Excuses… Get Rid Of Them!

[Rokker]

A problem I see at every bootcamp, almost every 1 on 1 and whenever I meet someone in the community is that they all are VERY good at coming up with excuses why not to improve their game. Huh? Don’t they want to improve their game? Of course they do! It’s just that they come up with excuses all the time why not to approach, why not to go out that night, why everything is stacked against them, why they’ll never be good at game… and thus find excuses why not to improve their game. If you can stop making excuses and focus your attention towards what you want to achieve instead of finding reasons why you won’t reach that goal, you are almost guaranteed success.

Pushing yourself out of your comfort zone
Yes, this can be painful sometimes. That’s why game is a hard (and therefore also very rewarding) skill to learn, because you simply have to do it. Now here’s where the excuses show their ugly face. We instinctively try to keep ourselves within our comfort zone, probably as an ingrained survival mechanism, and will find whatever reason we can to do so. Now the irony of it all is that the comfort zone you’re in is probably a zone you desperately want to get out of. You might feel terrible about your life because you have no women in it, but that’s now your comfort zone and you are petrified to break out of it and do something that’s out of that comfort zone.

Now if we can push ourselves (even if it might sting a bit) and integrate being really social and talking to women constantly (or whatever else we want to bring into our lives) then that will eventually become part of our comfort zone and not a big deal anymore…

There’s really only one way to break out of the shackles and expand your comfort zone, and that is to “kill the excuse generator” (concept name stolen from Captain Jack, who’s written a post about a similar thing at his blog)

Kill the excuse generator
So how do you kill the excuse generator? Well, first of all you must beware that you will constantly try to trick yourself. The excuses come in all kind of forms… some harder to spot than others. The classic excuses are “I’m not good-looking enough” or “I’m not rich enough”. They are what I call "direct excuses" and of course we both know that they are very rarely true, as we’ve witnessed both “not classically good-looking” and “not so rich” people pick up hot chicks. I will list a couple of other excuses at the end of this article and then squash them, so you can identify them as excuses and not valid reasons if they ever pop up in your head.

Other excuses can be a bit trickier to spot. Especially when you are using indirect reasons why not to game, such as “Too bad I can’t go out and game today since I have to do the laundry” or when you are out and go “Oh they are not hot enough, I don’t feel like approaching when they aren’t super hot”. Now take a minute and think about what’s going on here. In the first “laundry case”, is this really a good enough reason why not to go out or is it just an excuse why not to push yourself out of your comfort zone? Every time you get a similar thought in your head, figure out if it’s a legitimate reason or just a manifestation of your anxiety.

The “they are not hot enough” excuse is probably one of the most common excuses. Is it valid? Almost never. The only time it’s valid is when you are surrounded by hotties and someone goes “approach that set” and you approach another set because they are hotter… well then you are excused. In any other case, that “ugly” set will add to your experience and build social proof if nothing else. Realize that it’s approach anxiety in a different form.

The best way to get rid of your excuse generator is to have set goals with what you want to accomplish with pick-up, and every time you want to approach etc ask yourself: “Will this action take me closer or further away from my goals?” (Credit Sinn for this). The answer is almost always that the action will take you closer to your goals, and therefore you should do it.

Common excuses
Here’s a run-down of some common excuses:

I’m not attractive enough
Since we are guys, we tend to judge people by their looks (and think people judge us based on looks alone). How attractive you appear to women (without talking to them) is 80-90% in body language, grooming and how you are dressed and not in your physique. Above that you will be attractive when you talk. This excuse is never valid.

I’m not rich enough
Day game is free. You can find night game venues that have no cover charge, and you don’t have to spend a cent on the entire night.

They aren’t hot enough
They will still add to your experience and social proof. Approach.

I need a drink / go to the bathroom / wander around a bit before I approach
No you don’t. What you need is to get rid of your approach anxiety, and now is the best time to do it. Approach!

I’ll never be good at game because X, Y or Z
So you think you are the only one with problem X? Instead of quitting and feeling sorry for yourself (that won’t lead you anywhere) reframe it into something constructive. “What can I do to get around problem X? How can I change this into something positive or at least something that doesn’t interfere with my progress?” We all have our problems but the ones that get good develop this sort of thinking instead of feeling sorry for themselves or quit.

Conclusion
To kill the excuse generator is one of the biggest steps you can take towards mastery. It will be hard sometimes, but ultimately very rewarding.

Nothing in life worth having comes easy

- R

Who wants to change their abilities with women and dating FOREVER?

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