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Banter queen November 26, 2006

Posted by Niels in : Dating coach, Personal , 17 comments

She was a stunning blonde girl from Germany. It was an exclusive release party for a new energy drink, the girls there were some of the hottest I’d seen in New York yet, and she was at the top of the heap.

She passed me in the doorway leading out to the patio. “That’s not the password!” I said as she came inside. She started giggling. I continued, “You remember what happened the last time I let you through! They took me out back and gave me fifty lashes…” I was going to add “with a wet noodle” but she joined in too quickly: “Well, you should have learned your lesson then!” It was on. I took her hands and led her out of the doorway so we could talk.

We bantered for a while. A LONG while. This girl threw out a constant stream of harder banter than anyone I’ve dealt with yet. It took everything I had to keep ahead of her, and everything I had left to finally drag her into rapport 45 minutes later. I knew I had to do it though. She was so good at banter, I knew she’d done this a lot. If I didn’t make an emotional connection I’d blend right into all the other guys she met that night. Flake city.

Her: “I’m only looking for a rich guy to support me.”
Me: “Really? Me too! I go through the mail-order husband magazines, and if they don’t have four dollar signs by their name, I don’t even bother.”

Her: “Are you going to buy me jewelry?”
Me: “I think you’ve got me confused with your rich husband. I’m going to be your boy toy on the side, remember?”
Her: “Ok, you can be my sex slave”
Me: “You want to be my sex slave? That’s a bit forward, you’ve got to buy me dinner or something first.”
Her: “I’ll buy you dinner at McDonalds.”
Me: “Ok, but I want one of those apple pies, or there’s no deal.”

Me: “I’m starting a men’s magazine.”
Her: “About sex with animals?”
Me: “Now, see, this is exactly why I can’t take you anywhere.”

Me: “Nice outfit.” (belly poke)
Her: “Oh, you think it would look good on you?”
Me: “You have no idea. I make those clothes look SO good. I actually thought about wearing that tonight, but I didn’t want you to have to see me in it. I don’t want to make you feel bad about yourself!”

Me: “What are you doing tomorrow?”
Her: “I’m off to the Hamptons. [summer homes for ridiculously rich people]”
Me: “You know, I just can’t get as excited about my place in the Hamptons once it gets this cold.”
Her: “I’m taking the helicopter up there.”
Me: “A helicopter?! I take my own personal Concorde. It’s like a 15 second trip.”

I was running a lot of attraction tests on this girl and for most of them got nothing. But every bone in my body told me she was into me. It was strange at first, but I have seen this before. It was from a different girl who eventually revealed to me that she was really inexperienced. She had also thrown out a lot of tests, a defense mechanism to protect herself from getting dragged into a sexual arena she was unfamiliar with. I suspect it’s the same with German girl - the constant banter is a wall she’s put up for some reason. I’ll get the details on our Day 2 - a loud club isn’t the right time to go there. Still, I was certain she was attracted, or else I wouldn’t have committed myself to the number:

Me: “OK, give me your number.”
Her: “Talk to me for five more minutes, then I’ll give you it.”
Me: “Tell you what. You give it to me now, and if you hate me in five minutes, I’ll delete it.”
Her: “I don’t remember my number. Give me yours.”
Me: “Ok.” I take her phone, type in my number, call my phone. (credit jaykay) “Looks like we’re going out after all.”

Despite all the tests, it’s in rapport where this game is won or lost. If I can make an emotional connection with her, I’ll be different from every other guy in this bar. If not, this will be just another flake.

Me: “OK, mysterygirl, tell me something about yourself.”
Her: “What do you want to know?”
Me: “What’s your dream job.”
Her: “When I was two I wanted to be that guy with the red suit who gives out presents…”
Me: “Oh… You wanted to be Santa Claus!”
Her: “Hee hee! Yeah!”
Me: (look her directly in the eye, HARD energy drop) “What’s your dream job NOW?”
Her: *pause* “A fashion designer.”
Me: “Hmm… I get the sense you can see beauty in things where other people can’t.”
Her jaw dropped. Then she recovered.
Her: “What?”
I repeated myself.
Her: “Say that again?”
It was loud, so I did.
Her: “OK, one more time, louder, so everybody can hear.”
Damn! She’s messing with me. She’s uncomfortable - no one’s connected with her like this before.
Me: “Nope, that’s all you get. You’re such trouble!” I stare her down. “I don’t know who your boyfriend is, but he is NOT spanking you enough!”
She’s got no comeback for that one! But double damn, now I gotta pull her back down into rapport all over again.
Me: (*long pause*, another HARD energy drop) “It’s so important to find something you’re passionate about.”
Her: (actually interested now) “What are you passionate about?”
Nice. Back into rapport. This is where I want to be. As I open myself to her, she’ll be more comfortable opening up to me.

Later, a guy she knew came up and said “hi”. She pulled him in, I introduced myself, and she further talked me up to him very excitedly. He was a very cool, alpha guy and we vibed. I couldn’t figure out their relationship. He was too cool and aloof to be an orbiter, too familiar with her to be just a friend, but totally unthreatened by me. I remembered how Sean Deacon and his old girlfriend used to go to bars to flirt with everyone in sight, just to get their motors running and go home together. Am I just getting messed with here?

