Feedback Series Part 1 The #1 Mindset That’s Keeping You From Meeting Girls (While thinking it’s actually a GOOD mindset) One of the biggest community myths has lead the vast majority of guys down a very and confusing path. This one thing is the reason why so many of you are stuck at the same level for month after month after month. During my years learning game in Sydney I was always so surprised when I hadn’t seen someone out in a couple of months. They always seemed to be at the same exact level. Nothing changed, except for maybe once or twice a YEAR most guys would have a small breakthrough and maybe learn how to hook consistently. (While they should already be pulling and closing consistently.) But guys like me, Pierre and the notorious prodigy, Alexander Lindberg, would always level up month after month after month. Especially me and Alex, Pierre had a slower start but once he let go of esoteric concepts and got a mentor who taught him tangible steps he quickly started making quantum leaps on a weekly basis. Now, what’s the difference between guys who improve every damn week, and big improvements too, to guys that don’t? The issue is a lot of us think that being ‘Alpha’ means that you have to be right. LMAO Couldn’t be further from the truth. Also, for the record, being “alpha” is a cringey way of thinking about it. Some people are more alpha than others, but actively thinking about it makes you less alpha almost by definition. I like to think about it as just being a fucking man. You have to stand by all your views, you have to be strong minded and assertive. But in any case, so people think about this alpha shit and become paranoid about owning the frame etc. This leads to a huge problem. We have taught ourselves to be stubborn and stagnant. We have to learn to be vulnerable, we have to learn to be wrong, and be wrong A LOT. In every skill we learn or in every job we do, we always receive feedback. At my old work, we had yearly performance reviews, our team lead/manager would see what targets/KPIs we hit, what we didn’t hit, how to start reaching the ones we didn’t, and so on and so forth. This was CRUCIAL in order to improve. I took these reviews very seriously, and during the year I’d come back to these reviews and ask my manager how I was doing, and how I could improve. I knew I wasn’t perfect, and I knew that with intelligent effort and guidance I’d improve - fast. Others weren’t as dedicated. They saw the reviews as personal attacks and got butthurt. Let me tell you a quick story about my first 3 years as a specialized nurse... However, when we game we get zero systematic feedback. The only other group I can think of like this are teachers. This has recently been labelled a crisis and efforts to improve feedback to teaching methods has shown almost unbelievable changes in students grades and teacher performance. This is just more proof of the feedback power principle. It is the ultimate catalyst for growth. Imagine if my martial arts instructor just showed me how to punch or kick or do an arm bar but never actually corrected my technique, I would spend the rest of the time practising and continue doing it wrong until it was fully ingrained in my mind and muscle memory. You would never get better and you wouldn't know what to do differently. So in other words; Feedback is the crucial step to empowering your life and your dating life. Step 1: Open yourself up to feedback Before we start discussing the 4 Streams of Feedback, and how to optimize each one, we need to make sure you’re open to receiving it. Imagine you have a radio with 4 stations, one with sports, one with politics, one with business and one with entertainment. Great stuff, you got all the information you need. But, if you don’t adjust the frequency so that your radio can RECEIVE the stations, then they’re of no use. So let’s get your mind dialled in to receive the feedback, then let’s set up your “stations”. Fear & Ego If there’s one thing to remember from this massive guide, then it would be this. Apparently, we respond positively to constructive feedback (i.e., “Here’s what you did wrong”) only one out of 13 times. According to NeuroLeadership Institute (highly recommended resource for more on performance and neuroscience). Reason being, our brain has five times as much activity that’s dealing with threats (negative feedback being one such threat) as it does to deal with rewards. So, ANYTHING, that means we are to blame (again, for anything), triggers our brain’s threat response, creating a mental defence mechanism. It’s involuntary, we cannot help it (at least until we’ve become conscious of this and can set intentions ahead of time to respond differently, more about that later). And, of course, this leads us to be more concerned about defending ourselves than thinking about how to become better. If you want to get really, crazy, fucking good at pickup REAL FAST, then you have to understand this. Lots of guys complain that they feel confused. And that they feel stuck on a “plateau”. And that they’re just not ‘getting it’. I saw someone in a forum the other day ask why he’s taking so long to learn, despite having seen all the big products, hundreds of YouTube videos and hundreds of articles. I think he might even have taken one of the conventional non-residential programs (which are fucking useless compared to living with your coaches thanks to the mere OSMOSIS EFFECT, but that’s a story for another day, got some very interesting psychological studies and neuroscience backing this up). The thing that’s blocking your brain from receiving feedback is, believe it or not, fear. Yes, fear. I’m sorry to tell you, but you’re afraid to receive it, without fear you’d welcome feedback (but then also be able to critically assess what’s right or wrong is something we’ll get to later on). I’m not gonna go too hippie, woo-woo here, but essentially it’s ego protection. Being wrong is scary, and with today’s insane obsession with being Alpha in the community, people are more afraid of losing the frame than they are afraid of not becoming a better man. Funny stuff. If you don’t get rid of the fear you can’t receive the feedback. So let’s get into how you sabotage your own success by not letting go of your ego and opening up to receive new input: One of our first responses is ‘wrong spotting’. We will find a flaw with feedback. Whether it's the wrong time, too sensitive, one part of it is false or we don’t like the person giving it. We find what is wrong with it then throw it out, disregarding everything. The issue is, it may