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Hey guys

In the pick up community there is a lot of discuss about being alpha male, status and dominant behaviour. Some gurus say that women like bad boys and that we should be dominant at all times. Guys are really worried that if they are too submissive or equal to girls, that they will fall into the friends’ zone and will not be able to break out.  But what if you are a naturally submissive person and you find it hard to be dominant. Are you banished to the friends’ zone forever?

Overall I have found that more dominant men are better with girls, but it is a blessing and a curse. Very dominant people tend to be dominant all the time with little room for flexibility. It is just as hard for a dominant person to become submissive as it is a submissive person to become dominant! Read that again. Altering your status regardless of it is up or down, moves you out of your comfort zone and is emotionally painful to do.

Within our family, social circles and work, we already have defined roles. When we have a defined role it, allows us to be that person and therefore be in the moment and spontaneous. At home you might be an older brother to a younger sister and take a dominating role, however at work you may be a junior and be subordinate to your co-workers. When in a role you no longer have to worry about what to say or do as it becomes natural.   

The most influential people I know are those who are able to shift their role from dominant, to equal right through to subordinate. Instead of just being dominant all the time to get their way, they are much more flexible in their approach and as a result much more successful in achieving their outcomes. The main point of being flexible is to avoid resistance and allow persuasion to feel natural. The more flexible you are at shifting your status, the more advantage you have over others.

By knowing a little bit about human behaviour and psychology it can help us in our attempt to influence people. One key fundamental is that as humans we have a desire to be right as when we are wrong it lowers our status. For example I was at a party the other day and one guy was talking about a film he had been to see. He said how much he enjoyed it and how he really liked one particular actor, he went on to talk about another film the actor was in. The film the guy was talking about did not star that actor, I knew this but didn’t see any point in blocking him. However another guy who was is a total film buff there picked up on this, and tried to correct him on it. Both were dominant characters and neither one wanted to back down as being incorrect, so the film buff whipped out his iPhone and did a Google search. They found the page and he showed it to the first guy and looked proud in showing him up, this of course made everyone feel tense. The film buffs need to be right in the situation lead to everyone feeling uncomfortable and eventually disbanding our little group.  

The above example happened because the film buff is a dominant character and finds it difficult to become subordinate or wrong. When he is wrong he is out of him comfort zone, much like a really nervous guy opening a 3 set of hot girls. He has blinding desire and need to be right, regardless to damage he may ensue during the process. I knew that the first guy was wrong about the film, however I did not see any need to correct him, instead I was more focused on raising his status by being interested in his story. As I am flexible in my status, I often higher the other person’s status as this creates a stronger bond between us. I can easily shift to being equal or dominant by changing my body language, eye contact, vocal tone and language.

In pick up and NLP the term rapport is often used. Often much is written about rapport but it is much understood concept. I believe that when people know their role in a situation, it is that relationship that creates rapport. There are lots of different rapport relationships for example; police and civilian, man and son, younger brother and older brother, teacher and student, even things like doctor and patient. When you are in strong rapport with someone and you are monitoring what that person is like (status, needs desires etc), then they become easily to influence. Knowing when to change status and how, are the two important components.

When in a conversation you should focus on what status the other person is presenting and then raising and lowering your own. A key tactic is the ability to raise the others persons status and you should only lower it in extreme circumstances. The gap between your status and the other persons should be minimal, if the gap is too large then the rapport can crumble under the strain.

I have used these techniques in a multitude of situations in order to achieve my outcome. When I first started experimenting with changing my status it felt very weird, however the results were fantastic. Because of my physical stature and skills I am able to shift my status quickly within a situation. I am 6’ 2” skinhead and can be very imposing, however I also have the ability to be very playful and submissive. I am constantly monitoring the status of the other person and deciding which way to take the interaction. By accessing different relationship roles, my actions, thoughts, posture, language and feelings flow naturally.    

It is true that girls like alpha men, but they don’t have to be dominant all the time. By being flexible and raising the girls status when required, you achieve amazing outcomes. When I am approaching a girl I first of all observe what her status is (this is given away by her body language, how she is interacting with others, how she is dressed etc) I then choose a position to approach her from. If I am asking for directions then I would be slightly submissive, if I am giving a direct complement then I would be more dominant. If I went in to submissive or dominant, then I would either scare her or be too needy. By approaching in one status I can then easily change to get her number or take her for a coffee etc.

