28 February 09
Daxx’s Adventures
Annihilating Your Approach Anxiety, and Becoming Comfortable with Approaching People You’ve Never Met
Approach anxiety is a brick wall I hear about all the time that guys hit in game. It is not unnatural, it is completely normal, you are just passing through one of the stages that everyone who gets into game goes through. So let’s get to it.
Why do we get AA?
The # 1 reason we get approach anxiety is our ‘Fear of Rejection’. Our minds tell us not to approach people we don’t know as it is outside of our comfort zones. You have to realise that males are logical creatures (females are emotional), and that being the case, our mind will give us logical reasons not to approach to keep us safe, to keep us comfortable, and will put our comfort above our happiness. Examples of these logical reasons not to approach are ‘she’s probably got a boyfriend’, ‘she looks like she’s in a hurry’, ‘she’s not attractive enough’ (If she is not attractive then fair enough lol, but even still, for 6’s and up practice makes perfect!). Any of these sound familiar? The list could go on forever. Yes, if you don’t approach that girl you’ve been thinking about approaching, you’ll be safe from rejection, but you won’t necessarily be happy with yourself.
Annihilating Approach Anxiety
Something I learnt from Jeet Kune Do was a concept –
In short, we were taught not to think, just do, when conditioning, or fine tuning a new move/combo. What this does is it doesn’t enable your mind to think of everything that you should be doing, it doesn’t let your mind overcomplicate things, you just do it. This is something I linked when I first heard of the 3 second rule. Three seconds is about the time it takes for our brains to receive a signal and respond. In other words the time it takes for us to see the girl, and begin coming up with the logical reasons to not approach. This is why, if you do get AA, you have to let your body do the deciding & approach within 3 seconds, otherwise your mind will take control and will do everything in its power to stop you doing so. This doesn’t mean you can’t approach after 3 seconds, it will just get more & more difficult because you will dwell on the fact that you know you should be approaching, but you aren’t. If you ever begin thinking too much, to the point you feel anxiety kicking in, just say out loud to yourself ‘Fuck It, what’s the worst that could happen’. The next point I wanted to make, is don’t take it so seriously. You’re not putting this much effort into mastering this area of your life to make yourself crap your pants, you’re learning it so you can go out and enjoy yourself and meet many beautiful women along the way, as well as helping them enjoy themselves by meeting a great guy. A great concept to go out with is ‘Leave others better off than when you first met’. So if you feel yourself getting AA, take a step back, take a deep breath, and laugh. Realise you’re putting way too much thought into this and you’re not having fun! One suggestion is going to the same bar a lot and getting used to it there. It can help you relax, as you will become comfortable with your surroundings, you’ll begin to make friends who go there regularly, as well as making connections with the bartenders, doorman, DJ etc. I recommend getting familiar at a bar where you know lots of hot girls go. It’s money. Improving your social interactions is a skill set. So you have to warm that skill set up. With that in mind, each day/night you go out, do some warm up sets. These don’t have to be full blown conversations, they can be openers as quick as ‘Hey what’s the time?’, ‘Hey do you know what time this place shuts?’, ‘Hey do you know what the nearest tube station is?’. All the warm up sets are designed to do is get you in the mood of approaching. Use this rule, ‘The first 3 sets don’t count’. Your first three sets are your warm up sets, so until you’ve opened three sets, don’t worry about what happens.
Something Braddock say’s that I thought was helpful with overcoming AA is to say in a little girls voice inside your head ‘Oh no I’m too scared to go up and talk to strangers I couldn’t do that’. It made me laugh because you realise how stupid it sounds. Remember you’re a man, what the fuck is scary about talking to someone you haven’t met? Grab your balls by the hand and go have fun like a man would.
What’s the Worst that Could Happen?
Actually stop, and ask yourself, ‘What’s the worst that could happen?’. A girl could tell you to fuck off? A girl could slap you? Her boyfriend could come over and kick your ass? Let me tell you that I’ve tried & also seen guys do some outrageous stuff while experimenting in field, but I’ve never been or seen a guy (knock on wood) get slapped by a girl, been confronted by an angry boyfriend, never had a drink thrown over me, sure I’ve been told to fuck off, but that’s the worst I think I’ve ever had. So you wanna know what that feels like? Go up to a group of hot girls and say ‘Hey can you tell me to fuck off’, they’ll most likely not say it to begin with, but get them to say it to you. There, you’ve just been blown out in the worst way possible. Not as bad as you thought huh.
Mr. M told me something that I haven’t forgotten, and that was –
‘You have to fail to succeed, so fail fast’
It is so true. The best of the best out there are the ones that have failed the most times, yet undoubtedly, also succeeded the most. I actually like sets that I get blown out from now, they are the ones you learn most from, and where would be the fun without the challenge?! You wouldn’t be attempting this if it wasn’t challenging, that’s why it’s so rewarding, because your efforts pay off. So don’t beat yourself up the next time you get blown out, just say to yourself ‘Lesson learnt’, & move onto your next set.
Do I Need to Become Confident to Approach?
Some people say you have to be ‘Confident’ to approach successfully. But what is confidence? Maxwell Maltz summed this up in personally the best way possible. He said –
‘Confidence is your capacity, to rise above a mistake’
To me, that is exactly what confidence is. And how do you rise above a mistake? You do that thing 1000 times. So I want to get better at football, how do I do it? Go and play football. I want to get better at running, how can I? Go and run. I want to get better at approaching, what do I do? GO AND APPROACH! An awesome analogy from Mystery about confidence is, not becoming confident, but becoming competent. Becoming competent is basically doing something enough times so that you become accustom to doing it. He says to think of it like jumping into a freezing cold pool. The 1st time you jump in, it’s absolutely freezing cold and you want to get out as soon as possible. The 2nd and 3rd time it’s still cold, but it’s not as bad. Then the 4th, 5th, 6th times it becomes fun and you keep getting out and jumping back in. But then you dry off and go to bed. The next day, it’s back to square one, the first time jumping back in that freezing cold pool again is gonna be horrible. But it’s the only way you’re going to get used to it. So learn to love it! For me it boils down to this, men do the approaching, women do the choosing. Men don’t choose if they’re going to have sex with the woman (even if that is what we portray) and women very rarely do the approaching, unless they’re drunk.
I guarantee, if you do this every day, even after a couple weeks, you won’t wake up thinking ‘I have to approach strangers today’, you’ll find yourself just doing it, and the habit will begin to grow, to the point where it becomes a part of you to start conversations with people you don’t know. Better yet, you’ll actually begin to enjoy it 
Speak soon,
-Daxx
P.s. I do personalised one on one’s that cover all this & more if you’re interested in taking your game to the next level.
