Square Pegs and Round Holes

"Well make sure to build your home brick by boring brick, or the wolf's gonna blow it down..." --Paramore.

Alright, kiddos, it's back to basics tonight.  Sometimes I think the basic principles of seduction are so obvious by this point that I can skip over them and concentrate on the finer nuances, but every once in a while I think it's a good idea to go back and make sure we're all on the same page.  So tonight I'm going to talk about a very basic concept.

Seduction is, at its most basic level, the act of figuring out what another person needs from you in order to accept you into their lives and assign you importance.  Let me say that again.  It is the act of figuring out what another person needs from you in order to accept you into their lives and assign you importance.  Unfortunately, at the beginning, it is not about your needs.  It is about theirs.

I see a lot of women who talk about what they want out of a romantic interaction far too soon -- whether it's that they want a committed relationship, or a guy to support them financially, or a picket fence and ten babies, or whatever -- without giving a thought to whether the guy across from them might want the same sort of arrangement as well.  And sure, ladies, your needs are important, but when you foist them upon your targets too early in the game, what you are essentially communicating to them is this: "I don't really care what it is that you want, nor do I really care who you are as a person -- what I care about is whether I can make you fit into this role that I have predefined for the person who is going to play a romantic role in my life, and whether I can project all my hopes and dreams and fantasies onto you so that I can get what I want and feel good about everything."  This is not really an appealing proposition to the person sitting across from you.

What really turns me off is when I see someone who assumes immediate compatibility merely because of their own initial desire for their target.  This happened to me all the time during the brief interlude I had with internet dating (don't get me started on that).  I would receive messages in my okcupid inbox that literally read, "FINALLY!" or, I kid you not, "I think we'd be really compatible because I find you mind-numbingly attractive." For real -- that's the causation right there?  We're compatible because YOU find ME mind-numbingly attractive?  What about me and what I want?  Is our compatibility affected by whether I find you attractive, or do I just not get a say in the matter?

When we foist our desires upon our target too soon, we are essentially telling them that they don't get a say in the matter.  We want a relationship, or a house and kids, or whatever it is that we want, and because we are ready for this at this point in our lives, they ought to deliver, and their own needs don't really count.  This goes back to Helena von Salome's guest blog for the site from a few months back: it's the same flaw as the guy who said he just called her when he wanted to call her; the only person's desires or feelings being considered were his.  

The other reason that it is creepy to project your desires on a target too soon is that he hasn't really earned them.  Occasionally someone will walk into our lives at the right moment and appear on the surface to be everything we are looking for, and we say to ourselves, "FINALLY!"  But it's foolish to confuse this desire with actual compatibility.  We don't really even know this person yet.  We don't know if he's really the right person to fulfill all our needs and desires and fantasies, even if he looks like he might be at first glance. 

This happened to me several months back: I met someone who, after our first date, appeared to be everything I was looking for in a partner at that time, and it scared the living daylights out of me.  It scared the living daylights out of me because I knew, logically speaking, that I really didn't know this person very well yet, but the story he had woven around himself through the actions that he took toward me was so compelling that I couldn't help but hold a sickened, petrified hope in my guts that it would all turn out the way it looked.  I didn't tell him about my hopes for us; I just cleared space in my life for him to enter it should he have wished.  I'm sure on some level he sensed what I was feeling, I mean, these things broadcast out of us like radio signals even when we try our hardest to suppress them.  But at the very least, I tried to take it day by day and at least acknowledge superficially that everything was still very early, that anything could happen, that it could crash and burn, that either of us could get hit by a bus the next day, that it could very well all be too good to be true.  That didn't kill the irrepressible hope within me, however, which I can't even say was under my control.  On the inside I wanted my story to be true; I wanted him to be every fantasy of mine which he so seemed at first to be.

And then less than two months later it all exploded in my face, and he did something to me that proved that he was not even remotely what he appeared to be during our early interactions.  To this day I really can't reconcile the person I dated in December with the person I dated in January.  I've given up trying to explain it and simply learned my lesson: Do not try to fit the square peg of the person sitting across from you into the round hole of your romantic aspirations.  Wait until that person proves to you that he really is a round peg, that he really is the right person to fulfill you.  And don't expect that proof to come too soon -- anyone can play the good guy for a month or two. 

