Category Archives: Mastery

Sleep On It

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For men at least, the majority of emotionally charged decisions are sub-optimal at best, life altering at worst. Women naturally experience a wider gamut of emotions daily and make decisions based on them. From a pragmatic survival standpoint, there’s nothing wrong with this. Her hamster is a specific adaptation for dealing with tough situations. It drives men crazy, supersedes all laws, and will spin out of control if given the chance – but it works for her.

In contrast, men are poorly equipped to handle emotional highs and lows. We’re naturally more stable and prefer to rely on logic (or so we think) instead. Our hamster is there too – he just spins slower. But logic is not a virtue – it’s just our pragmatic survival method. From a purely biological standpoint, whoever secures the best and the most for DNA propagation wins, logic or rationalizations be damned.

So when men experience a high emotional deviation from the norm (99% of the time it’s a valley, not a peak), we often act in ways that don’t have the best outcomes. Unfortunately, unlike women our low points take longer to get over and that can cause an entire day/week/month/year (?) to elapse prior to getting back to business as usual.

It’s not good for anyone. The first step, then, is to force yourself, yes force, to not react immediately to everything. Even a few minutes can make the difference between a complete misunderstanding of a situation and proper handling. Take a deep breath and think about it. Walk away if you have to. Do something else for awhile and let your brain process.

The second step is to literally sleep on it. For anything significant, you can still maintain the initiative by giving it a little time. In the heat of the moment, a woman can drive you insane with something she says or does. Sometimes it’s her just being a woman and nothing to worry about, other times action is required. If she crosses the line and a few hours won’t change the situation – wait. Ignore her for the duration if you have to.

Once you’ve slept on it and your nerves have calmed, you can make a more rational decision. Let’s use a worst-case scenario: you found out she cheated on you. The initial reaction would be going off on her and/or trying to start something with her interloper. A delayed – and much more beneficial – reaction would be to calmly tell her it’s over, gather anything of yours she has, cut off all contact, and never see or talk to her again. The first will only cause more heartache, drama, and drag out the inevitable. The latter will let you move on as quickly and efficiently as possible.

This is an extreme example, but similar run-ins, disagreements, and general bickering can be better handled if you just take a step back. You might say something to piss her off and instead of backtracking or apologizing right away – wait. It may be so insignificant that it’s all but forgotten the next day, especially if alcohol is involved.

It takes training and a large dose of restraint, but it will serve you well.

Find Your Drive

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In our journey to become better men, the main component is an internal drive. It’s something unique to you, something you guard harder than your heart. For a lot of people, it’s a mixture of feelings of inadequacy, often stemming from childhood and adolescent experiences. These memories can make or break us. They can fuel an insatiable drive for constant improvement, or they can destroy us with perpetual distractions and pleasant – however temporary – escapes.

Your mission, first and foremost, is to find your drive. Think long and hard about everything and everyone who made you feel shitty, not good enough, and made you question your worth as a person. Then go prove them wrong. Since we tend to learn best from examples, I’ll give you my story.

Never Fitting In

I came to the states from Eastern Europe as a boy fresh out of grade school. We arrived with $100 (I’m not exaggerating) and my parents worked their asses off. We didn’t have a microwave or a dishwasher or a car. We hiked a mile to the grocery store a few times a week, which isn’t far but when you’re a little kid trying to haul bags of milk, it’s quite a workout. We lived in a dingy high rise with fire alarms tripping every other night and elevators that refused to work.

I didn’t know English so I was held back a few grades and shoved in a ‘language’ class with other foreigners. Think Tower Of Babel meets Lord Of The Flies. Our ‘teacher’ was some Jamaican lady who barely knew the language herself. In essence, we were lawfully distanced from students and teachers who taught ‘normal’ school. I had to learn English on my own, but I’m not mad – I spent a couple years watching Batman, Spiderman, and X-Men cartoons.

I was then transferred back with the rest of the students, bumped up a few grades to match my skill set, and quickly discovered that I was one of two white kids in the entire school. As you can guess, I never fit in as a result. I was bullied every day, got into fights (more like attempts at self defense) regularly, and even the teachers made fun of me. I pressed on.

When I got to high school, things started looking up – a little. There was still some bullying, but it was diverse enough that I was at least able to locate a few ‘losers’ like myself (at the time) to eat lunch with. The school required an entrance exam and I was one of a handful from my previous tenure to pass the test (it wasn’t hard, but I was surrounded by hood rats), so once again I didn’t have a clique.

