Do you know the way to San Jose, HB?

So having made up my mind to rehearse and practice routines, I then stumble across a couple of posts on the LSS that make me change my mind (you may need to register to access the posts). The first was the age-old debate between natural v. routine game.

Now I find it especially frustrating when those who propose one way of thinking say that those who think the other way are idiots or some other playground insult. It’s sloppy, juvenile thinking. But outside of that, the various points raised in the thread, and equally importantly the links to other posts started my cogs moving. Particularly the link to this post quoting Toecutter that blurs the distinction between routines and natural game. Indeed, most natural friends of mine who are unaware of the game have their own “routines” that they use with girls over and over again.

What it then transpires is that what you’re learning is not the routines or specific things to do in certain situations, it’s the mindset, and the acceptance of the experience of learning the mindset. The mindset is things like, have fun, be the party, not give a shit about anything, get out of your comfort zone, amuse yourself, ploughing, rejecting your assumptions, staying in set as long as possible, experimentation, being comfortable with rejection and plenty of others.

Learning natural game in a way is like a baptism of fire. For all the so-called pain and threats to your ego that you have to experience, it is only really a washing or burning off the extraneous uselessness of your personality so that next time you’ll be better, or at least different. Then consciously and subconsciously you’ll become the person (rather than the line-learning robotic actor) who has this sorted. I.e. the guy who fucks loads of chicks.

Finally, I read all seven pages of a thread where a poster called Tiger puts himself through a 30 day go-out-every-day challenge to learn natural game. It’s great as you get to objectively feel the highs and plumb the depths with him, and you can actually see the development over time, which is really important and very inspirational for me.

So it was this in mind that I headed out last night for some field practice. Despite being stoned when I arrived, holding a conversation with Fargo was enough to snap me into a more sociable state, and I started to feel the excitement of sarging and I could feel my surreal sense of humour coming to the fore.

For some reason over the last two days I have had the phrase “Do you know the way to San Jose?” in my head – just that line and that part of the tune, as I had never heard the whole tune before. (I checked it out on YouTube yesterday and it’s a sweet song.) So being in a surreal mood I decided to use that as an opener. Mainly as it amused me, for no logical reason. At one point Swiss Jonathan challenged me to open a set, so I did and tried it out. Can’t say it worked fantastically well, but at least I opened. Now I have a response prepared:

“Do you know the way to San Jose?”
“Er, no!”
“Yeah it’s funny, isn’t it, no one seems to know. I don’t think it actually exists, that’s the catch…”
(continue with inane, deranged ramblings ad termino)

Anyway, outside of this I wanted to use tonight as a dry run for my seven day challenge next week. The idea of the challenge is to go out for both day and night game every day for seven days (except Tuesday evening when I have band practice). The aim when going out is as follows:

• Have fun
  
• Feel good (independent of environment)
  
• Always open
  
• Stay in set until blown out or close
  
• Escalate
  
• Open at least five sets in each session, unless there is a kiss close or more.
  
• Experiment with routines but focus on natural game
  
• Be comfortable with rejection

So with these ideas vaguely in mind I went out. I was very keen to open at the start but kept on stalling for a bit. Fargo mentioned that I was an inspiration to him at one point, I think because of my optimism mainly, and that I was like a self-help coach. Which I know is true, and it’s true because it works (see my future post on How to Get Good at Anything). So the good vibes were with us.

We started in Lab on Old Compton Street and I did the San Jose opener as mentioned above, and then when I was getting drinks I had a fairly straightforward convo with a girl at the bar which I was about to number close but then logistics (mainly holding drinks in both hands) got in the way. I don’t think it was too solid anyway, it was more of a warm up.

After that we went to Bar Soho which was a bit rough and ready but at least busy with some hot girls in it. I think I opened two or three sets. I went for a walk at one point and saw this one girl who was standing on her own. I opened her with “You look lonely” and started chatting about random stuff. On more than one occasion I felt like ejecting but forced myself to stay in there. As I did I could feel both the connection between us growing and baptism of fire of my own limiting beliefs about myself burning away, which was a bit surreal. But it was a great feeling. I stayed with her for about five minutes and then ejected. Still, it was longer than I would have stayed in set on another day. Looking back now I could have stayed with her and isolated her. She was a bit drunk so I don’t know if she would have been coherent for long, or whether I would have felt like I was taking advantage of her, but I guess there was only one way to have found that out.

I also got rejected and didn’t feel bad. There was a girl dancing near us that I think Jonathan wanted to talk to, he wanted to ask her a question (can’t remember what) so I went to ask her. She immediately cut me off with “We’re here to dance tonight, thanks,” so I left her to it. But I didn’t feel bad at all, my mood was unaffected. I later saw her dancing with a big east European looking guy, so I guess she was taken.

I caught the last tube home though I could have stayed out and opened more sets. But despite no substantial results it was a good night and bodes well for my challenge next week.