This is a charisma and dating podcast in this episode I discuss how an outsider can charm his way into an elite social circle.
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Let's say you just joined a new club, online community, or perhaps
even a team. Some people like being the peon members of the group, which
is very fortunate, because without those people, no group would be very
good.
But beyond the general masses is usually a smaller group of
respected, and usually more priviledged individuals. In this article,
I'll call those people "the inner circle". Within that inner circle
there are decision makers - the members that have the power and duty to
control the very nature and future of that group. To make this article a
little more jargony and cool sounding, I'll call those people the
kings.
Today I'm going to teach you how to go from being a peasant to a king
in a relatively short amount of time. Is this possible? It has been for
me. The two best examples, which I will trace my involvement with
through this article, are my interactions with the pickup community and
with the gambling community.
To give a quick background, the pickup community is a huge
confederation of thousands of men, and a few women, who endeavor to
become more appealing to the opposite sex. There is a public forum
called
Fast Seduction
where everyone congregates. There are a great many factions in the
community, most of which are on bad terms with at least one other group.
There's Mystery Method, Real Social Dynamics, Gunwitch, Pickup101,
Badboy, Fidentia, and several others. In addition there is a private
forum called "Mystery's Lounge" where the elite 100 or so members of the
community hang out. That means that these people represent at least the
top .1%, if not less. Technically speaking, Mystery's lounge has been
renamed and a new forum has sprung up called Mystery's lounge. To make
things simple, when I say Mystery's lounge, I am always referring to the
more exclusive one.
The gambling community was never as large as the pickup community,
but it was still made up of a few thousand members. What makes it
interesting is that everyone involved has a financial interest in the
community. This hinders information flow somewhat. Within the large
community was a once-secret group simply called "private". Private had
only 40-50 members and being a member of it certainly meant a higher
income. Later in the game private went to the wayside in favor of a
smaller core group as well as exclusive secret groups outside of the
main population.
These aren't the only two societies I've risen to the top of, but
they are probably among the most impressive and both are very good
illustrations of my method.
A natural reaction for many readers may be the thought that
manipulation shouldn't be encouraged... let the strong rise to the top
and the weak to the bottom. In general, I agree with that. However, I
find that most communities favor the status quo. Those at the top like
peace and don't want to admit anyone who may usurp their position. Many
times, though, the most worthy are not at the top. For example, the
music industry is notoriously difficult to crack (I'm working on it).
I'm generally a fairly mainstream rap fan. I like Jay-Z, Nas, Kanye,
Biggie, Tupac, Eminem, Dre, etc. Sure I have some more eclectic tastes
as well, but they don't make up the majority of my preferences. With
that in mind - my absolute favorite rapper is an underground legend
named
DZK. Despite being, in
my opinion, more talented than any commercial act right now, he doesn't
have widespread fame. I believe that's about to change, because he's
finally putting effort into it, but my point is that the best doesn't
rise to the top without action.
The purpose of becoming a king in a group is to add value to the
group, make it stronger, and embrace the next generation to join.
Sneaking in to benefit yourself without helping others is never the
right play.
Step One : Identify the Leaders
It's important to know who you are going to eventually be joining.
Make sure you know who actually makes decisions and who is a member of
the core group. Sometimes there are several core groups and you need to
determine which is really at the top of the food chain. If you deserve
to be at the top - get there.
In the PUA group (pick up artist group) I identified Mystery's Lounge
as the end goal. It was regarded as the Garden of Eden for pickup
information and connections. Equally important was status in the main
Fastseduction group, particularly being respected by Formhandle, the
moderator and owner of the forum.
In the gambling group I knew private existed, so I wanted to join that. It was pretty clear who most of the members were.
Step Two : Shake things Up
This is an important step, and probably the most ignored one. For
change to happen, things must be shaken up. Most people aren't great at
dealing with change, but you will become a master of it. This gives you a
good chance to quickly ascend the ranks while the others are trying to
get their bearings.
I don't mean to do anything malicious. I mean to do something drastic
that draws attention to you and separates you from the masses. In
general the inner circles don't have much regard for the commoners as a
group (although usually they will respect some of them, arguably a
middle class). An important factor of shaking things up is putting
yourself in a position where people HAVE to notice you and probably have
to deal with you.
Outside of my two case studies, it's pretty obvious that I'm trying
to break into the blogging world (I will never say blogosphere - I
promise). With millions of blogs out there, it's not an easy field.
