Friday 23 January 2009

MOVED TO ADVENTURESOFKEYCHAIN.COM!!

Hey guys,

It's official, the blog is moving to ADVENTURESOFKEYCHAIN.COM!!!

All the old articles and reports will be carried over...along with a ton more stuff!

So update your bookmarks and links...we're moving to:

ADVENTURESOFKEYCHAIN.COM

Cya there!

Keys

Monday 12 January 2009

On Rapid Escalation

- Keychain


Every putt is different. Your feet dictate the stroke by how they feel on the green. I just never used the same stroke on every putt. - Jack Nicklaus


Every interaction is different. As I think back over the women I’ve been with, I see pattern and variation. On occasions I’ve met a woman during the day or at a bar, taken her number, met for a date and then slept with her. Other women took a little longer, perhaps we slept together on the second date. Other women took longer still. Using the principles from Mr M and Braddock’s Social Circle Mastery seminar, I’ve slept with women from my social circle after having them on what they call a “slow burn” for some months. None of these results is better or worse than the others, they’re just different.

There are other occasions when I’ve met a woman and slept with her that very same day. I was able to achieve these “fast” results because of my ability to escalate rapidly. This ability consists of:


• Being open to the idea that rapid escalation is possible
• Being able to recognise when a woman is open to rapid escalation (an ability to read her momentum)
• Having the skill and confidence (outer and inner game) necessary to actually escalate quickly
• Having the right logistics to lead the woman to a seduction location

When training clients, I’ve noticed two main sticking points that tend to hold them back: approach anxiety (fear of starting a conversation with a stranger, particularly an attractive woman) and escalation anxiety (fear of moving the interaction forwards or “sexualizing” the interaction). It was endeavoring to tackle the latter with my students that motivated me to systemize much of this material.

Please note, this is a fairly advanced idea that does require a basic level of social and sexual savvy. You should have the ability to carry out an engaging, pleasant conversation with someone without social ticks and excessive nervousness, and you should be meeting and attracting women fairly successfully without wrestling with crippling self-image problems or “running out of things to say”. If you can’t do these things, I recommend closing the proverbial pages of this article and taking care of the ‘first things first’. They are most learnable.

The Overview
Rapid escalation game is a momentum-based approach. A woman’s momentum dictates how fast you can escalate.

A woman’s momentum is how willing she is to follow your lead. Psychologists might call this ‘compliance’. It takes low momentum for her to shake your hand, but higher momentum for her to sleep with you. Momentum can increase or decrease as the interaction unfolds.

As you approach women, you will find various levels of momentum. Some women will allow you to escalate smoothly and quickly to a kiss or pull (taking her home) without showing any social resistance at all, while others may refuse to even talk to you when you approach! It is very helpful to be able to read a woman’s momentum so that you can tailor your escalation to each situation. If there is a lot of momentum in your interaction, you can escalate very quickly. Less momentum will require a more gradual, paced escalation.

Rapid escalation is merely a combination of your desire/ability to escalate and your ability to read the woman’s level of momentum. When you truly get to the level of intuitively sensing how fast you can escalate with each individual woman, you will naturally be reading a combination of physical momentum and a variety of other signals of her interest in you.

I don’t specifically test for momentum as a distinct act. Every act of leading is a compliance test, so the best way to gauge momentum is just to escalate and pay attention. As you do, take note of how easily she follows your lead. Think of momentum testing like a speedometer on a car – it is not something you turn on and off, it constantly reacts to the car’s speed and displays its measurement. As you get more and more experience, you’ll eventually get a feel for the speed of your interaction.


“Feeling” Momentum

You may never know what results come of your action, but if you do nothing there will be no result.
-Mahatma Gandhi


When you first taste wine it just tastes like wine, you either like it or you don’t. As you become more experienced and educated about wine, you begin to make finer and finer distinctions with the information your senses are sending to you. You begin to detect the nuances of the flavor and how one wine differs from the next.

