PUA sticking points
Sticking points?
I recently had a conversation with a student who was having trouble fixing a few sticking points. He came in telling me "I can open, but I can't attract. That's my sticking point. I don't know how to get attraction."
Maybe you've said this to yourself a few times- "How come I can open but I can't attract?" It's one of the most common sticking points students report when they walk into a workshop or see me in a live talk.
Another guy recently told me "I can attract, but I can't seem to turn things sexual." That's another one that I hear a lot.
I want to shed some light on this because it seems to be an issue that's slowing the learning process quite a bit. I fix these literally all the time. It's become very routine at this point. Here's what's going on behind these and many other sticking points.
First thing you need to know is that this process of "fixing sticking points" is an inefficient and slow way of learning seduction. Why? Many reasons.
1- Students rarely are able to accurately diagnose what their problems are. In most cases, they know the end result of the problem, but they don't actually know the root cause. I'd say less than 10% of students can self diagnose with accuracy.
Self diagnosis is HARD, and I don't expect that people are going to be good at it. The guy who says "I can open but I can't attract" is talking about the end result of what's going on in his approaches. It's damn near impossible for him to step outside, see himself approach a girl, read her mind, read her subconscious mind, then all the sudden realize why she's not attracted.
2- We all want to believe that "if I can just fix this one thing, everything will fall into place." So we try to pin all our problems down to one "sticking point" even though what's usually going on is something WAY bigger than any one issue. We don't want to admit to ourselves that there might be a lot of work to do, and it may be a long hard road.
3- It's hard to be honest with yourself. When you're not getting laid, it can make you emotionally fragile. You may be clinging to a glimmer of hope that there's some magic pill out there or you can just fix a few sticking points, and then all will be well.
If you really think about it, the sticking point fixing approach is only a few steps away from the "magic pill" approach.
At a recent lair talk I met a new guy who was very enthusiastic about the game. It's always a pleasure to see a guy like this because they're excited about getting started. In this case, he had bad clothes, bad voice, and the look on his face said "I'm scared of LIFE." But this can all be fixed, as you all probably know.
I talked for about 2 hours, then he raised his hand and asked a very broad question. He said "I have this one sticking point, how do I get the girl sexually attracted?" He was hoping I could say "Oh, sexually attracted?? Well why didn't you just ask in the first place. That's an easy one! Instead of standing with your left foot forward, stand with the right foot forward. Simple!"
But that wasn't the answer I gave him. Like most people who come in talking about a sticking point, his sticking point was.....
EVERYTHING.
That's right, he needed to fix everything. In most cases, that's what needs to be fixed. Even guys who have been doing this for a year or 2 sometimes need to fix EVERYTHING.
The guy who came in and could open but not attract needed to fix everything. Same with the guy who couldn't turn things sexual. I sometimes hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you gotta give people the truth. They need to fix everything. Why sugar coat it?
Some of the guys with the "everything" sticking point are not new. They've been at it a while. They can recite entire chapters of The Game. They've been out in the field "fixing sticking points" for months. There's a very good reason why this happens.
The learning process of pickup is fucked up. It's completely broken. If you don't believe me, go ask the guys who have done hundreds of approaches and aren't getting laid. Or ask the guy who's been studying for over a year and he's not getting laid. I've looked these guys in the eye and seen the despair and confusion.
It's not the material, the material works fine. It's the learning process. It's fucked.
What most people do is sort of stumble across this stuff from something in the media or from a friend, then they read for about 6 months straight. During this time they form a glut of decontextualized information. (see http://bradppresents.blogspot.com) Then they go in the field and get their ass handed to them. Then they go back and read more. Then they go out in the field and try to fix sticking points.
Sticking points? How can you be fixing those? The phrase "sticking point" comes from when there's a machine, and everything in it works fine, but there's this one part that's sticking. Ha! I wish people came in with everything working fine except one thing. I could just fix that one thing and then they'd get laid on the spot.
The time to fix sticking points is after you've already learning all the fundamentals and developed a method that you are comfortable with and can implement on a regular basis. If you are have state inconsistency, poor fundamentals, or social anxiety, you shouldn't be fixing sticking points. You're entire machine is stuck, not just one point.
Back to our average Joe seduction student. Read a bunch, went in field a bunch, now he's fixing sticking points. The way it goes from there is really interesting.
He might succeed in fixing certain sticking points. But as soon as he does, there's 3 more that spring up. So he goes around fixing sticking points and fixing sticking points until he forgets to do the things from the first couple of fixes.
It's a goddamn wild goose chase.
He might have broken 3 more things by fixing the first thing. For example, he might pick up something I call the "open and attract skillset." This is a common problem that community guys have. They can open and attract all day long, but they never get laid. What good is that? It's pointless.
The reason the community is teaching this is plain and simple laziness. It's hard to teach a true cold-approach to lay skillset. Students are happy to learn the open/attract skillset. If you haven't gotten laid in a long time and women generally treat you like shit, it feels pretty good to be able to open and attract. It gives them temporary validation and allows them to avoid blowouts (which would ultimately get them laid faster). But the need to get laid builds up and builds up. Eventually they end up frustrated. All that hard work was basically for nothing.
But that's a story for another day. Let's get back to the sticking points here. I'll do another post on the "open/attract" skillset another day.
I want to compare the learning process described above, the SP fixing process, to some more sophisticated methods of learning so you can see what I'm talking about.
Anyone here do mixed martial arts? In MMA, they give you strengthening exercises, drills to work on, positions and strategy, then you go spar at half speed. Only after quite a few of those lessons do you get in the ring for a real fight.
In pickup, students read a few books and then jump in the ring with heavyweights. That's way different.
Anyone here play jazz music? In the old days, the only way to learn jazz was to sit at late night open jams every night for 10-15 years and just immerse yourself in it. Then the Berkely School of Music came along and said "Wait a minute, we can teach this stuff in 4 years if we just structure the lessons the right way."
There's a difference there, it's called parallel learning verses serial learning.
In parallel learning, you try to learning everything at once, and you immerse yourself in it. If you do that for long enough, you'll get good, but it takes a long time.
In serial learning, the lessons are highly structures so you learning things in a certain order. The lessons progress in their difficulty and their complexity, and you attain a high level of proficiency faster than you would in parallel learning.
Serial learning is the basis of my 30/30 Club, where you approach 30 women a month for 12 months, and attain a high level of proficiency. Pre-30/30 systems would have you "go do 1000 approaches" just like the old days of jazz education.
If I could bring this back to something more practical and immediate, here's what I suggest you do.
If you are currently trying to fix sticking points, take a step back first, and have a look at everything. If you feel the following items are taken care of, then by all means, attack the sticking points.
Here's a list of everything, in the exact order you should be attacking them.
FUNDAMENTALS
Identity
practice approaches
real approaches
fashion
voice
body language»
Social Anxiety
Approach Anxiety
Conversational repertoire
PROCESSES
Dates
Escalation and sex
advanced social dynamics
same day lays
relationships
social circle game
club game
3somes
So if you're going to fix sticking points, at least be done with those fundamentals.
If I see ya out there, I'm still gonna be interested in hearing everyone's sticking points, because I know that's the conventional way for students to communicate their problems, but there's a chance I might tell you to fix everything, and try to help you get started on that.
I'm a firm believer in fixing everything. Is it the only way to learn? No, my way isn't the only way, and other methods also have value. I'm just looking for the most efficient way to do this, and I've had a lot of success with this approach. That's why I wanted to share it with you.
Brad P.
