by John

Hey guys,

I want to share some stories for guys like me: early twenties, out of school and in the bars competing against guys in their 30s and 40s with more life experience.   I want talk about how young guys need to grow up to get the girls.

What motivated me to write this article were the times when I would be “cock-blocked” by a girl’s friend out at the bar.  That’s a crude term that involves a girl’s friends swooping in like a flock of peregrine falcons to take her away and out of reach from a guy like me.

I used to think this happened because underneath their sundresses and oversized D&G sunglasses women were evil.  But in reality there was a laundry list of immature things I was doing. For starters, I was ignoring the friends rather than having the girl I was with introduce me to them.

Now I’m proactively social. I go out of my way to engage the girl’s friends. I’ll ask a question, get a response, then come back at the group with a statement in the “I” perspective and then repeat the process, making certain to engage everyone. If I end up hitting it off with one person, I may be unintentionally excluding someone from the interaction. I’ll fix that by saying, “I feel like we’re leaving you out, what do you think of ballroom dancing?”  Once I’ve won over her friends I’ll SOI the girl I like in front of them. If they approve I can now start focusing on the girl I’m interested in and I don’t have to worry too much about engaging the friends.

I used to be ignorant of her relationship situation too, so for all I knew she could have had a boyfriend standing five feet behind me.  He could have been a UFC Champion with tattoos on his arms of dragons and cobras, and dragons that eat cobras.  So maybe she ran away to save my life.  Now I simply say, “I like you, what’s your relationship situation?” It’s that easy. I usually do it within the first 5 minutes of an interaction. If she says she’s single, then I hit on her in a big way right then (this is usually funny too).   If she says she’s in a relationship I’ll ask about it while sharing my own feelings on relationships. “You’ve been dating two years? Wow, my longest is around six months. Part of me enjoys the freedom of being single but part of me misses having someone to steal the blanket from on cold nights. Have you two thought about getting married?” Whatever you do don’t walk away or start ignoring her two seconds after you find out she’s taken. That looks bad and also, she may be in a bad or not-serious relationship. Give it a chance as a conversational topic and you will find out more.  Also she probably has hot friends. Don’t bail.

I also felt a fear of loss that created a needy vibe that rattled around in my head something like this: “A hot girl is talking to me! Better not let this one get away. Play it safe. Don’t mess up. Listen to yourself mate, you are messing this up. Better just act cool. And flex, that’s it, flex those pecs. My God she is so beautiful. Oh, wait, where is she going? Arggghhhh.” I’ve found the easiest way to eliminate neediness is to simply look around. There are attractive women everywhere. No point in getting too wrapped up on any particular one.  Also find other things to occupy your time. Busy people don’t obsess on their dating life. They are getting a sense of achievement through other areas of their life. That makes them happier and more attractive.

Another immature thing I used to do was rely on alcohol for my courage and social skills. I recall one night there was a 36 DD blond, seated by herself. I could just walk up and easily start a conversation, but no, Mr. Budweiser had to be involved. Five drinks later, I got my liquid courage suited up and I approached her. (Okay… I stumbled in her direction.) Luckily, she was friendly – she was Rachel from Friends. All went well for the first 30 seconds. But then, I knocked my beer into her lap.  Ah! Ageooo! Fortunately she was forgiving.  I got a towel from the bar and began cleaning her and the table. The only problem was that while cleaning up my previous mess, I forgot my other beer (did I mention I was the jolly, two-fisted beer man?) and that one went into her lap as well.

Splash.

Imagine it in slow-motion. Noooooo!!!!! Damn, I had a way of making women wet.  Just not for the right reasons. I felt like I was eight years old. I’d screwed up and had nobody to blame but myself. And this time, it was too late.  She stopped my apologizing and cleaning with her death glare. She seized my hand and said, “Stop, just…stop.”  In that moment I shrunk to three inches tall.  I put my tail between my legs and walked back to my friends. Even they were embarrassed to be seen with me after that. I felt like the entire room was pointing and laughing at me.  A couple people actually were.

But now it’s a different story – with my involvement with Charisma Arts and some life experience I realize the error of my ways. I write this now to give anyone who was like me (read 99% of college age guys) some advice so to quicken the learning curve and score some babes.

First rule: I might have a drink here and there socially but I realize that alcohol does not help.  Some results have been obvious. If you don’t get drunk you minimize the chances of making a fool of yourself. But one result came as a big surprise to me. Women respect a man that can interact without the aid of alcohol. I remember when I was at a bar in Seattle earlier this year and a gorgeous girl opened me with:

Her:  “What are you drinking’?”
Me: “Something that rocks my world every time I drink it.”
Her: “What’s that?”
Me: “Water” and I smiled.
Her: “Me too!” she laughed, lit up like a Christmas tree and she raised her glass to cheers.

We went on to relate on the fact that we both liked drinking from time to time, but not always. I find I get positive reactions from women when they realize I’m not drinking or I’ve only had a few. I’ve even had party girls say: “That’s so cool; I wish I could have fun without drinking.” In summary, an easy way to show your maturity for younger guys, is to minimize how much you drink, and if nothing else don’t rely on alcohol for your charisma.

Something I learned about maturity came from sensei Johnny Saviour: When the mountain crumbles before you, don’t flinch.  When you approach three women and they give you a less than enthusiastic look, do not flinch - stand your ground. When a drunk guy jumps in between you and a girl and tries to ruin the interaction, don’t flinch. This shows confidence, one of the things every woman sees as a sign of maturity in a man.

I want to talk about a final aspect of maturity that I had to deal with: accepting the person I used to be. It’s hard for me to relate to the often anti-social, celibate, World of Warcraft-addicted bump on a log that once was me. It makes me cringe thinking about it. I used to dwell on the missed opportunities I had before deciding to better myself. Even now I look into the past with an eye that’s too unforgiving. Sometimes when I’m out with old friends they bring up the old me, they treat me like the old me: a guy who didn’t get it, had no value, no status - and that would be frustrating.  I used to try to fight it in order to show everyone the new me.  I’d go out of my way to try and impress them.

But this got me nowhere. If anything, it alienated me from them further.  Out of exhaustion, I stopped trying to show these people how cool the new John was. I stopped trying to show them my skills with women. I just didn’t care anymore. I did what I wanted to do and didn’t worry what others thought about it. If they weren’t going to accept me, then so be it.  But then a peculiar thing happened.  That’s when people started respecting me. I remember one time when I was chastising my dad for wearing a speedo (he was many years and many pounds too heavy) he told me that people are way too worried about what other people think of them to pay any attention to you. Turns out he was right.

If you want to blossom you need to learn to respect your prior mistakes and the person you used to be. You need to realize that nobody has every aspect of their life together. Everyone makes big mistakes that have negative effects on their lives at some point. It’s learning from those mistakes that separate a mature man from a boy. The next time you go out with old friends and they bring up the old you confidently admit to your mistake and leave it at that. Don’t apologize for it. Focus on the present and have fun. Look forward to the future.

If you want to talk more about meeting women in your early twenties or you want to go after some pretty young things, drop me a line at John@charismaarts.com or check out my bootcamp schedule here.  And leave me some comments.  I want to hear what you guys think about meeting girls when you’re young and straight out of school.

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