Learning by experience is about interpreting the information in your environment with finer and finer distinctions. As you become more experienced and educated, you begin to interpret each interaction better. Patterns and right-action arise from the wash of confusion and guesswork.
If I was to summarize the escalation learning process in one sentence it would be this: If you haven’t already, have a go at escalating really hard and fast and see what happens. Try this, you may blow a few sets but the finer distinctions are worth it. Here’s why:


• When most guys do the above, they are very often surprised at how much momentumthey find
• Most guys then realize that they don’t escalate as much as they could. Ask yourself, when was the last time you were blown out from over-escalating (has that ever happened)?
• For one reason or another, most guys don’t ever escalate to the point of blow-out and so never reach the limit of a woman’s momentum. They never really learn to feel where it is.
• If you don’t learn to feel the limit of a woman’s momentum, you can’t reliably gauge where she’s at.
• If you can’t gauge her momentum, you can’t escalate based on it.
• Therefore, your escalations very often fall short. They are based on what you think you can/should do rather than on an understanding of what you actually can do

Some How-To

Here are practical tips on how to escalate that will serve you well in-field.

o

Lead strongly from outset. The purpose here is to establish a lead-follow pattern and to get a feel for the woman’s current momentum. For example, my friend Sasha and I were on the street doing some daytime approaches. Sasha was talking to two women, I joined him. He introduced me and made it clear which was the one he wanted. As I shook the hand of the other woman, I just held onto her hand and drew her gently towards me, immediately taking the lead. I pulled her in close, spun her and draped her arms around my neck. We were face-to-face at this point, and she didn’t flinch away. Based on this, I tried for the kiss but couldn’t connect. At this point, I had hit the ceiling of her momentum, so we talked some more (still embracing), baby-stepped some more physical leading and tried again. Still no go. On the third attempt, her friend looked over from Sasha’s arms and shouted, “Just kiss him, he’s hot!” That social permission was just what she needed, and we kissed.

o Ladder the acts of leading. If you go for an act of leading, don’t worry if she does not follow. Just baby-step smaller, more palatable requests until she warms to your original intention. While doing daytime approaches in Oslo, I approached a stunning blond woman with a direct opener. She stopped, I transitioned off the opener by asking if she was Norwegian, she said yes. I hugged her (immediately establishing touch) and said, “Awesome, I love Norwegians!” As I continued talking, I moved to a bench nearby, “Come sit”’ (immediate leading) This was a fairly bold act of leadership considering the brevity of our interaction. She walked towards me but did not sit. Unphased, I simply baby-stepped the momentum with “Give me your hands…turn them over…hmm, okay…come sit”’ And she sat. The physical leading in itself didn’t make a lot of sense and I didn’t bother explaining why I wanted to see her hands. I was just laddering stages to get the momentum for her to sit with me.

o Escalate on an emotional spike. Another way to gain ground quickly during rapid escalation is to physically escalate on an emotional spike. For instance, if you want to move your woman to another location on the street and she doesn’t feel comfortable doing so, wait a while. Make her laugh and, as she feels that good emotion, take her hand and lead her, “Come on, let’s go to the bar.” When you hit a woman’s momentum threshold, you can withdraw some of the physical touching (a “takeaway”) so that she misses the connection you already have. Then when your emotional spike hits and you reinitiate escalation, it will be even better received.

o Dominant / Physical – Anyone who has been having sex with a woman and, in the throws of passion, has pinned their woman’s arms above her head for sexy effect will know that many women respond well to physical dominance. You can use this principle outside of the bedroom too.
Examples of physical dominance include taking a woman by the hips and pulling her close, physically lifting her up, catching a woman’s arm as she passes to stop her in a crowded club.

Teaching a bootcamp in London, I was talking to a woman with one of our clients. Some way into the conversation, she asked me to guess her age. She hopped off her stool and did a little spin for me (a pattern I had established earlier). I looked her up and down, pretending to mull over how old she was. I took her by her hips and pulled her sharply into me. I whispered softly in her ear, “I think…you’re twenty-six.” Then I released her.

This act of physical dominance had a profound effect on her. It was an unexpected move, and quite excessive for the topic of conversation. But it demonstrated an animal dominance that she found very arousing. Physical escalation does not necessarily have to have anything to do with what you’re actually talking about. You can make escalation jumps, take charge, test her momentum and spike her emotions all with your physical communication, while verbally talking about every day topics.

o For best effect you should have an authentic intent. Escalate and approach women that you are genuinely attracted to and all of your interactions will line up far more congruently.

o Don’t draw excessive attention to the escalation. This is a widely known point on escalation, and worth mentioning here. For more on this, check out Magic Bullets.

o Tests. As you escalate, you will encounter ”congruence tests.” The woman is attracted and she wants to test to make sure that you’re as solid a man as you seem. It’s like standing at the bottom of a mountain and giving your rope a tug before trusting your weight to it. She wants to know that you’re not putting up a front because she’s attracted – it’s a positive sign! Magic Bullets has excellent advice on dealing with these kinds of tests.


