Keeping Your Cool: Don't Chase Women
The other day, a reader wrote in with a question about keeping your cool when women are being flighty or slow to respond, in reference to the post on what to do when girls flake:
“In your article on girls not returning texts, I was wondering what your idea of a socially savvy way to deal with it was. I've found it hard not to take this personal, especially when it's from girls I've known longer that still do it. I understand it's quite common, but to me there's really no excuse. I'd much rather hear "I'm not interested" than waste my night waiting around, especially when considering how girls get when guys don't call them back.”
You know, a long, long time ago -- it almost seems like another life -- I made it a point to respond to every single person who texted or called me, no matter what. I looked at it as a matter of honor, and took it as a point of pride -- I was reliable.
And it annoyed me to no end when people didn't respond. Like the reader above, I couldn't understand people who didn't respond -- I thought it rude, and I considered it inexcusable.
Of course you can take 10 seconds to text a reply, or 10 minutes to return a phone call, I'd think to myself.
I considered it a personal slight, those people who didn't respond.
I see things a lot differently nowadays. Often, I don't even notice when one person or another -- when one girl or another -- hasn't responded, until maybe much later -- and perhaps never at all. And, for all my earlier "principles" on being 100% reliable in responding to those who contacted me, I'm now sitting at somewhere decidedly below a 100% response rate -- maybe 85%, maybe 90%. I still try to respond most times, but it's no longer an unbreakable rule.
The reason why I changed -- both in how I saw it when others didn't respond, and in why I don't chase women with texting or phone calls anymore and why I don't always respond when people chase me anymore -- is what I want to share with you here.
A few conversations I've had lately have revolved around me discussing with guys how simple things are with women. You just talk to them, and then... boom! They chase after you. You don't even have to do any work; girls take care of all that themselves.
Once upon a time, there was one subject that absolutely terrified me when women brought it up in conversation: their past relationships.
I had a date Friday night with a young television anchor for one of the big TV stations in China and Hong Kong. Things started out innocently enough -- she put me in the hot seat early on, treating me almost like how I imagine she must treat her interviewees, asking me lots of questions and making it feel like an interview -- but I soon wrested control of the flow of conversation, and pretty soon things were going swimmingly. I used something known as the cold read to do it.
The most frequent email I get from readers is of the very gracious, magnanimous variety, with readers reaching out to say thanks for writing your blog, your book, etc., and sharing perhaps some of the successes that have come from, in part, applying what they've learned from my materials. 
If you've ever tried to take a girl home with you, or you've ever been in a relationship, you know that sometimes women need persuading. And when it comes to persuading women, you'd be forgiven for thinking that this was a near-universal point of suffering for most men.
Walking back from the gym this afternoon, under the hot summer sun, I was a bit of a mess. My shirt was drenched in sweat; my arms were stiff and wooden; my hair was a little messy; and I was still breathing a little heavy.
A buddy of mine recently asked me to write on how to meet girls in groups, as it's something I don't talk about a great deal on here. The most I've touched on the topic before has been in "
One of the things that it seems like a lot of guys have difficulty realizing is when women actually want them.
When I first decided to start tackling women and dating as a skill set to methodically improve at the end of 2004, I went into it with three distinct aims: