How pickup actually makes you worse as a man

The problem with pickup is that they tell you not to care, be outcome independent and don't give a fuck. Know your own self worth, and stop looking for other people to gain happiness. Yet, every line/routine/eBook/DVD you're reading and learning has a base drive of WANTING more woman in your life. This is a BIG contradiction.

I've gotten to a point where I based my selfworth (and defining myself as a man) on makeouts and lays. When all is going well I'd feel good, happy and content. This is what I've been reading and studying for. Everything works. I've opened girls when I needed to, escalated when I had to, and now I got the girl.... awesome. Yet when things were going awful. For some reason girls were blowing me out (which had nothing to do with me whatsoever, but more to do with the mood she was in), dry spells, etc. I'd feel horrible. And the dry spells only got worse, because when I felt bad, I didn't feel like approaching. And when you don't approach, you're not getting laid. It was a self-destroying prophecy.

Don't get me wrong, I was proud of myself for not being a pussy and escalating when I had to (even though it's scary). Telling woman my desires when she might not reciprocate. It hurts to get rejected, we're all human. But for some reason I was BASING my happiness and selfworth on my ability to "get" woman and sex. I needed sex to be able to feel like a man. Maybe not even sex, but just constant interest from woman. Woman validating me that I'm sexworthy.

And I don't think I'm the only one...

Most people in this community base their happiness and self-worth on 2 things:
1. Taking action (even though you're scared), this means approaching, escalating, being sexual, etc. Even though your mind tries to convince you otherwise (for fear of looking bad in front of other people). This is doing what you want, without letting fear hold you back. The happiness you get from achieving goals.
2. Interest and sex from woman.

The first part is awesome, You're in control of your own happiness and no one can judge you for it. The second one is created by pickup. Because EVERY THING you do regarding pickup comes from wanting recognition. Recognition for your awesome game. Think about it like this, when you're rehearsing lines before approaching, calling or even going on dates, in order to not screw up, you've already set yourself up for failure. Because you're putting in all this effort, it's only natural to want a payout. If we put effort into something, we want results.

The reason things like approaching/escalating/calling/dates/losing the girl/etc, are scary, is because you care too much. You care because every waking minute you're thinking about pickup. You're thinking about improving yourself. You're thinking about your body language. You're thinking about how you like this girl and how you need to approach/escalate. Because this is what the community teaches you to improve on in order to "get" woman. And I think it's great that you want to do all that... but not when it comes from a place of needing it to go right in order to be happy and content.

We're brainwashed by pickup and society that we NEED sex in order to be men. We get highfived when we hookup, and people laugh at us when they find out we haven't gotten laid in months, or are still a virgin. When you can't get that constant approval from woman (in the form of interest and sex) you feel less of a man. You feel like your game sucks, and that you have the inability to "get lucky". No wonder we care so fucking much. Society and other people are putting all this pressure on us, and as social beings we have this strong urge to want approval.

Because of this most people think that after they get a girlfriend, or when they are able to get laid regularly that it's magically going to fix their lives and make them happy. Or they believe that after they buy X amounts of products that they can get amazing results with woman quickly. With no effort, time, or energy, and they care about getting the results they were promised. Or they make getting women some sort of measurement of how successful of a guy they are and they have to be better than this guy or get X amount of girls into bed a month.

They make getting more girls or getting laid THE most important thing in their lives.

This is a mindset that is going to set you up for failure. Pickup is hard in the beginning and if it's the most important thing in your life, you're going to be failing at what you consider the most important thing in the world. Which will make you feel bad. Not only that, but it will make you either hugely bitter (if you never get success) or feel like your entire life and whole sense of self worth is directly related to whether or not a stranger likes you.

This is why you shouldn't care if you'll ever get laid again. It's not healthy. In order to get laid you NEED the approval from another person to open up her beautiful legs for you. And if you care so much about getting laid, then you'll automatically care about another person's approval (specifically attractive women).

The solution is to not care, but still take action.

You only need to care that you are actually making an effort. If you're making an effort and the results aren't coming, you can feel good knowing you did your best. You don't have to be perfect with women or some sort of "master pick up artist" all you have to do is care about trying, do the approaches and not worry about the rest.

- Coldman