Mindsets

What are the differences between how a beneficial, robust mental model works, versus how robust-yet-harmful mental models (like victim mentality) or non-robust mental models yet clung-to models work?

I’ve been analyzing mental models a lot recently. In particular, how people can have extremely different, yet robust or at least unyielding mental models, and how each different kind of mental model produces different kinds of results.

For instance:

• Victim mentality is actually an extremely robust mental model. Individuals who view themselves as victims – and such individuals are extremely common across societies, of every sex, race, age, and creed – continually find reason to view themselves as the recipients of misfortune, find justification for their models, and receive feedback from the world that reinforces rather than disabuses them of their models

• Conversely, what I’d call winner, or success-driven, individuals also have extremely robust mental models. Individuals who view themselves as successes tend to be quite good at finding ways to pull victory out of defeat, at avoiding situations where they would suffer setbacks, and don’t spend much time dwelling on setbacks, other than from a problem-solving mentality. As a result, they spend little time in defeat and quickly dust themselves off even after most reasonably catastrophic failures
  

But it’s not just someone’s victim/winner orientation. It’s also the reliability of his predictions.

For instance, someone who sees himself as a victim has confidence in his mental model because his predictions are either correct, or he explains them away if they aren’t. He sees a pretty girl and says, “Well, she’ll reject me, of course,” and if he approaches and she does reject him, he says, “See? I knew it. Women always reject me.” If instead she’s friendly, he’ll be inclined to explain it away: “She must’ve been drunk” or “She doesn’t really like me... she was probably just being polite.”

Both victims and winners make predictions and their predictions either come true, or they attempt to explain to themselves (and others) why in this case the prediction failed, yet the failure does not violate their mental model overall. This makes these models robust.

Obviously, if they receive enough feedback to crash the model, they’ll be forced to reassess. But most people adopt models that seem to justify their experiences, and avoid experiences that may invalidate their models.

However, prediction is only the surface here – largely because it doesn’t give us a way to qualify the differences between different mental models (like victim and winner mentalities). So we need to add two more pieces.

I propose any robust, success-oriented mental model is comprised of three (3) bits:

• Predictive accuracy,
• Confidence in the model, and
• Harmonious choices and outcomes
  

“What are you WAITING for!?”

The question runs through almost all the advice I mete out on seduction. Big part of the advice I see other guys give, too.

A student from a coaching session stands around, hesitating to approach.

“What are you waiting for!?”

A lover complains about how she’s unable to live her dream of being a professional dancer.

“What are you waiting for!?”

A friend is hung up on a single girl, and unwilling to move on with his life.

“What are you waiting for!?”

People sure spend a lot of time waiting.

You could grow old waiting for most people to finish waiting. Or you could even meet a girl, sleep with her, and have an entire wonderful relationship with her during the same time other men spend looking for the “right moment” to chat with that girl from work or class or wherever she’s from.

But, you know – “What are you waiting for!?” – if you can internalize this utterly electric anti-procrastination attitude, you will be 90% of the way to becoming the man you know you really can be.

If only you stopped putting everything off till tomorrow though, or got up on time, or got that job... then you’d be ready to buckle down and really get to work... right?

Wrong.

The other day, one of the advanced members of our Girls Chase forums asked me about how you root out scarcity in all its forms, and how to resist the sometimes overpowering urge to give into it.

Scarcity can spring naturally from the situations you find yourself in, but it may also be engineered: individuals (and organizations) who understand the value of scarcity can also use it to make themselves more in-demand and attract higher value friends, mates, and associates. It’s all around us, pervades what we do, and we use it on each other, intentionally or inadvertently, non-stop. As you become an increasingly valuable individual socially, there will be more and more people who feel scarcity interacting with you (or trying to), and usually there will still always be someone or something you yourself continue to feel it with or for.

Scarcity takes many forms:

• You meet a girl who’s super hot and perfect for you and you can’t help feeling nervous around her and acting different around her

• You reach a point in a relationship where you find yourself going back and forth over whether staying with this girl is what you really want, but feeling unsure whether you’re ready to give her up
  

• You reach a point in a relationship where your girlfriend is clearly going back and forth over whether staying with you is clearly what she really wants, and it makes you feel helpless
  

• You find yourself working a job that’s pretty good, but not perfect, and while some part of you wants to leave, another part isn’t sure if other jobs are necessarily better... and you may be safer just staying right where you are

• You find yourself talking with a salesman who seems to be offering something you might be interested in, but he’s pushing you for a decision now and you’re not sure whether to take the plunge or beg off
  

In any of these scenarios and a whole lot more, scarcity, in one of its many forms, snakes its way into your heart and tightens its grip around your psyche.

Possibly on its own; possibly due to the machinations of those around you.

Sometimes you may fight free from scarcity, yet some of the time it gets you. And sometimes the end result is okay and you get the thing you felt needy toward and the thing turns out to be worthwhile, while other times you realize sooner or later you settled for something less than what you could’ve had... had you been a little braver. Or you tripped over your own two feet in your attempt to secure it, and chucked yourself out of the running in the process.

How do you combat the creeping feeling of neediness you get whenever you wind up in a truly scarce position, and instead remain calm, measured, and effective?

