For example, take a product that I found when researching for this piece. It’s called David DeAngelo’s 77 Laws for Success With Women and Dating. Mind you, I haven’t listened to this product, so I don’t know what it teaches in detail. I found it because I was looking to see if there were some PUAs specializing in laws and principles over tactics, and thereby avoiding the “hypertacticality” trap. This came close, but it totally falls into the ego trap I mentioned earlier of being in some ways even more dangerous than the usual PUA bad advice on account of the bad mindframe being more subtle.

See, if it was just called 77 Laws for Self-Respect or 77 Laws for Self-Esteem or 77 Laws for Self-Actualization or 77 Laws for Inner Peace I’d have been happy with it, as it would be congruent with the true self mindframe. But by adding “for success with women and dating” to the title, now all 77 laws become framed as a tool for external validation and as a result now fall into tools for reinforcing your false, idealized self rather of promoting your true self. Your goal becomes getting better at receiving validation rather than learning to become independent of any need for validation.

That means some of the potentially good advice in this product like “work on yourself,” “evict your inner wussy,” “know your purpose,” and stop apologizing” now carries a subtext that turns it into “work on yourself so you can get external validation from women,” “evict your inner wussy so that you can get external validation from women,” and “stop apologizing so that you can get external validation from women.” This puts it in alignment with the laws of the false self. A better frame would be “work on yourself to gain self-respect, because doing so is its own reward in and of itself,” “evict your inner wussy to gain self-respect, because doing so is its own reward in an of itself,” and “stop apologizing to gain self-respect, because doing so is its own reward in and of itself.” This frame, which is regrettably absent, would put the advice in alignment with the laws of the true self.

All you’ve done is ditch the wuss behavior but keep the wuss core. In fact, you’ve made the wuss core harder to fix because you disguised it under a alpha male Halloween costume and script.

People think men are driven by pussy, and they’re just chasing sex. They aren’t. Sex matters to men less than the validation they get from sexual combined with conquests and affection (by affection I mean just any type of friendly, warm approving treatment).

Wow, halfway through and this is really hitting home. I wonder how much of the pimp game can be evaluated in the lens of narcissism and co-dependency.

The correct solution is peel away his false self and to find out who his true self is, and strive to be true to that instead of striving to live up to his false, idealized self. This will give him true self-esteem.

You are fine just the way you are…and there’s always room for improvement.

fuk

Has tears in eyes

The followup, part 5, is here:

http://therawness.com/reader-letters-1-part-5/

“Each of you is perfect the way you are ... and you can use a little improvement.”
― Shunryu Suzuki

bump.

This entire article shined so much light on areas of myself that I was unaware of. A very powerful and thought provoking read for me.

It helped me get past a sticking point I had with moving past old pains. I realized my introspection was missing the emotional awareness side of it.

I've learned reasons why I have X,Y and Z, but I shied away from the emotions that arose with X,Y and Z; I chose to avoid the feelings and intellectualized the whole matter and this is why I never was able to have lasting and meaningful results. I was cheating out of a big part of the process, processing those old emotions I've been carrying around and honoring what I feel.

It's such a relief to be able to see that and it truly came at the right time; I would not have the strength months back to revisit my painful memories and also have emotional awareness at the same time. To be honest, I'm scared to revisit the memories which I've locked deep inside myself, because I know it will be painful!

I understand it now when others say "they've made peace with their demons"...they've revisited the painful memories and honored what they felt.

I'm talking a lot about myself...this was all just great stuff and a big big realization and insight deeper into myself!

I feel true self-esteem is around the corner.

Also, the author is great at gathering useful information for the audience to use, while also citing his information from outside sources; not just using his own opinion.

Thank you Meraki for posting this here.