I keep a verbatim copy of an internet post titled “HOW TO GET LAID LIKE A WARLORD: 37 Rules of Approaching Model-Tier Girls” on my phone. Despite its click-bait title and dubious source (“The Red Pill”, the former subreddit and mixed bag of sage wisdom and misogyny), the post nonetheless contains some pearls of wisdom.

Particularly insightful is rule number 13:

The “I am enough” frame = the gold dust that gets you 9s and 10s.

The basis of your inner game is the idea that “you are enough”. In other words, you have value to women simply because you’re a man.

Everything else is built upon that foundation.

You don’t have to “do” anything to attract a girl. She’s attracted to you simply because you’re more relaxed than she is.

You don’t have to change anything. You don’t have to improve your “game” beyond what it’s at now. You don’t need to become better looking.

You CAN do all these things if you want and they will help you. But you don’t have to.

You’re already “good enough” simply because you’re a man — because you’ve got testosterone and a dick. Women value that.

“Gold dust” is not hyperbole—the “I am enough” frame of mind is powerful stuff. It’s an insight that clicks on a cellular level, and I think there are two reasons for that.

Firstly, “I am enough” is a mindset that’s actually compatible with your inner critic. If you try to think you’re superior to everyone else, this will inevitably create cognitive dissonance. Your subconscious is always scanning for evidence to the contrary and deep down you’ll question such bold pronouncements. Better to think “I am enough”, which is both true and offers the same calibre ego boost.

The second reason “I am enough” is gold dust is more interesting. “I am enough” works because it makes you aware that nearly all of your value to women is based on the fact that you’re a biological man. That’s it. You’re already 99.9% there. You can rest easy in the knowledge that women want men, and that’s exactly what you are.

Women seem to understand this much more intuitively than men and take full advantage of their sex appeal. And I don’t just mean sex appeal as in sexual appeal, I mean sex appeal as in gender appeal. Even women that aren’t conventionally attractive can easily trigger a response in men by leaning into their femininity—by showing a bit more skin, for example, or being flirtatious and vulnerable. A woman (noun) can woman (verb) her way into attracting a man.

Men, meanwhile, seem to assume they don’t have any innate qualities that women find attractive. Part of this is due to the cultural conditioning that men must acquire accoutrements from the external world to attract a mate, so the locus of their attraction value is entirely external.

And yet…women are often drawn to men for reasons that boil down to elementary biology: a man’s facial hair, for example, or the pheromones he emits during exercise. Even the way a man sits can project masculine energy that women find attractive. The bottom line here is that while you can improve yourself externally – building your mate value by hitting the gym, advancing your career, honing your social skills – and you should improve yourself in these ways, all your efforts should begin with the mindset that you are enough. Everything else is, as rule 13 of the above post states, “built upon that foundation”.