be 90% wrong, but that 10% might be the thing you need to grow. The most common responses that are fed by a static mindset are as follows. DENIAL - “She didn’t like me because she’s a lesbian” “She just wasn't my type” “No you just don’t get it” DEFLECTION - “Okay, hey look, let's go talk to that group over there” SELF RIGHTEOUSNESS - “You have no idea what you’re talking about until you have slept with more women than me your opinion doesn't matter.” “I’ve done this longer than you I know better.” “I can learn on my own, thanks.” IRRITATION - “Dude just fuck off, no one asked your opinion” Not only are some of these reactions incredibly disrespectful, but it just echoes your own insecurity to accept and reflect on feedback. We have a core need to feel accepted and respected the way we are now. This is a part of the reason so many people are resistant to technical game. It suggests there is something about them they must improve. It’s very difficult to admit we might not be good enough the way we are right now. It’s tough to come to the realisation we have a lot of improving to do. For this reason, we see people in the community take the second option. They deflect and they push the idea that they are good enough the way they are now. They shouldn't have to change and anyone that does is not being true to themselves or has something to hide. It’s something easy to hide behind and might provide comfort in the short term. However, in the long term, we will realise we haven't met our goals and are disappointed with the time lost where we could have improved our lives and become a better person for ourselves and those we care about. Not that there’s anything wrong with believing you’re good enough. In fact, it’s a huuuuge part of our residential programs, realizing your own self-worth and becoming entitled. But using that as an excuse to not level up in your social skills is honestly nothing but a mere coping mechanism. It’s evident that social skills are just that - skills. Skills aren’t built by being delusionally self-righteous, they’re built by honest feedback and guidance by a coach. Another reason we find it so hard to listen to feedback is that of our commitment and consistency bias. This has been talked about a lot in this group and its use in creating frames during interactions with women. This is how we get girls that are usually shy or girls saying ”No, I don't want to go to an after party, I might just home early” transform to being fun and adventurous and having crazy experiences with you. The principle revolves around the fact that when we make up our minds, we tend to not go against this, even in the face of contrary facts. Some other reasons we react the way we do to feedback is reflected by the following triggers. Truth; is it correct and accurate? Do we consider it good advice? This is difficult to figure out as sometimes we misinterpret what the other person is actually trying to tell us and also we hold many blind spots. Relationship; feedback often is hugely influenced and framed but the type of relationship you have with the person. We often have a bigger reaction to WHO is giving the feedback vs WHAT they are saying. Identify; what the feedback says about who you are as a person makes a huge impact on how we feel about it. When it comes to identity we can often make judgments and rationalise how others see us verse how we see ourselves. Some common examples include; Aloof vs. Shy Unfriendly vs. efficient Overbearing vs. outgoing Intimidating vs. high standards Elitist vs. smart Inpatient vs. Passionate Arrogant vs confident Now that you know the behaviours and mindsets that hold you back, what’s the next step? Well, first of all, keep this stuff in mind at all times. Keep humbling yourself and open up to learn from anyone and everyone. Be a student of life. So how do we start to change this? It starts with approaching life like a conversation, you need to be willing to listen and hear as well as talking. The first step is really understanding the benefits of feedback. Feel free to read the first part of the article again. Really take a second to imagine how you want your life to change and improve. Do you really want to grow and become the ultimate version of yourself? If the answer is YES, then you need to prepare for some shifts in mindsets and beliefs. Some of the mindsets and beliefs you can adopt: Being open to change. It’s okay to make mistakes because you learn. The more wrong you’re willing to be, the more right you’ll eventually become. “A man who never made a mistake, never made anything” -Napoleon : Search for criticism, it will help you grow. Do not beat yourself up and do not keep making the same mistakes. Feedback is based on your actions and behaviours, NOT who you are as a person, we must remain independent from feedback. And as soon as you’ve got this handled, let’s move to the next part of the feedback series... Step 2: Intrinsic feedback This is the first and the most subjective part of feedback, but also the most flexible and most readily available. However, you MUST be extremely ‘technical’ when applying this, because of the extreme levels of cognitive biases and logical fallacies we have as humans. Some good read on this is Uncle Charlie’s Almanack, Thinking Fast & Slow and Affective Neuroscience. 3 AMAZING books that will change the way you understand yourself and other, and it’ll forever change the way you game and approach any form of persuasion. Back when Pierre first recommended these books to me I was already a very scientific guy with all this pickup stuff. I’ve got a specialised medical practitioner degree and I can’t stand broscience. But I had NO IDEA how profound these books would be for the way I understood women, friends, sex, work, learning and teaching. Absolutely amazing. We’ll see if we can get Pierre to maybe make some livestreams on neuroscience later since he got into that stuff in 2007 and is a legit expert on the matter. The stuff he’s been able to fine tune on our programs thanks to this shit is one of the main reasons our programs are so effective, working in alignment with how our biology works makes everything so smooth. That is OUR way of tuning into the right radio frequency, to keep building on the initial metaphor. But in any case, I’ll explain the self-feedback tomorrow, this is already a long post, take some time to reflect on how you can be more open to feedback, order those books, and check out this webinar: https://neuroleadership.com/.../preview-improve-neuroscience.../ All the best, Markus “Growth Mindset” Wolf