Here is a typical conversation with a girl and how I would adjust my own status and hers to achieve my outcome.

A meandering tourist is studying a map looking lost

I approach slightly high status asking if she needs help

I then lower my status to match hers as we look at the map together

I increase my status by pointing out where she needs to go

I lower my status and ask why she is going there

I increase her status by listening attentively and adding value to what she says

I then increase my status to match hers and talk about things to do in London

I lower my status by asking her where she is from

I increase her status by adding value to her answer

I increase my status by qualifying her on where she comes from or her reason for being here

I then increase my status by saying I want to go for a coffee and tell her she should join me

All the time I am monitoring her reactions to my change in status. I learn how far to take it both ways in order for her to feel comfortable. If I become too dominant she may become defensive, if I becomes too submissive she won’t follow my lead.

This is just a short example of how to increase and lower your status to allow for a smooth interaction. if I went in super confident and high status, then I wouldn’t be able to get the kind of information out of her that I wanted. By lowering my status when asking a question, it increases her status so she gives a full answer. If I asked questions in a dominant position then it would be more like an interview. If I asked her to go for a coffee from a submissive point of view then I would have looked needy. The method of shifting status up and down between two people is often referred to the see saw effect, and it creates very strong rapport. Having the ability to be subordinate, equal and dominant within an interaction increases your likelihood of success.

By being aware of your status within an interaction gives you great frame control and inner game. Instead of focusing on what to say and do, focus on your status and allow the words to come naturally. This sounds weird but when you already have a relationship with someone, do you need to know what you are always going to say all the time? No it happens naturally. 

To get good at this you first should go out and observe how other people interact with others and with yourself. Look at how people change their status and the reaction it has on you and others. Then start to experiment by changing your status. This will probably feel very weird at first, this means you are doing it right. Start to see how people react to you differently when you lower or higher your status, and also higher theirs.

All the time I focus on avoiding resistance, but what happens when someone says something I know is incorrect and I foresee a problem arising if it is not addressed? A good example is the other week I was going to meet a female friend of mine to see a film. She is someone who is very dominant and always has to be right about things. She said she had booked the tickets and the film started at 8pm. I had been online before we spoke and I saw that it started at 7pm. I could have just said that it started at 7pm in a dominant way, but this would have lowered her status and possibly cause an argument. So instead I plant seeds of doubt and say “8pm” in a slightly submissive questioning tone. She then checked the tickets and said “no it’s 7pm, I read the wrong bit”. To increase her status again (as I know she likes to be dominant however I remain in control) I lower mine by saying “the print on those new cinema tickets are really hard to read, I am often late for films”. We then become equal because we both start talking about the way they print tickets.   

Above I used the technique of planting seeds of doubt, I was first introduced to this by an FBI interrogator who was a client of mine. Interrogation is all about developing a relationship and rapport to get people to open up. To do this you need to constantly change status and method (think good cop, bad cop). He said that to avoid arguments instead of confronting people about their mistakes, simply repeat what they said to you in a questioning tone. This simple act makes people think about what they said but in a non defensive way.

From this take the following. When you are with a girl know when to raise your status and lead, when to have equal status to build comfort, and when to lower your status to just shut up and listen! Let go of the need to be right, embrace the emotional discomfort of shifting your own status and allow yourself to be in the roles where actions and behaviours are natural.

Hypnomatt (Matt Kendall)

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Hey all

Every day I get emails from guys all over the world telling me about their pick up and confidence goals. Unfortunately most people in pick up have read a lot of self help crap, so the emails I get are usually a load of “positive” and ambiguous nonsense.

Here is a selection of goals that people have sent me over the last few days;

“I want to be able to approach any girl I want and feel invincible”
“I want to be more confident”
“I want more self-esteem” 
“To smash my limits”
“I want to have abundance in my life”
“I want to feel empowered”
“To be able to live my life without fear”
“To have freedom in life”
“Once I get a girlfriend I will be happy”
“To become irresistible to girls”
“To feel happy and confident all day”
“I want to project a positive image”
“I want to have empowering self beliefs”
“I want people to like me for who I am”
“I want to believe in myself”

These are some examples of the less crazy goals I get sent. Whenever I work with a new client I get them to fill out 5 things they want to achieve or do. With every single client I have to send back their form and explain why it is a poor goal. Until someone starts being realistic and making tangible goals, there is little I can help them with.

