SLOW OPENING THE NATURAL WAY TO MEET HER
CHASE AMANTE
GIRLS CHASE BOOKS
SLOW OPENING THE NATURAL WAY TO MEET HER
CHASE AMANTE
GIRLS CHASE BOOKS
Copyright © 2011 by b y Chase Amante. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Girls Chase Books www.girlschase.com The Girls Chase name and logo are trademarks of Girls Chase, Inc. The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
TABLE OF F CONTENTS INTRODUCTION................................ INTRODUCTION ................. ........................................... ..................................... .................................... ..................... ..............1 ................................ ................................ ....1 WHY OPENING CAN FEEL UNNATURAL...................... UNNATURAL ......................3 ......................3 MYTHS AND SAYINGS ...............................................5 SUICIDAL OPENERS ...................................................8 CHASING ...............................................................10 THE ENTERTAINER ...................................................11 ...................................................11 MISTAKES MEN MAKE IN OPENING........................... OPENING...........................13 ...........................13 TALKING TOO F AST AST.................................................13 COMING IN TOO HARD...........................................15 P ROJECTING ROJECTING EXPECTATIONS .....................................18 WAITING FOR HER R ESPONSE ESPONSE ...................................23 R USHING USHING THROUGH THE OPENER .............................27 TAKEAWAYS...........................................................29 SLOW OPENING.................. OPENING................................ ............................................ ..................................... ................................................ .................... ...........31 OPENING.................. ................................ ................................ .. 31 WHY IT WORKS .....................................................34 WHEN TO USE IT....................................................37 THINGS TO K EEP EEP IN MIND .......................................38 CONCLUSION CONCLUSI CLUSION ON ............... ........................................... ................................ .................. ........................................ .................................................... ..................... ...............42 ................................ ...... 42
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INTRODUCTION Ever notice how contrived it can sometimes feel when you first go up to meet a new woman? You walk up to her, and it feels like this big presentation, as though this huge burden and a great deal of pressure has been placed upon you: she expects something incredible out of you, and you expect something incredible out of yourself, and anything short of that is going to be anticlimactic and a big let down. Sometimes you’re able to surprise her and yourself and pull off an opener that lives up her expectations and your expectations, but even if you do that, now you’ve set an expectation that the rest of your interaction is going to be completely amazing as well – and even the most talented men in the world are rarely going to have interactions that are completely amazing. With many traditional openers, a man also runs the risk of starting off on the wrong foot – the “entertainer” foot, to be more specific. We’ll take a look at why that is in this book, and why that’s best avoided. We’ll also take a look at some of the common mistakes men make while opening – speaking too
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fast, coming in too hard, projecting “expectations”, waiting for responses, or, conversely, stringing everything so tightly together in their openers that a woman doesn’t have the chance to respond or involve herself in the conversation. Finally, we’ll put all the pieces together, and take a look at Slow Opening – a natural way of opening that communicates all the right things and engages a girl on a normal, conversational level rather than on the “I’m here to impress you” level that most men come in on. Once you’re using the techniques covered in this book consistently and reliably, you’ll find opening goes a lot more smoothly – and a lot more naturally.
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WHY OPENING CAN F E EL UNNATURAL FEEL You walk into an electronics store, and instantly feel eyes on you. You want to buy something, you think, maybe… or maybe you just want to look around. But suddenly, there’s this unspoken pressure on you. And you notice one of the sales people meander, slowly but noticeably, over in your direction. “Great,” you think, “now I’m going to have him come over and bother me, and I have to let him know I’m just looking.” He walks up to you and, sure enough, asks you if you need anything or if there’s anything he can help you with today, and sure enough you reply that you’re just looking. “Okay,” he says. “Let me know if you need any help.” When many men open women, this is how it goes. A man spies a woman; he targets her and locks on; then he moves in for the kill. Just like the customer in the electronics store, the woman notices this – it isn’t subtle. Intuition though – most folks have this, they just ignore it. If a guy feels even a slight feeling that he's putting himself out there too much, that's his intuition kicking in to tell him he isn’t being subtle.
