Recommended classes / instructors

Someone asked me on Facebook: “Patri – what would you recommend as the best, or one of the best, youtube presentations of pick up artistry, particularly with the long term relationship angle?”

I don’t watch videos much, as I find them time-inefficient compared to skimming books or podcasts in the car. Married Man Sex Blog & his new book: Married Man Sex Guide 2011 is by far the best I’ve seen on PUA for LTRs.

In general, focusing on “Inner Game” over “Outer Game” (my very biased comparison: becoming a confident person rather than learning to pretend to be one) is much better for having open, conscious, fulfilling long-term relationships. The most prolific writer/podcast/author guy I like is Carlos Xuma, he does a lot of Outer Game too but his stuff is much more friendly/positive than most PUA stuff I see.

The best Inner Game workshop I know is the Authentic Man Program Course, they also have a video/online Foundations of Inner Game program.  The founder, Decker Cunov, is married with a kid, and is polyamorous.  I bet there are other good programs as well, I just don’t know them.

In Bed Reviews

Lexi lifting weights (sexy) and wearing a silly hat (err, not so sexy)

My friend “Lexi Larkspur” has started a sex blog.  Good sex is a very important part of keeping LTRs happy, so check out In Bed Reviews for a female perspective on sex, marriage, and more.  Recent posts include Sexercise, I wanna get in your hot tub baby, and The Magic Wand makes me purr.

Gilbert And Sullivan on Game

Even Gilbert & Sullivan knew that success with women came from study and practice:

The intro:

A man who would woo a fair maid,
	Should 'prentice himself to the trade;
		And study all day,
		In methodical way,
	How to flatter, cajole, and persuade.

(via dclayh)

Long-Distance Relationships

(This guest post comes from Jordan Harbinger of Art of Charm, who I had the pleasure of meeting briefly in DC recently at the Summit Series.  This is good advice for helping maintain your LDRs so they can become LTRs.)

When it comes to romantic relationships, distance can be a killer. If you’re in love and separated from your partner, there are a few strategies you can utilize to maximize the success of your long-distance relationship.

Here are some pointers from my own exhaustive experience with this:

Set The Rules Early

Long distance relationships allow for a lot of freedom for each party; this is both their best feature as well as their worst. Nobody likes to be smothered, and with a long distance relationship you have some breathing room. At the same time, however, it is impossible to ‘keep tabs’ on your partner, and he or she might very well be going out with other people and you would likely never know.  Emotionally, you HAVE to be ‘okay’ with this (either because you’re secure in your relationship or because you trust your partner implicitly -these are not always the same thing, by the way), or you’re going to drive yourself nuts with ‘relationship paranoia’ and worry.

One of the most important steps in maintaining a healthy long distance relationship, as a result, is to communicate your expectations and ground rules early on in the process—preferably before you are apart from one another. This can force you to have some uncomfortable conversations you would otherwise not need or would have later on in the relationship. These include determining a status for your pairing— are you ‘dating’, ‘seeing one another’, ‘boyfriend/girlfriend’, etc. What do these mean to you?  Make sure you’re clear on both the definitions of your relationship status and ensure that the rules on exclusivity are very clear. Last but not least, make sure you actually follow them!

Talk More Than You Otherwise Would

Talking on the phone is part of most relationships, but when you live close to one another your deepest conversations happen when you see each other face-to-face. You also have physical and sexual intimacy, nights out together and the capacity to help one another with chores, errands and other needs. When you are in a long-distance relationship everything is mediated through phone lines (as well as the internet, of course). This means you will likely need to talk more just to make up for all the dimensions you are otherwise missing.

Try to talk everyday, or at least exchange a few texts or instant messages. Talking just before bed is a great way to stay intimate and end your day on a loving note. Going incommunicado can send bad signals to your partner, and can precipitate the end of an already precarious situation. Make sure to stay in touch!

Use Technology to Your Advantage

We live in the best time in the history of the world for long distance relationships. At one time only letters and telegraphs could go back and forth. Later you had to pay big prices for long distance telephone calls. Now most cell phones call for free within the same country and VoIP programs can keep you in touch for cheap or free even overseas. Many of these VoIP programs also feature video connections so that you can see each other and have the help of facial expressions in adding dimensions to your communication.

Beware of IM programs, however, as they offer no context and no nonverbal dimensions. This means that innocent texts can be misunderstood and serious texts underestimated. Long distance relationships can be very stressful, and little mistakes can have a huge impact.