Let’s go through some of the above goals and understand why they will never work.

“I want to be more confident”

This is probably the most common thing I get sent. The aim to be more confident, however how do you measure confidence? How do you know if you are more or less confident than you are now? With this goal I send it back and ask “if you were more confident, what would you be able to do that you can not do now?”

People seem to believe that confidence is some sort of magic fluid that flows though our veins. It isn’t, therefore it can not be measured. All that can be measured is real world actions, results are based on what you do not how you feel. I am a firm believer that confidence comes from competence. A friend of mine said to me yesterday “would you prefer the person flying your plane to be competent or confident?”

As confidence is not something that can be measured, it is a pointless goal. You are trying to achieve something that doesn’t actually exist. This in itself causes a lot of frustration as how can you tell how far you have come? What is the actual end point? How do you know when you have arrived? When you have arrived, then what?

Here is a conversation I had with a client earlier this week;

Me: How can I help you?
Client: I want to be more confident. 
Me: OK, if you were more confident what would you be able to do that you can’t do now?
Client: If I was more confident I would enjoy life more.
Me: OK, back to the question I asked.
Client: what do you mean?
Me: well what would you actually be able to do in the real world that you can not do now?
Client: I would have more confidence to do things.
Me: specifically what things?
Client: like meeting new people
Me: Ok, what people, when and where?
Client: I don’t know, I haven’t thought about it.

And there is the problem. People want to achieve this magic feeling of confidence but without any idea of what they want to be able to do. Instead of making real world logical steps, we instead create fantasies that have little basis in reality.

Instead of setting a goal around a feeling, set it around real world actions. Be specific as you can, “meeting new people” is not a goal, it is just a fantasy. Going to a new social group on Wednesday at 7pm and speaking to 5 new people, now that is a goal! That is something I can actually help people with. Wanting to “meet new people” is far too vague and ambiguous to actually do anything with.  

 “I want to have empowering self beliefs”

I HATE the words “empowering” and “beliefs”. They are the core of a lot of dangerous self help nonsense, and again, they do not exist. I usually find that people who want to adopt empowering beliefs have a poor self image and want to over compensate by feeling better about themselves. Trying to change how you feel about yourself is stupid, you can only change your actions! Your beliefs are formed because of what you do, your actions are not governed by a magical belief you either do or do not have!

I was working with a client last week who 32, he is 5 stone overweigh, wears really old crap clothes, lives at home with his parents, is currently unemployed and has really poor personal hygiene. He wanted me to help install some new empowering beliefs. He had been to a “success” seminar a few weeks earlier and felt great, but now his problems had returned. He now wanted me to help install some empowering beliefs so he can “smash his limits”, or whatever crap they were peddling at the event.

When I asked him what he thought about himself, he replied that he hated himself and thought he was a useless loser. He wanted me to help install empowering beliefs so he could feel better about himself and be more positive. He did not want to change his actions, he wanted to change how he felt about himself. I informed him that I can not help him do this, as he wants to feel better about how he is living his life now. His goals should be about real world changes, not just how he feels about himself.

More and more people are taking antidepressants to deal with the stresses of modern day life. One of the main effects of antidepressants is to help people get by; they do this by allowing people to feel OK about their problems. If not antidepressants, then people often drink or do drugs to get to a point where they like themselves. Wanting to feel empowered is the same thing, it isn’t changing what you do, it is wanting to feel OK about what you are doing now. This is not going to help you change, if anything it keeps you stuck.

Self help books and courses have what I like to call the “sun tan effect”. You feel great when you are there or reading about it, and for a few days afterwards. However once all the warm fuzzy feelings fade away you are left with your old problems. This is why people attend “success” seminars every year and read self help book after self book. It allows people to temporally escape their problems and believe they are actually making progress in their life. It is the same as overweight people reading diet books, it might feel like you are doing something but little will actually change, especially in the long term.

When I work with clients for inner game issues, I always ask what they are looking forward to. The usual answer is nothing, or they don’t know. We all have fantasy goals like being rich, moving away to live on an island or finding the perfect girlfriend, but they are just fantasies. Most people kind of know what they want, but they have no solid plans on how to get there. Or if they do have plans, they want to feel confident before taking the first step.