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But is subtle even something we want? What’s the advantage of being subtle? Imagine two scenarios. In scenario one, a cool, confident guy walks across a room, heading more or less directly for a woman, and begins talking to her. In scenario two, a cool, confident guy ends up next to a woman, and casually engages her. Scenario one works okay if the man is incredibly confident, knows exactly what he’s going to say, and if the woman is receptive. If he isn’t incredibly confident, he doesn’t know exactly what he’s going to say, or the woman isn’t receptive though, he’s just walked across a room and had things not go very well. He looks a little foolish, and he’s got himself into a bit of a hole to climb out of. Scenario two works okay in much broader conditions. If a man is incredibly confident, knows exactly what he’s going to say, and the woman is receptive, it works. In fact, it works a bit better than if he walked across the room, because it feels more natural and more effortless – he put in less effort to meet her, and women assess men’s value as relative to the results they get compared to the effort they
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put in to get those results (more results with less effort equates to the greatest level of attractive qualities in a man. Lesser men work harder and get less for their efforts). But in addition, scenario two works okay much of the time as well even if a man isn’t incredibly confident, doesn’t know exactly what he’s going to say, or the woman isn’t entirely receptive. Because he’s put in less effort, he can get less impressive results and still stay afloat than the more obvious man who put in more effort. Because he was more effortless, women give him more leeway. This concept of putting in less effort and receiving more results as being a key factor in a man’s attractiveness and social power is something I call the Law of Least Effort, Effort and we’re going to keep returning to it throughout our discussion of opening here. The Law of Least Effort is important everywhere, but it stands out in importance even more in the most critical, extreme situations in a seduction – one of which happens to be opening.
Myths and Sayings
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I’ve heard a lot of different opinions about that moment when a man first meets a girl. “It doesn’t matter what you say, so long as it gets her talking to you,” is one. “It’s essential to make a strong first impression,” is another. “It’s not what you say but how you say it,” is one more. There is some truth to all of these, but also some fallacy. It very much does matter what you say when you start off an interaction – it sets the tone for the rest of the time you spend with a woman. Though it is true that more important than the actual words are the general thrust of the opener and the meaning that a girl takes away from it – so in that sense, what you say wordwise is far less important than the message those words convey. This same explanation holds true for “It’s not what you say but how you say it.” And you can certainly recover from a weak or neutral first impression. I’ve had interactions that started off with really very bland, boring openers, and ended with me taking the girl to bed. But there is also the matter of fundamentals – those nonverbal cues like eye contact, body language, voice tone, and the rest – and those things contribute to that initial impression as well, quite significantly, so it’s not just
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the words establishing it. You can use bland or even cheesy opening lines but if you have incredibly tight fundamentals you will still do fine, much of the time. Regardless though, making a strong first impression, while not absolutely essential, will make the rest of the interaction easier, and it provides reinforcement down the road – women don’t often consider the middle of an interaction when they think back on it later, but typically rather the beginning and the end. So if you start strong, and you end strong, those are the things a girl you've met will remember most about you after your time with her has ended, and that strong beginning and strong ending will make her more likely to want to talk to you or see you again in the future, and even a bit more likely to accompany you to another venue or to your home while she's still with you. Any of the myths from mainstream sources or people who don’t know what they’re talking about, of course, you can probably toss without much consideration (e.g., “You need a great opening line,” or, “Women won’t talk to men who do XYZ thing or say ABC to them”). We won’t talk about them, but you’ll know them when you hear them – pieces of advice that are thrown about like common
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knowledge without any attempt made to back them up with solid evidence, rationale, or counterpoints. We only want to use things that have been tested and found effective, and stay away from advice bandied about by those who haven't actually tested out that advice themselves to any real extent.
