An Approach to Approach Anxiety

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Hey Guys,

For the new year I thought I’d tackle one of the first problems people experience within game and slowly move through the topics throughout the rest of 2009.

Are you afraid of approaching someone you like through a fear of rejection?

Do you get that horrible feeling in your stomach and begin to formulate 100 reasons why someone wouldn’t want to talk to you?

This is a lot more common than you would believe. There are a number of different products out there which will supposedly “fix” the fear of approaching strangers, especially ones you are attracted to. However, few of them take the time to understand why we have that fear in the first place. If you understand why you have this fear or anxiety, you can take steps to counter it. This is probably the biggest topic when it comes to understanding attraction. Well, that is to say, it is the one that most people have the biggest problem with. I constantly receive the same excuses time and time again when it comes to this subject.

1) I’m scared of approaching

2) I have a fear of rejection

3) They aren’t in the mood to be spoken to

4) She won’t think I look good enough

5) I can’t meet people in a park/cinema/night club

6) I’m not good enough for him/her

7) There’s no point, it won’t work

These are probably the most common reasons I am given as to why someone can’t approach, or the feeling that is preventing them from approaching. The fact that these are so prevalent is because they are all based on very real psychological factors to do with learning and behaviour.

Anxiety is defined by Seligman, Walker and Rosenhan (2001) as a physiological state characterized by cognitive, somatic, emotional, and behavioral components. These factors essentially make up the feelings that we experience as fear, apprehension, and worry.

There are some physical sensations that you will probably be aware of such as heart palpitations, nausea, chest pain, shortness of breath, sweaty palms, shaking and perhaps headaches. These may be common to you. Some people will disguise these by making a decision not to approach. This will relieve the sensations and instead leave a sort of “numbness” to the situation.

Sigmund Freud himself believed that these anxious feelings were created by an association between a past negative experience and the current situation. These associations are often false and not related through causality – the idea that one situation directly affects another, but through correlation – one thing “tends to affect another over repeated attempts.”

When people begin to see this correlation as a fact, it is commonly referred to as “Magical Thinking.”

There are two governing principles behind magical thinking. The first is the law of similarity which is the notion that things that resemble each other are casually connected in some way that defies scientific testing.

 

For example:

Here people will typically see vertical columns of squares and circles as opposed to horizontal mixed rows of squares and circles.

The second law is the law of contagion which is the belief that “things that have been in physical contact or in spatial or temporal association with other things retain a connection after they are separated.” Contagion effects have been noted to be more effective with negative associations than with positive ones. This is probably best explained by the notion of getting “bad luck” or having a bad time every time you go to a specific venue.

Freud believed that the anxiety or fear was maintained through a form operant conditioning. Essentially the feeling of anxiety is reinforced every time you are in a similar situation. You then “learn” to remove the negative feeling of anxiety by not approaching. These connections of patterns, or “magical thinking,” are common throughout all the human societies across the world. The human brain is adept at forming these patterns, though we do not have a particularly good system for distinguishing between real and perceived connections. Theoretically this is due to a simple survival tactic. If we notice rustling behind a bush it is better for us to assume it is some form of threat and begin to prep our bodies to defend ourselves rather than ignore it and risk being eaten.

Our fear or anxiety response is actually designed to help us survive in a fight or flight scenario. Believe it or not the symptoms detailed earlier are all beneficial to us in times of survival. Perspiration occurs to help cool us down, heart rate increases to improve blood circulation and muscles tighten as they are filled with oxygen in preparation for use. Unfortunately these are not particularly beneficial when we are looking for something witty to say during a conversation with someone.

In short we learn the fear through a number of negative experiences and then reinforce them by not doing anything about it. The bodies natural reaction towards a fearful situation is the feeling we associate with approach anxiety or the fear of the approach. The way to overcome this is to reverse the learning.

