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The Fastest Way to Improve Your Dating
by Dr. Alex Benzer
of Tao of Dating
March 4th, 2007
Hello, hola, buongiorno, hej, hei, dag, hallo, salut and g’day to you. I’m elighted to report that you guys, my valued clients and audience, come from all corners of the globe -- Norway, Australia, Italy, New Zealand, Germany, and the USA—to make the Tao of Dating a truly international community. Great to have you!
Welcome to another enlightening and uplifting edition of The Tao of Dating newsletter. Today we’re going to talk about context—the idea that how and where you meet a woman is VERY important in determining how your relationship with her will progress. And in the context of context, we’ll discuss one of the fastest and most effective personal-improvement techniques I have ever encountered—and how you can apply it to your dating life.
Alright then, here’s a scenario: Let’s say you’re in the market to buy a car (if you guessed that I’m fond of car analogies, bulls eye). You’re not sure if you’re going to buy this week or next month, but it’s on your mind…and you want a Nissan 300Z, 1999 model year or newer. Over the weekend, you’ve rounded up your friends and gone to the carnival to have some fun. Let’s say at the carnival you’re at one of the booths, and you start chatting with the guy manning the booths. The conversation comes to cars, and somehow it comes up that you’re looking to buy a used 300Z. And the guy behind the booth says, “Well, funny you should mention that, because I’m trying to sell mine.”
Now, stop right here. Before you go any further, I want you to answer this question with the very first thing that pops in your head: On a scale of 1 to 10, how likely are you to buy a used car from this carnival guy? Got your answer? My answer’s about a 3. I mean, this car could be perfect, and the price could be just right. But it’s a carnival, for goodness sakes. And he’s a carnival worker. (Note for our international crew: in the U.S., carnies, like politicians and used-car dealers, have a reputation for shadiness that may or may not be well-deserved. I apologize in advance, if I have inadvertently offended the carnies in our audience).
Now—is it possible that he could be the most forthright, stand-up, honest guy in the world? Is it possible that he could be the one to offer me the deal of a lifetime? That
his 300Z is in tip-top shape and exactly what I’m looking for?
Of course it’s possible. But is it probable? The fact is, it’s going to take some effort for me to overcome the fact that I met him at a carnival (and that he’s in the carnival) before I’m willing to make any serious business dealings with him.
Now if I had found this guy in an online ad while I was looking for the 300Z, it would be a different story. If I had found his car at a used-car dealership when he wasn’t around, that would also be a different story. Or if a friend had introduced him, another story yet again. It’s almost as if meeting him at the carnival hurt him more than it helped him. Catching my drift here? Good. Now, let’s make it relevant to your dating life. In this story, you are the girl (and you look kinda hot in that dress, by the way). The carnie is the guy. And the carnival is a bar or a club. The point is, you could be the greatest guy on the whole planet. But if she meets you at the bar or club, YOU’RE STILL THAT BAR/CLUB GUY. And it’s going to take a LOT for her to overcome that. Most of the time, she never does. See, dating is a big deal for women. This stems partially from the fact that there is an intrinsic asymmetry in the reward-loss game for a woman vs. a guy when it comes to dating. Courtship (a.k.a., dating) is the prelude to sex. So it’s a “big-ticket” item…just like that 300Z you wanted. So, consciously or not, she is evaluating the whole process in terms of that “big-ticket” item. If you don’t think that makes sense, consider this. In the same way that you’re not going to take the conversation with the carnie about his 300Z any further because your probability of purchase from him is low, she is reluctant to continue the interaction with you—whether it be giving the phone number, first date or second date—if she’s already decided that she’s not likely to ever sleep with you.
Here’s the asymmetry I was talking about: when a woman decides to have sex with a man, she is risking pregnancy, childbirth which could kill her, and being saddled with a kid for the rest of her life. This risk is built into her mind and behavior through three million years of evolution, so the fact that effective contraception has existed for a whole fifty years is not going to change that. Sex is a big freakin’ deal for her.
