“The Game” by Neil Strauss aka Style outlines The Mystery Method

Trent recommended reading “The Game” by Neil Strauss. I picked up a copy and started to read it and quickly got hooked. I finished the “The Game” in a couple of days, voraciously tearing through it. Neil Strauss is a great writer with a good, balanced perspective of an outlandish topic: how to get laid.

“The Game” is an autobiographical account of how Neil Strauss joins a community of men known as Pickup Artists or PUA, and goes from being an inept nerd who can’t get laid to being a godlike player who can have any woman he wants in his bed.  Neil Strauss even works his game successfully on superstars like Britney Spears and Courtney Love (who becomes a friend and lives in his house).

So how does Neil Strauss aka Style go from being a hapless near-virgin to a socially acceptable sexual predator?  Strauss did it by diving deep into the wild world of Pick-Up Artists and by learning the Mystery Method from Mystery Himself.

Reading the book was quite an interesting experience and I picked up a few tips that I will probably incorporate into my game.  In the last two years, if I can get a woman to give me 15 minutes of her time, I almost never fail to gain her interest after that.  Getting those first fifteen minutes is where I run into problems, so I may try some of Neil Strauss and Mystery’s methods in that area.  I also have an entertaining story Trent told me about his attempt to incorporate the Mystery Method, but first watch the following funny Mystery Method pickup artist video:

Mystery Working Game

As you can see, Mystery’s methods work. A lot of it is just common sense stuff: girls like cocky/funny guys, silly lists and games, and a mix of pushing/pulling on their heart strings. The actual tactical science behind the Mystery Method as described by “Style” (Neil Strauss’s player name) is outlined and summarized by me below:

Mystery Method Basics

Smile first, last and always.  Smiling shows confidence and that you are a fun person.

Base attributes: confidence, humor, well-groomed, connecting with people, social center of room

Process: Find - Meet - Attract - Close

Group Theory- Women are rarely found alone.  Most girls are in groups and to win the girl, you must win the group.

Group win techniques
-win friends first while ignoring target (especially focus on men & other potential cockblocks)
-Use a “neg” to pretend to be unaffected by a girls charm and get friends to laugh.  Neg =  backhanded compliment with a barb hidden in it. Examples of negs are “Is that lipstick on your teeth?”, “You would look good with you hair down/up”, “Is she always this needy?”.  Nonverbal negs are disinterested looks, wandering off, checking cell phone, etc.

Peacock Theory- Wear something ostentatious to attract best females.  Look great, but also have something flashy/colorful.  Can be cheesy (weird hat, flashy jewelery, shiny shirt, etc.)

Interesting convo opener: “If I wasn’t gay, you’d so be mine”, “Did you see those two girls fighting outside?” , “Let me get your opinion on something…”

3 second rule: Approach a pretty girl within 3 seconds of spotting her.

Cocky/funny: Women love men with confidence and humor and they are easily won over by a cocky/funny atitude that doesn’t take things too seriously.  Trent is the first guy I have seen successfully use this and other guys I know also act this way, including myself.  I’m not sure if this can be learned though- it’s based upon how you truly feel about yourself and your actual sense of humor.

Provide Value: Show the girl that you are interesting and important.  You can do this through carefully concealed bragging in stories, creating and playing a game with a girl, gain interest of other women showing that you are important to others.  You can also try to quickly gain respect of the guys with her.

Create comfort: Be willing to emote and create a unique connection between you and the girl.

Close: Get her #, email, kiss her or even do the dirty.  Encourage her to make the first moves by using different techniques.  Create intimacy, then shut her out, then let her back in.  Or start with innocuous touching (sit on lap & look at computer, massage, close sitting).

The Mystery Method is not the only Pick-up Artist technique.  There are several other primary strategy sets used by men accomplished in the art of attracting women, but since Neil Strauss’s book “The Game” focuses primarily on Mystery and his strategies, I will do so as well.

More Funny & Educational Mystery Method Videos:

Mystery and Style (Neil Strauss) take ABC Primetime on an exploration of the pickup artists world. Mystery gives $2,250 a head workshops for guys who want to pick up girls. The video shows “Joel“, a guy who probably is actually gay, learning from Mystery how to pickup girls. ABC’s producers end up saying that the Neg is the ace in the hat of pick up artists: the subtle insult is the key to breaking down a woman’s heart. Watch the video breakdown of the Mystery Method by ABC below:

Actual videos of Mystery teaching the Mystery Method are below:

The Fear of the Approach Video- Mystery’s somewhat sketchy description of why men are afraid to approach women and the logic behind how to get over approaching women

Mystery Method Approach of Women Video: this guy overcomes initial rejection to get two women’s interest and end up winning them over. Highly educational pickup video. The guy in this video pretty much uses canned routines originally created by Style and Mystery. I don’t think he really has anything original, so it’s especially impressive how much success he has. Perhaps winning women is more mechanical and less organic than romantics would like to think. The girl even ends up asking for his phone number!

