Got a great question from my guy @MimeticValue on Twitter today (why are you not following him?), dealing with a very interesting phenomenon in dating:

“@Pat_Stedman I noticed that people project a role onto you from their first impressions, and it’s very hard to change this. If she likes you for that role, she becomes frustrated when you play an unexpected role.

For example, I’ve had the best connections with women who saw me as a gymrat or artist, but too often they see me as the scientist, businessman, or insights guy, and these relationships never work out. Thoughts on this issue? Thanks.”

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So there are two things to this issue worth exploring: the approach and the details. We’ll focus on approach today, and save the rest for tomorrow.

By “approach” I mean the manner in which you attracted the girl. As I’ve talked about awhile back, there are generally 2 different “macro” styles to approaching a woman: dominance and seduction.

Dominant men attempt to assert their frame onto a woman through pushing, while Seductive men attempt to subvert a woman’s frame by pulling her in. Most men of course use of combination of these two styles, but each leans more heavily on one than another.

Note that Dominance need not be a caricature; it overlaps heavily with direct interaction with a woman. Seduction in contrast is more indirect. For intuitive nerds: it’s the difference between painting a picture of a tree by drawing a tree, and painting a picture of a tree by drawing the ground and sky.

Dominance and Seduction are both tactics, and fall under the category of Persona (Game Styles). But the nature of Dominance allows a girl to know exactly what she is getting from a guy. The guy is more likely to get “blown out” being dominant, but is also more likely to keep a stable dynamic with the girl going forward.

In contrast, Seduction allows you more “operational mobility” when it comes to attracting a girl. You read what a girl wants, and then leave breadcrumbs in the right places… letting her imagination do the rest of the work.

This lets you sleep with more girls, which is why seduction is the preferred approach of most PUAs, daygamers, etc. Seducers understand that women are primarily motivated by fantasy, and simply give the woman the proper narrative pieces and let her imagination do the heavy lifting. They receive the reward.

This has very significant implications for our friend’s question. Because if you attracted a girl via seduction… you probably gave her impressions that were X fantasy of hers, which is fine for a fling… but as she gets to know you better, she’ll realize you’re different than the fantasy, leading to rapid dissatisfaction.

This is why, while I’m a big fan of the tactical power of seduction, you need to be careful with it if you’re trying to make a girl your girlfriend. Of course, this is a catch-22, as very often you don’t realize you want her to play such a role in your life until later… but it does mean you should consider more direct approaches towards girls when you’re looking to get serious.

Anyway, we’ll get into the meat and potatoes tomorrow.

As usual, apply to work with me if you want to improve your dating life: www.patstedman.com/application

– Pat