Suicidal Openers Some men use something I refer to sometimes “suicidal openers.” These are opening lines that guys use because they either really think they work, or just have no idea what else to say. They include things like: • • • • •
Telling a girl she’s so beautiful Using a clichéd pick up line Asking a girl her name Introducing himself right off the bat Using a boring question as an opener
Now, mind you, these can be used if they’re done right, but most men have no idea how to do them right. For these to work, these openers demand outstanding fundamentals and a man who’s exuding
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sexuality. They work under pretty much no other circumstances. We’re going to look at doing some things a little bit simpler here, under the assumption that most people reading this book have yet to master their fundamentals and are still working on exuding the proper amount of steamy sexuality. If you’re reading this and you have those things handled already, you can maybe skim over the parts of the book that relate to understanding the mistakes guys make, and perhaps skip down to where we talk about slow opening in and of itself. For the rest of the cats, avoid suicidal openers. They’re lame, every boring guy in the bar or the bookstore uses them, and if a girl is halfdecent looking she’s heard each of them a million times and is conditioned to automatically shut down any man using them on her (just as you may be conditioned to turn down those people who stand on the street corner trying to hand you flyers, or the homeless people who walk up to you shaking the coins in their cups; you don't even think to consider them, you just respond automatically). You might be the best man a girl'd ever end up having in her entire life, but if you use a suicidal opener and your
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fundamentals aren’t telling her to stop and give you a minute to win her over, she’s going to be dismissive and shut you down.
Chasing The reason suicidal openers feel so crappy to women (and to most men with any sense of social intuition… just because a man’s saying something doesn’t mean he doesn’t realize it’s probably not the best thing he could say) is that they are used in a very clear context of a man pursuing a woman. But what has she done to win his pursuit? If he’s chasing in the opener, he doesn’t know anything about her. He doesn’t know if she’s smart or dumb, educated or a high school drop out, fun or boring, insightful or dull, vivacious or laconic, affectionate or cold, artistic or uncreative, openminded or closed, adventuresome or conservative. And even more, she hasn’t made any effort to provide value to his life. If a man chases from the outset, he communicates that he has no better options in his life. A man with beautiful women in his life who is living a life he’s
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happy with does not chase. He does not go much out of his way to pursue women he doesn’t even know. He won’t waste the time or effort.
The Entertainer There is another dread thing that many men do in opening that make their openers feel unnatural: being the entertainer. A man who comes in very high energy, telling jokes, telling stories, and trying his hardest to be interesting is a man who is seeking to entertain. A lot of men seem to think that entertaining women is the key to those women's hearts. But let me ask you this: if a girl came up to you and immediately began telling you jokes and sharing wild stories with you and telling you all about how flashy her life and experiences were, would you fall for her? Or would you be more… reserved? Might you wonder why it is she felt she had to tell you all these things? Even a pretty girl loses a lot of perceived value if she starts entertaining like this – if she has to do this to get your attention, you feel like, there must be something missing that she’s trying to compensate for.
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If we can say men feel this way about women who entertain, why would women feel any different about men who entertain? Short answer: they wouldn’t, and they don’t. Longer answer: women view a man trying to entertain them as a man who’s trying too hard to hold their interest and impress them. In other words, he’s a man putting in more effort than he should be to get the same result – and because of that, he’s not nearly as attractive as a man who puts in less.
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MISTAKES MEN MAKE IN OPENING We could almost call this section “fundamentals of opening” – these are the things beyond words that have great impact on a man’s success meeting new women. When he eliminates these mistakes and begins doing things technically correct, opening goes much more smoothly, and his consistency in getting strong receptions from women off the opener goes up.
Talking Talking Too Fast Lots of less experienced guys rush through their openers, and that’s bad. In fact, they rush through talking in general, and it’s bad in general, but it’s particularly harmful in opening. The opener is a woman’s first moment of interacting with you; she does a lot of hard assessing really fast in the couple of seconds it takes you to open. There are a bunch of things she’s looking at, and how quickly you're speaking is one of them. Think about it like this: imagine the most powerful, masculine, sexy men you can think of. How many of them talk fast? None of them, right? They all talk in
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a slow, unrushed manner. A man who speaks too quickly communicates that he’s trying to spit everything out and make his point fast , because he’s afraid someone will cut him off. A man who speaks slowly, on the other hand, communicates two things: •
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That he isn’t afraid of anyone cutting him off, and That he isn’t overly concerned about the social repercussions to himself even if someone does.