In Conclusion


Blow me or blow me out. - Brad P

Your mission as a learner, should you choose to accept it, is to go out and escalate a bunch of interactions to the point of blowout. Find that point. Really zone in on escalation until you begin to obtain those finer distinctions. Escalate, escalate, escalate and let experience redefine your ideas about escalation.

When you get to the point where you can accurately read a woman’s momentum you can tailor your “game” to suit. Approach the women you’re attracted to. Some will be open and invest in your escalation so go rapid. If she’s less so, play solid game and shoot for the phone number, and setting up a date. Learn slow burn style from Braddock and Mr.M and add that to your arsenal for long term pulls. Rapid escalation is a part of your overall skill set to be used with calibration when the situation requires it.

That said, it really is fantastic fun!

Enjoy!

Keys

Tuesday 16 December 2008

Forming the Approach Habit

Forming the Approach Habit


- Keychain


‘We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit.’ Aristotle


Most of us are awake and moving about the world during the day far more than at night. We shop, we work, we eat and we travel. For those of us who live in or near a populated area like a city, there are lots of opportunities to meet beautiful women in the daytime.

When I first arrived at university, I would go out at night with my friends to meet girls. Perhaps three or four times a week we would hit the club and spend hours approaching groups of women and hitting on them. Later, after finding the community and armed with new knowledge, I would increase this practice and often go alone to bars and clubs to meet new people and exercise my social muscle. I felt nervous at first but after a couple of approaches in an evening this feeling would fade. After that, it was as if my motor was running, I’d have a sense of flow, excitement and social lubrication. After those initial nervous conversations, I felt acclimatised to approaching strangers and could work on other aspects of my game beyond the opening.

Inevitably, the night would end, with all its various ups and downs. I’d go to sleep, wake up in the morning. Lo and behold, the next time I went out to the bar, that fear of approach was once again back to bother me.

Going out for a big session of ‘sarging’, as the community slang refers to it, is great for practicing core aspects of your game but something we are not practicing as intensely is overcoming that initial reluctance to approach, often referred to as ‘approach anxiety’. This is simply because after a couple of interactions, this feeling fades. After that initial warm-up period, we usually find the social motor is running, we’re having fun and opening without too much worry. It doesn’t last. Every time we go out, this feeling tends to crop up to be overcome once again.

It is generally accepted that this is just the way it must be. The oft-prescribed solution is to ‘burn’ through some warm-up sets to get in the right mood. But what if it was possible to greatly minimise that feeling of nervousness over time so that you could generate the momentum to approach at any time to wish without the need to ‘warm up’? What if there was a way to form a habit of approaching beautiful girls?

Picture the scene, you’re shopping for groceries, on public transport or walking down the street and you see a beautiful girl. You don’t have the advantage of the mental run-up from making a conscious decision to ‘go sarging’, you have no wingmen to spur you on, you can’t just burn through two or three sets to get on a roll and then approach the girl. You’re just going about your daily life and ‘bam!’, a hot girl appears! Do you approach? Can you approach?

Forming the Approach Habit.

‘Approach the first hot girl you see every day. It will change your life.’ – Sasha


Begin an interaction with a stranger, preferably a beautiful woman, everyday. This begins to form an approach habit – the daily habit of initiating conversation with someone from cold. Over time, this habit can become so ingrained that it will actually feel strange not to approach a hot girl. The energy that you previously experienced as fear and panic will morph into excitement, playfulness and enjoyment.

This will not only help you greatly minimise approach anxiety, but the daily routine will have you meeting more girls than ever before.


Training Your Eye

Forming the approach habit will also go a long way towards training your eye to become aware of the opportunities already present in your surroundings. If you know you need to approach at least one girl in your lunch break for instance, you get good at noticing the attractive girls all around you.