Finally, another great mystery method video on how to open up a couple of girls to conversation during the middle of the day, overcome rejection and still succeed.

Neill Strauss went on the View

The following video is of Neil Strauss going on the View and explaining to a group of semi-hostile women his perspective on picking up women and dating. Strauss brings the women of the View around in the video and very impressively explains his thoughts.

Neil Strauss’s girlfriend Lisa is super hot! It’s amazing that by using the Mystery Method and other dating techniques, this short bald guy was able to pickup a supermodel rockstar and make her his girlfriend. I think that Neil Strauss is an extremely sharp guy anyways; he has been a writer for the New York Times and just listening to him discuss “The Game” with the women on the View shows just how smooth and smart he is.

Is “The Game” and the Mystery Method ethical or is it sleazy?

Towards the end of “The Game”, Neil Strauss starts to come to the conclusion that a lot of the pickup artists that he and Mystery have helped train have become “social robts”.  Social robots are people with no depth who have just taken other people’s personalities as their own, much like serial killers may cut off someone’s face and attach it to their own.  Strauss doesn’t consider himself to be this way, even though he took many of Mystery’s approaches on as his own, because he only uses these techniques to open girls up to him so he can be himself.  I think that Neil Strauss is right on on this point- it is okay to try different ways of introducing yourself (much like changing your resume), but you need to be able to move on to the substance of your character and who you are in order to be successful and happy. If you use some of the Mystery & Style Methods to start an interesting conversation with a woman, great.  If you use it to just sleep with women and take advantage of them by being someone who isn’t the real you, you are a scumbag.

Should you try out any of Neil Strauss or Mystery Method’s ideas?

Absolutely.  People who are naturally a bit shy can benefit enormously from some of the Mystery Method opening strategies.  Just be careful to be yourself too and don’t just be a sleazy ripoff of a human being.  Even if it works for you, you won’t feel good about yourself in the morning.

Is the already masterful King of America (Joel) going to use the Mystery Method?

I’m not sure if I should… it could be sensory overload for any woman I subject to an amplified level of my game.  I don’t want to cause seizures; those are unpleasant.

I am going to try out some of Neil Strauss’s advice and see what works and what doesn’t.  I primarily like his encouragement to be confident and keep trying.  I sometimes let my baseless fear of rejection overpower my belief in myself and don’t approach beautiful women.  I think that I’m going to creatively think up a couple of opening questions before I go out so that I will have something to initially talk about besides the incredibly boring and standard “How are you?”, “Where are you from?” and “Where do you work?”.  The core of the Mystery Method is to get away from these instant bores and to engage people with a unique emotional connection.

What do you guys think?  Write me some comments!

Fox Reporter Woman Gets Dollar Bill in Bra

I think this is the infamous Black Rooster….

Bad Job At Faking Heart Attack

Guy tries to fake a heart attack in the court room and the judge calls him out on it.

Iphone picture

Does the picture posting work?

Home Depot Horror

Puyallup Home Depot Experiences

I visited the place of my first corporate job yesterday to buy some nails and it brought back some memories; when I turned 18 I was a night stalker at Home Depot (also known as night-shift stock guy). I was the youngest guy on the crew at the Puyallup Home Depot by at least ten years, but I think the HR manager at that Home Depot wanted to see if she could cut costs by using cheaper, younger labor. I made $10 an hour and typically worked from 9 pm to 7 am. I worked at the Puyallup Home Depot for about three and a half months in the summer between high school at Cascade Christian and college at the University of Washington. After my time at the Puyallup Home Depot, I transferred to the Home Depot in Seattle to work as a sales associate in the hardware department (where I knew next to nothing lol).

The Home Depot was not a bad company to work for- it had slightly higher pay than most other retailers though the work was a bit tougher. Just suffice it to say I am extremely grateful to my younger self for going to college and not forcing me to continue that life path.

Lenny: Legendary Loser

During my time at the Home Depot, most of the guys were pretty cool except for the night shift manager, Lenny. Lenny was a nerd who tried to be an alpha male and was a real dick to his employees. One month before I left the Puyallup Home Depot, Lenny had the three month employee review with me (about two weeks before the three month point). He told me that my performance was not very good and he gave me a grade of D… I was shocked- I have excel at most things I do. Lenny then told me that if I worked extra hard for the rest of my time at the Puyallup Home Depot, he would try to put in a good word for me. For the next few weeks I worked extra hard though I was pretty pissed that I had received a poor grade when I worked harder than most of the crew. A few weeks later, Lenny and I sat down again and this time I had what apparently was my “real” review. The first one was something he just did to try to give me “a little extra motivation”- I actually ended up receiving a B- or so something like that. Lenny was an idiot.