You’ll notice that strong, powerful men in general do a lot of things that communicate their defenses are down, and speaking slowly is one of them. A powerful man does not need to spit everything out to defend his position in a conversation; he can take his time to get there. People size other people up very quickly based on their speed of speech. It’s not fair – I’ve known some very cool guys with very interesting things to say who spoke very quickly. But it’s the way things are. And if you want women to be more receptive to you off the opener, you really ought to pace yourself when speaking – don’t talk too fast.
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Coming in Too Hard Not every guy does this, but enough of them do that it’s a problem you’ll see fairly often. That is, coming in too hard – or opening a woman like you’re trying to barrel your way into conversation with her. Needless to say, no one likes feeling like they’re being pushed or pressured or forced into a conversation, and women are no exception – and it’s handsdown an attraction killer. A guy who comes barreling in and talking very loudly and acting very cocky with women might think he’s coming across strong and dominant, but the women he’s meeting are going to tend to think he’s being oafish and annoying. Loudness is good, to an extent, and confidence is always attractive, but these guys take it too far and it seems rather… artificial. Tryhard, if you will. Women can tell when a man is trying. The reason why is it’s one of the things they screen for: they want to know which men are genuine, and which ones are the charlatans. It’s an essential thing to screen for; anytime you’re dealing with people; you
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want to know what you’re getting. And if a girl can tell that she’s being spoken to by a man who is putting on his best front to try and get together with her, she’s going to be blocked from feeling much attraction for him. So, I’ll give you an example. Say a woman is leaning up against a bar, thinking deep thoughts and waiting for her friends to return from the dance floor. She’s a prime target for men out meeting women; if she’s standing there by herself, it’s reasonable for a man to assume she’s open to meeting someone new (while occasionally women are by themselves because they’re in sour moods and don’t want to talk to anyone, more often if a woman’s by herself it’s because she’s more in the mood for relaxing and potentially meeting a cool, attractive guy than she is for partying and dancing and gossiping with the girlfriends). Lots of guys will come in very hard, busting on this girl, trying to be witty, trying to be creative and funny and interesting. “Wow, did you see that fight?” they might ask. Or they might loudly and facetiously tell her she needs to calm down. Needless to say, to a woman who’s relaxing and low energy and specifically avoiding the wildness of her girlfriends,
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a guy coming in hard and high energy and wild is going to be exactly what she doesn’t want. It took me, oh, a few years to really learn this lesson myself. When you first start out and you’re new to going out and meeting lots of girls, you base your learning on what gets reactions, and being high energy and wild and crazy and coming in hard gets reactions. So it often seems to be working. But it gives a false confidence. These days, I come in chill and low energy, and women’s reactions to me are similarly subdued. No more wild crazy receptions like I used to get; no more girls bouncing up and down, laughing, jumping, frantic bantering – they don’t do that with me anymore. But what they do do, instead, is they accompany me home a lot more often and a lot more easily. For a long time, I was trying to figure out the magic solution to transition from the high energy opening I was doing into the seductive energy needed later to move the interaction forward. Eventually I realized the solution was simply being chill and seductive from the outset – it removes the problem of having to tone things down.
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This is a bit harder to do when your fundamentals aren’t as tight just yet. There’s a bit of a learning curve that goes handinhand with your progress in other aspects of personal development. That said, this is something you should definitely, absolutely, positively keep an eye on as you progress – and when you catch yourself losing women because you’re coming in too hard and too wild, take that as a sign it’s time to start toning things down and going sexy from the beginning. Once you get that running, you’ll have your opening in top shape.
Projecting Expectations Projecting expectations is an area of opening that most men aren’t aware of, but that kills a lot of beginners. Before explaining what I mean by this, I’ll illustrate an example for you to make it clear: You’re at a used car lot, and a man who’s obviously new at his job and inexperienced walks up to you and asks you if he can give you a hand. You notice he’s standing rather far away from you, his full body pointed at you, and his arms are crossed and he seems
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visibly uncomfortable and maybe a bit nervous. Seeing him looking like that makes uncomfortable, and you you feel automatically want to tell him you’re just looking so he’ll leave you alone. Ten minutes later, while you look at another car, another man walks up, clearly more experienced a salesman. He leans up against the car next to you and gets comfortably close to you, but his body is turned away from you. His head is toward you though, and he smiles warmly and makes some idle chitchat about the car, the city, the weather, the playoffs. You instantly feel more at ease, and ask him if you can take the car for a test drive. He tells you to wait there a moment and he’ll go get the keys. There’s a little bit of coming on too strong in the inexperienced guy example there – he gives most of his body to the customer, making the customer feel uncomfortable that he’s coming on too strong. But by staying far away, being visibly uncomfortable, and looking nervous, he makes you feel very uncomfortable being in his presence.
