There is one question in particular that I get from a large majority of guys who are at the very beginning stages of their dating journey.
And believe it or not, I was once in their position was well – but I was asking this question (after a horrible and awkward experience where the girl would literally and physically sprint away from me) at around age 15 instead of 30.
The only reason I brought that age comparison up is to show you that if you’re currently 30 years old (or older) asking this question and going through something like this, then you are in the very beginning stages of your dating skills development. Which isn’t a bad thing. We all start there, just at different times. The main point is, you can get better. It just takes two things:
C-O-U-R-A-G-E to overcome your fears and question your own current assumptions, values & belief systems (about women and morality) and P-R-A-C-T-I-C-E to put your newfound learnings into action.
The Guy That Asks This Question:
If you’re asking this question, you are a guy who has maybe kissed one or two girls in his life, and may or may not have lost his virginity. You are most likely a guy that has never been able to (yet) manage a “friends with benefits” types of relationship, and may even find yourself getting angry at other “jerks” for even considering such disrespectful relationships with women. And are confused why women even agree to those in the first place.
If this sounds like you, let me ask you a couple questions (and basically call you out for your own benefit because I love you):
Why are you putting women (and people in particular) on a pedestal?
Why are you lying to yourself, telling yourself you don’t have sexual urges and desires, while simultaneously suppressing them (which is only pissing you off inside) and playing the “nice guy that’s going to save her?”
Why don’t you want to question your own assumptions and beliefs about women? Are you afraid of becoming one of the “mean guys”?
Why are you running away from being one of the “mean guys?” And how long are you going to allow your “nice guy” facade to go on?
Why can’t you admit that being a go-getter that has a rotation of 10 women ready for him at every moment is alluring, interesting, and worthy of striving towards?
I’m here to tell you that you can get there. IF you unleash your inner rage (that you sure as hell know is in there) in a positive and proactive way and take control of your dating life.
No more “I’m not an aggressive person” or “I’m just super laid back”. You need to begin to strip away the beliefs that are forcing you to play the character of the “nice guy” (which isn’t even really you) and take a stand against them from holding you back from what you can become.
So…
Here’s the question.
The Question Is Basically This:
“Why did this girl change (seemingly overnight) when I told her that I liked her? It’s almost like we’re both negative magnets now. Meaning, I literally repel her.”
And here’s your answer:
The Question Itself Implies A Gap In The Social Skills You Need To Start Dating Beautiful (Or Any) Women
Guys who date multiple, beautiful girls NEVER explicitly tell a girl “I like you”.
They imply it. And do little “heat checks” to see where the girl is currently at with her interest level. I’ll explain more about “heat checks” in a bit.
Here’s a story that will help you understand why just telling a girl “I like you” is dating suicide:
I sold insurance to old people over the phone for two years. And I F******* loved it. I called myself the “insurance guy you wish your grandmother got on the phone”
But why did I like it? Isn’t selling insurance supposed to be terrible?
Well, It depends on how you look at it. I loved it because I love helping people. And insurance (especially to old people) is one of those areas that people have very little in-depth knowledge of. So when you know your stuff, you can truly help people by guiding them to a solution that they literally could have never done themselves. It was extremely rewarding, but required a lot of “soft skills” that are the exact same soft skills that come to building attraction with a woman.
To get someone to buy insurance with me over the phone, without them ever seeing me in person, I had to:
- Build rapport with them extremely quickly
- Get them to trust me extremely quickly
- Get them to think “this guy isn’t like the other insurance guys” extremely quickly
- Make sure we were on the same page before moving forward together, otherwise i’d look like a “fishy insurance salesman” that was trying to give them something they didn’t want or need
- And finally, take the lead (once I knew we were on the same page) by actively moving the conversation forward to the PURCHASE and helping them improve their insurance situation
Now here’s the crazy part. To get a girl to date me, I have to:
- Build rapport with her extremely quickly
- Get her to trust me extremely quickly
- Get her to think “this guy isn’t like the other weirdos” extremely quickly
- Make sure we are on the same page before moving forward together, otherwise i’d look like a “pushy douchebag” or “the guy that can’t read social cues” that was trying to give her something she didn’t want
- And finally, take the lead (once I knew we were on the same page) by actively moving the conversation forward to the DATE and making it easy for the girl to say yes
It’s the same process.
