My friend Garrison runs the Authentic Man business in SF. They specialize in male confidence, or “inner game.”
His email was so insightful about how men shut down around beautiful women, I asked him if I could share it here.
(Note: There’s a link below the story to a $1 trial membership for Foundations of Inner Game: Revealed. I highly recommend AMP’s work.)
Hi Sloane,
I’ve got a funny story for you…When I was in middle school there was this awkward, train wreck of a girl named Margo Frisbee (yes, that was her real name!)
She was taller than the other girls, her arms seemed too long, she wore this crazy looking headgear for her braces, and she had tons of hair that was always tied up so it made her look even taller.
She was three years ahead of me, and while I never spoke to her, I silently regarded her as some kind of tragic phenomenon.
But by the time I entered high school and she was getting ready to graduate, things had changed. Margo Frisbee was now stunningly beautiful! Everything about her screamed ”WOMAN.”
She looked like a cross between a supermodel and an action hero and she totally ignored all the popular kids who were now finally looking her way.
I was mesmerized by her.
In typing class I sat next to her friend Ken, and I confided in him that Margo was my dream woman. One day he turns to me and casually says, “I told her what you said. She was curious about who you were.”
“I can’t believe you told her!” I yelled.
“Relax,” he said. “Just say ‘hi’ to her.”
And then one day it happened. It was the classic scene. Quiet, empty school corridor, I’m walking one way, she’s walking the other.
My heart gives one gigantic “GLUG” and then it felt like it stopped entirely for a full instant.
She knows who I am and what I said, but we’ve never spoken a word.
My face turns red. My heart is beating so fast I’ve got tunnel vision. I think I might be going blind. There goes the hearing. Time slows down. I can’t think of anything to say!
She’s almost next to me, passing by. I’m not looking at her but I can feel her eyes on me! I can barely even remember my own name. I’ve got to do something… but what? As she passes by I stand there totally clueless with nothing to say.
When I really think about, it seems like it should have been the most natural thing in the world to interact with this beautiful creature, and yet for the majority of men, like me back then, it seems impossible.
If you think about it, it’s kind of strange that when we’re genuinely attracted to and interested in a woman, we’re terrified to approach her! What’s going on here?
Well, the women that we are drawn to are generating a lot of ”feminine radiance.” For a lot of men this is both the source of our attraction AND our “contraction.”
You “contract,” or close down, in the face of her radiance because of how little capacity you have to handle all the sensation. In other words, you’re getting “blown out.” She’s really beautiful and you’re getting short-circuited before you even talk to her. You could be a rocket scientist but in this moment you just can’t seem to put two words together.
Afterward, you’ll think of all the playful things you would have liked to say, or the perfect joke you could’ve made….
Yet, it’s as if you’re not functioning, literally short-circuiting, in those moments.
The good news is that this doesn’t have to be the case. In fact, you can increase your capacity to be grounded and centered around radiant, gorgeous women. One thing we’ve noticed is that a lot of men who have an easier time approaching women have practiced a lot of martial arts or yoga.
They have actively cultivated the capacity to be with a lot of sensation and intensity without losing their center.
Whether you go out and start working on your black belt or not, we’ve found that for most guys, simply becoming aware of how they get overwhelmed by their feelings can make a huge difference.
With or without intense training, you can handle a lot more energy than you think, at least once you know how to try.
Really get this: The source of you shutting down with extraordinarily beautiful women, in those pivotal moments, is you avoiding what you’re feeling!
It’s true. As Margo approached me the sensations I was feeling in my little high school body were so intense that all I knew how to do was resist them.
If I had known that I could actually open to those feelings and enjoy them, instead of try to fight them, I would have been able to stay calm, centered, present and connected to my creativity.
Once I started to learn from AMP how to do this, I wanted every guy who ever missed his Margo to be able to do this as well.
Oh, so what happened with Margo? The moment passed, my vision returned and that was the last time I ever saw her. It was a big school, it was close to the end of the year, and she graduated and moved on, never coming back. I’ve Googled her but only found pictures of dogs jumping for discs.
Don’t let your Margo get away.
Garrison and the AMP Team
P.S. If you’d like to learn how to be able to handle the intensity
that comes up whenever you’re relating to *your* Margo
Frisbee, then definitely check out our “Foundations of Inner
Game: Revealed” Video.
It’s packed with practical tools and live examples of men
interacting with women that will transform how you mix
with women… and as part of a special promotion, it’s COMPLIMENTARY
(you just pay a $1 processing fee).
Why are we giving this away? Simply because if you get as much value from it as I know you will, you’re going to want more of our work… and I don’t want anything to stop you from catching YOUR Margo!
One Response
Yoga? Nonsense.
Talking to beautiful women is fun and easy. I just do it. Sloane.
MATT