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Contrast that with the experienced guy. He gets close, in your space even, but his body is turned away so it doesn’t feel like he’s coming in too hard. He’s comfortable, natural, and nonchalant. As a result, you’re far more open to working with him. What’s the big difference between those two guys? The inexperienced guy was projecting an expectation of you not wanting to work with him – and, like the selffulfilling prophecy it is, that made you not want to work with him. The experienced guy, on the other hand, projected both a cool confidence that of course you’d be relaxed with him and talk to him, and also a lack of neediness or expectancy or any kind of reliance on your actions. He seems calm and selfcomposed; you feel more comfortable letting your guard down around him. This is what we’re talking about when we discuss projecting expectations. It’s this communicating via body language and other nonverbal signals of how you expect an interaction to go that is a big factor in determining how it actually goes. Funny, huh? How you project expecting an interaction to go influences how it actually goes.
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There are a number of things to watch for here, but I’ll give you the most important. These are the things to watch for and correct if you notice yourself doing them wrong. •
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Staying far away. A woman's friends don’t stand far away from her when they talk to her. Neither does her family. And certainly her past lovers and boyfriends didn’t. Can you imagine a sexy, suave, romantic man she’s just met keeping a big gap of space between the two of them while he talks to her? Feels awful uncomfortable, doesn’t it? If you catch yourself doing this, force yourself to start closing these gaps. Being the outsider is never what you want to be. Protecting yourself. Humans have some instinctual body language that they use to protect themselves when they’re feeling fearful or apprehensive at all. These include folding the arms over the chest to protect the upper abdomen, and crossing legs closely together while seated to protect the genitals. Be aware of these behaviors and scratch them out. You can add arm crossing back into your body language later
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on for a handful of strategic purposes that it can be useful in, but if you’re like the majority of people, crossing your arms and not even being aware of it any time you feel a little uncomfortable, I strongly advise you nix this behavior entirely so you stop signaling discomfort when you aren’t aware of it. •
Grimacing. This was a thorn in my side for such a long time. A grimace is that awful fake smile you make when you’re trying to force yourself to smile, but you’re really not feeling like smiling at all. Solution? Purse your lips, rub your hand over the corner of your mouth, do anything to stop smiling. Usually you want to smile when you first meet a girl, but it doesn’t have to be a big grin; it can be a small, seductive smile you flash her way instead. Save the big fake grimaces for silly photographs, and choose a smaller smile or no smile at all when you don’t feel like grinning eartoear.
Clean this stuff up if you’re doing it, and you’ll greatly reduce any negative expectation projection you have going on right now. And if you start
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projecting at least neutral – then, as you improve, positive – expectations, women will start receiving you more warmly and more openly.
