Intro:

In my two year observation of this forum, I’ve noticed that the most frequently espoused advice on TRP is to “hold frame”. The concept’s importance has been drilled into our heads with such frequency that any member of this sub should be able to drop a twenty-page thesis paper on the subject with a girthy explanation of what frame is and how it looks to hold frame. And while this may seem like a great accomplishment on the surface, an understanding of this concept serves little benefit without a subsequent internalization of why someone is able to hold frame. My goal for this post is to show someone how to stop being a fraud.

Body:

So, why do people succeed or fail to hold frame?

Simply put: an individual is only able to ‘hold frame’ when they are able to derive validation from sources external to the person attempting to break their frame.

As I’ve reflected on my own journey on becoming less of a beta bitch, I hypothesize that no matter how well you internalize what holding frame looks like, your results won’t align with your intentions until you have developed *genuine* ways to reallocate your focus.

I put the word genuine in italics because I am a stout believer that “working on Inner Game” is futile. What I mean by this postulation is that no amount of books you read, posts you save, or infield videos you attempt to replicate are going to mask the insecurity you subtly reveal to the women you awkwardly attempt to seduce. You could be a walking dictionary that spits out the perfect line that insinuates that you don’t give a fuck, but you would still come off as a fraud because your body language, tonality, and content of your speech are incongruent.

You will never believe that you are an inherently valuable person if you receive resounding feedback from the world telling you that you are dogshit. Half-assed affirmations that attempt to validate your existence are worthless.

Everybody, regardless if they admit it or not, seeks validation. If you cannot derive it from areas of your life other than a single woman, you will fail to hold frame. The only path to a congruent and successful attempt of holding frame, then, is to find other sources of validation. Abundance mentality comes from having many sources of validation, including, but very much not limited to, women. In my opinion, the three most tangible ways of developing a frame where you possess the ability to walk away are:

  1. Overcoming stagnation in any/all non-social areas of your life
  2. Developing a close male friend group
  3. Spinning plates with *multiple* women

Overcoming Stagnation:

I can't give you the answers to overcoming plateaus in your life. But I can tell you that adding 100lbs to your Squat/Bench/Deadlift total will make you more confident in your abilities. Getting a promotion or a 20% pay raise will provide substantial insurance that you are a valuable human being. Mastering an excruciatingly difficult guitar solo that requires hours of dedication to get *just* right will give you a firm grounding that you are capable of overcoming plateaus. It doesn’t really matter whether you find improvement in a hobby, in your fitness life, or in your professional life, measurable improvement will always aid your belief that you are worth something valuable.

A large part of why lifting is so crucial to one’s development as a man is that it becomes an area where he can make consistent reliable quantifiable progress (assuming one follows a linear progression and hasn’t maxed out their newb gains). The increase of testosterone doesn’t hurt either.

Regarding Developing a Close Male Friend Group:

A close male friend group makes you feel less alone in this world. And while it is imperative that you understand that in many ways you are essentially alone in this world, a close friend group will provide you with enough support to deal with this harsh reality. Though I do not recommend often relying on other people as a source of validation, men can occasionally provide you with emotional support. You cannot do this with women. Leaning on a woman leads to them looking down on you. Once this begins, hypergamous instincts kick in and she begins her pursuit of a man that will not become reliant on her for emotional stability.

You must, however, be willing to cut certain people if you feel that they are keeping you trapped in a cycle of mediocrity. While cutting friends sucks, learning that you’ll survive without shitty friends actually reinforces the belief that you will be fine in solitude.

Regarding Plates:

While women should not be used as the only form of validation, it is inevitable that they will bring some to you. If you have more than one at a time, you will soon come to realize that no woman is special, and you have the ability to move on from one without a fuss.

If this dwindles down to one woman, and unless you have the other areas of your life in check, you will begin to act needy. This is why LTRs and marriages fail — you cannot use dread effectively if you truly do not have the ability to move on to other options.

Conclusion:

The “I am enough” and “I stand by my values” mentalities that are at the core of all forms of holding frame come from within, but these mantras are only internalized by setting and achieving goals, developing a sense you are a human being worthy of respect from participating in a close friend group, and by sleeping with enough women to realize that you’ll recover if one decides not to be with you anymore.

TL;DR: Everybody, regardless if they admit it or not, seeks validation. If you cannot derive it from areas of your life other than a single woman, you will fail to hold frame.