Rejection - Originally posted Sep.2007

To anyone new to the world of pickup, I'd like you to meet one of your new best friends. Rejection. I know what you're thinking - "Dane's on crack". And you're right. I just hit some rock a few minutes ago. Joking. Most guys fear approaching women for biological reasons. I'm not going to go into it much here, but thousands of years ago rejection meant possibly never bearing offspring, or even death. The fear of rejection is a survival mechanism, an automatic response that we as men no longer need. Unfortunately evolution is a slow process, and has not yet rid us of it.

Is the fact that you get that feeling when even considering approaching a woman really a bad thing? Yes and no. It's bad because it stops most men from meeting or talking to the women they desire, and makes them so nervous when they do that they usually blow it. However, it's good because overcoming approach anxiety gives you a challenge, a chance to expand yourself and break through what you believe to be your limits, and when you do this, when you step outside of your comfort zone, the payoff can be huge.

We've all seen and experienced it before: you see an attractive woman, talk to her, and decide to go for it. You ask for her number, and suddenly your interaction comes to a screeching halt - you get the dreaded "I have a boyfriend". Worse yet she doesn't even give you a reason, instead she sighs, tilts her head, gives that little smile, and just says "I'm sorry....” Suddenly you feel yourself shrinking. You're getting smaller and smaller, everything around you is growing. You feel your balls disappearing. People are pointing and laughing at you.

Yeah right. Snap out of it douchebag. If you aren't willing to face scenarios like this every day then forget about being good with women - just go ahead and click on the little red X in the upper right corner as you recite the following: "I'm a wiener. I'd rather date my fist the rest of my life then face an irrational fear".

Good, you're still here. Rejection and approach anxiety go hand-in-hand. If you have approach anxiety and it's having a negative effect on your game then check back for an upcoming post highlighting a proven step-by-step method to get over it. As for rejection, there are two really powerful ways to handle it, both of which should be utilized. The first is to simply experience it. Expose yourself to it. The other is to reframe it. Change your interpretation of rejection and you change the impact that rejection has.

Think about this: when a woman rejects you, what do you automatically assume? Most likely you assume that she rejected you for some flaw of yours. Maybe she didn't like your approach. Maybe it was your "I-let-my-mom-dress-me" sense of fashion. Maybe she thinks you look like Sloth from The Goonies. Whatever. Or even worse, maybe there's one little thing about yourself that you're self-concious about, and you always resort back to that thing as your reason for being shot down. Horrible mentality to have.

But what if she really does have a boyfriend that she's committed to? What if she's a hardcore lesbian and not at all interested in guys? What if she has some crazy disease and doesn't wish to infect you? Or what if she's just too blind or stupid to see a golden opportunity when it's right in front of her, much like the one you presented her with? Hey wait, maybe SHE'S the one who blew it here. After all, you're a good guy, hell a woman would be lucky to be with you, right?

The other way to look at rejection is like this: BEING REJECTED IS NOT FAILURE. FAILURE IS ALLOWING THAT REJECTION TO STOP YOU FROM PROGRESSING. You see, the only time that failure is TRULY failure is when it keeps you down. Any other time it's simply a learning opportunity. Think about how many shots even the best basketball players miss in practice, or how many passes that even the best quarterbacks DON'T complete. Where would professional sports be if these athletes adopted the same mentality on rejection as men carry with women and applied it to what they do - there would be no sports. These guys miss and miss often. The difference is that they don't let it get to them - they wait for the opportunity to take another shot and they go for it.