A guy, on the other hand, stands to lose about 10cc of semen. Which he can regenerate in a few days’ time. Also, remember that poll Margaret Atwood did? Worst-case scenario for a guy on a date is that you get laughed at. Worst-case scenario for her is that she gets killed. And that, my friend, is more asymmetrical than a Picasso portrait. So how can we use this insight to your advantage? In The Tao of Dating e-book, I talk a lot about venue selection—where the best places are to meet women such that it gives you a natural advantage. Hypnotists always like to arrange the environment such that it favors their outcome, and I recommend that you do the same.
To make the process of venue-selection easy, I developed the “Three C’s” concept. Ask yourself, “How does a given venue score on the Conversation, Community and Continuity scale?”
Conversation-friendliness: how easily you can communicate there with your voice. Community: how much you have in common with the other people there just by virtue of being there. Continuity: how stationary people are, so you can actually have meaningful interaction with them.
The higher a venue scores on these three criteria, the better a place it is to make a new, meaningful, and potentially lasting connection. Bars and clubs generally score poorly on the 3 C’s scale. Moreover, just like the carnie in the story, they can actually hurt your chances with a decent woman (if you happen to meet her there first).
So, am I saying that you should stop going to bars and clubs altogether? Of course not. Still have your fun—but know what the dynamic is. And if you’re interested in actually
bringing women into your life, know where to invest your time. Sure, some decent relationships (even marriages) have started in bars and clubs. But that’s also true of fish-cleaning plants and military bases, and those aren’t the best places for having quality interactions with quality women either.
OK, so where are the good places then? In The Tao of Dating, I talk about the Nine Top-Secret Goldmines. Some of them are gallery openings, book readings, yoga classes and community events. But here, I want to talk about my own personal favorite place, that has given me the best results. And it’s NOT one of the Nine Goldmines.
A few years ago, I sat down with myself, and thought about the relationships I had experienced. And I wondered, “Hmm, where did I first meet these women? Is there a pattern to where those first encounters occurred, and how the relationships progressed?” Well, you bet there was. I made my own list, and I found out that for me—the place that gave me the best results was private parties.
This isn’t exactly a world-class epiphany—private parties score sky-high on the 3 C’s: people know each other, safety and comfort are built-in, etc. etc. What’s significant here is the process by which I arrived at this conclusion. It’s called “modeling your own excellence,” and it’s hands-down the fastest way to improve in any area of your life.
See, you’re already doing many things right in this life (and your dating) life right now. And you’ve had some significant successes—you wouldn’t be reading this if you didn’t.
(In my experience, people who subscribe to these newsletters and get these products are ‘pilgrims of perfection’—they want to get better at something they’re already doing
well.)
What you have to do now is to figure out the stuff you’re doing that’s already giving you results. Then go out, and do more of those things. Simple.
So sit down with yourself, and look back on all the relationships you’ve had. Now classify them by where they started. Where did you meet her? Make a couple of columns: party, bar/club, event, on the street, however you want to slice it.
Now tally up the numbers for each type of venue. You now have a sense of what your power zone—your venue of excellence—is, but you have to take the analysis one step further. Keep in mind how frequently you go to a given venue and make sure you weigh your results accordingly. If you met half of your girlfriends at bars and only a third at private parties, but you go to bars every night and private parties once a month, that means that private parties are probably giving you 5-10 times better yield than bars, so
THAT’s your powerzone.
Over time, as you track your “where did I meet her” info, you will develop a sense of where your zone of excellence is, and you will put more and more time and energy into that. As the great management guru Peter Drucker once said, “You can only improve what you can measure.”
To summarize, here are the ACTION STEPS that this article boils down to:
1) Recognize the female point of view. Don’t be the carnie.
2) Spend your time in places that score high on the “Three C’s.”
3) Find your Power Zone by tallying up the venues where your dating successes have started.
4) Model your own excellence.
5) Track your progress.
Thanks for your attention! I’m interested in your comments and questions. Just put “Question” in the subject field, and I’ll see what I can do to answer your question in a future article. You can reach me by clicking the link below.
The power is within you,
Dr Alex
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