It sucks so hard but what I am learning to my great dismay these days is that the people who can play the consummate charmer in the beginning are often doing this as a coping mechanism to compensate for some far deeper character flaws.  And one day they'll suddenly reveal to you their inner douchebag, and you'll get hurt by it, hurt so much more deeply because you know that they have the capability within them to make you feel awesome and they are choosing not to utilize it.

Don't give anyone the privilege of being your everything until he's earned it.  If you let someone embody that role too easily, you devalue it.  Being the person to fulfill you romantically ought to be a privilege, not an obligation or an assumption.  Don't give that away to just anyone to sit down next to you at the bar.  Make them earn it.  Make them prove they're as advertised.

So the lesson here is twofold: One, don't project your needs onto your targets because it's inconsiderate of their own needs, and seduction is about catering to another person's needs long before you set demands regarding your own.  And two, don't project your needs onto your targets because the role of the person who is going to fulfill you is far too valuable to give away to just anyone you meet who may seem compelling on the surface.

Instead, maintain your interest in your target and occupy your time getting to know what makes him tick, what sort of relationship he might want in his life, and start doing the little things that will add value, make him happy, bring the two of you closer.  If he responds well and starts reciprocating, then you'll know it was worth your time and effort.  If, however, he starts to show a few true colors that didn't seem to be there in the beginning, you'll be glad you took your time and didn't allow him to take on such an important mantle in your life from the outset. 

Comments

[Hammer]

Maybe it's because this is advice for rookies, but it feels pretty backwards based on my experience. You're putting the needs of the other person, and thus the needs of the seduction, before your needs. What this will amount to, without fail, is a situation in which you have a ton of low quality people in your life due to a lack of qualifying early on in the seduction. As a seducer in training it is extremely important to get to this point before you can really decide what you want in a partner. Once you're there, however, it will become a massive time suck to seduce without your needs in mind.

I have spent years fine tuning my game. At first the goal was to be able to get essentially any woman that I was attracted to. Once I got there, however, it became less about quantity and more about quality. I have since made tweaks to my game so that I would get blown out by women who I wouldn't like anyway but would drastically expedite my results with women who I were my type. A very large part of this is involved qualifying based on what I was looking for in her as early as possible, intellectually, emotionally, and of course sexually.

[Arden Leigh]

On the contrary, I think one of the two main points in this blog is distinctly ABOUT qualifying. In fact I was going to bring that up, but qualifying in the PUA sense of the word is far more useful in guy game than in girl game, so I chose to put it in my own words.

My point is that you allow yourself to qualify over time, that you do not confuse your initial desire for compatibility. Which is a longterm version of the whole "Sure you're really pretty, but there are a lot of attractive women in this bar, what else about you sets you apart and would make me want to spend time with you" line thing that all the PUAs do (that I've had said to me more times than I can count).

It'd be great if it were possible to qualify in the first encounter, and maybe on some level it is, but as I stated in the blog, I'm finding that a lot of guys who can seem perfect and amazing in the beginning have calculated themselves (perhaps consciously, perhaps not) to appear that way precisely because they are different under the surface, and were they to unable to mask their flaws early on, they'd never get laid at all.

And more importantly, girl game is much different from guy game because of how different the end goals are. If you qualify on the night you meet a girl and two months later she turns out to be someone totally different, hey, at least you've had two months of good sex, and you probably still have all the other girls' phone numbers you met that night too. For us, if we qualify on the first night and two months later the guy turns out to be not as advertised, we've had two months' worth of dopamine forming attachment bonds and now we're left sans the provider/protector we thought we had.

And okay, that's probably an unfair distillation, or at least an exaggerated one, but anyone who's studied even a lick of evo-psych knows that men are programmed to pair widely and women to pair wisely. On some level, the consequences of thorough qualifying are going to be different.

So, I stand by what I said.

