In your quest to become the best man that you can be in all areas of life (including game), I have distilled many of the best practices in the manosphere down to seven strategies.
These strategies were chosen for their synergistic effects on one another. By improving ones financial standing, physical appearance, communications skills, and subject matter mastery alone, the other aspects of ones life are noticeably improved.
1. Develop a side hustle
In this age of global economic uncertainty, relying on a job as your sole stream of income is a dangerous proposition. You will forever be at the beck and call of “the boss,” and at the mercy of economic forces that can change the employment landscape in a moments notice.
Do not make the mistake of relying on a job to secure your future. Your military enlistment will one day end. Your company will one day go out of business. The economy will tank and jobs will be lost (again).
Having a side hustle—a stream of income that you create independent of your primary occupation—grants you a measure of insurance against these forces while increasing your disposable income and net worth.
Over time, your side hustle can grow into its own small empire that grants you the freedom to live life on your own terms with your own schedule. With so many free resources available, there is no excuse not to start building your empire immediately.
2. Train your body with a purpose
Needless to say, exercise is mandatory for any man seeking self improvement. However, the goal of going to the gym in order to look good is shortsighted. Cranking out rep after rep of heavy lifts and doing triple digit situp sets might make you look good, but exercise alone is not a replacement for developing ability.
For years I spent hours in the gym bulking up. While I scored a number of lays from my physical gains, I felt sluggish, slow, and stiff for most of the day. I changed things up by joining a boxing gym to develop the ability to defend myself if needed. The results were spectacular. I had more energy, a well honed physique, and the confidence of knowing I could hold my own against a potential adversary. That last point increased my inner game more than the size of my biceps ever could.
Take up boxing, mixed martial arts, or practice functional strength training and put that muscle mass to work.
3. Be the best dressed man that you know
Lets face it, we live in a world where looks matter. Until you open your mouth, your appearance is the only thing the world can judge you on. Your appearance is a statement of value to the world and more importantly to yourself, so when you look good, you feel good and both your performance and bearing reflect it.
In order to communicate your true value to the world around you, strive to be the best dressed man that you know. Learning to dress well is a skill like all others that can be acquired. Start with versatile wardrobe staples that match well with almost anything — basic items like white shirts, dark blue jeans and grey sweaters.
Many men think they have to be on top of all the latest trends to become more stylish. However, when you start out, developing your own style is vastly more important. Once you figure out what image you want to portray, you can start adding trends that will work with that image.
Another misconception is that a large wardrobe is a better wardrobe. The opposite is actually true. Avoid filling your wardrobe with lots of clothes, thinking this will offer you variety. You won’t need lots to have a great arsenal of stylish outfits. Shoot for quality over quantity.
As your side hustle yields more disposable income for you and you become better at spotting value, you can experiment with trends and interesting pieces that set you apart.
4. Develop mastery over a subject
Robert Greene’s must-read book Mastery has been the subject of a number of articles here at ROK, and for good reason—the pursuit and development of great skill drives every man worth his salt.
In a world where being a Jack-of-all-Trades is the status-quo, gaining mastery over your area of focus will place you above and beyond the layman. Not only will you command more adoration from the women around you, but you will also garner the respect of those you serve as customers of your side hustle.
For example, When getting your car fixed, do you prefer a master mechanic or someone looking under the hood for the first time? If the cost were the same, would you seek out the master or the apprentice? When given a choice we automatically pursue and pay the more skilled individuals.
5. Never complain. Never explain.
Complaining and explaining are hallmarks of an inferior man. To complain is to resort to the only means the powerless have to express their displeasure. The way of the superior man is to take ownership of the issue at hand and take measures to correct it. Likewise, the superior man need not resort to explaining himself unless he is teaching others. If those around you cannot trust your behavior, then you have yet to let your results speak for themselves.
On the subject of a man’s words: Word play is a form of foreplay, and every man should have command over his native language. This is not to say you should bludgeon the women you meet with million-dollar words packed into every sentence. Rather, subtly intermingle interesting and rarely used words into everyday conversation.
Stepping up your vocabulary will set you apart from the average slack-jawed monosyllabic beta. Commit yourself to learning and adding a new word to your vocabulary daily. This guidance applies to learning and speaking foreign languages as well.