Get Creative

There are a million ways to add intimacy to your long distance relationships, and every tactic you use will increase your likelihood of success. One fun idea is to find a movie you both want to see that is showing around the same time in both of your respective cities. Go to see the movie, and then talk about it on the phone afterward (not during!). Despite your distance, you can have a ‘date night’ together.

Also consider setting your respective alarms on your phones or watches for the same time every day, and take that moment to think about your partner and know that he or she is thinking about you. And don’t be afraid to go low-tech as well—love letters are powerful things, something everyone cherishes. Take your time to write by hand and send cards with personalized messages or letters explaining how you feel about the person. When you are back together these can be lasting mementos of what you endured for the same of your love.

Travel Regularly

A good rule of thumb is that you should try and see each other at least every 2-3 months. If one of you is deployed in the military this won’t work, but if you can get to him or her twice a year and he or she can come to you twice a year, it can make all the difference in the world for your relationship. Love can’t live on text messages and postcards alone—you need time to cuddle, make love and otherwise be in one another’s presence. To help bridge the gap between these times exchange items you’ve owned, particularly clothes that retain your respective scents. Holding onto these can help you get through the toughest nights.

Keep all of this in mind, stay true to your love, do the work and your long distance relationship can succeed despite the odds!

Married Man Sex Life

You will be unsurprised to hear that I was delighted to see a blog called “Married Man Sex Life”, by Athol Kay, especially after reading his description:

Tired of a tiny trickle of marital sex? Wondering why the hell you even got married in the first place? Basically feel cheated out of the main reason you got married? It’s a all too common tale. Most men are never taught anything about women and marriage, so it’s not all that unexpectted that she confuses you and your attempts to please her fail her more often that not. The truth is for the majority of guys, the woman able to give them the hottest sex possible, and their best shot at lasting happiness, already climbs into bed with them each night with their wedding ring on her finger. Welcome to the journey to reclaim that.

One of his themes, which I know some of my pro-Beta-attribute female readers will appreciate, is that being a good husband is a combination of Alpha and Beta skills.  Alpha for attraction and Beta for comfort, because attraction alone makes for a one-night stand and comfort alone makes for spark-less friendship.  As he says in Be Both Alpha And Beta: The Journey Is The Reward:

I generally disagree with the entire Alpha = good, Beta = bad mindset. You really need to have both Alpha Traits and Beta Traits in a marriage to really hit the sweet spot of happiness and sex. The blog is still new, but believe me I’m going to sound like a broken record on this point as the years play out.

If you’re a decent Beta, the solution is to add Alpha traits, not reduce Beta Traits and add Alpha. It’s not a zero-sum game where you can be either Alpha or Beta, but not both. You can and must be both. You still hold a job down, play with the kids, listen to how your wife spent her day, do housework etc. That’s all vital comfort building goodness. She likes and needs that to feel comfortable, like you’re invested in the relationship and family. These things are not “turn ons”, but lacking them makes them “turn offs”.

In another post, he explains how you can be both alpha and beta.

Other posts to check out include:

• Introduction: “My approach to marriage is part a married spin on Game, part Evolutionary Psychology, part Sex Ed, part Self-Help. Mostly it’s about learning what it is about you that unlocks the Holy Grail between your wifes legs. I will caution you though, some of this stuff I have to tell you is not going to be easy to read. It’s the Red Pill for those that dare.”
• Ovulation Game: Learn Her Cycle and Close On Tuesdays: “around ovulation itself she is going to feel a surge in sexual interest. This is when she is most likely to; experience orgasms, want multiple orgasms, be the wettest, cheat on you and generally seek raw dog Alpha Male pounding. My strong suggestion is that you supply it.”
• What To Do When She Comes Looking For You Wearing Lingerie (a good problem to have!).
• She’s A Nice Place To Visit (But I Wouldn’t Want To Live Her) – my one great worry about the Game community…  it focuses solely on winning sex within the context of the wider hook up culture that has developed and the hook up culture is driven / dependant on… well… sluts who are dumb enough to have sex with someone they’ve only spent seven hours with.

Women choose healthy vs. provider mate based on environment

In response to Vlad’s beta-ization post, Sarah B writes in with a comment:

To anyone who listens to this sort of stuff: Why don’t you just talk to your specific woman rather than jumping to conclusions about what “all” women are thinking.