[Hammer]

I totally agree with you about the difference between the male and female brain, and how the two months worth of forming attachment bonds (I think you meant oxytocin though) is going to cause the woman more problems than the man. It's pretty refreshing to hear that from a woman, particularly in the post-feminist world that we live in these days. I guess the connection that seemed obvious in my mind that didn't get expressed, however, is that I qualify myself as a means of qualifying her. Her qualifying herself is mostly in the form of implicit acceptance of the frames that I set rather than overt compliance. I don't really understand how you can qualify someone effectively without going first. Maybe that's why you're having trouble distinguishing the Charlatans from the desirable men? Take it with a grain of salt, as I have no experience dating men, but it's food for thought.

I also wonder if the act of seducing him in and of itself, as in, the fact that you are calculating your moves in order to garnish a desired response, is what is causing you to overlook their flaws from the get-go. As someone who seems pretty extensively read in male-female social dynamics and NLP, I would imagine that you understand how powerful investment is. Investing that much mental energy in seducing someone who you don't like creates a cognitive dissonance that your brain cannot handle, so your mind will backwards rationalize liking him. Cut to two months later, you realize that he's a dick and have no idea how you didn't see it before.

[Arden Leigh]

Oxytocin plays a factor as well, but I did mean dopamine, as it's linked to incentive salience, the thing that causes craving for the desired stimulus. Dopamine is released in the brain at orgasm, so when we have sex with someone, it makes us want them more. (I've always been curious as to whether this is also the case in males, since obviously orgasm can cause the opposite effect in them, but until Dr. Helen Fisher has lunch with me, I'll have to rely on what I know about women instead.) Oxytocin certainly doesn't help either though. :)

You're right about the act of seducing creating investment in and of itself, but there's another level to it, even beyond the notion of cognitive dissonance created by seducing someone you don't like (it's like that always accept the cup of coffee offered to you at a job interview thing): like it is impossible for a hypnotist to put someone under without going into trance himself, it is impossible to seduce without being seduced yourself. You are creating compatibility frames for the sake of the target, but they're having the same effect on you at the same time. You are creating peak experiences for the sake of your target, to activate the pleasure centers of his brain, but your own pleasure centers are being activated at the same time because you are sharing the same peak experience. This is why people who attack seduction as a concept with arguments of "But you can use seduction for evil manipulative purposes to get what you want blah blah blah" really don't get it. You can't seduce without being seduced yourself. Ever try to run OMS on someone and find that you feel the exact same state you elicited in them? It happens. That's why you have to use it so responsibly.

So you're right about that. But even before I chose to name a few people as targets, the very reason I chose to name them as targets was that they showed that they were capable of making me feel excited and inspired. Which points to an ability to be charming that masks other overt character flaws. Think about it, if you're someone who has trouble being naturally considerate of other people, or generous toward other people, or genuine toward other people, you're going to develop a skill set to cover that up by being charming, exciting, and capable of showing people what they want to see.

I'm not saying it's always true across the board, but the few guys I've met recently who have known at the start exactly which buttons in me to push in order to make me feel devastatingly attracted to them have disappointed me a predictable amount of time later. Some of it remains to be seen as to whether I can sway them back by adding enough value/creating enough leverage to get my own needs met (and it's at this time, when you've added enough value that they want to keep you in their lives, that you can begin putting your needs out on the table), but at that point, you have to wonder whether it's even worth the effort if it's going to take so much teeth-pulling to even be treated with basic amounts of consideration.

My business partner consoled me recently on a situation where a target had disappointed me with his behavior: he said to me, "The problem with longterm seductions is that your targets often reveal their flaws to you before you get to enjoy them."

But then again, he's a guy, and he can be fine with two months of good sex ending in disappointment... or at least more fine than I'll be able to be about it.

Oh yeah, and feminism? Don't get me started on the bulk of it. I'd pole-dance to "Smack My Bitch Up" before I signed on to 90% of the feminist (read: anti-masculinist) stuff I read out there today.

(People are gonna get mad at me for saying that... ugh...)

