How to approach without fear

[Marquez]

I have posted this information in another thread, and I think it is useful to overcome anxiousness when approaching strangers.

It is normal to feel uncomfortable when interacting with strangers. The brain stem reacts with FEAR. Why? Because a stranger is a threat, a potential enemy and represents DANGER.

We don't feel outright fear, since we have learned to compensate / dampen that feeling with our concious mind (see #3 below), but the "fear" input (brain stem -> cortex) nevertheless is there.

how to react to danger?

1.) run: not useful. some people develop panic attacks and stuff in public, which relates to the "run" reaction.
2.) attack: not useful. notice when you are drunk, you will not rationalize enough to decide usefulness.
3.) trick the brain stem by thinking "others do not exist": this is used by most people while enjoying activities like shopping or walking to the subway station. Sometimes in public even people who know each other, don't see each other, because their thinking is in "others do not exist" mode.
4.) pretend to be dead: this is what most people do when they are forced to notice other people, like in public transport. if they have some kind of activity, even if it's reading newspaper, they switch to 3.)

reaction 3.) is prefered, cause it involves the least stress.

When you start to see strange people with this knowledge, you can start to feel relaxed in the given situation. You can smile, since you realize that most of the people around you experience a mild form of fear or anxiousness, but don't know it. Which is what you did before reading this post.

Keeping this in mind, you have mastered your brain stem. You conciously decide that most strangers are no danger to you. Why should they? They are afraid of YOU! (and the other strangers). And ofcourse you still can identify a real threat.

Now you can approach people on a casual basis, effortless and without fear. You can talk to almost everyone - if you like. If you see anxiousness, stop your approach. Or wait a little bit, let your opponent recover and realize that you are no danger. A stranger starting a conversation is not normal, especially when you are in "others do not exist" mode. Some people react friendly, some cautious, some will reject you. Rejection is a reaction to feeling uncomfortable.
But most people will be grateful for the favor you are giving by approaching them.

 

[Aiken_Drum]

Nice post, I like it.
Where did you learned about the different reactions? It sounds like you've studied psichollogy? Right?

 

[Ragnar]

That was an amazing post. Where did you get this info? This should be moved to the DJ BIBLE>

 

[Marquez]

Where did you learned about the different reactions? It sounds like you've studied psichollogy? Right?
...
Where did you get this info?

I learned about the different reactions by learning NLP, studying neurochemistry (some university - biology/genetics, plus reading a lot of books), and observing people and myself.
My mother has a NLP master practitioner degree and later specialized in systemic family therapy, so I had access to a lot of books and help with understanding the material.

I was wondering a lot why people are so stiff in vienna's public transports (especially subways), behaving like frozen. it is very silent in the trains, it's obvious people are feeling uncomfortable. I never could understand why no one talks (except groups of friends and such). Sometimes I felt uncomfortable too, but didn't know why. Sometimes I laughed because the situation was so ridiculous ... silence ... people on purpose try not to smile or meet each others eyes. I started to make experiments, starting discussions by commenting on newspaper articles or asking if someone is from here or from out of town, smiling, locking gaze until opponent looks away (happens fast), provocant body language (legs wide open and hands pointing to crotch), suchs things ...

One day I noticed a girl checking me out from some seats away, but everytime I looked into her direction she looked away. So I waited until she looked again, and in the same moment I also turned my head. I "catched" her. She immediately looked away and was such confused, that she held her hands before her face for a minute. Then she recovered and looked around and realized how strange it is that everyone is silent and is afraid to look someone in the eyes. Shortly before I left, she asked the person in front of her (an old man) if she could lend his newspaper. I concluded she mastered her "brain stem" by concious thinking and wanted to know if it is possible to change that awkward silence in the train. I never saw such a thing before (except when I did it). Unfortunately the old man looked at her if she was a ghost

Later I asked my mother about the psychological background of human behaviour in subways in particular and in public in general. She explained me the "Stranger = Danger" brain stem mechanics, in which you are trapped unless you master it by realizing it conciously.

 

[xRobertx]

interesting post, marquez!

i made the same observations e.g. in public transport. people feel very uncomfortable sitting next to and especially across from a stranger.

sometimes i wonder if let's say 90% of the people (particularly here in Central Europe) suffer from some kind of social phobia because they get intimidated by others so easily. Unfortunately I often feel uncomfortable in those situations too, but one way or another I think I'll be able to overcome these awkward feelings.

I also believe that most of the people, even those with an unfriendly/uncomfortable look on their face, would enjoy being approached by a stranger to have some slight conversation. I think it's great when people are able to do such things.


xRobertx

 

[Capitol39]

As children, adults were always telling us not to talk to strangers. I understand the merit in this, but it also propogates a sense of fear towards other people. I mean, what are kids supposed to think of other people when they are constantly being told that strangers are dangerous?


It would be interesting to procure some imperical evidence in a controlled setting to really test your hypothesis.

 

[Mack Of All Trades]

you know ALOT about phsychology. Is that your major in college?

 

[xRobertx]

Originally posted by Capitol39
As children, adults were always telling us not to talk to strangers.

I think this fear is not acquired or at least not the major part of it. I heard that even babies are already able to dinstinguish their mother/father from a stranger. I've seen it quite often that a baby is given to a friend or so and it starts crying and when it gets back to the mother it calms down again.
This is an important congenitally protective measure.
Later on when you grow up you have to somehow distinguish between the harmless and the potentially dangerous strangers and act accordingly without being disturbed too much by this built-in protective measure - that's the difficult part.

robert

 

[Page]

While we are on this subject, i have a method of my own:

From the Book of Shuma Gora:

THE FUN OF THE APPROACH

Many people initially have a difficult time with the approach. They are often self conscious, have a shortage of confidence, and thus they go forth anticipating failure.