It is not unusual, a week or so into this, for students to say things along the lines of, ‘I never realised there were so many hot girls around here!’ Sometimes we can work and live in an area for years without realising the opportunities all around us.


Don’t Run the Perfect Set

Don’t worry about running the perfect set in every one of these interactions. At first, don’t even worry about continuing the conversation. If you are short on time, just make your daily interaction a quick one. Remember, we are forming the approach habit. For this purpose, it is more important at first to approach than to close. Don’t let the pressure of ‘what do I say next’ and ‘what if…’ questions dissuade you from taking action.

When you spot that girl, and you get that feeling of ‘I should/could/can/want to approach her’ – go talk to her. If it lasts ten seconds or ten minutes, it doesn’t matter – just approach. Form the approach habit.


Avoid Burnout

‘Habit is habit and not to be flung out of the window by any man, but coaxed downstairs a step at a time.’ Mark Twain

It’s much like joining a gym. In the first flush of enthusiasm and novelty, the temptation is to go very frequently and stay for hours, working really hard. But continue down this road and it is very likely you’ll experience burn out. You lose your motivation and weeks go by before you darken the gym door again (if at all!). It is much more sensible (and healthy) to do shorter workouts and ration that drive for the long haul health benefits of regular exercise.

Consider this point when embarking on your mission to form the approach habit. One a day for a month is far better than ten in two days, burning out and flaking for the rest of the month.


Find Your Window

Look at your lifestyle, find the window of time where you can make your daily approach and stick to it. For me, I had a long commute, so I would use the train journey and approach at least one girl on the way into London and one on the way out of London. For you’re your lunch break might be and ideal time. Whatever it is, find your window.


Scale It Up
It can feel more challenging to approach during the day without a wing to encourage you.

If you’re alone and feeling nervous, just take off some pressure. Scale the opener you use – if you’re petrified, you don’t have to start direct and ballsy, start more situational and low-key. For example, a functional opener such as, ‘Hey excuse me, do you know if there’s a Starbucks around here?’ is much easier to muster the courage to deliver than ‘I saw you from across the street and I just had to come say hi…because I think you’re gorgeous!’ If you gradually scale up your material, just as you would add weight to your bench press routine, you will be able to deliver the latter opener with ease and enthusiasm.


Fashion

If you’re going to form this habit, be ready. Always leave the house dressed well, whatever that means for your lifestyle. Throw out your bad clothes so you won’t be tempted to wear them – don’t let the fact that you’re dressed badly be an excuse to not approach. Dressing well has a positive impact on your interactions with everyone in your life.


Wing/Mentor

Your daily approaches should be done solo for maximum growth, but it can help to have a wing or accountability buddy who will check in with you every day to make sure you’ve done your approach. This added motivation can give you the kickstart you need to start forming the habit.


Conclusion
Does this mean no more sarging? No!

‘Sarging’ is great for getting your game tight – perhaps your attraction phase needs tweaking or your comfort game lacks connection. Go out, hit the clubs and bars, do a ton of sets. The trick is to combine this with daily approaching to build and sustain the approach habit and you’ll go a long way towards achieving your relationship goals.

I often think of the ability to approach as a muscle. For every approach you make, you grow that muscle. For every approach you back out of, you weaken it.

Make those approaches, build your courage. The results may very well astound you.

Good luck!

Keys

On High Value First Impressions

Hey guys,

Here's an article that LSi readers may well recognise. It appeared in its own edition, sent out just before the Winter 2008 SuperConference. It covers some of my experiences learning Social Circle Mastery (guys, take this seminar!) from Mr.M during Project Rockstar...as well as some really awesome practical tips. Here it is shared here for your enjoyment

Keys

On High Value First Impressions


- Keychain



'Drop everything. Come learn from the best and BE the best.'

When I got the call from Mr. M announcing that I was 'in' and destined to become a member of Project Rockstar... I was ecstatic. I couldn't believe that I was chosen. I was excited about all of the amazing things we were going to learn, all the amazing instructors we would meet, and all the beautiful women we'd be trained to attract! And so I dropped everything, disappeared off the radar for two months and took my first step into a new world...

During gruelling theory sessions, lasting up to eight hours in length, Mr. M schooled us in the closely guarded principles of Social Circle Mastery, a system that teaches men how to build a large, high-value social circle filled with beautiful women. It's about complete social mastery - social dynamics as applied to both men and women... and how to ascend to the very top of the social ladder. At the highest levels, it's like having Jedi powers.