And in both situations, you ignoring the “making sure we are on the same page” part will ENSURE that the girl figuratively – or literally – runs away from you. Ignoring the “making sure we are on the same page” part of the process is what is getting you “she got all weird and is running away from me” result.
Before We Get To The Answer, Put Yourself In Her Shoes For A Second
Make sure you read the story above before you read this part. The insurance story was a metaphor for the problem that you are facing when you tell her you like her.
When you tell her you like her, this is the conversation she is having with her friends:
So becky, you won’t believe this. I randomly met this guy a couple months ago at that volunteer thing. He seemed really shy and timid, and kind of socially weird. That was really all I remember from it. Anyway, we were put together on some projects and he would just sort of orbit around me. I would catch him staring at me from the corner of my eye and it began to get a little weird, but we were working together so there wasn’t much I could do. Eventually he started trying to talk to me and ask things about my life. Even though I was clearly uninterested, he kept talking and talking until I could find an excuse to leave without hurting his feelings. I was being nice because I didn’t want to be mean to him and leave, and the conversations were usually very bland and boring. He’s never said anything remotely funny. But to make things worse, he somehow found my instagram and followed me. I followed him back because I didn’t want it to be awkward, but I now feel kind of weird about it. He hasn’t really said anything to me that has been sexual, and I’m definitely getting the stalker vibe. *two weeks later* Well, he literally just told me he likes me. I don’t get how he doesn’t see how uninterested I am. I know if I just straight up tell him that he’s weird, he would be crushed. So I just told him I was working on myself, I think. I can’t really remember because it was so stressful. Anyway, I’ve let this go on for too long. I have to start avoiding him so he gets the message, otherwise it’s just going to get even worse.
There Are Two Problems: A Lack Of Understanding Social Cues And A Lack Of The Psychology Of Women
If you are currently a guy who’s telling a girl “I like you” without sleeping with her for at least 3 months, then there are two problems that you are experiencing – that if not fixed – will screw you over forever. I’ll go through both of these separately.
#1: A Lack Of Understanding Social Cues
This is going to be a harsh truth, but you need to hear it:
You are lacking social cues. And it’s because you are being selfish.
How are you being selfish, you ask?
Because instead of looking at peoples faces and body language, and respecting the signals they are always at every moment giving to you, you are stuck in your head ignoring the outside world. Completely oblivious to the social signs the girl is giving you. And it’s this ignorance of the outside world’s reactions that is screwing you over.
Let me tie this back to the insurance example again.
Telling a girl “I like you” when she has 0 interest in you is like me trying to say “Hey Nancy, grab your credit card so I can sell you this insurance policy” after she’s been telling me “I don’t need any insurance, Grant” for the last 20 minutes. It’s just an uncalibrated move that is coming out of left field.
How To Get Better At Reading Social Cues:
The first thing you’re going to want to work on is getting better at reading social cues. You can do this by simply talking to more people, and paying attention to their facial expressions, body language, etc. It also helps if you have a certain outcome in mind, like getting someone to come into a store with you, and then trying to build enough rapport with them so they will actually come with you. When you do this enough times, you will be able to feel the moment when they like you enough to come with you intuitively.
Why “Heat Checking” Is The Key To Success
“Heat checking” means checking the temperature of something. In the case of dating, it means doing little compliance tests to see if the girl will comply with you on a smaller scale before you do something bigger like asking her on a date. I have a good example of heat checking here. Here is also another one.
In this example, this girl and I recently started talking so I have no idea where her interest level in me is. So to figure it out, I do little “heat checks” by making jokes and seeing if she goes along with them.
The key with heat checks is that you want give the girl an opportunity to reject you on a smaller scale, like not going along with one of your jokes. Doing this allows you to see the level of interest she has in you, because if she is rejecting one of your smaller compliances (like going along with a joke) she will obviously reject bigger ones (like a date).
But, if she does go along with them, then you know she is at least interested up to that certain point. And if she doesn’t go along with them, you know you have some more rappot to build. When rejected for a heat check, I usually “pull back” and try to build up some more interest – usually in the form of jokes – and do another one. Here is a successful heat check:
For this example, I have no idea if the girl is interested in me. So I need to find out.