Sorry, Patri, had to say something here.

If you look at articles written by people who are trying to study these sorts of things scientifically, if they’re decent scientists, they’ll admit that they can’t discern predicatable behaviors.

And a fascinating study (PDF) (although I would argue that it does show predictable behavior):

The evolution of human mating: Trade-offs and strategic pluralism Source: Behavioral and Brain Sciences [0140-525X] Gangestad yr:2000 vol:23 iss:4 pg:573

“Mating tactics are highly variable in both men and women and evolved to be contingent on environmental factors. Complete theories of mating strategies must account for these individual differences and contextual effects. We have proposed that these phenomena cannot be fully understood without considering the nature of the trade-offs that underlie mating decisions in humans. We suggest that good genes sexual selection, in concert with good parenting sexual selection, may have generated the variation and contextual effects associated with the short- and long-term mating tactics witnessed in both sexes.

Given the demands of biparental care during evolutionary history, both men and women were selected to use long-term mating tactics and invest in offspring. However, they were also selected to use ecologically contingent, conditional mating strategies, dedicating some effort to short-term and extra-pair mating under specific conditions. Women may have evolved to trade-off evidence of a man’s genetic fitness for evidence of his ability and willingness to invest in offspring. The specific mating tactics and preferences women adopted, however, depended on the nature and quality of their local environment. If the local environment was difficult and demanded biparental care, women placed more weight on the investment potential of prospective mates and less weight on indicators of their genetic fitness. As a result, a larger proportion of women adopted long-term mating tactics almost exclusively. If, on the other hand, the local environment was prevalent with pathogens (or signaled the importance of the genetic fitness of offspring), women placed more weight on indicators of the genetic fitness of prospective mates. In such environments, a larger proportion of women were willing to engage in short-term, extra-pair matings, allowing them to gain genetic benefits from men who provided less parental investment at the risk of losing parental investment from their primary mates. The mating tactics and preferences of women accordingly reflected the nature and quality of the environments in which they lived.

Whereas women “tracked” their environment, men tracked and adjusted their mating tactics and preferences to the behavior of women (Thiessen, 1994). If most women expected heavy paternal investment, most men (especially those who displayed less fitness) offered more and perhaps exclusive parental investment, dedicating a greater portion of their effort to long-term mating tactics and parental investment. As a result, variance in men’s mating success was reduced. If women’s “demand” for genetic benefits increased, some men (especially those advertising such benefits) dedicated more effort to short-term, extra-pair mating tactics, thereby increasing variance in mating success among men. Only a small proportion of men (i.e., those who displayed the most fitness) were able to carry out short-term tactics successfully at all times, regardless of the environmental factors to which women were responding.

Many of the unique predictions derived from this model have been supported by recent empirical data. Although our notions extend our understanding of the strategic plurality of human mating in many ways, this account of the ties between evolutionary theory and human mating strategies remains far from complete. “

I’m rather surprised at Sarah’s conclusion that: “In other words, there are theories as to how or why women choose the men that they do, but they’re just that – unproven theories” .  To the contrary, this article seems like great evidence for the way evolutionary biology looks at the world – the very theories that Game and the alpha/beta distinction are based on.  The idea of women switching between short-term alpha matings and long-term beta pairings based on the local environment fits solidly into the Game worldview.  One need only add that in the modern world, we are so wealthy that the local environment does not demand biparental care, and we now have an explanation for the drop in marriage and rise in women “playing the field”.

Why Should Husbands Become PUAs?

Because otherwise, your wife will talk like the wives on the blog My Husband Is Annoying.  Is that how you want her to feel about you, and talk about you to her friends?  Or do you want to be the ever-entertaining, still slightly mysterious, exciting yet dependable center of her world?

The Betting Man

Whenever he suggests a bet, the stakes are always the same: sex or some form of sexual activity.  For the sake of all involved, I won’t go into details.  But for all the women out there, you know what I’m talking about, right?  It’s never a wager for money or for who’s going to do the dishes or for who’s going to walk the dog(s) in the rainy cold.

And no matter how healthy a couple’s sex life may be, the man will stillmake the stakes of a bet about sex.  For example:

Man: Wanna make a bet on the football game?

Woman: Sure, why not?  What do you want to bet for?

Man [with that look in his eyes that pretty much just says it all]: Oh, I don’t know…got anything in mind?

