I've got a different theory to this whole "be yourself" thing entirely.
My belief is that our real self is the one we've been covering up, ever since we learnt it was wrong to express ourselves.
I've discoverd that lot of the guys that enter the community believe that "being themselves" is being the nice guy who always finishes last, the dude who always gets LJBF'd, or the man who constantly ****s himself when in the company of hot women.
Whatever it may be, that was never your real self.
That was you trying to be what you thought she wanted. That was you trying to present a "self" that you thought she would like.
Think about this for a second in the context of the guy who always embarrases himself around hot women. Maybe you've been that guy (I have definitely been that guy). You feel anxious around the hot ladies, you go blank in your mind because you don't know what to say, and you're constantly watching every move you make, so as not to "**** it up".
What is your purpose in this interaction?
I would like to suggest that in this interaction (and just about any you have with women even now, as a Don Juan) that almost always, on some level, your purpose is:
To get her to like you.
When you interact with a woman with an underlying purpose of getting her to like you, you are playing a game you can never really win.
The challenge alone is enough to enough to turn any man's balls to mush.
Which is no wonder why you experience anxiety in this situation, and in trying NOT to **** it up, you are more likely TO **** it up.
In these instances, there really is no sense of self. You are playing into what you THINK (because you'll never know for sure) she wants you to be.
So rather than being your truest expressed self, you suppress who you REALLY are, and play the puppet.
I've personally found this to be true of men pre-community, and during-community.
My perspective is that you've never REALLY been yourself, usually only around very close friends are you expressed as your truest self - and how many of you could say you express yourself exactly the same with a hot woman as you would around your friends?
My advice is to REALLY be yourself, not some shadow of the self you've been repressing.
Find that man who's always lived inside, who is naturally fun, who naturally knows his own direction and follows it in any moment, who women really can't help but be attracted to. You've already been this man, just think back to moments when you were "in the zone", "on fire", where nothing could touch you. In those moments were you ever really thinking about what you thought other people were thinking about you? Or were you just completely fully expressed from your deepest level, not holding anything back?
That man has been hard to find because you've covered him up in insecurities, unhelpful beliefs, defence mechanisms, and whatever else you'd like to add to this pile.
Finding this man, for me, was not about piling more on top in learning methods of approach, a new way of being around women. What it actually involved was unlearning all of the **** that had been holding me back.
Obviously I can really only speak of my own experience, and those of my friends around me, but it may be worth trying on.
The self that wants to get better, that wants to improve, is really the self that wants to get out from underneath all of the layers you've attemped to supress it with.
Let it out once in a while, see how it feels.
You never know what could happen.