When you have nothing to look forward to in life, it usually causes depression. When you are depressed you tend to think that by achieving something major, like getting a girlfriend, becoming slim or winning the lottery will make you happy. If you have a crap life before the big change, then it is likely to be crap a short while after too, after the warm and fuzzy feeling fade. We are sold on the idea of instant happiness and getting overnight results. The faster you change something, the faster it will revert back. 
 
When I work with clients I help them to achieve real world goals in a methodical and logical way. I firmly believe that what you do in life is much more important than how you feel. If you are trying to chase a feeling, then it will elude you. A client yesterday told me that he is depressed and doesn’t have a social life so he spends most of his time playing games consoles at home. I had to explain to him that he is depressed and without a social life because he spends all day on the games console. Your feelings are a result of your actions.

So here are some basic steps you can take to make real world goals.

1. Pick a direction, not a destination. Some good examples are; to have a good social life, to become healthier and to live a more exciting life.

2. Pick a tangible and measurable goal. If your goal is to have a good social life, when what does this mean to you? Does it mean going out 3-4 times a week, having friends over to watch the football, going out for meals etc?

3. Now we have a solid goal, we can reverse engineer it into small milestones. Write down everything that has to happen for you to achieve this tangible goal. This process usually throws out a lot of information you didn’t originally take into consideration.

4. Make 4 – 6 milestones with all the information from the previous step. This now creates a 4-6 step process on how to achieve your goal.

5. Finally start putting some dates next to these small milestones and also allocate some rewards for achieving them. If your goal is weight loss, then if you lose 6 lbs, buy yourself a new watch etc.

6. Once you start to come close to achieving the first major milestone, repeat the above process but for the next goal. If you arrive at your goal without a direction, then we often go back the way we came. We often don’t make big changes in our life because we just don’t know how to. We perceive the first step to be a massive one, so we are reluctant to take it. We want to feel 100% confident or empowered before we embark on such a mission. We don’t want to ruin the fantasy of whatever the goal is, so this prevents us from ever taking the first step. There is always another book, course or seminar we have to take before we actually feel confident enough to execute our plans.

By wanting to feel confident before we do the real world physical action, is the same as wanting all the lights to be green before we set off on a journey. 

So in conclusion, work out what you want to do, make a plan and then get to work. Do the things that make you feel empowered and confident, don’t try to chase the feeling itself. The feeling is always the result of the real world physical actions.

If you want help planning and achieving your goals, please drop me an email at hypnomatt@puatraining.com

Hypnomatt

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Hey guys

Today I am going to talk about emotional pain and our strategies for dealing with it.

Yesterday I went to see a brilliant hypnotherapist called Andrew T Austin, to work on some of my own issues. Andrew’s background involves working in trauma departments in hospitals and also with psychiatric patients. He has specialised in helping people with depression and dealing with emotional pain. What surprised me was that he told me that life is suffering, and it is how we deal with this that really matters.

Life is not meant to be a utopian existence where everything is fantastic and pain free. This is where I believe many people get caught out as this is what we are sold on a daily basis by drug companies, the media, the self help industry and anyone else who can profit out of such a proposed existence. Having a pain free life is impossible, the result of not achieving this is often depression and not fulfilling our goals and potential.   

Like Andrew, I work as a therapist, and we both see clients who are suffering with emotional pain. I have noticed that as humans we are very poor and ill-equipped at dealing with emotional pain and we have a very low tolerance level to it. Our fears have a strong hold over us and our behaviour. When faced with emotional discomfort we have our favourite coping strategies that we rely on. Such distraction techniques help us to dim the pictures in our mind and quieten the voices in our head. Distraction may work in the short term but it is often our strategies that exacerbate our problems. The most common coping strategies we tend to adopt are drinking, smoking, texting, drug use (both prescription and illegal), excessive TV, hiding ourselves away from the world, internet, porn, shopping, gambling, video games and comfort eating. I am sure there is a whole load more that people use too but these seem to be the most common when I deal with clients.

Today, fate dealt me a bitter piece of news. I have just found out that I have irreversible hearing loss in my left ear, making me partially deaf. This has been a problem I have been working on for several years and up until now my doctors have always been very optimistic that it is something they could treat. Despite previous efforts and treatments, my new doctor told me that the nerve in my ear was damaged and it is more serious than previously diagnosed. I asked if anything could be done, he said that the only thing they can offer is a hearing aid, if the condition worsens. Apart from that, nothing can be done.

