You Will Be Rejected Before You Are Accepted: How to Approach Strangers

EDIT: SUMMARY: In summary, authenticity is the key to all conversation. If you try to fake an attitude, you will be found out. Always calibrate after the fact, rather than before, as it frees you up and allows you to become more flexible in the conversation; you will be able to move through the conversation more fluidly this way. Never forget about the 60/40 rule - the way you asked is only 40% of the reason as to why that chick on the subway didn't give you her phone number. One short-term goal you should have in every conversation is just to have fun; you should be chatting up that old lady in the library because you want to, not because you feel obligated to. Most importantly, remember that you will be rejected before you are accepted.

When a man walks up to you trying to sell you something, what is your first reaction?

Most people would say, "Who the fuck is this guy and why the fuck is he trying to sell me whatever the fuck he's trying to sell me?" The reason for this is because, as human beings, we are pack animals; what this means is that we operate in cliques. Most of us may have gone through high school, or even college, with at least one of the same friends from elementary school. This is not to say that we are unable to branch out from our established cliques - because we can; however, most of us find it difficult, as we have been brought up to shy away from strangers and embrace those whom we have met through mutual activities such as work or school. In addition to this, and because of our upbringing, we have not been gifted the necessary tools, the necessary skills, to accomplish the seemingly daunting task of meeting new people by our own volition. We have been seasoned to ward off strangers, and because of this, we live in a society that will reject him (the stranger) before it accepts him. We do this for our own reasons; everyone has their own.

Some may do it for protection, safety: we don't know what that stranger offers, and that fact alone may scare some. The stranger who just approached you may be your next best friend, or the yet-to-be-apprehended serial killer who is trying to coerce you into his evil den, and - also due to the society we live in - we tend to lean towards the latter; we have been trained to assume the worst of people, only changing our opinions if we are proven wrong consistently. What ever happened to innocent until proven guilty? The advantages of this paradigm are there but the detriments severely outweigh them.

The advantages of living in a more socially open society like that of mid-20th century America are clear to be seen. Hostility towards strangers was seemingly non-existent. Trusting someone whom you did not know was normal back then, from what I can gather. People were even leaving the doors to their cars and houses unlocked until the 70's. Today, that is virtually unheard of. "Stranger danger", something taught to the most recent generation and even the one before that, is a fairly recent invention, albeit it does hold some water in today's society.

What I'm trying to say is: there is a wall between you and that stranger on the bus. There is a wall between you and that hot chick at Starbucks. There is a wall between you and the old lady at the library.

By striking up a conversation with that stranger or that old lady, you are attempting to tear down that wall and forge a connection - no matter how short-lived. Tearing down the wall is a multi-faceted problem which requires a multi-faceted solution.

When breaking the wall, you must be delicate - but not to an extreme; you mustn't be afraid to step on some toes. Like a professional League player, you must be willing to do whatever it takes to win - which, in this case, means breaking down the wall but ultimately getting that pootang if that stranger on the bus is a girl - but maybe not, maybe you just want to borrow her pencil, and while when breaking the wall, yes, you must be gentle, but you must also maintain your own frame and you mustn't act fake. This may mean being that sarcastic, crass "douchebag" you may be, without so much of the "crass" (as to abstain from being called creepy); however, maintaining 100% of your composure may prove to be useful, but it is always good to air on the side of caution in situations like this - ones where you have no clue how the other person may react. Also, don't be an asshole.

Remember to not only show your best qualities, but all of them. I'm not saying you should reveal to Sally your dom/sub fetish in the first conversation (maybe the second; /s). Always remember to be genuine. You do not want to portray an image of yourself that you are unable to maintain. The image you can maintain 100% of the time is yourself; doing this is key to breaking down the wall, and toning down a part of yourself (like your sexual appetite) is not the same as acting disingenuously. You, if you decide to, will - in time - reveal the true bounds of your libido, but when you're introducing yourself, saying, "Hi, my name is Jeff and I'm a nymphomaniac," is a good way to be, at the very least, ignored. You must only reveal parts of yourself to the other person to whom you are talking when they are comfortable enough with you to handle that information.

When you have a conversation with someone remember to smile; you need not be a stoic rock that shows no emotion. Smile. Laugh. Remember to have a good time - that's what you're supposed to be there for. Maybe you're interested in that person and what kind of long-term relationship y'all can have, but when you talk to someone your first goal should be to have a good time - to enjoy yourself - you should be talking to them because you want to; this plays into something I learned from Julien of RSD (Real Social Dynamics for those of you who don't know). Basically what he says (for a more in-depth reading of his lessons I strongly reccommend watching his seminars on Youtube) is that whenever you approach a girl (or anyone for that matter) wherever, your thoughts, words, and actions must be aligned.