6. Live an Epic Life
In the early days of the pickup community, neophytes were encouraged to tell stories that demonstrated their value as fun, adventurous men worthy of the adoration of every woman within earshot. As a shortcut to actually living an epic life that produces these stories, many would instead fabricate or memorize stories from other members of the community in an attempt to pass themselves off as men of high value.
Understand this: There are no shortcuts to living an epic life. Telling other people’s story in lieu of your own does nothing for your self-esteem. Even worse, if you are simply passing off someone else’s story as your own, you are living a lie.
The stories that you tell should be your own. If you dont have any, go our into the world and create them. Write a book. Skydive. Quit your job and travel to China to study at the Shaolin temple. Go climb a mountain. Live an epic life and you will never cease to have stories to tell.
7. Develop a strong sense of humor
A sense of humor demonstrates both confidence and interpersonal skills as well as the ability to put others at ease. Everyone has their own unique sense of humor that, if developed and expressed, can lend to your quest to build a respectable harem.
As a bartender I have the priviledge of watching social interactions go down in real time, and I can assure you that playful banter will get you laid exponentially more than serious, cold, mechanical approaches. While we are not here to be sideshow acts for women for the sake of getting laid, I challenge you to find your own sense of humor and make others laugh. It will pay you dividends.
Gentlemen, if you would like to share your specific strategies for stepping your game up, I look forward to hearing them in the comments below!
Read More: Inner Game or Outer Game – Which Should You Work On First?
This is not to say you should bludgeon the women you meet with
million-dollar words packed into every sentence. Rather, subtly
intermingle interesting and rarely used words into everyday
conversation.
Stepping up your vocabulary will set you apart from the average
slack-jawed monosyllabic beta. Commit yourself to learning and adding a
new word to your vocabulary daily. This guidance applies to learning and
speaking foreign languages as well.
Fantastic advice, and you can bet your jodhpurs that I do this!
Humor is also highly relevant. I’m against ‘trained monkey boy’ to get pussy, but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t have a sharp wit about you. Your bartender experience is exactly how it should apply in most situations. The guy who casually throws in amazing wit while tending to other business, etc.
good advice..channel bill burr or the most interesting man in the world
8. Sex Transmutation – Transforming Sexual Energy into Pure Genius!
Experiment with courtly love. Let your desire and lust build and build. Restrict yourself to cuddles, caressing and anything but full-penetrative orgasm. You can even practice karezza – where the man penetrates the woman but you just embrace each other without thrusting and just feel one-another and bask in the sensations.
Gandhi was a celibate but he would sleep (while remaining celibate) with two virgin girls either side of him. Apparently this helped to boost his energy levels.
Over indulgence in sex and orgasm, will quell the feeling of desire and the affect that it has on the mind. Once a man ejaculates, more often than not he rolls over and falls asleep! One moment he’s a tiger, straining with every part of his body and mind to get what he wants … the next he’s unconscious!
Sexual fluid though is very similar chemically to brain fluids. Deplete one and it seems that you deplete the other.
I think that has mostly been debunked. While you can surely get more focused on other activities by abstaining from sex, it’s not some kind of magical act where he looses some mystical “essence”.
Falling asleep after sex is not a permanent thing, you normally can recover in 20 minutes to an hour or so, generally. So if you had sex the night before, by the next morning you are as chipper and ready to do things as if you’d had no sex at all. There is no mystical energy exchange I’m afraid.
Just one name – Nicola Tesla.
Sex transmutation does not mean abstaining from sex because it will lead to lower sexual drive. In fact, it is the heightened sexual drive that is used to transmute into a creative passion. It’s just a different sexual practice from what it practised by most men today.
Another name – Timothy McVeigh.
Well acknowledged that this psycho had no sex life and therefore pent up, ridiculous levels of rage. Maybe if he had of gotten laid once or twice he wouldn’t have blown the f*^# out of all those innocent people.
I don’t know about you but I am ready for round 2, food or a workout after I bone a chick.
I would add a recommendation to master social dynamics in general. There are topics like Social Intelligence and Emotional Intelligence that you can study. You can find material on increasing your charisma by recognizing that charisma consists of a set of learnable behaviors.