[And then this is when the man tries to get all coy in the  hopes that the woman will pick up on the suggestive tone and say it herself for some reason.]

Yup, I know I’m generalizing here.  And maybe it’s just my husband that does this on a regular basis though womehow, I don’t think so.  But believe me, the next time the subject of betting comes up, you can put money on the fact that if he loses, I’ll be making him do the dishes…no sexual favors necessary.

Mistake: if you want a sexual bet, and your wife is not the type to pick one, then “got anything in mind” comes off as pathetic passive-aggressive subservience.  If you want something, take the lead!

Where’s My Baby?

my husband has a habit of asking where I am even when it’s clear I’m right in the next room.  I’ve gotten used to this and there are times I even find it kind of endearing.  He’d often say, “Where’s my baby?” and I guess I was expected to reply, “I’m in the kitchen” or some such thing.   (I’m aware this line of questioning would make much more sense if we lived in a large, multi-story house but seems fairly ridiculous in a 500 square foot 1 bedroom apartment.  Still, I do occasionally like to humor my husband.)

But lately the conversation goes more like this:

Husband: Where’s my baby?

Me: I’m in the kitchen, getting a snack. [This is most often where I am and what I'm doing.  I probably spend the majority of my time at home in the kitchen getting snacks.]

Husband: No, my baby.

You see, I guess I’m no longer his baby.  I’m now just the person carrying his baby.  And I seem to have lost my name, too.

Ok, if you have a special term of endearment for your wife which has established a history, don’t suddenly start using it for someone else in her presence!  This is just common sense.

Garbage Wars, Part II

In our kitchen we have a smallish white trash can. When my husband Bill has an item that is too big to fit in the trash can, such as a pizza box or his “Silk” soy milk cartons (shown in the photo), he will set it BESIDE the trash can instead of just taking the thing to the outside garbage bin, which is literally only 16 footsteps from the kitchen trash can! 16 steps. I walked the distance to check.

Ok, if your wife needs to measure the number of steps for a chore she wants you to do, you got problems.  Could be that when she complains, you argue or ignore her, so she isn’t feeling heard.  Could be she doesn’t feel supported in the relationship, and this chore has become the touchpoint for how she wants you to do more.  Could be that you don’t appreciate her enough for her maintenance of a nice domestic environment, and damned if she’s gonna throw out your trash if you don’t appreciate it.  I dunno – but it’s a yellow flag for sure.

If that’s not enough to inspire you to go work on your inner game, check out their Photo Friday, where wives post pictures of their “pathetic husbands”. When keeping a long-term relationship working smoothly, time is your enemy, both time in the relationship, and absolute time as societal changes weaken marriage:

according to the National Marriage Project’s latest report, their discontent is growing: fewer than 60 percent of wives report that they are “very happy” in their marriages, in contrast to more than 66 percent in 1973. (Male marital happiness has declined, too: from 70 percent to 63 percent.)

So learn some skills, or risk becoming pathetic.

The Paradox of Beta-ization

(A guest post by Vlad the Impaler)

Patri wrote in “Game Matters In Marriage Too“:

it should be clear that women look for more provider (beta!) characteristics in LTRs and more alpha characteristics in STRs.

I am not going to address the dangers of lumping all women together and making sweeping  generalizations about their mating strategy, neither I am going to discuss those (quite numerous) women who intentionally seek pliant beta providers for husbands.

Instead I am going to approach this statement from an unexpected angle by examining  a near-universal, but little appreciated phenomenon of “betaization” (the term coined by a  PUA Franco).

What is  “betaization”?  Here it is:  a woman mates with  a masculine Lover type to whom she is attracted, they stay together and  have passion for each other,  but gradually, little-by-little, she starts trying to transform him into a beta-behaving Provider. As she slowly succeeds, her respect and sexual attraction for him start waning. It is a very familiar scenario – a story of Dave from Hawaii (before his transformation), as well as of countless other men.

If this scenario is allowed to play out to its extreme, the participants end up as  a dysfunctional sexless couple of a clueless submissive provider husband who is continuously being pecked by his shrill frustrated wife. At this point there is a high probability that she will leave him or will cheat on him if another Lover will become available to her. Even if there is no eligible Lover at the moment, she might  choose to end the relationship with her now-despised  man  but  keep using him as her provider via alimony and child support. Not a pretty picture.