Waiting for Her Response “It’d be a crime if I didn’t come say hello to you when I noticed how ravishing you look. I’m Tim,” a man says to a woman he’s just met. Then, he waits. And waits. And says nothing. He is waiting for her response. “Nice to meet you too,” she says, finally. “Well… goodbye!” Then she rushes off. What happened? Waiting for women’s responses is not something you want to be doing early on in an interaction all that much, at least not until you’re seasoned enough to be able to tell when waiting will work to your advantage and when you ought to keep moving instead. There are two reasons a man might wait for a woman’s reply:
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•
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He’s not sure what to say next, and wants to base his next conversation on her reaction, or He’s not sure if she likes him or not, so wants to gauge her reaction to find out before proceeding
Neither of them, needless to say, communicates anything all that great about the guy. In reason one, he’s uncertain and a bit tentative; in reason two, he’s uncertain, tentative, and unconfident. Let’s look at the other side of the coin. What are the reasons a woman might not reply to a man right away? •
•
• •
She was off in her own world and is a little surprised to suddenly be in a conversation She’s not sure how to respond to what this new man’s just said She didn’t fully understand what he said She hasn’t made up her mind how she wants to react to him yet
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Which of those do you think the man will benefit from this girl having a little extra time to decide? Which do you think him standing there waiting for her to come to a decision on proceeding will be a good thing for him? That's right – none of them. If a girl's surprised or not sure how to respond to a man's opener, it’s often easier for her just to end the conversation and leave. If she didn’t understand, it might feel too awkward to tell him that, so again she may rather just leave. Or if she hasn’t made up her mind how to react, if he stands there waiting while she does so, he doesn’t look terribly good in the process. Why is he standing there waiting to be judged, unless he isn’t confident she’ll judge him a desirable man? Now consider the following scenario: “It’d be a crime if I didn’t come say hello to you when I noticed how ravishing you look. I’m Tim,” a man says to a woman he’s just met. He waits a split second, but no response. “What brings you to the market this fine day?” he asks.
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She smiles softly. “I just wanted to get out of the house and do some shopping,” she replies. “Great,” says Tim, “I know the feeling. How’s your shopping going so far – any big purchases?” He’s gone in, made his strong opening statement, then noticed that she seemed a bit quiet and may have been overwhelmed by his opener for one reason or another. So, he toned things down and asked her a basic situational question. He’ll make a little chit chat with her for a few minutes, then perhaps ask her to accompany him to a shop somewhere to look at something, or if they get along very well he’ll ask her to join him for a coffee or some food. He didn’t wait for her response here; he gave her a split second to reply, so that if she’d been excited and wanted to say something right away, she had the opportunity. Then, he moved onto the next part of the conversation, making the judgment call that if she didn’t have something to jump in with right away, she probably needed more help feeling
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comfortable in the conversation, so he continued things on to help her reach that place of comfort and ease.
Rushing Rushing Through the Opener Sometimes a man would rather burn through his opener and get it over with and get onto the conversation. Understandable; that initial opening can be one of the most nervewracking aspects of meeting women. But just because it’s nerve wracking is no reason to rush through it – while you always want to be moving fast, rushing haphazardly through any stage of your interactions does some things that hurt you. “I saw you here and I said to myself, ‘Wow, now there’s a girl I have to meet.’ You have this really cool way about you. I’m Bill. What’s your agenda tonight? Out drinking or partying or just chilling with the girls? I figured I’d come out and get some fresh air; I’ve been cooped up in the office all week.” First, rushing through an opener can create anxiety for a woman. She picks up on the man’s rush to get
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through it and starts feeling jittery herself. Second, it tends to come off a little strange and confusing – “Why’s he talking like that?” a woman might think to herself. Third, and perhaps most important, when a man throws this much at a woman in quick succession, without letting her get a word in edgewise, it makes her feel like he’s afraid she’ll cut him off and excuse herself if he gives her the chance to. And if a woman feels like a man might fear that, that tells her it happens to him fairly often – which also tells her there must be a good reason other women cut him off and excuse themselves. And so, she picks up on his desire to rush through the opener, and becomes far more likely to excuse herself and leave – as soon as he gives her the chance to, anyway. Finally, even if she doesn’t excuse herself immediately, a woman’s going to be left feeling unconnected from the outset if a man burns through his opener this aggressively. She hasn’t had a chance to participate in the conversation, have her voice heard, or contribute at all; it’s almost as though she’s watching the guy on TV and he’s just going on and on without room for feedback.
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TV isn’t something we use for choosing mates, though. We use it for entertainment, or we change the channel. For a man trying to meet women, “TV” is the last thing he ought to be.
Takeaways Those are the primary mistakes men make when opening. They are: • • • • •
Talking too fast Coming in too hard Projecting expectations Waiting for her response Rushing through the opener
You'll most want to target getting these down: • • • •
•
Talking at a metered pace Coming in smoothly Avoiding the projection of expectations Keeping conversation flowing without necessarily waiting for a response, but Not moving so quickly that a woman can’t get a word in edgewise
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Get these handled and you’re on your way to a very successful opening. But there’s one more thing you can learn that will take your opening to the next level, and that's what the next chapter is all about.