Mr. M spoke a lot about how powerful social dynamics were when applied to situations outside of seduction. He stated that once you have mastered the realm of seducing hot women, you begin to realize that what you have learned has far greater and more important implications for success in the rest of your life.

For example, one of the key lessons of Social Circle Mastery is the power of the 'first impression' and more importantly, how to properly deliver one when trying to build rapport with a high value individual (this could be a celebrity, a millionaire, or generally a person with high social status in any given situation). When two high value individuals first meet, there typically is a subtle exchange of verbal and non-verbal cues that allow each party to recognise the other's social status. Malcolm Gladwell calls this 'thin slicing' in the award winning book 'Blink,' which Mr. M recommended to us. These go unnoticed by the vast majority of people, but to those with a high degree of social intelligence, 'the 10s of life,' these cues are as clear as day.
So how do you meet a high value person and develop the kind of mutual respect that is the foundation for a healthy long term friendship?

In this article I'll share some insights into this very topic, as taught to us in those closed-door sessions by Mr. M (note that the technology was devised by both Mr. M and Braddock - Braddock is the other half of the mad genius pair that came up with Social Circle Mastery).

Establish Respect

The first thing to do in an interaction is to establish a solid platform of mutual respect. In this phase, it is crucial to avoid a negative 'thin slice.'

Upon making first impressions, there are usually two big mistakes that people make.
1. Trying to demonstrate higher value immediately - or 'trying too hard.'


Don't show all of your value up front. If you immediately start trying to impress the other person by talking about all the cool things in your life, you're playing a risky game. It is this kind of rapport seeking, try-hard behavior that distinguishes the 'not quite there' crowd to the top 10%. Consider this. The up-and-coming bank investor can't wait to tell you about all the money he is responsible for and all the money he makes. But the owner of the bank, if he mentions what he does for a living at all, is just 'in finance' when asked what he does. He doesn't feel the need to parade his goods for all to see.

2. Don't defer to the other person's value.

Most people make too much of a big deal out of recognising the 'main value proposition' of the other person. The main value proposition is exactly that - the single most valuable aspect about the person. So, for example, for Justin Timberlake, it would be his music or fame. For a millionaire, it would be his business.

The key, as taught to us by Mr. M, is to recognise their 'major value proposition' on a 'throw and go' basis. So for example, to a music celebrity, simply saying, 'Hey man, I like your music' is sufficient. People typically meet celebrities and 'emotionally overreach' (a topic covered in Mr. M and Braddock's new Inner Game Seminar). For example, they get hugely emotional and gush about how much they love that actor's movies, or how they listen to this music star's album every day. This tactic may well get a smile, a handshake or even a couple of seconds of appreciative dialogue with that person, but it is very unlikely to result in mutual respect or much, if any, desire for further contact. The key to building MUTUAL respect is then to qualify and relate to that person on topics outside of their main value proposition... and to find ways in which you can add value.

To round off, let me share a fantastic quick tip that you can put to work immediately. If a person is of significantly higher value than you, while it is crucially important to respect them, it is also important to neutralize their value by not putting too much emphasis on it. In fact, according to Mr. M and Braddock, you can take the concept of neutralizing another person's value a step further. The concept of neutralizing a person's value is similar in some ways to teasing a woman you just met. When you approach a beautiful woman in a coffee shop or in a bar, you shouldn't focus your conversation on her physical beauty. [If you are doing this, stop reading now, go to the Magic Bullets page, and download the free chapters. You need to be familiar with it so you can access the advanced stuff we're all moving into.] To do so would focus on her value so much that she'd feel like you put her on a pedestal and that you were not of equal or higher value (unless you were using a properly executed direct approach).

With high value people - men or women - focus away from the main source of value. This will help you build rapport. If you subtly encourage people to qualify themselves to you on other topics, you tacitly increase your own value in their eyes. This is because people generally don't encourage others to qualify themselves... unless you are a high-value person yourself! By getting a person to qualify to you, even subtly, it equalizes value on a certain level.