Your T.W.A. - or thoughts, words, and actions - plays into every social encounter. Whether you're talking to your grandma or that hot chick at the club, your thoughts, words, and actions must be aligned; I cannot stress this enough. If you walk up to a girl and you start chatting her up and you're thinking, "Man, I really hate life right now," then your words and actions should follow that thought. If your T.W.A. is not straight, you will be spotted as a fake; this is because it is hard - if not impossible to maintain, for example, a happy-go-lucky exterior when you're sobbing on the inside. If you're mad, that's fine. If you're happy, that's fine. If you're not really feelin' it, that's fine. As long as your T.W.A. is straight, you'll be alright.

As the saying goes, you can't love someone else if you don't love yourself, and this extends into something as shallow as having a conversation with someone. Having a straight T.W.A. is important because you cannot have a genuine conversation with someone if you are not being genuine. You cannot be genuine with others if you are not being genuine with yourself. For example, if you're having a little bit of an "off day", but you see a cute girl on the subway and decide to approach her, it is better to say, "Hey, I'm havin' a lil' bit of an "off day", but I noticed you were just chilling over here alone, so I thought I'd come join you and have a nice conversation," rather than faking an exuberant attitude. Let's say you choose to do the latter, what would happen?

At first, everything would be fine. She'd eat it up, and you'd be thinking, "Ah man, this is great! I knew this would be better than telling her I'm pissed right now," or something similar, no doubt. You'd be OK with this at first because you could simply recall how you would respond if you were actually feeling the way you presented yourself to be feeling; however, after a while, a little kino escalation here, and some flirting there, the shit tests would come - and if you aren't in the right mindset, you can't answer them the right way. In other words, your "shit answer" would tell a different story than your words and actions because your thoughts aren't there. You can't think X when you're thinking Y. You can't pass a shit test the way you would if you were happy when you're sad, but let's say you do pass it, halfheartedly, because you probably can get away with passing a couple shit tests in a happy manner simply because you've "seen them all before". Sure, you could recall how you've answered one or two shit tests in the past if you've been confronted with it before, but what happens when she shit-tests you in a way you've never been shit-tested before? You will fail, not necessarily because you said something wrong, but because of the way you answered it. If you have to think on your feet - you will always use your current state of emotions as a starting point. If you're pissed but you're trying to act happily, when you try to spontaneously conjure up an answer to the shit test your answer will come from the mindset of "I'm pissed" instead of "I'm happy". What this means is that you may not fail because you said the wrong thing, but because your answer will not match that of a person who is genuinely in the state that you are only claiming to be in. "Well, what happens if I fail a shit test?"

By having conversation, you build rapport; you build credibility. If you fail one shit test, all is not lost, but to the person you're talking to, you do lose at least a little bit of your credibility. Basically, a conversation (especially the first one) is your mating dance. You're saying to the other person, "This is who I am and this is what I'm about." You're putting yourself on the table for the other person - and it is their choice whether they accept you. It is similar to how male peacocks fan their feathers in a show of dominance/masculinity/attractiveness, etc. By shit-testing you, the person to whom you are talking is checking the validity of your claims about yourself. If you're saying, "I'm an adventurous scumbag (that Indiana Jones type)," but you answer the shit test in a way that says, "I sit inside and play video games all day," the person who shit-tested you will do one of two things: he will either walk away from the 'show' right then and there - because he sensed that you were being disingenuous - or they will continue viewing your 'show' but do so in an almost skeptical way. If they confront you from the latter perspective, they will shit test you more frequently and/or harder in order to truly decide whether what they consider to be your 'mishap' was their own misreading or truly your own foible. Lose credibility enough and the person will walk away from your 'show'. Being genuine is key in all conversation.

It is important to know where you stand during your 'show' (your passes/fails) in order to properly gauge where the conversation is headed. The goal is to always be a couple steps ahead of the other as to know how the 'show' is going; you should be mindful of this even if you are being genuine during conversation because it is still possible to fail a shit test while remaining completely authentic with the other person.

Your thought process should be (assuming you can identify a shit test): Did I pass the shit test? Then, how well did I pass the shit test? And lastly, how well did that person react to my passing the shit test?