[Hammer]

Shit, I think I'm in love. Let's get married, and quick before your book comes out. That way when you see through my shell for the douchbag that I am and choose to divorce me, I can get half of your money. I'm pretty easy to please, and I promise to only hook up with other girls when you're involved. :)

That said, feminism had its place, Patriarchy is not masculinity. It is really the empowerment of the beta male, preventing their women from straying through social stigma. I think we're moving back in the right direction though, at least fringe elements of society are. It's fine though, I'm happy to be a part of that fringe and reap all of the benefits, both in this community and in areas like nutrition.

Sorry to play stat boy like Tony Reali. I know that dopamine is the pleasure chemical, but I believe it is oxytocin that creates the bonds. It is also released at orgasm, much more so in women than in men. If dopamine releases created bonding, coke addicts would have an unusual attachment to bathroom sinks and one dollar bills.

[Arden Leigh]

Only hook up with other girls when I'm involved? At this point that sounds like a great deal! Haha truth be told I'm not that much of a monogamist, at least not at this point in my life. I'm sure I'll change my mind again when I meet someone I actually want to be monogamous with. I'm like the cat that wants to be indoors when it's outdoors and then once indoors immediately wants to be outdoors again.

Even though I realize it's much more complex than this, I love reducing feminism to "We lost the womanizers and got jobs. Now men have 'feelings' and we have to work. Dammit all."

Disclaimer, yes, feminism did a lot of good things too, and it's almost come full circle to the point where neofeminism would defend a woman's right to dance on a pole to "Smack My Bitch Up" and not be called anti-feminist for it.

You might be right on the oxytocin, but I do think incentive salience caused by dopamine release plays a big part as well. Dopamine as studied by Kent Berridge actually doesn't so much cause enjoyment of pleasure as it does seeking of pleasure. This is why we sometimes develop a "tolerance" to the presence of the people we love -- the longer we go, the more of them we need. At least I've often found that to be the case. I was supposed to have coffee with a neuroscientist recently to discuss all this, but I've been too busy with deadlines.

But yeah, oxytocin. Tell me where norepinephine comes in and I'll be really impressed. :)

[Ankush]

Arden - your advice is sound. But in all fairness, hindsight is usually 20/20. I've known about projection, cognitive dissonance, idealization and magical thinking for a long time but that doesn't stop it from happening to me. I think we all do this in order to achieve cognitive and emotional parity with family, friends and colleagues. But maybe the fantasy of a romantic ideal is so strong for some of us, that our psyches are willing to take greater "leaps of faith" without our permission. Personally, I don't think we usually have a conscious say in the matter. Why? That's a longer discussion.

[Arden Leigh]

@ankush - Yep, that is very true as well. As they say in the pua world, attraction is not a choice. Le sigh.

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[Hammer]

No idea how norepinephrine comes into play in regards to the chemistry of love, my first instinct is that it probably related to that feeling of butterflies that lets us know we are attracted. Dopamine is very interesting though. It definitely has conditioning elements to it. Eating disorders, specifically anorexia and bulemia are great examples of this. Not to get into the details of how now, but suffice it to say that low dietary triptophan causes a lack of dopamine in the brain and so when the body finds ways to get dopamine spikes (see starving oneself, throwing up, doing cocaine), it will be very likely to repeat that behavior. People with normal base levels of dopamine generally do not engage in this behavior on a regular basis.

[Arden Leigh]

Very interesting. Theres so much baggage that goes into an eating disorder that it seems nearly impossible to unpack just chemically, but itd be interesting to look into it more.

I would hypothesize re: butterflies (or for me, electrodes to the chest, which is how it always feels) that thats phenylethylamine at play. I think norepinephrine usually comes up later in courtship, but I cant remember its role. Time to put aside my Robert Greene and go back to my Helen Fisher for a little bit.

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[Colleen]

This sounds like great advice for approaching a relationship. I'm not sure if you need to completely ignore your own needs. I think that striking more of a balance between your needs and finding out your target's needs would be beneficial to a developing relationship in the long-run.

It also seems to me that this all doesn't work very well unless it runs both ways - if your target isn't considering your wants/needs as well, it has the potential to turn into something very one-sided on your part.

