by Guest » Mon Nov 23, 2009 12:22 pm
No offense man, but this is a really boring conversation. I mean, it's hard to read I can't imagine how hard it is to have participated in it. Understand, that I don't think you're boring, I just think you didn't escalate this conversation or make it fun and casual.
We all have different styles, sure, yours may be one in which you try to get the girl to feel as if you care about her and really know and understand her. Being sincere and curious about her CAN work, but I don't necessarily think it's what most girls would want from a man.
Texting is supposed to be casual. You aren't supposed to get to know each other via text.
Looking at your text thread, I noticed something. At first you she was asking you roughly the same number of questions that you asked her. Near the end you went off the rails a bit. You asked more questions and she asked virtually none. In total, the ratio of your questions to her and hers to you was 2:1. You asked 10, she asked 5.
More than that though, you'll notice that the questions you asked had more teeth and substance. Her, on the other hand, were very superficial and appear to be more of a cordial thing than otherwise.
I got the distinct feeling that you were trying to really 'force' that conversation. There were a handful of places where you should have just cut the thread and started over in a couple of days. Instead, you plowed ahead and the energy of the conversation went no where.
Remember, conversations are two way. If you're not able to coax the energy level out of her that you need to, then cut the thread, walk away for a while, then try it again.
I know you said that you're focusing more on building comfort. But, the comfort stage involves more than just being comfortable with someone. You can be comfortable with tons of people so it doesn't really differentiate your from the masses too much.
The other part to the comfort stage is rapport.
From Wiki:
[B]"Rapport[/B] is one of the most important features or characteristics of [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unconscious_communication"]unconscious human interaction[/URL]. It is commonality of perspective: being "in sync" with, or being "on the same wavelength" as the person with whom you are talking. There are a number of techniques that are supposed to be beneficial in building rapport such as: [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matching"]matching[/URL] your [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_language"]body language[/URL] (ie, [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posture"]posture[/URL], [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesture"]gesture[/URL], and so forth); maintaining [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_contact"]eye contact[/URL]; and matching [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breath"]breathing[/URL] [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhythm"]rhythm[/URL]."
Rapport, generally speaking, is only really created in person. Sure, non-verbal communication is important but so are things like common experiences or inside jokes. Maybe a movie that you both enjoy and can commonly quote (for me it's always quotes from Anchorman). It doesn't take much to build rapport, but it's difficult to find someone with a similar perspective. Or someone that's willing to adopt yours.
Also, I think you've still got a bit of a too structured view of comfort and seduction. If you break PU into four broad stages, as done by Mystery and what I generally believe is the 'road map,' you've got attraction, comfort, rapport, and seduction (Mystery actually lumps comfort and rapport together, but I think rapport is a fundamental differentiation point that is uber powerful and should be viewed as a higher level of comfort so much so as to be a step beyond comfort).
Here's my definition of each:
Attraction -- Occurs almost instantaneously, many times it's based purely on her physical attraction to you. This stage last, at tops, like 60 seconds.
Comfort -- The point where she no longer views you as a stranger. Instead, you're that funny guy, cute guy, interesting guy, Bull Run, whatever. You now have some kind of identity to HER. Now, she'll start opening up to you as if you are no longer a random person.
Rapport -- Sometimes never happens. But, it's when the two of you are on the same level. A few inside jokes, a few common experiences, etc. This is what creates rapport.
Seduction -- This is when the interaction gets sexual in a REAL way. Before, you both may have joked about it but now it's serious. Kissing, petting, touching, or talking about sex (in a serious way). I've even had chicks show me naked pics of themselves on their camera phones.
Too often guys think of each stage as a level, it's linear and instantaneous. It's kind of like a light switch. When a girl is attracted, the light switch turns from 'off' to 'on.' When she's comfortable, the comfort switch turns from 'off' to 'on.' When she's ready for sex, the seduction switch turns from 'off' to 'on.' But, this isn't right AT ALL. Instead, think of PU as a dimmer switch.
The only point at which you turn anything 'on' is at attraction. That is almost always instantaneous (by that I mean within the first 30 to 60 seconds, sometimes immediately if they find you physically attractive). Once you've clicked on the dimmer switch, then you start turning the knob so that the light gets brighter and brighter. There really aren't stages necessarily. And, going from one stage to the next is so subtle as to be almost impossible to identify. Maybe in hindsight will you discover when you went from attraction to comfort and from comfort to seduction, but generally speaking, when you're in the middle of the PU you don't ever know what stage you're really in. You just know if things are going well and progressing, which is really the only feedback you'll ever get. The line between each stage is simply too dynamic and ambiguous to see a definitive demarcation point.
So, back to the dimmer switch analogy. Your job is to slowly turn that dimmer to get the light as bright as possible. A woman's job is to decide how much resistance to give you and when to coax you a little further. So, as you start turning up the light, understand that you can also reverse coarse and dim the light again. Then, since you've already turned it up to a certain point, you can easily go right back to that 'brightness' level on the dimmer switch.
This is how I think of push and pull. You turn the knob up, then dim it again. You don't ever turn anything 'off' you just turn it up or down. Remember you're working in levels of degrees here, not checkpoints.
I think you've misinterpreted what Smirks and I have been saying about comfort, which is more our fault than yours. What we're saying, and anyone else that advised that you work on comfort, is not that you get to comfort and stop turning the knob. Keep trying to turn the knob!!! But, understand that you can go back to comfort once you've hit rapport OR seduction. That's what I think of as push and pull, you turn the dial up then when she resists or does something you're not crazy about you turn the dial down.
You are on the offensive, she is on the defensive. If you stop trying to turn the knob, then she's going to start really pushing back on you. Then, the tables have turned. She is now on the offensive while you bunker down and go on the defensive to try to hold onto the ground that you've gained. When this shift occurs, you're almost always toast. You've got to keep pushing the interaction, keep turning the dial.
When I say I fight to stay in comfort what I means is that I push the dial still, then turn it back to comfort. Then push it back up to seduction, then back to rapport. Then down to comfort, then shoot up to seduction. Back and forth, back and forth.
The reason you do this is because you want her to have some level of confusion as to what you're doing and where this interaction is and where it's going. This causes her to lower her defenses a bit and makes it easier for you to turn the dial up even further. The goal is for her to be having such a good time and to be so thrown off-balance as to not know what's happening until it's too late for her to push back or offer you resistance.
One of the recurring themes of the feedback I've gotten from women that I've successfully seduced is this confusion. Many times, either at the end of the night or the next day her friends will ask her what that was all about with me. Their answer is almost always "I have no idea, but he better call me OR it was fun."
As for specific feedback to your thread, I'd say you had a golden opportunity to better use the smores conversation.
Her: Haha i forgot you were camping. Smores are yummy! Where are you camping at?
You: Smores are yummy! I'm going to take you camping just so we can feed each other smores and gaze at the stars. Wait...I only have one tent and I don't trust you to sleep so closely to me...I'm not a piece of meat you know, I need comfort and rapport before I put out ;)
You're firmly in comfort with her, but that doesn't mean that you should stop trying to push the interaction. She held that thread with you for so long for a reason. She wanted you to escalate! Near the end, she got tired and frustrated with the platonic-get-to-know you thread you two had and wanted you to ante up and get to a this-conversation-is-getting-hot thread. That's why she seemed to get short and less inquisitive at the end.