Life, pickup and philosophy - Alan Watts

[Smith]

Alan Watts - Life has a voice
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7A9ZqItiq0
Let go of controlling everything
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Qptyt0-S9U

Great philosopher - Give up on self transformation because theres no one to be transformed. It's a clever of way of your ego controlling you. It will leave you with more disappointment most of the time. Learn to let go of controlling everything. It allows you to abandon your socially nervous personality.

His ideas make a lot of sense to me. Whether in pickup or in life, most people would try to control a social situation to seem dominant, when doing that only makes you more nervous and shows your insecurity. It's the same in life. The CEO of the company or the leader of the country doesn't control everything, and only by relinquishing some of that control, they gain the ultimate power back.

It also got me thinking about what it means to be a dominant guy - it's a guy who's comfortable to let go of control and pardoxically the power comes back to him. You're simply defending yourself if you try to control everything. By letting go, you give yourself more power. I think this could be related to pick up in a sense that I've seen most guys, esp. beginners (myself included when I first started), learn to pick up by trying to control everything they say or do with a girl, and that is neediness and insecurity. Only a dominant guy would let go of that control (the need to say or do the right things) and gives a girl space to reciprocate their interest, and thus giving him more power. Even if it's a rejection, it won't feel like a rejection because there was nothing to hold onto in the first place. Hope this helps!

- Smith

 

[Drck]

Yes, good philosophy. The assumption that a person should improve in some area(s) indicates that he has deficiency in that particular area. Which could be good or bad, depending how you look at it.

On one side, if a guy doesn't know how to get girls, he has a deficiency and should learn. On the other, once he has some skills it should be good enough - yet he can't let go of control because he wants to master all the skills out there, he feels that need for constant improvement.

It has to do a lot of with anxiety. A person who is anxious tries to control the anxiety with his behavior, in more extreme cases he become obsessed with doing and controlling things (classical OCD).

Which again, can be good or bad. For example, a person can be a good student because he tries to control his anxiety by more studying. He excels in college and may become say doctor. As a matter of fact, a lot of smart persons in high positions have OCD, the OCD really makes them perform well above average. So, high anxiety might have a good effect in his career, however if he is unable to manage it may cause him stress, depression or even infarct.

On the other hand, a person with less anxiety may be too happy. He has no need to control things, he has no desire to excel. There are a lot of very smart people with high IQ who ended up doing just average jobs. They were "too happy" with their lives, they had no need to push themselves forward, they had no desire to control their life.

It is the same with pick up. A guy really needs just little bit (assuming that he doesn't have any skills). Once things with the girl start moving forward, there is no need for more seduction, there is no need for more control. He doesn't need to be in charge all the time, he doesn't have to be dominant and leading all the time. All he needs to do is to setup directions, and then let go of the control, just "flow" towards the destination without really seducing.

Many guys become too obsessed with the whole process though, they try to control every single step of the interaction, which may actually hurt them. He thinks that he still have to improve a lot, but the reality is that he already might be doing too much...

Good post!