The application of advanced qualification to social situations as expounded in Social Circle Mastery is obviously far more complex than what I have covered above - this is just one basic implication. And to sum up, here's the big take-away point to remember:

The next time you meet a high-value individual, whether it's in the club or in the boardroom, focus on making an effective first impression with these elements. To internalize these behaviors takes practice and a degree of inner game confidence but it's worth it. To be able to communicate on the same level with that top 10% and develop a relationship with them to build your amazing social circle is a skill that trickles down to every area of your life -not just to meeting and attracting beautiful women (although it applies very much to this as well)!

Enjoy,

Keys

Saturday 22 November 2008

Massage Esclation

Hey guys,

At a recent London bootcamp, I explained to a student a particular massage routine that I use to escalate an interaction, particularly in the bedroom. He wanted it for his library so asked me to write him an article on it. I, of course, obliged and here it is for you guys! :)


Massage Escalation


- Keychain



Have you ever taken a girl home, you thought sex was on the cards…but she ends up sleeping in your bed, with you in it, but without any sexual activity taking place at all? That’s right, both of you in bed, but no sex happening?

This used to happen to me all the time. I’d open, attract, qualify, run great comfort…run a good solid interaction. We’d day2 and it would go great. The girl would end up in my room and it was so on! But…what to do now? I’d feel awkward, unsure of what to do next, in the dark about how to escalate to sex. And, sure enough, we’d both wind up in bed. Together. Half naked. Sleeping. BUT NO SEX!

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Here are some key pointers to help solve this sticky sticking point and put you both on track to having a much more enjoyable evening:

Kino early – this breaks down the touch barrier and gets both of you used to touching each other. If you aren’t touching each other throughout your interaction, it’s extremely unlikely you’ll end up sleeping together. There’s lots of great advice on kino in the community, it’s a key part of the LoveSystems dating science.


#(A word from my experience: a lot of guys remember to kino during the initial approach but forget to re-initiate the touch on the day2 – don’t make this mistake! Assuming you’ve built attraction and run good game, good kino and a healthy dose of physical leading are all you really need to escalate to sex.)#

Close the distance - you need some way to get at least within kissing range to start getting down to the practical act of sex.


Let’s focus on the second point: closing the distance. A great way to close the distance and begin escalating towards sex is massage.

Often I’ll seed this during the date itself, setting a qualifying frame around her ability to give good massages. It then feels perfectly natural to call back to this an initiate massage later. Here’s a typical way I run this:

‘Are you good at massage? Not bad I actually learned massage as a kid. I takes a lot of body awareness to be good at massage, you have to be really in touch with your own body before you can really ‘get’ how your touch is affecting someone else, you know?’

And then take your hand away, lean back and say, ‘Cool, you’re pretty good.’ Or put a big smile on your face and playfully exclaim, ‘No, no, no…that’s terrible! Here, let me show you…’ take her hand and begin to massage it.

The astute among you will recognise elements of:

• Teasing
• Qualification
• DHV’ing your own body awareness (trust me, the connections here with great sex are not lost on girls)
• Building comfort through touch
• Push pull as you release the massage (particularly applicable in a date/cold approach scenario)

You can run this routine in the club or in the bedroom. In the club, it’s a handy piece that works well in qualification and comfort. In the bedroom, it’s perfect for closing the distance. From the hand, you can move to massaging the neck, shoulders and upper back (or actually start there, ‘Here, rub my shoulders.’ I often have a girl sit down at my computer to search for a funny clip on Youtube, stand behind her and casually start rubbing her shoulders as an ‘in’ to the routine).

You can have the girl lie down, tell her to remove her top to let you massage her better. Give her a really nice massage, throw some oil on there, some nice music. After a while, she’ll be making lovely ‘mmm’ noises and you’ll feel that escalation window open up for you. Pause the massage, start kissing her neck and back, escalating from there on in. In my experience, this process is so natural that LMR rarely makes an appearance.

Photobucket

A caveat, if you use this routine in the bedroom, we’ll assume that the girl is attracted to you. After all, you’ve just been on a date, or you’ve met at a bar and you’ve both ended up at your house. It’s on etc…I obviously wouldn’t recommend using this on a girl who isn’t into you. It might still work but that’s hardly the point! ;-)

So, next time you have a girl in your room and you know it’s time to take things in a sexual direction, try out this little number and have fun…

Enjoy!

