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There's a certain allure to that guy. He has it. That special something. Women love him and men want to be him. To some degree, we've all seen these guys. Mystery calls them 'naturals'. They learned the game the way you would expect society, in a perfect world, to teach it to us. These are the alpha males, the leaders of the pack. The football player, the rock star, the Hollywood actor. They all personify the kind of man that many men - secretly or outwardly - wish to be. So, it comes as no surprise that sooner or later, someone would finally figure out the ingredients in the most elusive of all secret sauces - how to bed the woman of your dreams.

I was first turned on to the seduction community in the mid-to-late nineties. It was then that I got a checking account and learned that certain porn vendors didn't ask for any age verification other than a simple date of birth and a signature. It was a fairly simple deal that wound up affecting me to this day. What I didn't know when I ordered these videos was that I would be added to an erotic mailing list. A deluge of junk mail showed up in my parents mailbox the following month plying everything from videos to butt plugs to shit that I don't even wanna mention. Of course, they didn't notice. All this stuff is sent very discreetly and even if there was some kind of marking on the envelope, it was unlikely my parents had any idea what it meant.

One day, though, something caught my eye. It was a piece of junk mail formatted like a letter. It proudly proclaimed that anyone could learn to bed the woman of his dreams. "Nay," said I, "This isn't something you learn. Some guys have it and some guys don't." At the time I was perfectly content with stroking my pole all by my lonesome, so this idea intrigued me. How do you teach something as complex as meeting women? It boggled my mind. I had to read more.

The letter was from a guy named Ross Jeffries, self proclaimed lay-guru. Ross' plan was simple. In the day and age of technology, he had harnessed the power of NLP and was using it to practically hypnotize women into doing anything he wanted. It revolved around patterns and eliciting a person's values to find their trance words. Then, once you found their trance words, you could simply drop them into a canned pattern which came off like a normal conversation. Each pattern had a specific form and purpose that was designed to produce a certain result. Ross advertised the boyfriend-destroyer, the blow-job pattern, the friends-into-lovers pattern and a host of other patterns designed to solve common social situations faced by hopeless nerds every day. I was entranced. Here was a guy who was going on his forties and still bedding co-eds. Could this be real?

I pondered that question for a long time. Ross' taped seminars were well beyond my price range as a lowly dish-tank operator at the local Steak n' Shake. Besides, there was no real proof this stuff worked. Only the hyperbole of some far-off huckster who printed my name in the greeting line of his letters - like he actually sent this exclusively to me. As if to stave off my reservations, each letter also contained dozens of testimonials from men who claimed to be able to take this stuff the week they got their hands on it and get blow jobs from women who were freezing them out. At a hefty $300 price tag, that was a bit too much to be spending on something I didn't know actually works. My high school marketing teacher had already told me once in some of the best advice I've ever been given in my life - "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is." Good motto to live by, as long as you pay attention to the second to last word of it.

At the close of the century, high speed Internet hit our home and a computer was in every room. I remembered Ross one day, and punched him into a search. Sure enough, there he was, still plying his trade and selling people on the idea that he could solve all their problems with women. By now I had read a couple Tony Robbins books and, if you know anything about him, he also sells NLP as the invention of the century. I started to think that maybe this NLP thing could be the real deal. Again, I checked back around 2000 and something else turned up in my searches. Ross had competition.

An entire community had sprung up revolving around dating and seduction. A site called Fast Seduction 101 had become the clearinghouse and nerve center of the community. If it had to do with getting laid, it was on Fast Seduction. The body of knowledge offered on the site for free was fantastic, but it was unorganized and crude (and still is, IMHO). All the community had to offer, it seemed, was a backlog of forum posts so full of machismo and night club daring-do that it would make Casanova blush. I lurked for another year.

When I checked back, the hottest thing out on the block was an e-book by a man named David DeAngelo called "Double Your Dating." This author advised being yourself. He advocated dragging yourself out of your shell and putting your best foot forward. Sounds a lot less far out than Ross' over hyped bluster. I decided to bite and downloaded a copy of Double Your Dating immediately. I was again blown away. David was much different than Ross. His motto was "Attraction is not a choice." Although he did offer a few social "tricks" and tips, he also offered a huge history on sexuality and how it pertains to modern day relationships, most importantly, attraction.