My question to them is, why are they making is so hard for themselves? The approach is supposed to be a relatively easy accomplishment for the avcerage Don Juan, yet these new Don Juans quite frequently turn a relatively neutral situation into a self-hostile predicament. They begin to think about what would happen if they mes up, walk over but are afraid to talk, etc.

This fear that the new Don Juan feels is not something to be bitter about. The emotion which translates itself into fear is merely the reaction that the woman has on you.

Anyone who has this feeling is not afraid of women in general. If he were, he would be afraid to approach ANY women in GENERAL.

In reality, my friend, this fear is just your own reaction to seeing a beautiful woman. If she has this type of reaction on you, then surely she is worth approaching, wouldn't you think? Also, what you are feeling is not the fight-or-flight emotion that we call fear, no, it's more like a feeling of excitement and anxiousness.

Feeling excitement about the approach is perfectly natural, my friend. If you were not to feel it, your ability to feel emotion should be called into question. The underlying reason why we dislike this feeling in our approaches is simply because we have come to asociate it with failure.


This is because the average man (or new Don Juan, for that matter) is more or less unaware about how to deal with these feelings. Since many just let their AFc tendencies take over in their approaches, this excitement often translates to the woman as horny desperation. A desperarate Don Juan will be spending his evenings alone unless he combats this improper use of excitement.

Another way that excitement works against the new Don Juan is in the fact that he has not yet resolved his own feelings of insecurity. If an insecure man starts to feel this excitement, memories of his past failures come flooding back to him. He then interprets his excitement as anxiety, and his own anxiety starts to feed on his fear, and it begins to rob the man of his confidence and remind him of his own shortcomings. When he fails to make his approach by holding back, he chastizes himself emotionally because of this. He is blaming himself for feeling this emotion.


In psychology, Conditioning is the principle of training someone to assosciate a natural response with a learned stimulus. Just like how Pavlov's dog associated meat with the bell and thus began the natural reaction of salivation, The AFC man becomes conditioned. The AFC Man learns to associate this excitement (natural response) with failed approaches (conditioned stimulus). After conditioning is complete, the AFc man will sabotage his own success by expecting to fail every time he feels excitement.



ON THE OTHER HAND, THE DON JUAN IS DIFFERENT. HE KNOWS HOW TO TRANSLATE THIS EXCITEMENT INTO A POSITIVE EMOTION, AND THUS BECOMES CONDITIONED TO SUCCESS.

How does this principle work? Well, to simply describe it, the Master Don Juan (henceforth referred to as "The Master")knows that this excitement cannot be removed from the approach, so there must be a way to positively utilize it.

The Master then learns that if an AFC can be conditioned to fail via experiencing this emotion, a Don Juan can be conditioned to succeed through it. For the Universe is balanced. For every negative, there is a positive to balance it out. Since the Don Juan walks the positive path, a positive solution exists; it need only be found and used.

The Master knows that he is intrinsically able to make his approach successfully. He knows that he is confident. He knows that he is ready. He knows that he will succeed, for after all, he is The Master.

Since Negative association is contrary to the Don Juan System, the Master realizes that he needs to learn how to associate the excitement of the approach with the opposite of fear, PLEASURE.

The Master then realizes that the approach NEED NOT BE A FEARFUL ORDEAL, IT CAN JUST AS EASILY BE FUN. AFTER ALL, A DON JUAN THAT IS HAVING FUN IS INFINITELY MORE ATTRACTIVE TO WOMEN, THUS HIS SUCCESS RATE AUTOMATICALLY INCREASES.

So when The Master makes his approach, fear is the last thing on his mind. Likewise, he is not afraid to feel the excitement for what it is, that is, excitement at meeting a beautiful woman. The Master knows how to enjoy the positives in life, and since meeting a new woman is a definite positive, The Master knows that he must approach with an aura of fun.

The Master learns how to do this by conditioning himself to think of the approach as SOMETHING FUN.

When the Apprentice Don Juan is having trouble shaking the fear of the approach, he must succeed by any means possible to convince himself that the approach is FUN, not a tedious chore. This human nature may resist this at first, but since Positive emotions are stronger than negative ones, the Apprentice Don Juan will soon condition himself to believe the approach is fun, and he will no longer need to remind himself; the concept will be implanted firmly into his personality. Once this happens, the Apprentice Don Juan will learn one of the many hidden wisdoms of the Master, that knowledge being how to convert the fear of the approach into the fun of the approach.

So remember, my friend, the approach is a fun activity, not a terrifying one. The challenge of this lesson is convincing yourself that the words that I teach are true. Your past experiences may tell you that the approach is difficult, but there is no need for oyu to listen to the negativity of your past. Instead, look at the positivity of your future. Also take into consideration the fact that the past has no sway on the present and the future unless you give it the power to impact your decisions.

 

[Master Of The World]

you guys should sell books !

every day I read your posts guys you impress me more and more.... inspiring !

 

[Marquez]

Very interesting information, Page. Very simiar to my idea of "mastering the brain stem" ... I did it by realizing the fun of the absurdity that *everyone* feels fear, you did it by interpreting your anxiousness as funny. Excellent method with same results.