If you don’t see how it applies immediately, watch again with the following in mind: Money = Lays; Business = Lifestyle; Work = Sarging.

Although the advice is fairly generic, I believe it’s important. It’s one of those “this is water” things where it’s constantly under our nose (be passionate about what you do; have patience to reach your goals) that we often forget it.

It’s inspired some thoughts from me, as it particularly relates to some life changes I’ve been making and also a student I’ve been working with. I’ll be back in a day or two with a full post full of my ideas. But in the meantime, check it out and leave any comments if it inspires something in you.

First off, to clarify, I don’t mean luck IN SET, what I mean by luck is all of the external factors that influence chasing tail… all external factors are out of your control and are therefore random and considered “luck.” Go out and venues are dead? That’s out of your control and luck. Open a girl and her friend just puked and passed out? Luck. Opened another girl and she’s insanely horny and loves guys who look just like you? Luck.

I am arguing that the vast majority of factors in pick up are external, therefore the vast majority of picking up girls is luck. Again, your actual “game,” no matter how good or bad, probably only influences 20% of your chances with women… It’s not much, but it adds up VERY FAST over the long-term (20 lays a year versus 2, for example).

Game will always give you the best chance to capitalize on the situations presented to you… but short of throwing yourself into as many situations as possible, you have no control over which situations you’re given. And the majority of situations are not going to be stacked in your favor. In fact, the vast majority of situations, you’re going to have little to no chance… That’s what I mean when I say luck.

Even if a guy stands in a bar all night and waits for a girl who’s horny to approach him… he’s still surrendering the majority of control over his outcomes to luck. He’s basically hoping for a drunk, horny girl to show up. Most nights, she won’t. But every now and then, she will. And even if he escalates perfectly and fucks her in the bathroom, he’s only controlled a tiny minority of his outcome.

I have a question: can you set yourself up for luck? Like, screen like crazy for girls that are really horny and receptive to escalation (if you’re going for SNL, bathroom, whatever)?

Absolutely. It’s called pre-selection, and we all do it to varying degrees. We all tend to avoid sets that we think would yield a poor result — tons of guys, seated sets, large groups, etc. — and focus on sets that we think we have a higher probability with. Again, this varies from guy to guy, and you could argue it’s even a skill unto itself. These days, I can scan a venue and find women who look like they’d be very receptive, both to me and in general.

This is how you hear some of these stories like, “two nights in a row, it was one and done. I opened one girl and took her home.” This DOES happen. I’ve done it. But you walk into a large venue, find the easiest looking girl and approach her. Or sometimes, guys will hang out for a few hours waiting for an “opportunity” to pop up. Nothing wrong with this, I do this quite a bit when I’m with friends now… But it’s definitely pre-selection, and you’re leaving a lot of pussy on the table by only approaching the low-hanging-fruit.

I have a small question, do you drink when you go out to on the ‘field’?

Yes, no, and yes. I get asked this constantly. The answer is yes, I do drink. Although I rarely get hammered, or even that drunk when chasing girls. When I first started, I had to get very, very drunk to work up the nerve to approach. After some time, I decided to stop on the booze for a while. In some ways, it made me better, but I decided that I enjoyed myself more with a couple drinks. So I’m back to drinking again, but not as hard or as often. I often won’t drink while coaching though. And some nights I’ll go crazy with some friends. My Achilles’ Heel is if a girl starts buying me shots… then it’s all over. In more ways than one…

Should you drink? My answer is always, it’s up to you. But if you feel you HAVE TO drink when you go out, then you need to learn to go out sober. Once you can go out sober, then make the decision. Gaming sober is pretty different and has its advantages, so I think every guy should try it.

If you have health concerns, like you’re an athlete or something, and you can’t afford to drink every night (those calories add up REAL fast), then no, don’t drink when you go out. Maybe save it for the weekends or something and just do shots of Vodka or something if you really want to.

Why do you think outer game should be learned first? Do you think that a solid inner reframe can naturally allow things like body language and interaction skills to enhance?