All of the common problems detailed above can be directly related to either “magical thinking” in the form of a false belief that failure is almost certain due to some form of connection to a previous situation that failed. Or pure fear learnt and reinforced by not approaching. These are both forms of self fulfilled prophecy i.e. Unless you actively do something to fix it they will continue to support themselves. The good news is that this problem is far from unfixable.

The bad news is that it does take time. The easiest way to fix this is to actually go out and meet new people. The problem is that when you do this, any negative experience you receive is likely to reinforce the previous attitude or fear you had before. As I’ve mentioned before one of the easiest ways to get around this is to simply meet people for the sake of meeting people.

Most of us are actually more than happy to talk to other people, especially on boring long journeys, or when waiting in a long queue. Get used to talking to absolutely everybody, male or female, young and old. This should help you generate a great deal of positive responses to your approaches and help curb some of those negative connections.

 

I hope this helps guys,

Adam Lyons

(AFC Adam)

The Top 10 Pick Up Artists Of 2008

Welcome one and all to the Top 10 list of best Pick Up Artists for the year 2008!

2008 was a strange year – for me personally, and for a lot of others, I think.  In many ways, I’m glad the year is over.  But regardless of how good of a year it was, there were many people in the seduction community who continued to rise above petty squabbles and drama and actually help other men improve their lives and their success with women, and this list is a CELEBRATION of those men, who have helped others throughout the past year.

For those of you new to the list, let me explain how the rankings work.  It becomes very easy to get “caught up” in the hype of certain personalities, so I try and rank the Top 10 based on a number of criteria, which I believe must be present to be considered a good “PUA.”  So all of this years winners were ranked based on:

1.  In-Field Performance.  This is basically the skills the PUA displays in the field with women.  Most Top 10s deal with this factor exclusively, but I’ve found that just looking at a guy’s in-field performance can be misleading, since people have off-nights or can get lucky.  That said, their ability to use the techniques in field repeatedly and consistently to get results is a big, big factor in the ranking process.

2.  Innovations.  This is what new outlook or techniques the PUA brings to the table.  It’s easy for any new guy to get good using Mystery Method or any other school of seduction, but then again, that stuff is designed to work!  So being innovative and bringing a new twist, spin, philosophy, technique, or whatever to the mix is also a big deal, because that means the PUA actually has something to contribute to his students and the community as a whole that no one else does.

3.  Teaching Ability.  This is how effectively the PUA can teach what he does to other people, and have them get similar results.  This is another important factor, because it weeds out the people who are just the lucky naturals, and finds the PUAs who have something to offer humanity as a whole.  After all, I don’t care if a guy gets laid a lot.  I care if that guy can get ME laid a lot – and I think the same is true for you.  That is why I factor in the PUA’s ability to teach others into the ranking.

4.  Contributions To The Community.  This is a measure of how much the PUA “gives back” to others in the seduction community.  This factor is all about the PUA’s willingness to help others, the knowledge and experience he’s willing to share, and the compassion he shows to those who need help.  Too many PUAs look down on people not as successful with women as they are, and that’s not what the seduction community is about, so giving back to it should play a factor, in my opinion.

5.  Philosophy.  This comes down to the PUA’s outlook on life, women, and other men in general.  It’s about how they live their lives, and whether they’re consistent with it.  Some PUAs spout great philosophy, but don’t really believe in it or practice it.  But it’s that core foundations which will influence their students, so I believe this is important in factoring the rankings.

6.  Likability.  One of the things I base my ranking on is whether I actually like the PUA or not.  This is a subjective thing, but I feel its important, because there’s usually a reason I don’t like someone, and that reason has to do with them being a fake, fraud, evil bastard, or what have you.  I like to think I have a fairly decent “B.S. Radar,” so when I meet a PUA in person, I can usually tell if they are legit or not after getting to know them, which is why I tend to rank PUAs I have actually met in real life.  If I haven’t met them, I need to get good feedback from at least 3 sources I trust to make the decision to rank them in this category.