No topic was left sacred. Using a mix of evolutionary psychology, cocky and funny, and personal experience, David was finally able to pull the curtain back for me and give me a glimpse into his world. In his world, sexuality was a function of biology, namely reproduction. It was our nature and only purpose in life, biologically speaking. David would go on to derive every modern social behavior that leave most men flabbergasted with women and trace them back to our caveman roots. He had decoded the secret language of women. For the first time on paper, I read the what women really want from a purely scientific stand point (I'll give you a hint, it isn't always about how good you look). I read it from beginning to end, twice. After a round with college and coming back empty handed, I decided to finally try some of this stuff out.

It resulted in me almost having sex with two girls, making out with several and having a one night stand. This stuff was working! The problem, I later found, was that David had very little to offer in the way of real material. There was no structure to his method, just a long convoluted string of theories about sexuality, body language and humor. Useful, no doubt. However, they were much easier to write and read about then they were to use. It all looked good on paper, but it lacked any structure that could be useful. Just "be cocky and funny." Great. I got the cocky part down, but the funny not so much.

Then I found out about the Mystery Method. Mystery (aka Eric von Markovich) had taken all of it and condensed it into a simple and easy to use system. Any AFC (Average Frustrated Chump) could now become a PUA (PickUp Artist), just like him. If you could learn to fire off the material properly and anticipate her reactions through experience, then you could get women attracted to you. Not only did Mystery provide the material, he also provided a structure to which all male-female relationships come from. That structure is Find, Meet, Attract and Close, in that order. If anyone reading this can find one relationship between a man and a woman where these four steps did not take place, please let me know. I'll be sure to ridicule you mercilessly.

I think it's worth mentioning at this point that none of the material mentioned in this review was ever advertised to me as a magic bullet. Although you can see results from day one, the magic really isn't supposed to happen until you're out meeting new women every night and have internalized your material so much so that it is possible to crack it off and focus on the important aspects of the interaction not the talk. Instead of trying to figure out what to say next, you were instead deciding what your next move was going to be on the proverbial chess board.

From this structure, supposedly, you could master each step to become a Venusian artist. Where martial arts stemmed from the need to survive, the Venusian arts stemmed from the need to reproduce. Since our society does not teach us, as men, what we need to learn to reproduce, we're scattered to our own devices to figure it out. In the meantime, women are getting grooming and fashion lessons from their parents/friends and discussing ways to paint their fingernails - all in the pursuit of sexuality. In short: Most women are trained by society on how to be attractive and to ensure they get the highest value man they can get. Men receive no such training. In the same way a martial artist trains his reflexes for battle, a Venusian artist trains his reflexes for social interaction. Finally, there was a way to level the playing field.

"Just being yourself" and "Go say 'Hi' to her" will only get you so far. That's just an opener. If she doesn't find you interesting in the first few seconds of the interaction, she will most probably leave said interaction before she gets to discover how great you really are. "The Venusian Arts Handbook" (now simply called "The Mystery Method") was a revelation. It was a blueprint for relationships anyone could follow. It was aimed squarely at helping men gain the attention of the woman long enough to show her that he was, in fact, a good guy.

Ross was a perverse manipulator by comparison. He advocated getting women to do what he wanted to by making him think it was their idea. They would just talk to him and BAM - they were already well on the road to being hypnotized by them. It seemed dishonest and crude. You don't have to be yourself if you can recite a script. Cupid, he ain't.

"The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists" by Neil Strauss recounts his own journey through the world of the pickup artist. He started out just like most guys. Neil started out writing Marilyn Manson's memoirs. After that, he toured with Motley Crue and chronicled his adventures with them. Not long after, he earned a spot on the staff of the prestigious music magazine, Rolling Stone. However, not being the alpha male, Neil, at the ripe age of 30, had only been laid six times. Then he met Mystery and Sinn. And their very first night out at Mystery's very first workshop, Mystery told him he was going to be a superstar.