Only if the guy already has those body language and interaction skills. Some do, many don’t. Let’s take an example of a student: he’s a smart, confident and successful business man who can be very dominant and commanding in proper business situations. Then yes, it’s about fixing his inner game around women. It’s just a matter of transferring his confident behavior from his professional contexts to his social contexts.

But if you have a student who has spent most of his life behind a computer, has had few to no friends, has always been shy and awkward — in every situation his entire life — getting him to “open up” and “express himself” is just going to make him continue to express his awkwardness. He never learned good body language habits or social skills initially, so there’s nothing TO open up to. RSD always talks about how game is just learning to be “unstifled.” Well, what if you don’t even have enough to be stifle with?

Outer game needs to be taught first because it gives you reference experiences in the context of women in which to develop the important inner game qualities. Again, a guy who runs around yelling, “MY GAME IS A 10!” between 15 blow outs isn’t reframing anything. He’s deluding himself and avoiding dealing with some very fundamental outer game issues. First, he needs to develop the basic outer game skills — get women to talk to him, get a few phone numbers, make a few friends — before he even has a chance to worry about things like confidence, state, etc.

The other reason outer game should always be taught first is that it’s so easy to fix. Inner game issues take months if not years to overcome, and wax and wane from day to day. Outer game stuff can be fixed immediately and results can be improved immediately. And honestly, NOBODY has perfect outer game, so there are always new things to be focusing on.

It just comes back to that every guy has a unique situation. These days, probably 1/2 of the guys who come into the community already naturally have most of their outer game stuff handled. That’s why you see such an inner game focus in general these days… that’s the way the market’s shifted and most of the new coaches these days only had to fix their inner game, so they assume that’s all anybody has to fix.

Things in life are almost never as clear cut as “All you need is X.” Pick up is no different.

How much of success is inner game and how much is outer game? A lot of people say all you need is inner game, which makes sense to me. What else do you say to a guy whose whole reality is “I’m bad with women?”

That he’s probably right and needs to fix some basic things about himself. Anyone who knows me knows that the whole “inner game only” trend drives me absolutely nutty because I think it’s wrong, wrong, wrong. A guy with bad outer game and great inner game will never get laid. A guy with great outer game and bad inner game will get laid all the time — he’ll just lay low quality girls and not be able to keep them around or be happy.

No matter how awesome the shit going on inside your head is, it’s just that: going on inside your head. All a woman ever experiences is your outer game.

If you want to change a guy’s reality that is “I’m bad with women,” then you change it by giving him good outer game first. Fixing your inner game is a luxury of those who already have outer game. I’ve never understood why having this reality is such a bad thing if the guy never gets girls. If you never get girls, then it’s true and you should face it. The problem begins when you meet a guy with 200+ lays who says the same thing: “I’m bad with women.” To have a newbie virgin deny this reality is just shooting himself in the foot. It reminds me of the RSD monkeys I’ve coached who walk around clubs shouting out, “MY GAME IS A 10!” in between getting blown out 11 times in a row… They’re not doing themselves any favors… just deluding themselves from the painful reality: they have a lot of work to do.

Also, second question: how much is just dumb luck? Every guy I talk to with a high lay count has a couple stories that are just lucky.

Or quite a lot of stories… the more experience I get, the more I realize how much is out of our control (And hers too sometimes) and is just dumb luck. I can usually judge a guy’s experience-level these days based on how aware he is of how much luck is involved. It’s always the guys who tell me with a straight face that they’re practicing cold approach threesomes, or that they’re currently working on their bathroom lay technique that I immediately assume have no idea what they’re doing but think they do because they have like 20 lays or something. There’s no technique… you just find a really fucking horny girl (the luck), escalate fast (the skill) and then drag her to the bathroom. She either goes with you or doesn’t… no technique involved.

For instance, when I first came into the community, I was sold on the idea (marketing) that we could control 90-100% of our fate with a certain girl. When I got out into field, I soon realized that was probably much more like 50%. After I banged a few dozen girls and had some ultra-wacky and crazy experiences under my belt, I realized it was a minority, probably 30%.