After hearing the news from my doctor I felt extremely down and sorry for myself. I went through the cliché “why me” questions and suddenly felt very depressed and alone. At times like this I like to put on the TV or go online and try to busy myself rather than face the painful emotional issue. This time however, I decided to embrace the emotional pain, rather than running from it. For a while it felt horrible and I got very strong urges to do other things to distract myself. After a little while I got used to the pain and instead of thinking about how to make myself feel better in the short term, I focused on what I can do to solve the problem. My issue can not be treated, this I have now accepted. In the future it may worsen and if that is the case I can turn up the tv, I can ask people to speak louder and if I have to I can get a hearing aid. Apart from that, I can not do anything so I realised there is no point feeling bad about it and instead to focus on my other goals. It was a rather strange yet liberating experience.

What Andrew taught me was to embrace the emotional pain, that way you can build up a tolerance to it. Building up a tolerance makes it easier to deal with when it comes up again in the future, instead of running your same old distraction methods (drink, tv, drugs etc) and allows you to be creative and adaptive and make much better choices that carry long term benefits.

A good example of embracing emotional pain is approaching girls. I specialise in working with guys with approach anxiety and helping them to overcome it. Recently I worked with a client who had severe approach anxiety and he was not even able to go and ask a girl the time, let alone get her phone number. After doing a brief hypnotherapy session we uncovered the source of the anxiety and he started to embrace the emotional pain instead of running away from it. As usual it was linked to issues at school and these experiences had infiltrated their way in to most areas of his life. Once he was able to embrace the pain it allowed him to work with it rather than run from it. Shortly after I got him to approach a girl to get the time. He was able to do it although he was extremely nervous and could barely get a word out. He was however, able to do it. The next girl he went to speak to he was much better, this time he asked her the time and talked a little bit about why she was in London.  The more he exposed himself to the emotional pain in a controlled way, the more he could deal with it. The more he can recognise and deal with the pain, the more options it gives him in a situation. After the 4th or 5th girl he was able to approach, ask for the time, have a short conversation and even do a bit of kino. By the 10th girl he was starting to even enjoy the process and managed to get the girls number. By the end of the session he had a considerable shift in his confidence levels. He had faced his fears and by embracing them instead of running away, he had started to overcome them.

I think that as humans we are bad at dealing with emotional pain because we simply do not understand it. Physical pain is easy to understand, you bang your toe and it hurts. Although you might be in physical pain you understand why it was caused and therefore what you need to do to make it stop. Emotional pain is different, we are not sure why it is caused, how long it will last or how to deal with it. This makes emotional pain much more complex and difficult to work with and treat than a physical injury.

Before I said that it is often our coping strategies that exacerbate our problems. I worked with a guy recently who spends 6-7 hours a day playing video games. He wants to get a girlfriend and build a social life, but he said he is too depressed to do so. The client told me that he is depressed so he plays video games, I see it the other way round. He plays videos games and this makes him depressed. Whenever he feels lonely or down, instead of embracing the emotional pain and working with it, he distracts himself with video games. If he instead embraced the pain, worked with it and changed his strategy to going out and meeting people, he would move closer to his goals. We do not realise the damage our strategies are doing until it is often too late. The only thing we have is time, so the sooner we start to embrace emotional pain and change our strategies, the better our results and quality of life will be.

Try out this exercise, for the next few days just observe your own emotional reactions and coping mechanisms. White down how you are feeling and what you are doing as a result. Also write down your most important goals that you want to focus on. After a few days read your notes and see what strategies you use the most and if they are conducive to your goals.

Once you have started to identify your coping strategies, ask yourself “what part of this is actually helping me?” and “by doing this, what feeling is it allowing me to avoid”. If your strategy is not helping you need to consider changing it. As humans we have an overwhelming design to be right, by choosing methods and sticking to them rather than admitting we are wrong, even if our chosen methods are destructive to our goals.

By understanding what feelings it is you are trying to avoid you can start to expose yourself to them in a controlled way. By doing so you will start to build up a tolerance level, you will start to gain control over emotions, rather than them controlling you.