I still had no sense of style, I just started liking girls, and I was going through that awkward stage with nappy hair, braces, entirely too skinny, and clothes that clearly didn’t match the times. High school can be brutal and I got to ‘enjoy’ every minute of it. I escaped to video games to not think about it. As is quite common of teenagers, at one point I entertained thoughts of suicide. It’s a dangerous age.

Then something changed.

Between junior and senior year I said fuck it. I picked up my first dumbbells and never looked back. I began to care about my appearance, my presentation, and my social skills. I got my first girlfriend a few months later after picking up sports. It was a complete disaster, but at least I got a taste. I also got my first job, started my first business, and for the first time felt ok about life.

College was several years of making myself un-awkward. I was still pretty weird, but I began to solidify several good habits, cut back on video games, all but quit watching television, and got laid enough to keep plugging. It wasn’t until after graduation and getting out into the ‘real world’ that I sensed the power within.

I proceeded to devour books like an English major, tried multiple styles to discover what worked, and began to make up for lost time, but I still had 15 years of resentment to deal with. Since then I’ve worked in multiple fields, started multiple businesses, follow a very rigid financial plan to freedom, and have become marketable enough to not worry about paying the bills.

And that brings us to now. My drive is to prove the world wrong, to show it – to show myself – that I am good enough for what I want, that I’m better than all those people who put me down, that they were all horribly wrong, and that I can achieve – within reason – whatever I put my mind to. I use it to work harder, to pound the weights, to set aggressive deadlines, and to go about every day and every interaction with an unshakable sense of self respect.

What’s Your Drive?

You don’t have to be a social reject with a decade of contempt under your belt to hustle, but it helps. Adversity builds character and gives you the fortitude (with a sprinkle of coldness) to go after what you want, because you’ve realized through experience that:

  1. Nothing in this world will ever be given to you. You have to take it by any means necessary.
  2. You have to love, respect, and have mastery over yourself before you can love, respect, and have mastery over anyone else.
  3. You may never fully ‘get over’ some things and that’s ok. Your goal is use those feelings, those inner issues, as fuel for the fire.
  4. We all have choices to make. Do what you want, do what you believe in, and you’ll attract people who want a part of it and repel those who don’t. You’re not here to please everyone.
  5. It’s important to leave a legacy. Whatever higher power may exist, one day you will die. What will you leave behind? Children? And will you do something significant, something that helps others, to go to your deathbed knowing that there was a reason for your existence?

How To Say No

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You thought I was going to give you some clever way to get your stalker to take a hint, but I have something better: how to say no the easy way. It’s not about political correctness, being brought up a certain way, not wanting to hurt feelings or any of that garbage – it’s a lack of conviction.

Everything we do is a function of time. When you say YES to someone/something, you’re saying NO to someone/something else.

Sounds simple, but we rarely look at life this way. I’ve written more than I care to admit about only dealing with high interest level women, but this goes beyond mere dating – it should be applied to every decision you make. Every YES is a NO in disguise. By saying NO to people or activities you feel are wasting your time, you are saying YES to self respect. The caveat of course is to replace this NO with a YES that’s superior, and that’s the crux of self improvement.

Once you begin making adjustments on this ‘return on investment’ fact alone, you’ll see how emotionally detached you become, and logical decisions often require detachment. You’ll no longer feel like you’re letting someone down. It’s nothing personal – you just have better shit to do.

I’m going to keep this brief because it requires no further explanation. Follow this creed and decisions become easy.

Be A Self Made Man

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A few nights ago I was having a drink with my one of my buddies while talking business. He never went to college and barely graduated high school, yet here he is – roughly my age – making high 6 figures running his own multimillion dollar local cleaning business. A part of me is envious. He’s ‘made it’. He knows the hustle. Another part of me doesn’t want to trade in for his short stature, overweight frame, and ‘yes if drunk’ wife who’s entirely too high maintenance (quite literally a trophy wife, though she’s not much of a trophy), but that’s beside the point.

I can’t help but respect him. It takes balls to flip the bird to everything your parents, your friends, and society tells you and cut your own path. He said something so obvious, yet so succinct coming from someone who’s living it, that it stuck:

No one who ever worked hard and really cared didn’t succeed.

It really is that simple. Money, power, women, whatever you desire (happiness is a byproduct) – it’s a 2 step process.

  1. Find something you care about.
  2. Work hard at it.

There’s no need to complicate the purity of this maxim. What do you care about? Fuck what anyone says. What do you want?

We live in an unprecedented time of opportunity. There are tons of jobs everywhere. Some are less glorious than others and some pay more or less, but they’re available. A lot of businesses can be started with little to no up front expenses. Even more businesses are economies of scale. 99% of broke people are lazy and lack rudimentary financial discipline.