These days, I honestly think, even when you include all the inner game stuff, the social circle stuff, the lifestyle stuff, on top of all of the mechanics and techniques… we’re talking 20% control of our own fate with any particular girl — and that’s probably still a HUGELY generous estimate — come to South America some time and see how much control you have over the interactions…

Fact remains, the absolute best thing you can do to get laid or get girls, is to just go out and meet as many women in as many situations as possible. Everything you learn, study, practice, think about, etc. is completely supplementary. Give me an average guy will all the pick up theory and skills who goes out twice a week, and give me an average guy who is clueless and goes out five times a week, and the guy who goes out five times will (usually) have better results in the long-run… There are just far, far, far too many intangible and extraneous forces that you can’t learn about until you’ve been forced to face them. I think really the difference between a guy who’s amazing with women and a guy who isn’t is a 90% fail rate versus a 99% fail rate. It doesn’t sound like much, but over the course of 100 sets a month, it adds up very fast.

It’s only when you’re going out all the time that that 20% advantage theory gives you adds up over time. If you’re not putting yourself out there consistently, then there’s nothing anybody can do for you.

As always, field is king.

That’s all.

(Thanks Clarence for the correction.)

“Joe is turning sixteen. All he wants in life is to have a car. He’d give anything for it. Sarah, who has a car, has never had a boyfriend. She’s dying to have a boyfriend. Tracy has a boyfriend, and is about to have his baby. The kid was a mistake and she would do anything to turn back time and not conceive. Dale, who has no kids, just lost his job and desperately wants to make money. George, a billionaire, would give up his fortune to be young again, like Joe.”

It’s a great and short article. Check it out here: http://tynan.net/appreciation-why-it-should-be-impossible-to-be-unhappy/

I’m also doing a bunch of interviews right now. One is supposed to be for a local news station, but the broad keeps flaking on me (women…).

But anyway, this week’s mailbag deals with more theoretical stuff of why you should escalate, social circle game, and limiting beliefs.

Hey Mark, I’ve been analyzing my game lately and I think that the only thing that I don’t do is pushing the interaction, your famous ABC! I get telephone numbers easily, but I think anyone can do that. I’ve made out few times and when I do it I see the girl again. I’ve never had a SNL or sex in the bathroom. Why is it so hard to see the girl again if you don’t have a physical interaction with her? What does she think that she wants to see you again? What does she think that she doesn’t want to see you again when yo don’t have a physical interaction with her? What’s going on in their minds? Why do I have to have the physical interaction ASAP? What is the problem with dating?

Thanks, Leo.

There’s nothing “Wrong” with dating or taking things slow. The more physical you get with a woman, the more invested they become in the interaction. For instance, if you talk to a woman for two hours one night and get her number she may think three days later, “Oh, he was a nice guy,” but not make any effort to see you again. But if you talk for two hours and passionately make out then she’s much more likely to remember you, be more emotionally invested in you, and backward rationalize reasons why she liked you and wants to see you again.

I recommend guys get physical as soon as possible because it increases their chances of seeing women again, decreases flakes, and gives them more flexibility in establishing expectations for the relationship.

Entropy,
I’m 20, but I feel like I’m 60. I feel like I’ve been wasting my life. Everytime I try and improve my discipline, skills, whatever, a little voice inside me goes “Damn you, John. Why didn’t you do this years ago?” I need to get over my regrets.

Thanks,
John

Yeah, you do. Dude, you’re so young, it’s ridiculous. Just remind yourself every time you think this to go ahead and do now because if you don’t, five years from now you’ll back and say, “Damnit John, why didn’t you do this when you were 20.” This way, you can prevent those thoughts from even occurring in the future.

Hey Entropy, I think you are right on with your Personalizing Pickup ideas. To follow up on the question from anonomous, for us lucky guys who have physical advantages, would you suggest different openers since we are coming in with high value as it is? Direct or indirect, maybe low-investment or compliment openers, or even low value openers like Braddock’s “I’m not sure what to say to you, but I had to meet you. I’m Braddock.”