Our current coping methods are typically referred to as our “comfort zone”. It is called a comfort zone because everything is nice, comfy and safe. While that may be a pleasant environment to existence in, it is extremely limiting and keeps us from progressing in life. When we do not progress and achieve our goals it can cause stress, depression and even more reliance on our strategies i.e. drinking. It is simply a cycle and it can be broken, but only through embracing painful emotions and taking action.

I have found that people want to confident about something before they do the action. People also seem to forget that there are skill sets you need to learn to be able to carry out certain actions. A recent client asked me to make him a good public speak but he has terrible stage fright. I informed him that I can help him face the emotional issues and reduced the anxiety, but public speaking is a skill set that he will need to go and learn.

One golden rule I have learned in life is “competence equals confidence”. You can not feel confident about something until you have done it. Once you do an action over and over and deal with the painful emotional issues, you develop confidence.

So to use this information I suggest doing the following steps;

1. Write down and identify your current strategies
2. Write down the emotions and experiences you are avoiding
3. Write down your most important goals
4. Ask yourself what part of your current strategies are helping you to achieve your goals
5. Change your strategy and slowly embrace the painful emotions
6. Increase the exposure level to gain control over the emotional issue and expand your comfort zone

I hope you found this post useful. Remember, embracing painful emotions is like lifting weights to training your muscles. The more you train, the stronger you become.

HypnoMatt

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Why does your mind go blank in front of a hot girl?

Have you even been in the situation where you walk up to a hot girl and your mind goes completely blank, only to think of the best thing to say once you have left? If this is something you have experienced then you are in good company. There is not one guy I know who that this has not happened to the in the past. This post is about why it happens and the steps you can take to prevent it from happening from you in the future.

Our brains are wired and designed for survival, especially the male brain. There are two basic parts to the brain, the cerebral cortex (the outer part of the brain) and the R complex (the inner and oldest part of the brain). We take in information through our senses and this then activates the cerebral cortex for thought or the R complex for movement. When both parts of the brain work in synchronicity they we have both thought and movement, meaning we can react to situations whilst also thinking and rationalising about it giving you options in a situation.

When both parts of the brain are working in sync all is well, however depending on the situations and stimulus, only one part of the brain often reacts. When just the cerebral cortex works alone then all you have is thought and day dreaming. When just the R complex is activated then it produces emotional and physical reactions, this is how fears and phobias are structured. Thinking without movement and reaction without thinking are both critical for survival but it can leave us in trouble when we need to do the exact opposite.

So what makes the inner and emotional brain react without communicating with the cerebral cortex? The answer is fear, or at least perceived fear. When there is a perceived threat the brain switches to survival mode, by this I mean R complex is activated. Our speech centers are not directly linked with the R complex, so when you are reacting to survive, you literally cut off your access to your cerebral cortex to think and speak. When the perceived threat is past i.e. when the hot girl goes, then the brain starts to work in synchronicity again and you once again get access to thought and speech. So when in danger your mind goes blank, when in a relaxed state you have proper access to thought and speech.

 So what does all this neuroscience nonsense mean and how can it actually help you? Put it like this, when you are with your friends or family do you ever run out of things to say? Usually not, the reason because you know there is not a perceived threat from them and usually you actually have things to talk about. There are two areas you need to work on, firstly you need to learn how to be more relaxed when talking to girls, secondly you need to improve your conversation skills and have something to talk about.

Let us take the first part of the solution, becoming more relaxed when talking to girls, or as some of you guys call it “being in set”. The advice to be more relaxed when talking to girls is about as helpful as when girls say “just be confident” or “just be yourself”. If you have not had much success with women or not that great at talking to people in general, then making cold approaches to hot girls is going to create a lot of anxiety and fear.

Most guys who get into game want to be able to walk up and seduce any girl, anytime, anywhere, but this takes a lot of skill and practice. If you have problems striking up a conversation with a man or a women you do not fancy in the queue for the bus, then you are going to have real problems talking to girls you do like. The truth is that you can not be good with hot girls if you are not great with all people. Guys who are naturally good with women always tend to be with all people!

My area of work is helping guys reduce anxiety when talking with women and build self esteem, unfortunately I can not get to the bottom of your issues in a blog post but I can give you some tips to improve your success. Follow these three simple guidelines and I guarantee that you will have improved success with girls and people in general.