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SLOW OPENING Here it is, the chapter this book was named for. Slow opening is a very specific, very natural way of opening women you can start putting to use right away. It’s simple, natural, and very effective, and it works off one of the same basic principles as chase framing; namely, that a woman is more comfortable with something once she’s encountered it, given time to turn it over in her mind at least briefly, then encountered it again later. Just like when the idea of intimacy with a man is seeded to her gradually and with subtlety, she becomes more open to it, so does opening slowly make a woman more open to a man’s approach. This is something I have worked on for a few years, and it’s quite good when implemented correctly. It goes quite basically like this: Brief genuine Brief situational or low low intensity intensity genuine interest pause, break interest opener opener conversation and let eye contact drift away reopen four to six seconds later, this time fully engaging.
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So, three steps. You make a brief statement engaging a woman, then let the conversation die . Stay quiet for a moment, look away, then reengage, this time beginning the conversation in earnest. Here’s an example of how this looks in an actual interaction: Man :
Well, this is fun, waiting in this long line. Woman : Yeah, really. [pause] Man : What’ve you go there? Man : Woman : Just a few things for a friend having a birthday. Oh, I love birthdays. Lots of cake Man : and ice cream. Booze too, hopefully. Woman : Haha, I don’t know if it’ll be that kind of party. What are you buying? Imagine for a moment that that conversation could begin two ways: one with the pause, and one without. Which one feels more smooth, normal, and natural? The one where the man blazes right in without pausing feels very practiced and as if he’s starting in on the woman. The one with the pause seems as if he was just making a natural remark,
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then realized that, oh, I might actually like to get to know this girl, and began speaking with her again. Here’s another example; this one’s actually how I started a conversation with a very pretty girl I met in an elevator, who went on to become my girlfriend. She was a great girlfriend, very kind and considerate, good career as an architect, and an absolutely killer body. We spent some very good times together, and she helped me to learn a little of the local language. Me : Girl : Me :
Me : Girl : Me : Girl :
Leaving so soon? [smiles, looks away] I’ll take that as a yes. [pause. We take the short elevator ride down together quietly] [as we leave the elevator] How was your night? Good. So I’m guessing you must be from around here. This is your town? I’m from another city. Where are you from?
As it turned out, this girl was quite conservative, and I was the first foreigner she’d ever dated. She said
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that normally when foreign men would talk to her, she’d simply ignore them… but she sensed I was different. She also noted that I seemed quiet, while most of the foreigners she met just talked all the time. This seemed mostly to reference the opener. Had I barreled in there guns blazing like most cats do and gone opener conversation, I likely would’ve come off too strongly for her, no matter how I proceeded, and the two of us would never have gotten together.
Why It Works Women are accustomed to men walking up to them, initiating conversation with them, and then not letting up until the conversation ends, then leaving. Slow opening is a way to break that mold and come in differently, and it says some wonderful things about you. Such as: •
That you’re confident enough to let a conversation die momentarily, and start it back up again. again Most men are like pitbulls; they latch onto a woman and then won’t let her go or let the conversation die out of a
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fear of losing her. Letting her go briefly shows a degree of confidence most men lack. •
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That you’re confident enough to reengage. reengage Most men, the instant a conversation dies, they feel it’s over, and go hang their heads in defeat. When you reengage, you communicate that you’re confident a woman will want to keep talking to you. That you’re intriguing and hard to win over. over Assuming she’s a beautiful woman, most men when they meet her flip out, go crazy, and start chasing immediately. A few guys play it a little more smoothly, and they open her and start talking to her right away, but more calmly. Then a guy like you comes along, makes a brief comment to her, then lets it die… then restarts it again. She doesn’t know exactly why, and one of the ideas she may float in her head is that you only decided you liked her after first speaking with her. When a woman feels she’s won you over a bit, but that winning you over isn’t easy, it makes her feel quite
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special and makes her like you a lot for making her feel that way. And there’s one more thing it does very well for you: •
It puts women on an emotional rollercoaster. rollercoaster An attractive, sexy guy talking to her is very exciting for a woman; and an attractive, sexy guy letting the conversation die before it even got going is very saddening and disappointing. When you reengage, she will be many times more excited than the first time you began speaking to her – it almost feels for her as if she just received a second chance with you. She will appreciate you far more for having had you, then lost you, then having you again, then she would have had she had you from the beginning and never lost you.