How about with qualification? Should we avoid the large and harsher hoops like “What do you have going for you other than your looks?” and stick with small/medium hoops? Or should we assume rapport and go straight into comfort after the opener?

Thanks.
F

Yes, the more physical advantages you have, the more going direct will take care of literally all the attraction game you need. Also, much lower investment openers work really well, such as, “Hi, I’m F.” because most of the time when you approach girls figure you approach women a lot and want to be hit on by you.

As for qualifying, you don’t want to be harsh, but definitely get as deep as possible with your hoops to build more comfort. Again, the disadvantage of being good-looking is that women are going to be slower to trust you and think that you say this shit to every girl. You’re much more likely to come off as a “player” and often they have to feel like they earned your affection. This is why the more natural (passive) attraction you have, the less you need to build (active attraction).

Hey Entropy! Sad news Doc is done but I’m actually glad for him. Simple question: how do you handle getting a reputation with being with a lot of women. For a while I felt like my dick was on the black list but recently I have been cleaning up, but certainly girls have heard about me. Any ideas?

Best,
Adam

I wrote about this last year. I call it “Attraction by Osmosis.” It’s an interesting effect once you infiltrate a social circle and start sleeping with the girls in it.

What happens is they naturally become more attracted to you (this is what I called “attraction by osmosis”). But because of their increased attraction for you, they become more skeptical of you and will test your congruence a LOT. I think they also do this for social reasons because they don’t want their other friends to think they’re trying to steal their man or whatever.

But basically these girls will ACT really bitchy towards you, but if you remain unaffected and get one of them alone, usually sleeping with them is very easy.

“Mild narcissism also seems to help people recover from accidents or other trauma—it gives them an unrealistic sense of their own invulnerability, and they believe that they will be able to handle whatever else life throws at them. As one researcher put it, being somewhat narcissistic is like driving a huge SUV: You’re having a great time, even while you hog the road, suck up extra resources and put other drivers at higher risk.”

It scares me to read shit like this and see myself in it.

I hate the feeling of sleeping with/hooking up with girls that I am not that attracted to. I always feel shitty after the fact and while I might enjoy the experience I pray not to bump into that person again after. A lot of that could be due to immaturity and shallowness in general (i.e. thinking that a girls looks define how successful you are). However, I am sure that this is something that must comes up a lot in guys developments. Its not as if I am sleeping with anyone now so I always think that I should push myself to just sleep with as many girls as possible. However, I came into this to find girls that I could really like a lot not to put up numbers.

I know having standards that are too high is just a dumb copout. Intellectually that makes total sense. But there just feels something peverse about forcing yourself to hookup.

What are your thoughts on this?

This is a question I get a lot and it’s tough because my answer varies depending on the guy asking it and why he’s asking it.

Here are the two arguments:

1. The argument for hooking up with girls you’re not that attracted to is the “practice” argument. Basically, it gets you used to escalating, to getting physical and sexual, to reading signals from a girl who likes you, etc.

2. The argument AGAINST hooking up with girls you’re not into is, well… it’s that it’s not that fun.

I’ve always fallen into the second camp myself. I know some guys don’t mind sleeping with a fat chick now and then, but if I don’t find a girl attractive, I literally am not enjoying myself… I’d rather be masturbating.

So the answer here has more to do with priorities and what exactly a guy is struggling with. Doc used to regularly recommend guys with little or no sexual experience to lower their standards to get over a lot of their fears and anxieties surrounding women and being sexual. On many points, I agree with him.

But at the same time, if you don’t really have any sexual hang-ups, if you have some experience in the past, if you’ve been with attractive women before, there’s really NO acceptable reason to slum it other than to pad your stats.

Sleeping with a slew of mediocre girls is a validation trap, and in the end, it won’t get the moderately experienced guy any better with girls he’s ACTUALLY attracted to.