You should always be "calibrating after the fact". Calibrating after the fact is deciding how you will deal with something after it happens, spontaneously. The opposite of this would be deciding exactly what you're going to do and doing it without fail and without diverting from your original plan in order to account for any variables that are out of your control or that you hadn't even considered - which is called calibrating before the fact. Calibrating before the fact is an extremely dangerous way to operate both inside and outside of conversation because it does not lend you the same flexibility as calibrating after the fact. I'll call calibrating afterwards "mode a" and calibrating before "mode b".

I'm going to revisit the "approaching the girl on the subway" scenario once more. While operating in mode a, you would think of anything from a simple to an elegant open - and that's it, nothing more - nothing less. You would go in armed only with your open, you would open the girl, and then you would just talk to her while prepared for unknowns, even expecting them; unknowns can be anything from the way she responds to the way you open her to the way she is as a person. It should throw you off more if, at the end of the conversation, she doesn't do something out of the ordinary - in a good way of course. Operatin with this mindset allows you to be more fluid in the conversation since you weren't expecting a certain outcome or situation to come to fruition; you're taking the raw materials she's giving you (her reactions, her replies) and transforming them into a beautiful work of art. Having this kind of mastery over the conversation also demonstrates you high value, at least in this area. Based solely on this (conversation while in mode a vs. b), someone who properly applies mode a in their conversations would be judged as a higher-value male than someone who utilizes mode b.

If you were operating under mode b you would do something along the lines of think about every single move you're going to make and every single word you're going to say when you approach her; sure, you'll try to take into account her reactions - but they will probably be the best-case scenario - which is still detrimental to your approach. If not, you wouldn't even go up to her because you'd be under the impression that you'd get rejected (God forbid you plan out your rejection, let it affect you, and still approach the girl). You'd go up to the girl and you'd say your open, and then it'd start going 'according to plan' - maybe she said exactly what you thought she would (if so, wow), maybe she didn't (but it's OK because you were prepared!). You'd start chatting her up, using your canned lines of course, and then, bam! She does something you didn't expect! Oh no! What do you do? Undoubtedly, this would throw you off. Maybe you'd start panicking, maybe not, but you wouldn't be able maintain a solid frame - at the very least, your frame would be shaken, and if you didn't know how to reframe a conversation you're SOL. Maybe she shit-tests you, how are you going to react? Regardless of how you react, you will fail that shit test because you would be so worried about the fact that she shit-tested you when you didn't expect it that you can't think of a passing response. You will panic. You will crash and burn. I have not met a guy who has been an exception to this rule, if you are, that's great - but utilizing mode a will set you light years ahead of where you would be using mode b under the same circumstances. What happens if a bomber pilot operates under mode b? He and his crew die. Yes, they can still be killed even if their pilot is Tom Cruise who is operating under mode a, but their chances of survival are increased exponentially.

By operating under mode a rather than b, you not only increase your 'chances of survival', but you also allow yourself access to the greatest tool in conversation: flexibility. By being flexible, you can roll with the punches - unfazed - and maintain frame.

Remember that you cannot account for the way someone will react to your open - ever. It is impossible as a human being. The way someone reacts is essentially the "X Factor" in the equation of conversation - it is not necessarily totally random (if she's in a pissy mood she's probably gonna act like a bitch, etc.), but you cannot account for it in your 'calculations' before talking to a person - all you can do is give it your best shot and fire away; this is why operating under mode a is so much more pertinent than operating under mode b.

Also, remember the 60/40 rule - something I picked up from Nick Sparks from one of his seminars at The 21 Convention (I totally recommend watching his stuff like "How to Have Conversation Like a Man"). The 60/40 rule is really simple; it states that a person's reaction is based 60% on what they're feeling or going through, while only 40% of it is based on your open, joke, comment, whatever. Obviously if you purposely insult someone you're more than likely going to get a negative response, so don't go call someone a line of insults and question why he responded to you in the way he did. As long as you operate appropriately during a conversation, the 60/40 rule applies.

In summary, authenticity is the key to all conversation. If you try to fake an attitude, you will be found out. Always calibrate after the fact, rather than before, as it frees you up and allows you to become more flexible in the conversation; you will be able to move through the conversation more fluidly this way. Never forget about the 60/40 rule - the way you asked is only 40% of the reason as to why that chick on the subway didn't give you her phone number. One short-term goal you should have in every conversation is just to have fun; you should be chatting up that old lady in the library because you want to, not because you feel obligated to. Most importantly, remember that you will be rejected before you are accepted.