You can recognize patterns, like the way women respond to dominance, and how to be the Alpha Male Of the Group (AMOG). You can learn to do sales, perhaps on a small scale in your side hustle, if not as a full time career. You can learn to project a command presence.
Make a point to study this area in general, learn the knowledge that has been assembled, then practice it. Obviously gaming women is an important part of this topic, but it’s much broader. I recommend developing the broadest possible skill in the area of social dynamics, based on actual field experience.
I’m interested in this topic. Any recommended books?
I’ve lived a pretty sweet life and done a lot. People get real jealous real fast when you tell them all the cool shit you’ve done, they call you a braggard
It’s hard to have conversations with much of the population. They are absolutely boring. No, I don’t want to discuss football or Duck Dynasty. What’s your thoughts on the space program? Oh, you don’t have any… didn’t see that coming…
It sucks too, I was in SAmerica for NYE and it was just fuckign awesome. This one guy was like ,”I broke communication when you bragging about how awesome you are”. I’m thinking wtf are you talking about?
3 falls or a submission.
He discovered your weight class, didn’t want to take the falls and bailed, then bitch moved the responsibility for it onto you, rather than admit he was just too weak to compete.
Be grateful the little bitch self selected himself out of your circle before he ruined it.
I tell people a lot of stories about things that have happened to me and they often call bullshit. It is only hard for them to see you are not bragging or lying because the chances are they have led an incredibly boring existence.
I’d take almost anything as opposed to lead the lives that 99% of people lead.
Amen.
I’ve done quite a bit in my 25 years.. i usually don’t bother telling stories unless the topic is raised as it seems to roll right over most people because they can’t relate. The solution is: seek out and associate yourself with interesting, ambitious and adventurous people.. because they will compliment your life rather then attempt to pull you down.
I tell people stories about my life and I get threatened with accusations of sexual harassment. I no longer tell people stories about my life.
Some might say you’re doing something right…
I would also add developing a strong resonant voice tonality. This should be treated like any other physical training.
There’s nothing more grating than listening to a soft spoken lisping hipster with the inflections of a valley girl. Speak like a fucking man, or shut the fuck up.
Do you have a starting point or anything you’d recommend to start this? I mumble a lot and have been thinking and looking at ways to improve my speech. Any more help would be great.
I currently use Perfect Voice by Roger Love and Voicing it! by Nancy Daniel. These are good products and they have served me well; they address voice tonality and some other issues. If what you have is a speech disorder, you may want to look at the products from Jay Miller or even hire him to address your specific problem; however, his consulting fees are not cheap.
Great article. You should’ve bolded and underlined #5 Never Complain. Whining and complaining is almost encouraged today with so much social media presence. Such a bad look.
Good list. I would add with #1 to develop a side hustle that you are passionate about. If you don’t like stocks, stay away from them. I’m developing #1 myself making quality, homemade grooming products for sale at farmer’s markets, etc. It combines everything I like – developing recipes, making art for the labels and flirting with hippie chicks.
I have a growing interest in stocks and investing. I’m thinking of making it a side hustle, but at times it seems like it would be more suited for my main hustle. Which i can’t do.
Start small and grow it organically. I don’t do the market as I don’t have the disposable income for it yet, but my dad and brother do pretty good for themselves day trading and investing. If it is really something you like, some day you might have to take that tough leap, quit your main hustle, and pursue what you want to pursue.
What do you think of mutual funds?
Honestly, I’m sure 10 other people on here could give you better advice. My retirement is in a diversified portfolio of mutual funds, about 50% is high yield, 25% in slow and safe and 25% in the middle. Put in every month the max your employer will match and wait. It’s the conservative Dave Ramsey method. As long as you still believe in the market, use it. I hear a lot of people say gold and silver but I think it is too volatile and uncertain. Plus, if this shit comes crashing down on us, gold ain’t going to get you nothing. Canned food and bullets will.
Your first side hustle should always be to sell things people want to buy and not necessarily what you’re passionate about. The vast majority of people have no business experience whatsoever, so advising people to monetise their hobby or passion with no prior experience in purchasing, advertising, sales etc is not good advice.
Experience the joy of turning profit before the joy of monetising your hobby. You’ll often find that becomes your hobby and passion.
I see your point, but everything that comes with running a business can be readily learned. I did business law for a few years helping people set up LLCs, etc. Lots of people were running successful businesses and were learning at the same time.
