Three seconds. That's how long it took. Your shoes. Your posture. The way you held your drink. Whether you looked at the floor or looked at her.
She already filed you away. Interesting. Boring. Safe. Bold. Before you even opened your mouth.
Everything you say after that is just her confirming what she already decided.
So stop rehearsing lines. Fix the first three seconds. Stand tall. Look up. Smile like you mean it. Walk like you belong wherever you're standing.
The words come later. The impression comes first.
You paid for dinner. You drove. You said "whatever you want is fine" every single time. All the effort, no expectations.
And she left anyway — probably for a guy who makes her pick up the pizza.
Painful. Also predictable. Her mind quietly concludes that anything requiring zero effort from her is worth exactly zero. You became a free sample, and free samples get taken for granted.
The 22 Rules flip the dynamic. Small shifts that get her investing effort, money, and time in you — until SHE'S the one afraid of losing YOU.
Fuk that Zekko. the mere fact she even entertained the idea was enough.zekko said:Jophil, you're an older guy on here like I am, and I notice you give a lot of seriously good advice, so I trust your judgement. But I can't help but wonder if you didn't pull the trigger just a bit fast here. She didn't say she was going to FOLLOW these mad instructions from her therapist, did she? I might have said something to the effect of stop seeing that quack or I'm out of here, but your way was definitely more dramatic. And like I said, I trust your judgement.
Were you seeing her exclusively then? If not, I'm not sure why it matters if she saw other men, unless you expect multiple women to be exclusive to YOU while you play the field, which would be very interesting also.
I think we have some therapists on this forum and I mean them no disrespect, but I have very little use for counseling. When I was getting close to my divorce, my wife wanted to try marriage counseling first, and I swear it made things worse. We actually tried two different counselers. The first one was a woman who basically sided with her on everything and tried to set up as her project how she could completely change me. The second took a more fair approach but it seemed like talking about everything did nothing but stir up the hornet's nest with no way to settle it. But in the end we did get divorced, and by that time it was okay with me anyway.
I think she FELT you were hard to talk to. (You might be the easiest guy in the world to talk to, but unless we FEEEEEEEEL it, we assume you're a brick wall.) Out here in cyber-land can only guess at what's going on in your relationship and your (ex?) girlfriend's mind.jophil28 said:I am not sure how or where you got the impression that I was unwilling to listen.
Perhaps you were assuming that she felt "unheard" by me so she talked to Leanne instead.
Well yeah, if they have a valid gripe, and the guy addresses it, how are they supposed to be able to keep the victim mentality? Better to keep the guy in the dark than to risk some sort of resolution.Easier to just blame the guy for everything, but keep it a secret from him .
She asks it casually, mid-sip. And you feel the floor open up, because the honest answer is work, gym, and a couple shows you're half-watching.
Women rarely say this out loud, but a man with a life is attractive before he says a word. The guy who spent Saturday deep-sea fishing and came back with photos and a story — he walks in already interesting.
The "22 Rules" pushed me to build a life worth talking about. Turns out the fastest way to be interesting to women is to be interested in your own life first.
OH, those precious FEELINGS that woman value above all.WaterTiger said:I think she FELT you were hard to talk to. (You might be the easiest guy in the world to talk to, but unless we FEEEEEEEEL it, we assume you're a brick wall.)
I have no idea because she has not TOLD me. I am therefore left to guess and speculate .grinder said:What does she want?
You've said it a hundred times. Maybe a thousand. And every time you say it, you train your brain to freeze the next time she walks into the room.
Leagues are a myth invented by guys who are scared of women.
She's a person. She has bad breath in the morning. She picks songs she can't sing in the shower. She overthinks her own texts.
Walk over. Say something. The league dissolves the second you open your mouth.
There is no reasoning to this, it's just menstral emotional head games.jophil28 said:It gets curiouser and curiouser.
HB just called, She had just seen Leanne a few hours ago.(session 4)
HB, Fluff talk ..how are you ..etc..
HB," I told Leanne that you said that you would be willing leave our relationship. She said that she was not surprised.." ( I sense a noose being prepared)
Jophil," I am not surprised that she is not surprised."
HB, "Huh ? SHe said that there are four basic components that are essential to maintaining a successful relationship and that we only had one, and you are willing to remove that so there is nothing left if you do that."
Jophil," Hmmm. She sounds like she has the ability to reason somewhat."
HB. "Why do you hate her. You have not very met her.?"
Jophil," Has she told you that you need to openly reveal what your complaints are to me."
HB," Well, sort of. How do I know that you will listen."
Jophil," How do you know I won't ? It is your job to open up .It is not up to me to shuck you open like an oyster. Have you told her what is annoying you."
HB, "Yes - mostly "
Jophil," Well write it all down and email me."
HB," You'll just delete it."
Jophil, " This is really dragging on and getting nowhere. I have had a birthday come and go since you called. "
HB, "You are impossible."
Jophil," I bet Leanne agrees with that, gotta go - talk later."
That sentence contains at least five follow-up questions she WANTS you to ask. Where in Florida? What brought you here? How long have you been in the area? What do you miss? How does it compare to here?
She handed them to you on a silver platter. And you said, "Oh cool. I come here every week. I love this band. Ummm... pretty crowded tonight."
She smiled politely. Nodded. And never texted you back.
I was that guy for years. Talking too much. Listening too little. Panicking about my next sentence while she was literally feeding me the answers.
Then I found 22 rules that fixed the whole thing. Rule number one: shut up and listen. She'll tell you exactly what to say.
This is infuriating. This woman meddles in her client's relationship, knowing full well she might bring it to ruin (if indeed that isn't her objective). Hey, no biggie, it's not like it's her relationship, right?HB," I told Leanne that you said that you would be willing leave our relationship. She said that she was not surprised.."
So very true.women with the propensity to defer to a 3rd party psychotherapist are attempting to control the frame by proxy. Essentially she's expecting you to accept Leanne as the higher authority (higher than yourself, which is rightly angering you), who'll then hand the frame back to her if you accept her authority. She's like a hostage negotiator.
Leanne is her buffer, and she's upset that you wont recognize her as an authority.
This is a perfect analysis. JoPhil already gets it. Rollo clarifies it for the rest of us.Rollo Tomassi said:I think "counseling" ought to be qualified a bit here. There are 'counselors' who help veterans returning from war with PTSD, there are 'counselors' who talk people out of suicide, and there are 'counselors' who listen to your marriage problems for $75 an hour. Big difference.
That said, and from what I can gather from your report here JOPHIL, women with the propensity to defer to a 3rd party psychotherapist are attempting to control the frame by proxy. Essentially she's expecting you to accept Leanne as the higher authority (higher than yourself, which is rightly angering you), who'll then hand the frame back to her if you accept her authority. She's like a hostage negotiator.
Leanne is her buffer, and she's upset that you wont recognize her as an authority. If it were anyone else I'd say just NEXT this woman, and you probably will at some point anyway, but I'd encourage you to string this along for as far as you can just in the interests of the guys here.
You've replayed it a hundred times. She stood three feet away, scrolling her phone. You had an opening. You composed the perfect line — after she was gone.
For all you know, she's married now. To some guy who said something. Anything.
Openers are cheap. Almost any sentence works when it's delivered within three seconds. The expensive part is the standing there, drafting and deleting, while the window quietly closes.
The "22 Rules" stripped out my hesitation. What to open with, how to keep it alive, and the one habit that costs guys more women than anything else: waiting for perfect.