Women are everywhere and it’s easier than ever to connect with an unlimited supply. If you’re not ___ enough to get a date with her, work on getting into the next league while keeping your eyes open for a willing participant. If one crosses the line and disrespects you a little, remove yourself and let her come back after she’s had some time to think about it. If she doesn’t, so be it. If she really crosses the line, cut her off and find someone else. Relationships are give and take – just make sure it’s not you disproportionately giving.

If you’re out of shape you only have yourself to blame. Relatively healthy food is cheap. It’s only ‘too expensive to eat right’ if you compare Whole Foods to McDonald’s. Shopping at Costco is often cheaper per-calorie than any fast food joint. You can exercise for free. If you really don’t want to spend money on a gym membership (which is one of the best expenses there is), get some pushup handles, a pullup bar, and do a calisthenics routine.

Social prowess is a result of continuous practice. If you don’t know how to talk to women, go out there and start talking to them. If your job/lifestyle prevents it, change one (or both). Gaining status and becoming famous – to some degree – is a function of getting your name out there. People won’t just ‘know’ who you are unless you promote yourself.

In short, be a self made man. You don’t have to quit school or your job necessarily, but take the time to figure out what you like, what gives you energy and intensity and pursue that – the rest of the world be damned.

Self Improvement For The Big Ego Man

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As you may have noticed, I focus a lot on self improvement in the 5 main alpha characteristics – looks, wealth, status, fame, and game. Most resources tout game above all else, which I find more than a little disturbing. To be fair, for the majority of men game is the quickest path to getting the lay, but like all shortcuts it has severe limitations.

First, there are no shortcuts to lasting success. You can spend your entire life chasing skirts, but you’ll miss the fringe benefits of years of development into a successful man. Money can buy happiness and the people who say otherwise typically don’t have much. But how will you build any substantial wealth if you spend most of your time on women? Looks matter, but how many guys think that having a great body is unnecessary if your game is tight, then wonder why she’s drooling over the ‘douchebag’ with nice arms and abs. I’d rather (semi) retire 30 years early.

Second, game itself will only work so much and for so long. Past a certain age, a man is expected to have something to show for his time on this planet. My worst fear is growing fat and old and still driving a car that barely runs, with no hope of ever attracting even a semi cute, young girl – but look how common that is today. Of course I don’t know what these men have been through, but I’m willing to bet most of them didn’t have the full deck stacked against them.

As you get older and your SMV rises, you’ll need more compensatory traits. A 40 year old can’t expect to put on some fresh clothes, hit the town and pick up a 21 year old hard 9 with his charm alone – he’d better have some cash and status to seal the deal. Unfortunately, these things take time to build and there is such a thing as too late to start (or to reach a certain peak). Don’t let that be you.

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I say all this because I have a huge ego. Biologically higher value of egg vs. sperm be damned, I want women to come to me. Don’t we all? But like all wishful thinking, there’s good news and bad news.

The bad news is that few men will briefly experience this, and most will never experience it at all. Why? Because they keep chasing T&A now to the exclusion of a bigger T&A payoff later. Instant gratification is easy to succumb to.

The good news is that it can – and does – happen. I’ve had a few glimpses through working in various fields where I’m the contextual alpha (personal training and bartending) and every now and then a girl will approach and in so many words tell you she’s yours whenever you’ll have her. You can see women the world over fantasizing about rock stars, movie stars, and sports figures. I realize few of us will attain these levels of celebrity, but even a fraction thereof is enough to never live a dry day again.

And because my ego is huge, my mindset is focused on the harder path, but one with greater rewards. I talk about game, tips, and post lay reports, but that’s not the primary goal. Women can come and go as they please – I have bigger fish to fry. In a twisted way I actually enjoy downtime from girls. I often go ghost just to see who contacts to me and how often, as it’s a good indicator of interest (and thus my relative value). If they all peaced out tomorrow, I’d work even harder to get a fresh batch ‘passively’.

Develop your game while focusing on the money. Exercise like you’re getting paid for it (you are actually). Do all of this thoroughly, passionately, and word will spread about your intensity in life. Women will pick up on this, don’t you worry.

There are so few men in this world who focus on the big buffet – most are content with scraps every few days – that when a woman sees one she can’t help but wet her panties. Look, this shit is simple. You’re judged as an aggregate success object and the higher you score the more bangin’ women will come to you. Rise past a certain point and they will approach you. Now wouldn’t that be something?

Get to it.