Stalking Nights

The Puyallup Home Depot night stalking (sorry cant resist) experience was a pretty unique one. I was unable to hang out with most of my friends because my day started at 6 pm when I had breakfast and farted around the house for a couple of hours before I left for work at 8:35. Work started at 8:35 pm and I worked through the night till 6:30 or 7 am, when I went home and crashed. The work was pretty physical; I was on my feet the whole time, walking around and carrying boxes of tools and nails to put on the shelves. My days off were Monday and Tuesday- all the old timers had the weekends to go drinking. All this resulted in me having no social life- until Trent got smashed by a log and had his lungs punctured.

After Trent’s recovery in the hospital, he and I hung out almost every day and he would stay up all night with me on my “weekends” (Monday and Tuesday at 4 am lol). The two of us had all sorts of adventures. One night we were bored and decided to try to catch a rabbit. The two of us were running through his neighbors yards in the dark chasing rabbits when a cop showed up. He waved us over and asked what we were doing. We told him we were “hunting rabbits” and he looked at us incredulously, shook his head and drove off. Later that summer I had my first beer with Trent and Rachelle… Trent took the lead because he had “previous drinking experience” and proceeded to give each of us a glass of Coors with ice in it. A week later, I decided that we should have a real drinking experience since my grandparents were gone on vacation.

Rough Night With Yellowtail

Little Joelio was a good-hearted kid, but sometimes he was irresponsible.  Trent came over on my Saturday morning (conventionally known as Monday night) and I went downstairs and took the biggest, cheapest bottle of wine from my grandparents wine cellar.  It was one of those oversized bottles of Yellowtail and probably held two and a half ordinary sized bottles of wine.  Trent and I put our favorite cds (Nirvana, Eminem, Radiohead, Rage against the Machine) in my grandparents sound system and turned it up a little and settled down to drink.  Unfortunately, neither of us had any clue what we were doing, so we poured ourselves pint glasses of red wine and tried to drink it- we had not acquired the taste and it was awful.  We both just plugged our noses and pounded.  We finished the huge bottle in a fairly short time.  I had never been even buzzed before and had no idea what to expect.  I felt good until my head started to spin, then I looked at the ground and asked Trent why he hadn’t cleaned up his puke… to which he replied that’s yours, look at your shirt.  So I went and collected my poor grandparents white towels and mopped up the wine & chunks off the floor and tossed the towels in the laundry room.  I spent the next couple of hours praising the porcelain god on my knees.  I remember one thought from that time, “Ugh, I shouldn’t do this again… but I can’t promise myself that because I probably will”.  What foresight.

The next night Trent and I’s other friend came over and though I didn’t drink, they did.  The two of them ended up starting a three year relationship on the bed of my grandparents guest room.  Apparently they didn’t know what they were doing in bed  any more than I knew how to drink because the sheets had blood on them the next day (c’mon guys, lay down a towel if its that time of month!)

My grandparents arrived home a few days later and my grandma has the mind of a steel trap.  She came to me and said, “Joel, what did you do while I was gone?”  I never lied to my grandparents, but I did my best to avoid her questions…. “I worked and hung out with my friends.”

“What else did you do, Joel?”  “Um….. I worked out… ate food…. talked to people on the phone…”

“What else?”  Ack!  What does she know?!?!?!  “What are you referring to?”

“Why don’t you tell me about the wine you drank?”  I told her everything then and she and my grandpa were not that angry, but they didn’t let me use their house again alone for three years.

I have a bunch of other stories from that time period and the ridiculous first three months at the Seattle Home Depot if anyone is interested.  Write u want to hear more in the comments and I’ll add to this post, otherwise I’ll just keep it in my head.

The Power Of Rumor

Hateful rumors have been spread about both candidates, John McCain and Barack Obama. But which rumors are true and which are false? The video below is pretty good at dispersing false rumors that have been spread online against both candidates. I recommend forwarding this link to your family members and friends who spam your email inbox with forwarded garbage that is untrue.

Wrong Pizza Joint To Rob

Robber gets his butt handed to him when he tries to rob this pizza joint. Apparently, wearing pink shirts is a sign of manhood lol.

Suncadia Pictures

Nick just forwarded me some pictures from our Suncadia trip about a month ago. See below:

Tasty dinner of scallops, asparagas, salad and steak. From left- Nick, me Nicole, Stephanie, Kenny

More good eats… Bryan is the second one from the left.

Not really sure what’s going on here.

I love food

The Brick.

Me looking creepy

Bad Day At The Office: Crazy Office Worker

Sometimes you just can’t take it anymore…

The crazy office worker in this video is pretty nuts, eh?

Iraq War Cartoon