In the following two years, Neil would transform his life. He rechristened himself Style and his baptism, like that of all pickup artists, was by fire. The game consumed Style's life. He stopped writing for Rolling Stone and paying his bills. He was addicted to the thrill and small victories of the cold approach pickup. Every night, seven nights a week for over six months, Style learned to control his emotions as he both approached as many women as he could and saw as many experts in the subject as possible. He dined with Ross, attended David's seminars and even subjected himself to being hypnotized so he could cram even more information into his head as fast as possible. Eventually the magic bullet came about and hit him in the ass and he became a super star. He was finally able to enjoy the power and choice with women that had never been thought possible. He got the numbers of Playboy Playmates and stole women away from men like Andy Dick like he was born to do it. Not long after, he and his mentor would be standing shoulder to shoulder as equals, teaching seminars and workshops to the next generation of pickup artists.

"The Game" has an amazing energy to behold. The sweeping soap opera that unfolds in this book is quite honestly unlike any other. In it, he recounts the entire history of the seduction industry from his own perspective. From steamy sex on the beach to real hypnosis - on a regular basis, no less - it's almost like reading science fiction. In fact, one of the first things you will read when you open this (very nicely leather bound) book is:

Those who have read the early drafts of this book have all asked the same questions:

Is this true?

Did it really happen?

Are these guys for real?

I find it necessary to employ an old literary device...

THE FOLLOWING IS A TRUE STORY.

IT REALLY HAPPENED.

Men will deny it,

Women will doubt it,

But I present it to you here, naked,
vulnerable, and disturbingly real.

I beg you for your forgiveness in advance.

DON'T HATE THE PLAYER, HATE THE GAME.

I can confirm for you here and now, that, yes, it is indeed very real. My marketing teacher had been proven wrong (or at least partially so). There are some seemingly tall tales in this book, however since I kept an earnest eye on the community and can easily say that I was able to observe a few of these the Internet news posts and site outages recounted in the book first-hand.

Some of the most wonderful reading in this book is contained in these posts. In them, these men discuss anything from how to get a first kiss to reporting their successes, to venting their anger. The Mystery Lounge figures prominently into the structure of the book. In between Style's breakneck tale of his advance to superstardom is interspersed these posts. Sometimes, they open their hearts and minds to the community. Other times, they solicit advice from each other or write guides on how to surpass certain common issues. Other times still, they report their experiences in "the field," which refers to the bars and clubs in which the "game" is played. All these posts and the rest of the book make heavy use of seduction acronyms and terms coined by Mystery and used by the entire seduction community. In fact, the back of the book contains a complete glossary of terminology used by PUAs to communicate with each other about their own experiences and sticking points.

For example, an AFC is an Average Frustrated Chump, the guy who try as he might, can't nail down what it is that attracts women. He then settles into relationships as "getting lucky." These are the guys who marry early. This is often because they don't think they can do any better. Even worse, the woman makes out like a bandit in this deal because she is easily able to control the guy because of his poor social conditioning. The Field, as mentioned above, is where the game is played. Bars, clubs, on the street, in the coffee shop, in the elevator or anywhere one might meet a woman. An IOI is an Indicator Of Interest. Pick up artists look for these small hints - the playing with the hair, the light touch, an intense stare - in order to know that a woman is attracted to them in order to escalate their game to the next level. In "The Game," Style's rule was to always wait for three IOIs before going for a kiss. It worked like a charm.

Style rapidly began creating his own material and coining his own terminology and routines. Regrettably, all was not peas and carrots, as Forrest would say, in the world. Style's mentor, Mystery later became mentally unstable and had to be temporarily institutionalized. Thus, the seduction community now looked to Style as their lord and savior. Everyone was coming to him for advice instead of the other way around. The man was a machine and nothing could stop him... That is until Mystery came back.

If there's one complaint that could be leveled at the book as a whole, it's that it doesn't really pick up steam until the second half. Before Mystery's big crash that leaves Style out on his own, the book tends to slip into a meandering and sometimes slow recollection of the history of the seduction industry and biopics of it's major players (no pun intended). Although it is entirely necessary to the development and theme of the book, it's a shame Neil couldn't polish these middling middle chapters a bit more.

Probably the most interesting section of the book, the second half chronicles Mystery's return and subsequent spawning of an idea called Project Hollywood. Mystery and Style would hand pick the world's foremost experts in dating and seduction and stick them all into the same Hollywood mansion. Their plan was to host the most decadent Hollywood parties, train the next generation of PUAs and advance their lifestyle further than they ever thought possible. Unfortunately, it wasn't to last.