At first sight, it is a paradox: if the woman  wanted a beta-like Provider, why didn’t she choose one to begin with? And if she wanted a alpha-like Lover, why would she try to betaize  him, killing her own attraction in the process? It just does not make sense from the POV of our Male Logic.

However, there is a simple explanation to to this seeming paradox. Women are attracted to alpha-behaving Lovers because they possess superior genes (and often superior resources as well). The problem for a Lover’s  mate  that her position is inherently insecure – an untamed Lover might just leave her and go on sexing other women, he might not  invest his resources in her and her progeny, etc. He has lots of options and she has lots of female competition looking to poach him.

So the truth is that the “right” strategy for a woman would be to snag an alpha-Lover and then “betaize” him  so that he stays with her and invests his resources in her and her children.

Most PUA’s view betaization as an evil plot that has to be resisted by all means. I, however, see it in a more benign way: without a CERTAIN MEASURE of betaization stable LTR’s (foundation of human civilization) would not be possible. “Betaization” only becomes destructive if it is allowed to proceed to the point of loss of man’s alpha traits, while stable and happy LTR exists in that “sweet spot” when the man is betaized enough to stay in LTR and invest his resources in it, but still alpha enough to command woman’s respect and attraction. This  “sweet spot” is the result of dynamic tension between woman’s betaization attempts and  countervailing force of man’s desire to maintain his alphaness. Outside of this sweet spot the LTR is either not stable, not happy, or both.

So, for a man, what would the practical applications of Betaization Paradox ? There are a few:

1. Your woman WILL try to betaize you, so do not take it personally and do not take offence when it happens  – it is not a result of her bad will or some evil feminist conspiracy – it is just her evolutionary program running.
2. Do not count on her stopping her betaization attempts at the “sweet spot” – her evolutionary program will make her pull incessantly  in  beta direction. Do not abdicate your responsibility as a man – it takes two people pulling in opposite directions to stay in the sweet spot. Maintain your alpha frame. This tension between two countervailing forces will also make your relationship more exciting.
3. View  her betaization attempts as tests. She is indeed testing you -  testing whether you are still alpha enough to keep having sex with you. Do not give in to the temptation to just  yield for the sake of peace – if you yield without resistance, you failed the test and weakened her attraction to you. You will have not  “peace”, but another test, harder than the first..View it instead as an opportunity to show your alphaness. Passing the test will increase her attraction to you.

Discussion welcome.

How to Own Your Relationship

Journal cross-posted from my Life Coaching Blog

Jason was having problems with his girlfriend.  He wanted her attention, but she didn’t feel she had the energy to give him more of her attention, and she told him that he was annoying her when he requested more of her time.

He came to coaching wanting to figure out how to not annoy her.  What I told him is that this already puts him behind the 8 ball.

“You don’t want to not-annoy her, you want to attract her!”

This reframe helped a lot.  Because he’s now coming from a place of feeling empowered to change his situation, he’s able to empathize with her about how she really cares about the relationship, and that she is trying to make things work.  From this new perspective, he feels that he’s able to contribute to work on the relationship with her together, instead of just working to get her attention.

Jason’s coaching homework is to watch Authentic Man Program videos to help him work on his inner game.

Shannon Friedman blogs about life coaching at Starry Night Coaching.

OKCupid Stats Validate Indirect Opener For Guys

This has nothing to do w/ LTRs, but it’s a cool bit of pickup science.  The dating site OKCupid has a blog called OKTrends which consists of statistical research using their data.  For example, they’ve posted about how race and attractiveness affects reply rates.

Their latest post is on profile pictures, and among lots of other interesting data, includes:

Here we see that for women, making eye contact and flirting or smiling is best.  But while smiling is good whether or not you make eye contact, flirting actually becomes bad if you don’t make eye contact.  As the blog post says, “Certain social etiquettes apply even online: if you’re going to be making eyes at someone, it should be with the person looking at your picture.”

For men, however, the case is quite different:

The best thing a guy can do in his profile pic is to not make eye contact – and ideally, to not smile.  This matches the game concept of the indirect opener – women will get creeped out if you come on too directly during initial contact.  They want to start slow and social, which is why you build comfort before you build attraction.

Again, not relevant in an LTR, where you can just be direct, but it’s interesting research.  And the OKStats post has more graphs on the effectiveness of female cleavage shots, men showing abs, and lots more.