In order to do this, I do a “heat check” and give her the opportunity to reject me on a smaller scale. In this case, I say “i don’t know if this will work with you living far away because I never learned to drive. I was born without arms or legs or the ability to roll quickly”.
The reason this is a GREAT heat check is because it is doing a S*** ton of things for me at once. It is conveying that i’m high status by saying “I’m not sure if this will work”, it is something funny that she’s never seen before, it is helping me with logistics and seeing if she actually has a car and can drive to me (because I don’t want to drive the 30 minutes to see her), and it also gives us a chance to move forward together by giving her the chance to reject me .
Instead of saying “It’s all good I have a car” and going along with it, she could have said something like “uhhh… okay?” or “uhhh… bad joke”. And if she said something like that, then I’d know where we stood at that moment.
The cool thing about heat checks is that even if she said something like “Yeah that does suck. Better get a car to see me” or “No I don’t have a car, you better find one!”, she is still going along with my joke and showing interest. The only way to lose in that situation is if she completely shuts it down or just ghosts it.
Alright, I could write an entire post on heat checking. If you need more help, email me grant@stepbystepdating.com or check out this free training. Moving on.
#2: Not Understanding The Psychology Of A Woman
Women do not think like we do. They do not view attraction like we do. The second problem you are experiencing along with not being able to properly read social cues is not properly understanding the psychology of a woman. It is MUCH MUCH different than ours.
We as guys know that if a girl was nice to us, we would probably start to like her (as long as she was attractive). The problem is, guys take this understanding of how attraction works for them and project it onto girls. Girls do not think this way at all. In fact, what makes them like you is the complete OPPOSITE!
Too many guys think they need to be “nice” to a girl to get her to like them, and if that doesn’t work, they should just keep being nicer, and nicer, and nicer, until it works. This is the opposite of what you need to do.
To understand what you actually need to do, you must first need to understand what women are attracted to:
Status.
Status is where you stand in the pecking order. And the higher you are (or are perceived to be) in the pecking order, the more likely you are to attract a women on your level or below where you are in the pecking order.
Here is an extremely helpful model for understanding women and dating:
Women date men who they perceive to be on their level and above them in the pecking order. Men date women who they perceive to be on their level and below them in the pecking order.
So if you want to date a girl, you need to make her believe that you are above her in the pecking order. (on her level works too, but above her is safer). Here’s a visual.
This is obviously hyperbolic, but it does have a LOT of truth in it. I mean think about it, if a 500lb women with a meth addiction told you that she liked you, wouldn’t you be like “why would I date her when I could do so much better?”. Well, girls do the same thing. But instead of being a meth addict, all you have to be is “too nice” LOL. It’s strange, but it’s reality.
You Saying “I Like You” Is Instantly Putting You Below Her Level
Guys who date a lot of girls never say the words “I like you”. Because according to the chart above, once you say you like her, it means that you are elevating her status above yours. Which is super unattractive to women.
What To Do Instead
Your main problem is that you are “hiding” your interest in her, and then just slamming her with it all on her at one time. There is nothing bad or wrong about showing interest in a woman. In fact, it is NECESSARY if you ever want to date her. And the earlier you do it, the better.
Instead of hiding your attraction to her, you want to express sexual interest in her without saying it directly – and always judging her reactions to what you are doing.
If you get any negative feedback at all, pull back a little back, and try another heat check in a few minutes. Heat checks could be in the form of great eye contact, light touching and joking around, or telling her that you don’t think she’s cool enough to be talking to you, in a playful way. Doing all of these things will help her understand that you are flirting with her.
Instead of telling you that you like her, start by doing verbal “heat checks” like making jokes and seeing if she laughs, or asking for her help on smaller things. If she complies with these smaller things, you will be able to build up to the point of you and her dating once you get your dating skills up.
Again, I could go on forever about this. I will be writing an entire book on female psychology (because it is the most important aspect when it comes to successful dating) but the basic premise is this:
Women like high status guys. So act like a high status guy (until you really become one).
That’s all I got for now. If you need more help, email me grant@stepbystepdating.com or check out this free training.
Never say “I like you” again,
Grant