I ask her how they know each other. “Oh, we’re married,” she says. Aargh! More banter! Well, gotta roll with it. I turn to the guy. “You poor guy! I bet this girl (poke her belly) gives you all sorts of trouble!” He laughs. “Oh, yeah!”

New guy pulls another girl he knows into the set. She’s too old for me, but we click instantly and start laughing together like old friends. I wonder if new guy pulled her in just to occupy me, but I don’t get that vibe. I honestly feel like he was just introducing two people that he thought were cool. I feel like I’ve taken rapport as deep with my German girl as it’s going to go, so I’m cool with just talking to the new girl. I do notice German girl withdrawing into herself. She can sling harsh banter like no one I’ve ever met, but she’s not comfortable just vibing. Interesting.

I keep talking to new girl for a while, then tell her to hold on for a moment. I turn around, hug German girl and tell her bye. “What?!” she says. “I saw that little head bob, ” I said. “You guys are heading out.” “No! We’re staying here for a while!” Cool. She likes me. I turn back to new girl and keep vibing with her. This goes for a little while with the two pairs merging and splitting, merging and splitting.

Eventually German girl does need to leave. I shake hands with new guy, another hug for German girl. “Call me!” she says. “We’ll do coffee!”

Lessons learned:
1) Bitch shield? What bitch shield? Everything she does is cute. She was playing - with the one guy in the bar confident enough to play back at her.
2) All the attraction game in the world won’t cut it if you can’t drop into rapport. The first five minutes of banter set me apart from everybody else, but it was seeing something special in her that no one else saw that blew her mind.
3) “Yes, and…” rocks my world. What’s “Yes, and…”? Take an improv class or ask one of our instructors…

Your thoughts?

Landmark strikes back November 25, 2006

Posted by Niels in : Links , 2 comments

I recently posted a link to a French documentary that shines a spotlight on some of Landmark’s more disturbing practices.  According to The Truth about Human Potential Seminars, Landmark is hunting down the source of the documentary.  (There’s 60 million people in France.  I’m sure any one of several hundred thousand people have the capability to record a TV show and post it to the internet.)

Landmark Education subpoenaed the Internet Archive, Google Video and YouTube to reveal the identity of who uploaded the France TV 3 video on the Landmark Forum.

-Enric Cirne

Your thoughts?

Happy Turkey Day! November 23, 2006

Posted by Niels in : Personal , add a comment

I’m thankful to be spending it with friends and family.  I’m thankful for my health, and for my health insurance.  I’m thankful that I have options to fall back on to pay my bills.  I’m thankful that I have a fulfilling social life and that I’m finally in control of my relationships.  I’m thankful that I don’t have to worry about where my next meal is coming from.  I’m thankful for my natural talents and a supportive family that allowed me to make the most of them.  And I’m thankful to have their support as I search for my passions in life.

Your thoughts?

Look out DC, here I come! November 22, 2006

Posted by Niels in : Personal , add a comment

On the road again…

I get a free trip home for the holidays, courtesy of the Washington, D.C. Art of Attraction workshop.  Totally sweet!  I don’t get to have Thanksgiving with my family that often anymore.

Your thoughts?

I’m a grad school dropout November 20, 2006

Posted by Niels in : Graduate school, Personal , 10 comments

Actually, I was already a grad school dropout.  When I took this semester off because my internship ran late, I technically withdrew from Berkeley.  If I went back this spring, I would have had to apply for readmission.  It would have been a formality, but still a bit of red tape that I would have had to deal with.

But after a great deal of thought, I’ve decided not to come back to school in the spring. I came to grad school in the first place because my job offers coming out of college simply didn’t appeal to me.  Once in grad school, I realized that I wasn’t going to end up in academia, leaving research in industry as the obvious choice.  But my summer internship made it clear I wasn’t happy there, either.  In retrospect, perhaps I should have seen this coming, given how miserable I was at all my previous internships in industry, from Cray to ViaSat to Army Research Labs.

More to the point, I looked at the people around me at work and couldn’t see any role models.  There wasn’t anyone with a lifestyle that I could look at and say, “Wow, I hope I end up like him.”

So I had a talk with my advisor today, and he agreed that taking a break from grad school is a good option for me now.  He was incredibly supportive and told me that life was too short to finish a Ph.D. just for the sake of finishing a Ph.D.  Plus, I’m still young.  Life doesn’t have to follow a linear path.

Having such a supportive advisor actually makes me want to stay longer.

But that’s that.  I’m done with grad school for the time being.  Perhaps I’ll discover what I want to do and realize that I really need a Ph.D. after all.  And I’ll come back motivated to finish, which will make the work much more pleasant.  Or maybe I’ll find my true calling and learn that I’ve been in the wrong line of work all this time.  The next phase of my life is a blank slate and I’m excited.

Your thoughts?