Pook’s sixth lesson: “YOU are the prize to be won”.

Cheateau Heartiste: “The most important change in thinking you can make: You are not there to win over women, they are there to win over you.”

Heartiste again: “The way you bring a girl toward you is by flipping the script of pursuer and pursued.”

It’s an iron law of seduction that trying to earn a woman’s affection lowers your relative value towards her and makes you less attractive. It’s therefore advised that men “flip the script” and see themselves as the prize to be won by women.

This can easily backfire though. A man reads this advice, goes on a date, and applies it with no finesse, no respect, no class. His attempts to signal high value and self-respect are too blunt and come off as extreme douchebaggery. The aim shouldn’t be to achieve direct superiority over a woman, but rather to subtly knock her down from thinking she’s superior to you. As David X puts it, “if she thinks she’s giving you a gift, don’t take it.”

A quick and effective way to do this without being too heavy-handed is to assume the role of the judge. By that I simply mean to question and probe (things that, if you haven’t noticed, are usually done by women) and also to be occasionally judgemental of her responses.

Example:

You: So what did you do last weekend?

Her: My friend and I just stayed in and talked to guys on the apps. That’s how I found you. We stalked you, too (said flirtatiously with the subtext: “we liked what we saw”)

You: Oh wow, okay….do you always do that? (said in a way that’s polite and charmed by the attention, but ever-so-slightly creeped out)

By sussing her out in this way, you signal that you have options. Her good looks and rationed approval won’t easily win you over. It’s a textbook case of a male demonstrating “female choosiness”. Females must be choosy because they often have an abundance of sexual opportunities, whereas males usually jump on whatever low-hanging fruit they can get their hands on.

By being the judge, a man demonstrates that he’s not like other men. Again, the name of the game is finesse. Too much judgement towards a woman will make her defensive—she’ll see you as an adversary or simply “not a good fit”. But if you can master being the judge (a subtle art if there ever was one), you’ll be able to raise your value in pretty much any social interaction, romantic or otherwise.