However, within two months I have been able to go from 10 readers a day
to 4000 (if you average out the huge spikes), and I keep going. To shake
it up here, I posted some stories which I knew would get massive
publicity like the
Ghetto Pool story, the
UT Tunnel story, and most recently the
Living with Courtney Love story.
I knew that these stories would put me in front of a lot of eyeballs,
which would force people to notice my blog and read it. I managed to get
on the front page of digg, college humor, delicious, shoutwire, reddit,
fazed, and leenks. Thanks to those services, over 150,000 different
people saw my blog in a month, and a number of them became regular
readers.
In the PUA world, I had a tougher time. The year prior to my entry
played host to the world's first Pickup Artist summit, held in Boston by
Formhandle. It was a small event, but it attracted some of the biggest
names in the business - a perfect setting to get noticed. But I missed
it. I decided that to shake things up I would host the next one that
year. That meant that although I would have to do some work (read :
bring value), the best in the game would be forced to deal with me. I
e-mailed Formhandle with my plan, and he ignored me.
He simply got too much e-mail and to him I was still one of the
peons. So I had to get a little bold. I saw a post that he made that I
didn't disagree with, and I publicly called him on it. Normally I would
ignore it, but I needed to get noticed. He wrote back, and then to avoid
a further flame war I e-mailed him to apologize and settle it
privately. After that he always responded to my e-mails and agreed to
help me organize the PUA summit. A sidenote : I'm sure he's forgiven me
for my rudeness... today we're friends and we hang out every time we're
in the same city.
Gambling was interesting. Sometimes there's no convenient way to
shake things up, so you must wait for an opportunity. As with anything,
opportunities come frequently if you're looking for them. The previous
owner of the gambling forum wasn't actually a gambler himself, which was
breeding discontent amongst the ranks. We wanted fewer members to
protect our secrets, he wanted more to increase revenues. To resolve the
situation he agreed to sell the forum for a rather high price. I
immediately told the purchaser I was interested in purchasing the forum.
I was interested, but what was more important is that I knew that he
would be a king soon. It's a good idea to be friends with the kings.
The sale got botched, but it was good enough. Through him I had been
introduced to others. I made good friends with one of the more
influential members (not strategically) and he told me that if I started
my own forum that he could bring most of the members with him. Sure
enough I started my own forum and everyone moved over. Within a month I
went from a nobody to one of the most important people in the community.
Step Two and a half : Take Power
Notice how in both of the examples I took a leadership role? All
kings are in some sort of leadership role, formal or informal. The
sooner you take one, the quicker your ascent will be. You don't need to
kick someone out of their position either, just create a new role that
you're good at that will benefit the group. Maybe you'll organize events
for the group, or archive materials. It doesn't really matter - just
make it important and hopefully well known.
Step Three : Cement your Role
Being at the top can be tricky. If you're part of the top 1%, that
means that the other 99% are jockeying for your position. Now it's time
to really flesh out your role in the group and make some ties. This is
usually easy because others at the top will be like minded and you'll
naturally befriend them.
In the PUA world I did run the summit, but by that time I had moved
in with three of the other kings and began teaching with one of them.
Not only was I invited to join the lounge, but I was also in charge of
the membership there, being the one person with the final say on who was
a member and who wasn't.
In the gambling scene I shared information with other top guys to
show that I wasn't deadweight. Of course the information they then
shared with me was even more valuable.
Some people say that if you have no enemies, you're doing something
wrong. I'm conflicted on whether or not I subscribe to that notion, but I
try to avoid enemies. My philosophy is that most people who rise to the
inner circle are probably reasonably interesting people and some
benefit can be gained by being on good terms with them.
My involvement in the gambling community faded over the years as I
became more independent, but before that I was friends with everyone. In
a few cases I was friends with two bitter enemies and had to help
moderate.
In the PUA scene even though I am fairly inactive in the community
today, I am probably friends with more top guys than anyone else.
It's ok to be friends with rivals. Just make sure you do not fuel
their rivalry. It may be tempting at times to share stories and
information from one faction to the other, but this is a huge mistake.
If you can't be trusted to keep your mouth shut, you will soon find
yourself shunned by both.
It's also important to continually add value to the group. Deadweight
may get a few months tenure, but inevitably someone has to be removed
to make room for the new. Every community has members who are not
actively improving the community, and they are the first to go.
Even though I barely ever go out anymore, I still offer value to the
pickup community by sharing my ideas and stories, and also giving
information on my other areas of expertise.
Go Do It!