In a comment on my article “In Seduction, “You” Don’t Matter (But Her Emotions Do)”, a commenter who dubs himself ‘Enlightened’ left the following remark:

“This article seems to suggest that women care more about what you can do for them and how those actions make them feel vs what they can do for you. It’s very much important about what they deduce they can get if they stick around with you. Is this correct? If so, how does this sentiment vary by country and across the world? If this is correct, then why should men pursue women at all when ultimately all he is to a woman is a talking dildo?”

Now, in case you haven’t read this article or skimmed over the part Enlightened is referring to, my point was twofold – that:

1. When people meet someone new, they evaluate him on value and attainability – essentially, how valuable does this new person appear to be, and how accessible is that value of his?
   

2. Once someone has spent a longer period of time with another individual (say, perhaps, 80 to 100 hours?), he begins to form a real attachment to this person, and begins to want the best for him, care for him, and deeply understand and empathize with him – however, this connection is only formed with time; it is not instantaneous
   

Enlightened may have missed that latter part and only zeroed in on the part that raised his ire, so he may not necessarily be guilty of the following mindset. However, I have noticed there is a distinct minority of men who stumble onto this site (supposedly stumbling in here from places like Reddit, or some manner of MGTOW websites and forums) who think point #1 is totally unreasonable in all circumstances – at least, for other people.

They still judge others by the value they present to their lives, and how attainable those others are. However, they believe they themselves should be exempted from this.

That they are special, and entitled to special breaks from the rules they expect of others.

Mindsets like this are a product of a world replete with advertising and feel-good messages designed to make you feel like you deserve honor, respect, and everything your heart desires, merely for breathing. I rarely if ever encounter this mentality outside the West. However, it’s ubiquitous among the more radical elements of Western feminists, men’s rights advocates, and ‘men going their own way’.

In this post, I challenge you to break free from slavery to the mindset TV commercials, magazine ads, and now even much (most?) of the Western education system do their darnedest to instill in you, and to instead adopt the manliest, most liberating, most self-reliant mindset there is on Planet Earth:

Nobody owes you nothin’.

There’s a truly wonderful post (and equally wonderful comment section discussion) on LessWrong titled “Why startup founders have mood swings (and why they may have uses).” The authors describe the mood swings startup founders tend to go through, vacillating between euphoria and despair. I can certainly relate; in the course of running startups (such as Girls Chase), I’ve had plenty of opportunity to sit at both points on that spectrum. It’s kind of a taboo topic (nothing to make you sound unmanly like talking about mood swings), but hey, let’s tackle it.

The authors of the post above point to other examples when people are likely to experience similar mood swings:

• Early on in their first ever romantic relationship

• When deeply invested in furthering a devoted cause

• Whilst struggling to create a first great work of art or achieve something notable

And it stands out to me there’s another place endeavor I’ve experienced these same mood swings I’ve felt during my startup career, and that was during my first two or three years actively seeking improvement with girls.

I know a lot of other men go through this too, especially the men who have a burning desire to become ‘great’ with girls... or at least to improve their prospects markedly.

Yet many more men wash out of the seduction game early on, when the lows of the mood swing prove too much for them.

What I’d like to discuss in this article is why the mood swings get you, what you can expect when you apply yourself to improving with women, and how to stack the decks in your favor to prevent yourself from ‘washing out’.

A few weeks ago I read over a few of my posts from 2015. I noticed that most of them were about dealing with inferiority. Whether it was race, baldness, height, or build, the theme was “I feel inferior because ...”

Now my other posts were fine, they dealt with the symptoms of inferiority – but I didn’t write about how to get rid of the disease. Because of this, I wanted the first post I write for 2016 to be one that tackles this issue head on. Inferiority takes on many forms, it affects what decisions you make while talking to a girl, it affects how you plan your life, it affects how much success you will have and how you will feel about it.

“I’ve got a question for you.”

The cute older waitress smiles at me expectantly.

“Yes?”

“You see those three girls sitting at the table over there?”

She follows my eyes, sees the girl, and then nods at me.

“What do you think would happen if I went over there and said hi. Would that be weird?”

She smiles, giggles, and responds:

“No, I think that would be really awesome of you actually. Not a lot of men would do that.”

I smile. I don’t need her permission, but I’m curious. I continue,

“What do you think I should say?”

She thinks for a moment and laughs,

“I don’t know! I guess just introduce yourself or... yeah, I’m not sure!”

I smile again. I know exactly what I’m going to say.

Ever see the film Vicki Cristina Barcelona? If not, stop reading and go watch it. In my favorite scene, the sultry Spaniard Juan Antonio exchanges slews of sexy glances with the adventurous and flirty Cristina. All the while, Cristina’s uptight and reserved friend Vicki admonishes Cristina’s flirty behavior and flawlessly performs the role of a cautious and boring upper-middle class woman.

Recognizing Cristina’s overly obvious eye-fucking, Juan strolls over to their table. He looks lazily from one girl to the other, and then rests his eyes on Cristina and simply asks,

“American?”

His intonation barely registers as a question and is devoid of all fucks, drawing them both into his world. And despite some protest, he convinces them both to fly with him to Oviedo and spend the weekend with him. And, yes, he eventually smashes both of them.

I had to try it out myself. Not only did Juan’s bravado stir my Latin blood, but once I consider approaching a girl, very few reasons can stop me.

After paying my bill, I tell the waitress to wish me luck and walk over to the girls.

They all look up at me expectantly. I pause for an extra second, because why not, and then say simply, to no girl in particular,

”You from here?”