far as my statement, or my "having to point out" that I can get quality girls, that also means reading between the lines, that I can get virtually ANY girl, because if I can get quality ones, I can obviously get the rest too. And, I have no shame in admitting that.

So, exactly what is it that you are trying to pick apart? Did you have a bad experience that you want to project onto the rest of the community?

Funny that your first line of defense is to throw insults. Furthermore, your misconception of AFCs is startling. Even if an AFC is 'focused' on getting women, it is nothing like the obsession that the pick up community cultivates.
I'm saying that the investigation into the community (based on a whim, a 'focus', or whatever) breeds obsession. You're saying obsession breeds investigation to the community. I don't really know if there's a way to categorically prove one particular belief right in this regard, but even if you're obsessed before you enter the seduction community, your obsession only deepens. In other words, PUAs spend more time thinking about women than AFCs do. They might think in different terms, but they invest more time, energy, and money into the pursuit.
Don't get me wrong. I didn't have a bad experience with the pick up community. Most of the people in the community - unlike yourself - are genuinely warm and receptive individuals. I've spent years here and now I have just decided to move on. I post my observations because I feel that they can be valuable to the members of this community. I think that they can help shape a future generation of PUAs. Pick up isn't a doomed venture. The approach is all wrong, though. Sure, you can get more quality girls, but you're putting in much more energy. If I spend a lot of time learning better study techniques and studying harder, I'll get a better score on my physics exam. It doesn't mean I've gotten over my focus on grades and schoolwork. I've merely become better at satisfying that need.

This is the fundamental delusion of the pick up community - that they've transcended women.
See, I wasn't impugning your honor. But you choose to read it as such. Because, in your typical community mindset, your value is apportioned to how much tail you can hypothetically score. I honestly don't care. The ability to respond to a philosophical thread is not scored by how many girls you've f-closed. My point is that you're trying to DHV - even in this thread. And it just proves my point.

agent, the only real thing you're doing is traveling in a circle. First you tell us that what we're doing is wrong, then you tell us that what we're doing is fine, but the approach is wrong, and then you tell me that I'm not warm and receptive, and that I'm slinging insults. I think you need to re-read what you yourself have written and take it from a readers perspective. Before you think I'M the only one that took it negatively. Because, I'm not the only one. Now, before you CONTINUE to judge me, when you don't know me, and call me cold and unreceptive for some reason unknown to me, why don't you step back a bit and, again, consider how you're coming across?

Ok, so you're the expert here, since you've been doing this for over a decade. However, you have no idea of my age or experience, yet you judge me. Hmmmmm. Something isn't right in that equation.

And, FYI, I'm not DHVing to you. I was merely explaining a point that you missed. I don't care what you think of my personal value. That point is of no relevance at the moment. Besides, it's obvious already that you've prejudged me with a lower value than yourself anyway, when you don't know anything about me. And you want to say that we're wrong in our judgement with women. Hmmm, something doesn't add up there either.

I didn't say anything about how many girls I've f-closed either. So you bringing that point up is also irrelevant. In fact, I haven't shared that figure with anyone in the community. Because it doesn't matter.

Now, you say you aren't talking about my honor or anything like that, but again, re-read your own posts here. Read it from a reader's perspective.

A philosophical discussion doesn't have to be tainted that way.

Many posts on this forum has helped me deal with my inner game. Simply having a community like this where guys can see that they are not alone in their troubles with women is tremendously valuable.

Sure PUAs have their sarging tools (ESP, the Cube, peacocking items), but that is true for any other field of study---surgeons have finely crafted cutting and slicing instruments to aid themselves in surgery, programmers have their IDE's to help develop code more efficiently, lawyers have...other lawyers.

But it is important to note that the fundamental concept of pickup involves women. Pickup IS about women, just as medicine is about health, programming about computers, and lawyers about law.

Therefore, even though women may be the reason most people come onto these boards, many will realize once they embark on the journey that women, and other people in general aren't the source of true happiness. They will then have to turn and find enlightenment from within...or have a meltdown (i.e. frame crash).

Although studying PUA can enhance your self image and self esteem, its ultimate application is intended for the fairer sex. As such, PUA can never transcend women, but the people versed in PUA can transcend pickup.

A note on AMOGs: Calling people AMOGs generally give them a negative connotation, one that carries a mixture of respect and fear. These are simply people who have accepted and embraced who they are physically, mentally, or both and are projecting that to the rest of the group (which is then observed as confidence or alphaness). Notice I said OR, because some AMOG's have just as many inner game issues as the rest of us, while others may have the attitude but not the physical presence to back it up. The AMOG who is sure and sound in both body and mind is by no means ignorant.

_________________
afc-challenge-to-the-masters-social-anx ... 10108.html

I think there's a difference between disagreeing with someone and getting vehemently angry about it like you have. You keep fishing for this ulterior motive which I don't have. I've been very clear all along. Entering the pick up community, while rewarding in some ways, is ultimately a losing proposition because it inevitably stunts one's personal growth and prevents transcendence of the expected supplication to femininity.

The only thing I judged you on was your string of rather acerbic replies. You're making it about your honor because you are unhappy that I'm telling you that you in fact never got past a supplication to the double-X chromosome. That's fine, you can be unhappy. But when you lash out irrationally you're the one who's turning this from a productive debate into something unpleasant.

agent, once again I will repeat this. You seriously need to quit judging me. I have not lashed out at you, as any long time member of this forum would tell you. If I did, you would know it. You continue and continue and continue to judge me, w/o knowing a single true thing about me. You're telling me what I'm making this about when that has nothing to do with my replies. Period. Why is it that you insist on projection something onto me to satisfy your own argument?

You just said it yourself, you're advising against getting into PUA because in your words it's ultimately a losing proposition. So, you do have negative feelings about it that you are projecting onto others, and in this moment, onto my comments.

Let’s stick to the thread topic!