That last one’s a doozy, and it’s hard to quantify. But I will attest I’ve seen slow opening work with women that I normally have a very hard time getting to open (like the girl who became my girlfriend). Quiet girls, conservative girls, girls in bad or unsocial moods, girls with very high standards, girls who aren’t sure about you on the
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initial approach – your odds with all these girls improve substantially when you slow open them . No joke, this works.
When to Use It I tend to be a very low energy, relaxed guy, so slow opening very nicely fits my style. I’m not a huge fan of running around going crazy expending huge amounts of energy doing stuff; I prefer to move smoothly, calmly, and… organically, you might say. When you’re operating this way, slow opening works like a dream. It gels perfectly with your vibe, and seems like the most natural thing in the world for you to be doing; far more natural, normally, than opening and launching immediately into followup without a bit of a pause. I wouldn’t advise slow opening when you’re very high energy. If the environment is high energy, but you’re low energy, it can still work; if the girl is high energy, but you’re low energy, it may also still work, although it won’t be as effective.
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If you’re high energy, though, it’s usually going to seem a little strange. What high energy boils down to, basically, if you keep the concept of effort in mind, is someone who’s expending a lot of effort. And if you’re expending a lot of effort, it would seem a little unnatural for you to open a girl, then pause, then resume talking to her. So, slow opening is best used when you yourself are moving at a slow tempo. It’s dynamite then. If you’re feeling energetic or wild, maybe put the slow opening on the backburner until things quiet down a bit.
Things to Keep in Mind Although it’s a fairly straightforward manner of getting to know a woman, there are a few, shall we say, rules of engagement that you’d do well to follow when using this style of conversation initiation. They are as follows.
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Your Y our Statement, or Y First Words Must Be a Statement, You Must Follow Up with One Before Pausing This is essential. You must use statements, not questions. If you begin with a question, you must follow it up with a statement before pausing. I’ve tested this out a number of different ways, and it seems to be that if you first ask a question, whether the girl responds or not, if you do not follow up with a statement, your reopening rates go very far down. I’m not completely sure why this is – my current theory is that it feels more you’ve been thrown off balance, or it feels odd – why did you ask a question, then be quiet after, then reengage? The conversation seems to feel unconcluded without ending on a statement, and therefore the pause feels more like the man paused because he simply didn’t know what to say, rather than because he was naturally concluding the conversation. On the other hand, when you end with a statement, it seems to feel like a natural conclusion to the conversation, and the woman gets that jolt of sadness at seeing it end so early. When you reengage, it’s a welcome return to engagement.
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Wait No More Than Four to Six Seconds to Reengage The most challenging aspect of slow opening for beginners will be the chance of a second bout of hesitation or anxiety before reengaging a girl. This is just something you’ll need to get over and get used to, and recognize that so long as you reengage while feeling a bit of anxiety, your results will necessarily suffer a bit. Don’t dismiss the technique because of this, just work on getting to the point where you can reopen with less anxiety (which will also come naturally once you’re a bit more practiced with the technique and have seen some good results from it). Beyond that, make absolutely certain you’re not waiting any more than six seconds. Beyond that, and your odds of successfully reopening seem to begin a steep decline, the longer you wait before reopening. There is only a limited window to pull the reopen off during; you must be fairly precise.
Avoid VERY Slow Slow Opening
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There might be a temptation, if a woman isn’t fully responsive when you reopen, to give her a few more pauses and ended conversations and reengagements. Don’t fall prey to this way of thinking. Do a slow opening once, and it’ll increase your mystique and allure. Do it twice, and it starts seeming gimmicky. Thrice, and you might as well be a onetrick pony. Slow opening is like a special power, of sorts; you can only use it once with each girl.
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