Okay, so now that you know how I rank the list, let’s get to it! Read more

Top 10 Contest 2008: Best Product

Hey guys,

Great job with the other contests!  We definitely have some winners there.  Remember, I’ll be announcing the winnners TOMORROW, along with the unveiling of the Top 10 PUAs of 2008.

But for now, how about another contest worth $100?

Tell me what you thought was the best product of 2008.  The course you got that changed your life forever!  One caveat is that the product had to have been released during 2008, so nothing from before that – even if its new to you!  Also be sure to include WHY you thought the product was so good, and mention where others can find it.

I may hold off until Sunday to announce the winner of this one since the Top 10 comes out tommorrow, unless of course someone writes a great entry really quickly, in which case I’ll just make the announcement along with the others.

Don’t forget – it is totally possible to win more than one contest!  That means if you enter all three with a good entry, you can get $300!

So be sure to check back tomorrow for the unveiling of the Top 10 list!  I’m sure it will surprise some people.

Top 10 Contest 2008: Best New PUA

Hey guys,

So far, no winners on the Craziest Drama contests.  None of you guys really seem to be putting forth any effort in explaining what the best drama was and why it was so much fun.  I’m looking for PASSION, people!  I’ll be extending all contests deadlines to Friday and announcing the winnners at the same time as the unveiling of the Top 10 list to give people more time to participate.

Today’s contest is who you think the best new PUA on the scene in 2008 was.  You have to give their name, a detailed reason why you think they’re so good, and any links to back up your statements (blog posts, videos showing them doinng their thing, etc.)

Winner of this contest gets… $100!

So if you win both contests, that’s $200 smackers in your pocket.

Top 10 2008 Contest 1: Craziest Drama

Okay guys, Day 1 of our countdown to the Top 10 list this year is an easy one…

What do you think was the craziest community “drama” to happen in 2008?  Please give a *DETAILED* explanation as to why you think it is the craziest, what impact (if any) it had in the community, and what you enjoyed the most about it.

The winner of this contest will get…

$100!

Right out of me own pocket, to spend on whatever you want.

Sound good?

Winner gets announced on Wednesday.  If no one gives me anything good, or no one enters, I’ll just roll the prize money into the next contest.

So get yer butt into the comments thread of this post and start submitting your entries.  Can you submit more than one?  Fo’ sure.  But remember:  You can’t win if you don’t enter!  So if you’re one of those hoity-toity types who wipes his arse with Benjamins, don’t bother entering.

For the rest of you, I look forward to seeing your entries!

I’m Baaaa-aaack…

S’up party people.

In case you didn’t notice, I took a little “mental health” break from the blog for a few months.  Just needed some time to unwind and have fun instead of dealing with people who wanna hate on me and threaten lawsuits and the like.

I wanna apologize to those of you who liked my Pick Up Artists Recaps.  I had tivoed all the episodes with the intent of doing recaps, but honestly, I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.  I really, really, REALLY did not enjoy this season and it was a great deal of effort to sit there and make up masturbating serial killer jokes – something which just simply should NOT be work… ever.

Maybe if I’m feeling really masochistic some day, I’ll download the eps I missed on iTunes and recap them then.  But otherwise, I’m going to have to stop.

One thing I will NOT stop, however, is my TOP 10 PUA LIST.

I usually release the list on New Years Eve/Day, at least traditionally, but I found myself in a situation this year where I was without internet for a good week and a half, so I was not able to post this year’s rankings.

But I will, in fact, be posting the 2008 list THIS FRIDAY, January 9th.

Why this Friday?  So I can spend some time this week giving away the obligatory fan-fare prizes that go along with the unveiling of the list!  Duh.

As always, prizes will be dispensed based on Blog Participation, so you’ll want to check in every day leading up to Friday to see what the new contest is.

This year I’ll be giving away mostly money, since it’s too much of a hassle to deliver prizes and crap to people.  So I hope you guys out there are a fan of cash!  Because this year, I’m gonna be giving away a LOT of it.  Savvy?

So let’s get started with the TOP 10 COUNTDOWN, BABY!!!!