To me, the pursuit of profits alone is pretty offensive. That leads to Wolf of Wall Street behavior. A man should have pride in his work and strive for producing quality, be it a product or service. Then again, I’m a hippie that likes to make beard balm, so what the fuck do I know?
Number 5 is probably one of the most important. Nothing worse than someone that constantly whines and complains, especially when it’s a guy. I lose energy being surrounded by people like that. Feel like complete shit now, could hit the bed and skip my training session (bed is closer than the gym after all), but instead going to head down to the gym.
Would have been helpful to have a father/masculine figure when growing up to teach me this: you have to do things even if you don’t feel like it. Don’t whine and bitch, get it done. Would have been in a better position right now, but hey, you have to accept the cards you’re dealt by life and keep pressing on.
I think websites like ROK are going to essentially become surrogate fathers (and already are to some extent) for a lot of men as single parent, especially single mother, households increase.
I totally agree, RoK is more like uncles, brothers and cousins for me (my dad is a natural alpha). Provides something different for everyone who contributes here.
Masculine role models is probably a better term. Something that a lot of men do not have in today age, especially if they’re younger than 25. From what I’ve heard, my dad was quite a bad ass, unfortunately he died before I was born.
I have two guys at work that constantly complain about having to do others’ work. I just want to stand up and yell, “Then leave goddamit!”
Not even just for avoiding being whiny and complainy.
Its also because humor gives you more of a sense of enjoyment of life and other feel better around you and trust you more.
There’s also a difference between being humorous and being a clown. Do NOT seek to impress others by being a clown but do have a sense of humor.
Good article.
#8 – Be somewhat of an outsider
Absent fathers who are alcoholics are fukin useless. I will eat well..work out…get money… n play basketball.My dad let me down bigtime…he did nothing…. said nothing….i think he was a fkin coward…what man would ignore his sons?????
Could. Not. Agree. More
1. Develop a side hussle if you can and remember that if it doesn’t fill your pocket to the top then it’s just a side thing.
2. Keeping in shape keeps the blood flowing and you fresh
3. Dress smart and cheap and if you want to flash a bit then buy some expensive clothes that are worth every penny e.g. armani, stone island, penguin, canada goose.
4. If you can you can make money/impress women and you’re more interesting to the world
I buy Penguin shirts from Nordstrom Rack. You can still be flashy and not spend a lot of money.
Same here.
Yh Yh, that’s true, matter of fact that should be a goal. Cheap and cool stuff that I buy is ussually from TK Maxx or House of Frasier.I don’t know what you have in the US.
Do you mean TJ Maxx? We have that, also Marshalls, Kohls, Stein Mart, Nordstrom Rack, outlet malls (I love the Perry Ellis outlet store) so many places to get expensive clothes at a discount
I really agree with the last one. Being funny will get you laid more than being aggressive. And if she laughs at your unfunny jokes, you know that she’s really into you. But Humor can not only get you women, it can also keep your sanity. Taking life, or yourself too seriously is harmful. It’s best to lighten up and find comedy in everything. Remember than not a shred of evidence exists that life is serious.
Inner game. Inner Game. INNER game. Inner GAME. INNER GAME. inner game.
More men should start off with “Inner Game” before they start focusing on their external world (ie, picking up chicks).
You hear that, keyboard warriors? You hear that?!?!?
Inner. Game.
*drops microphone and walks out the classroom*
hell yeah dom!
Any suggestions on where or how to startÉ
Another winner from this site. Lots of untapped gold on ROK.
This is a good article, really. I may be a work in progress on the rest, but number 7….There aren’t a lot of other men that can tell a story of visiting the ruins of Babylon in 2009 and have the pictures to prove they did it. That one alone is enough to make quite a few women, the ones who know about Babylon, do a strong double take.
Fuck listicles.
“Side hustle” sounds dumb. What’s wrong with “side business”? Hustle sounds like you are doing something that really provides no value, just a trick to extract some quick money from morons.
Some here think buying stocks is a “side hustle”. Investing is something most people do. You can be a drone at a big organization and have that “side hustle” too except it is called a “401k” and/or “employee stock purchase plan”.
Don’t fake it. Just make it
Solid list. Thanks, Demetrius.