What's really interesting is, this blog entry came at a poignant time. I'm considering getting back together with J, with whom I had a very strong relationship with before it stopped working. We parted on good terms, took a break, and are now friends. But this advice struck a chord with me and made think twice about the way I was approaching it - I was spending so much time thinking about what I want/need, and never stopped to consider his motivations for pursuing me again or what he wants/needs out of a renewed relationship.

[Arden Leigh]

@Colleen - Totally, your needs are just as important! Trouble is, until youve added a lot of value into a relationship (ie considered your targets needs), what incentive does your partner have for fulfilling them? Its when youve added a lot of worth to the relationship that hell decide he wants to keep you around enough to go out of his way to make you happy. In sales theres a saying: Never quote price before establishing value. Same thing here. :)
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[Hammer]

I think that all of that psychological baggage, for the most part, is backwards engineered from the physiological brain chemistry issues. The thought doesn't really acknowledge this, but at the same time, if this weren't the case, it wouldn't make sense to treat with drugs if the brain chemistry wasn't the source.

Norepinephrine is an adrenaline hormone. It is what is used in those "epi-pen" things, which people who are at risk from anaphalactic shock from food or bee allergies will carry around. It is one of the factors in the fight or flight response in the body. Interestingly though, fight/flight and attraction are highly related. There have been studies done where people meet on high bridges and are more attracted to each other, among others, that illustrate this.

Helen Fischer has a TED talk from '06 up there somewhere. I'm not a huge fan of her stuff, but she talks about oxytocin and vasopressin as the bonding/love chemicals. I find that researchers who do research like that become to immersed in the science and tend to lose out on what the meaning of what they're researching, i.e. how it can be applied to impact people's lives. In the case of love for example, I believe she talks about it as a chemical addiction, but if this is the case, why wouldn't you treat a break-up like withdrawl? I think you should. Remove the drug from your environment (i.e. cut off communication with your ex), focus on doing things that make you feel better and produce happiness chemicals, etc.

[anonyme]

Sorry this comment is coming in so late but...

"For us, if we qualify on the first night and two months later the guy turns out to be not as advertised, we've had two months' worth of dopamine forming attachment bonds and now we're left sans the provider/protector we thought we had."

"[...] but anyone who's studied even a lick of evo-psych knows that men are programmed to pair widely and women to pair wisely."

I'm sorry but that's just not true (and a lot - but not all - of evopsych doesn't meet the basic requirements to be considered a vigorous science... i.e. it is ridiculed by evolutionary scientists)

If human females didn't have a hidden estrus cycle it would make sense, but women have hidden ovulations which from an evolutionary perspective, means that they are biologically as promiscuous as human males. The only difference is a greater time and calorie/energy investment during pregnancy which would make women pickier about their mates' health, genetics and providing ability (which in turn would make the males have to work harder and thus spend more energy and time to prove themselves to become providers), but once they are pair-bonded (assuming they live in a culture where at least temporary monogamous pair bonds are the norms, unlike say a matrilineal non-monogamous culture like the Chinese Mosuo tribes where everyone boinks everyone and everyone supports everyone's kids, assuring that their own will get supported) they, just like males, can go around and share some genetic code with other people without their mates noticing.

Example: Female mates and makes a pair bond with Mr.Strong... they have a baby. Female then meets Mr.Brains and because having her genetic code in a strong offspring AND a smart offspring will be quite beneficial to her, she has sex with mr.Smart and gets pregnant.
Unfortunately for mr.strong, he doesn't know when she ovulates and thus can't tell whether or not the newborn has his genetic code or not- he just assumes it does. (and hey, if it doesn't, well, it's a good thing he also impregnated Ms.Never-Gets-Sick behind the female's back so either way he also has an even better chance of passing along his genes successfully - because the female he mated with also has a hidden ovulation cycle and the male she is supposed to mate with exclusively will raise the child thinking it is his own).

So it doesn't make sense for women to be emotionally invested than males - or at least not significantly so, since outside of those few months of pregnancy, both are looking out for good genetic material just as intently