The social situation of having so many 'fake alphas' in the house soon brought Project Hollywood crashing down around them. Though the situation was helped somewhat by Style and Courtney Love, nothing could stop Mystery's manic tendencies and difficulty in maintaining lasting relationships. Whenever Mystery found another steady girlfriend he would crash and become psychologically unstable. This cycle repeats itself at least twice during the course of the book. Soon after a particularly violent outbreak, Mystery is kicked out of the house. And at the same time, as if to complicate matters further, Style finally seems to find the one in Lisa Leveridge, a ten from Courtney's rock band. For the first time in two years, Style gets one-itis. Even better, she manages to legitimately challenge Style's advances. The player had been played.

Finally, in one of the most endearing and relevant passages in the book, Style lying in bed with his lover, confesses everything. The seduction industry, the terminology, all the experts he saw, the thousands of approaches. And after all that, she simply replies:

"'All the things you learned from the PUAs almost made us not come together,' Lisa continued. 'I want you to just be Neil: balding, nerdy, glasses and all.'

Maybe she was right. Perhaps she would have liked the real me. But she never would have had the opportunity to meet him if I hadn't spent the last two years learning how to put my best food forward. Without all that training, I never would have had the confidence to talk to and handle a girl like Lisa, who was a constant challenge.

I needed Mystery, Ross Jeffries, David DeAngelo, David X, Juggler, Steve P., Rasputin, and all those other pseudonyms. I needed them to discover what was me to begin with. And now that I had found that person, brought him out of his shell, and learned to accept him, perhaps I had outgrown them.

Lisa sat up and took a sip from the bottle of beer she had brought upstairs. 'Everyone was hitting on me tonight,' she giggled... 'I hope you realize that you are dating the most fabulous girl in L.A.'

In response, I wordlessly pulled open my bottom dresser drawer, grabbed two large manila envelopes from inside, and brought them to the bed. I turned the first envelope upside down and dumped its contents onto the comforter. Hundreds of paper scraps, matchbooks, business cards, cocktail napkins, and torn receipts spilled out. Each one contained the handwriting of a different girl. Then I emptied the second envelope onto the bed - full of more of the same - until there was a small mountain of paper scraps. They were all phone numbers I'd collected since taking that first fateful workshop with Mystery.

'I know you are,' I finally answered her. 'I've spent two years meeting every girl in L.A. And out of them all, I chose you.'"

David DeAngelo put it best when he related contemporary human sexuality to poker. David is a huge believer in the role our genetic heritage plays in our sexuality. To him, biological impulses form the basis of all sexuality from initial attraction to sex. Women are hard-wired to bear young and have an impulse to see that they are provided and taken care of, whilst men are programmed to seek out and mate with as many women as possible. Even biologically this is consistent: a woman produces one egg per month and in the meantime, a man produces millions of sperm. Thus, according to him, the true winners keep playing until they attain the woman they truly deserve. Others, lacking the skills or biological wherewithal to move up the genetic ladder, choose to "Fold," marrying and thus removing themselves from the wider gene pool.

The point of all this is that the human mind is far more sophisticated than even our own genetics anticipated. You are, speaking against the backdrop of the entirety of human evolution, are last year's model and are designed for a time and a place that no longer exists. We have ceased being a tribal society of cavemen who use our superior strength and size to bludgeon the woman we desire on the head and drag her back to our caves by her hair. We live in a society where more people than ever before have lived on the face of the Earth. Social skills are learned behaviors and Neil's story teaches us that we can all learn the skills we need to attain the choices we've always wanted for ourselves.

In the end, that's all any guy could reasonably ask for - the freedom to choose. Everyone should have the chance to meet and attract that one person that makes their life complete. Few men today, outside of the obnoxiously rich, famous and those elusive 'naturals' are ever offered it. And in those cases, when that person finally happens upon them, they wind up too jaded to realize how lucky they really are. Neil was smart enough to see that and, as a result, while other men around him were busy attempting to fill the void in their life with riches, fame or religion, Neil Strauss filled it with the woman of his dreams.