1) Start to make small talk with more people. If you work in an office make a conscious effort to speak to more people, even it is just asking them about their weekend. Try to elicit good emotions, memories and feeling from people and not bad ones. For example if it has rained all weekend and on the Monday morning in work, do not moan about the weather. Instead ask them what good things they did and take it from there.

2) Create mutual rapport with people. Walking up to a girl cold without knowing anything about her is hard, so instead go to events, clubs, societies, meetings, classes or anything thing where you have shared interests with others. When you have something else to focus on it shifts the pressure off you and therefore your mind is less likely to go blank. Try www.meetup.com and find local interest groups and go! I personally attend a range of events from hypnosis meetups to internet marketing workshops. Speaking to someone at a meetup where you have shared interests is so easy and effortless.

3) Do your research and have things to talk about. Recently I meet up with a girl who is really into promoting stand-up comedy events. Before I went to meet her I simply did a quick check on google news to see what was happening in the comedy world. That week Frankie Boyle had been in trouble over making some offensive jokes about the queen, Michael McIntyre has just announced he was going to tour the UK and play the O2 arena and BBC3 were launching a new program all about new stand-up comedians. From less than 2 minutes work I had 3 solid things I could talk about and get her opinions on.

Remember that you want to elicit good memories with people and make them feel good in your company. People like each other for the way they make them feel, so become good at making people feel good about themselves. By this I do not mean suck up to people, instead get them access long term memories. For example with the girl who was into stand-up comedy some questions I asked her included; do you remember the first joke you ever heard, who is your favorite comedian and why, what are some of the best gigs you have gone to, what is the best part about running comedy nights, who would you most like to perform at your gigs etc etc.

I hope that you have found this information useful and they you go out and try it. I would love to hear how you get on, please feel free to drop me an email at hypnomatt@puatraining.com. If you are still getting approach anxiety or your mind keeps going blank, then I am available in London for 1-2-1 sessions. I am a fully qualified Clinical Hypnotherapist and I specialise in working with guys to help improve their inner game

Matt Kendall AKA HypnoMatt
PUATraining Master Trainer and Clinical Hypnotherapist

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It is that time of year again when I get bombarded with people giving me their advice on New Year’s resolutions and how to really “go for it”, “smash those barriers” etc. I work with people everyday helping them to achieve their goals in a practical and methodical manor. From working with hundreds of people I have noticed what really works and what does not. By keeping in contact with clients it has allowed me to track their progress and see the differences between those who make progress and those who stay stuck.

I have put together my top tips for making sure your goals are never reached and that you stay as you are, or even end up in a worse place. Follow these rules and be frustrated forever!

Make totally unrealistic and unattainable goals
Firstly you have to make completely unrealistic and unattainable goals. If you are 15 stone overweight then aim to be skinny, if you are broke then aim to be a millionaire, if you are single and never had a partner then make sure you want to be able to approach and seduce anyone you choose.

Remember at the first sign that everything is not going to plan, jack it all in and blame everyone and everything apart from yourself.

Ensure that you believe when you reach your goal, life will be pain free and super happy
OK everyone, time to think positively. Once you are skinny life will be amazing, once you are rich you won’t have any problems and once you have a girlfriend/boyfriend life will be just peachy. As soon as you reach this massive goal, everything is going to be fine. No more pain, no more suffering, no more living like you do now. All your problems just magically disappear.

Make it one giant leap, never make milestones
Never take small steps! As this time you are going to really do it, you just know it. On Monday morning everything will just happen and you will start to live your new life. If you are currently overweight and eat far too much, don’t worry as on Monday you will eat small portions of healthy food and be skinny by Friday. Hey, in fact as you are going to start your diet on Monday, you should eat as much bad food as you can before then!

Breaking super massive goals down into milestones is boring and silly, always make sure you make massive goals so you can really get the adrenalin going just thinking about it. So what if you currently eat 5 take-a-ways a week and never exercise, that Monday morning run and porridge breakfast is defiantly going to happen. You are going to really stick at your new lifestyle this time and not fall at the first hurdle. Make massive changes that completely contradict your way of life, it is the only way to make changes that stick!

Never get professional help
Professionals, bah what do they know. Just because they have spent years studying and working with people getting proven results, you should never go near them. Professionals cost a lot of money, just because they know their subject inside out and know how to get the results you desire, it doesn’t mean you should ever go near them. Instead why not do a bit of research on the internet, or better still buy a self help book. Now you are your own expert. Simple eh!