Keys

Keychain Joins LoveSystems

Hey guys,

Keychain here. :) So you guys know I got back from LA a couple of weeks ago where I was helping out at the LoveSystems SuperConference, hanging with my buddies Sasha and Yen and generally causing mischief (including partying at Style's place with Neil, Mystery, Matador, original-Sin etc...) There are a bunch of FR's online about our antics out there...gonna throw some up on here eventually. Well, Savoy and I have been emailing back and forth since then, trying to find a time for a phonecall. Last night our diaries finally clicked and we had the call...

Savoy has officially offered me the LoveSystems instructor gig...

Truth be told, I feel very honoured by the invitation. The London LoveSystems team are great friends, rolemodels and awesome guys. Meeting the excellent international instructors in LA sealed the deal for me.

Cool ey?! Well chuffed :)

Keys

Sunday 5 October 2008

Keys on Fashion

Hey guys, how’s your fashion? I’ve met a lot of guys who have questions and struggles when it comes down to getting a good look together. It’s something I definitely had to work on myself.

We all know that fashion isn’t everything, but I’m sure we can all agree that having a good look certainly helps when meeting women. It’s a bit like taking the bricks out of your suitcase.

Photobucket

In light of this, I thought I’d share some of my thoughts on fashion for you guys…

I have found that when learning pick-up, it is useful to learn how to create your own style of interaction - to get the best long-term results, I found it most helpful to try various things and, through a process of constant learning and experimentation, find the particular combination that works best.

For instance, I model my voice tone and vocal delivery on Mystery, but there are strong elements of Sasha, LondonSoul and Zan in there too...the result? My own way of talking that is unique and works for me. How did I get there? I copied Mystery loads until I truly understood what it was about his delivery that worked so well...and then I added in a bunch of other influences (much of which happened just by hanging around guys with great vocal delivery) and the result was my own thing.

The process is IMITATE, ASSIMILATE, INNOVATE.

So it is in fashion. Mimick someone with great fashion, yes. Copy him, yes. Then begin to understand why it is his particular fashion works - elements that make that look so successful. Then innovate with that and come up with your own thing.

This is how many lots of people learn skills – be it game or tennis. We find role models. It's common sense. Here’s a great way to apply this approach to fashion that I personally found really helpful:

First, create a folder on your computer desktop called: Fashion.

Second, jump onto google. Google some celebrities that you think have a great look - if you're not sure, go for pretty much anyone really on the A-list. Check out their style - I looked specifically at movie stars, musicians, television personalities etc... Search their names and click on the IMAGES option in google, so you can see lots of pictures of those people. Look through and save to your Fashion folder any photos of those people where you think they look cool, have good fashion, a great look etc... whatever it may be. Go by what you like and you'll have a portfolio of people with a variety of great looks to choose from.

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Third, choose an image with a look that you think you could replicate, something you could identify with and think is really cool. Maybe it's a shot of Brad Pitt on a talk show or of some rockstar from a VH1's 'Behind the Music' episode. Then, go out with that picture and start shopping for that outfit - you can get loads of great items for really knock-down prices. You don't have to shop for the exact items in the picture, just use the image as a template and work around it. Ask sales assistants for advice, show them the look you're after.

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Some extra tips on fashion

• Start small. Don't buy too much at once. Getting your fashion together is a learning curve and even with a template you will occasionally buy something that, when you get it home, you realise was such a bad idea! That's okay, it's part of your education, you can usually return it to the store anyway.

• Try on at least two items that are definitely not you - two very 'fashionable' items that you could never see yourself wearing. Often, when I have done this, I have found stuff that really works and that I'd have never considered had I strictly been shopping for 'my thing'.

• Have a look around you. Chances are you know some guys with a great fashion sense. Have a look at them and think, what is it about their look that works? Get specific. Notice the combination of top, jeans, shoes and accessories - anything around the neck, wrists? What are the colours? Copy them.


I hope some of these ideas have grabbed you or inspired you to take a fresh look at fashion. These ideas are great starting points to get your eye trained to notice a good look when you see it. When you get used to noticing good fashion, you’ll start to see it all around you and have lots of reference points for your own look.

Happy shopping guys!

Keys

PS
: Commenters, let’s list some of the stores you shop at for clothing, especially if there are great bargains there!