Never plan what you are going to do and when
It is dangerous to plan ahead, especially with all the fun you will be having with your super new life. Sitting down and working out a methodical and practical step by plan and gathering the resources you will need is a complete waste of time. Instead just think of the goal e.g. I want a million pounds, and just get started. You will just learn as you go along and soon you will have a million pounds and a great pain free life you have already dreamt about.

Just think it and you will achieve it. The universe loves you!
Fans of the film “The Secret” already know this proven and completely true universal law, “just think it and it will happen”. Are you broke? Then simply think about cheques and money being delivered to you and it will happen. Single and lonely, well just cut out pictures of people you are attracted to, put them on your dream board and soon they will be walking through your door and throwing themselves at you. Massively overweight? Simply stand in front of the mirror and picture yourself as being slim, there is no need to make any changes or exercise. Not when you know “The Secret”.

The universe loves you and it is there to serve you. Everything happens for a reason and all your wishes will come true. Remember to just think about what it is you want and it will be delivered every time. Know this amazing information how could you ever fail to achieve all your dreams?

Sadly I put this on a message board a couple of weeks ago and people emailed me to thank me for the great information and they are now following my advice. They actually thought they were serious steps to goal setting. Reading the above article you may think I am just a mean person, this is not true. I have worked in the field of change work for several years and I get frustrated when I see people profiting from other people’s pain.

Every year we fall for the same old tricks. Just turn on the TV or read the newspaper and look at all the adverts offering you an amazing new life. People who are desperate will buy and do anything to achieve their goals yet they have little direction, plans or even an understanding to why they want to achieve them.

If you are serious about making changes in your life then I can offer just a few simple tips;

Make a direction instead of a destination.
Instead of wanting to be skinny, aim to live a more healthy lifestyle. Instead of wanting to seduce everyone, aim to improve your social skills and talk to one or two people a day. By making a destination people are often lost when they arrive there and do not know which direction to then take, often they go back to the start as this is what they already know. A common form of this is yo yo dieting, once the weight is lost you do not know what to do so you simply go back to how you were before and the weight starts to gain again.

Work with professionals.

If you want the best results then work with people who can really help you. Put the self help books down, stop going on the internet trying to find that little tip, secret or product that will transform everything. Personal trainers, hypnotherapists, dieticians, doctors, financial advisors etc are all available. Yes it may cost you money, but how much is achieve your goals actually worth to you? Working with professionals also makes you accountable to someone and they can save you so much time, pain and wasted effort.

Make plans.
When making a goal, remember to put plans into place and prepare. I specialise in helping people with social anxiety and weight loss and I am always amazed at how people never prepare. If you want to become more sociable then you need to actually plan things to do, start to fill up your calendar and stick to it. If you want to eat more healthily then you need to go and buy and prepare the food to take to work etc. Without proper planning we tend to fall back into old habits.

Calm down!
Everyone wants to change overnight. Unfortunately that is not going to happen, and if it does then it is build on very weak foundations. I have worked with people who have been for weight loss surgery and they are surprised that they are gaining the weight back almost straight away. The fact is that their mind and habits are that of an overweight person, they simply do not know how to act as a thin person.

Aim to make small changes that you can stick to and make part of your daily and weekly life. Sometimes you need to take larger steps, especially to get going, but then introduce small and manageable changes that are not going to revert. When you make massive changes they are hard to stick to, once you fail on one it tends to bring everything crashing down.

Change your strategy, not the amount of effort
Human behaviour is often a strange thing. One major part of our behaviour that keeps is stuck is our desire to be right. We hate to be wrong and we tend to stick to what we know, even though it does not deliver results. Instead of changing our strategy, we put more effort into what we are already doing in an attempt to be right.

People get stuck in their own patterns and this leads to frustration and depression. A classic example is people trying to lose weight. They read every new diet book and try them all, yes they might lose a few pounds but it always come back. Others will tell them that diets do not work, but they don’t listen. Instead they keep buying the books and the products hoping that one day they will find the right one and the weight will fall off.

This is another reason why working with professionals is priceless, they can look at what you are doing and make simple yet highly effective changes. It often takes someone with an objective viewpoint to see the mistakes you are making.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Albert Einstein

If you want help with your goals this year, drop me an email at hypnomatt@puatraining.com

HypnoMatt

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