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Getting In Touch With Your Inner Asshole

November 30, 2011 By 36 Comments
Reader: My wife has been making a concerted effort the past 6 months or so to lose about 10-15 pounds.[Much of that is actually taking a cue from me as I have working very hard on eating better, getting fit and working out.
She constantly hits me with the “Do I look fat in this” or the “I am a giant blob” while checking herself out in the mirror. In reality, she’s not that bad. Sure, she could lose a good 15 pounds but for the most part she looks pretty decent.
I usually handle those comments with the usual “Game-approved” method usually cocky/funny Agree and Amplify – although sometimes I’ll just plain Ignore. That usually works – although this comes up constantly. (I really think that often it is just her low self esteem regarding her weight rather that always being just a shit-test…but I digress.)
Anyway, earlier that day I “caught” her eating a chocolate pudding and started negging/joking about it with her. I usually don’t say anything because, hey she’s an adult and also that I don’t really think its bad that she cheats every so often. But it drives me crazy when an hour later she starts on the “I’m so fat ” shit.
That evening while she was getting ready for bed and changing into PJ’s she passed the mirror and again started with the “I’m a whale” line. This time, I took a different approach and hit her with some asshole: “Well, you did have that chocolate pudding for dessert” I replied.
It was a tactic, I really had not employed before. Her immediate response was calling me an asshole, storming into the bathroom, and generally getting very bitchy and upset. She got into bed and gave me the cold shoulder calling me asshole several more times. I just played it very cool, continued to do my own thing, and told her to stop over-reacting.
After some time passed and I was ready to go to sleep I said to her in a strongish tone: come here – motioning her to lay right next to me in my crook before I went to sleep. Amazingly, she agreed. She called me an asshole one more time and sidled up right into me – almost melting into me. I put my arm around her tightly and we went to sleep. (I am certain I could have sexed it up at that moment but I really was exhausted.) The next morning nothing was mentioned and she was lovey dovey business as usual.
I am in shock about how things went. I would love to get your thoughts and take on the episode.
Athol:  (1)  She’s losing weight, so she’s probably doing that in response to you upping your game recently / in general.
(2)  She’s playing for your attention. She’s a little nervous about why you are changing for better, so she’s trying to attract your attention to her.
(3)  There’s a disconnect between her talk (I want to lose weight) and her actions (Watch me eat all this pudding!)  When you brought up the disconnect, she got mad, but you’re basically in the right in that you’re calling her on her own disconnect between talk and action.
(4)  Women are notoriously attracted to assholes. Seriously it’s like a damn hypnotist as implanted “asshole” as a trigger word in the entire female population, making them want to screw any man they call an asshole. The time she said it in bed was a compliment. Just say “Thank you, I appreciate the compliment.”  Then follow up with “So you wanna have sex with an asshole?”  Big goofy I’m-a-naughty-boy grin.
(5)  After you’ve had sex, in the warm after glow, it’s fine to tell her you have noticed and appreciated her efforts at weight loss. We’re rewarding the behavior we want to see continue… crazy good sex, then cuddle and compliment.
(6)  Do have the sex when it’s on offer like that. When it comes to sex, most women want to think that their man will always be up for it as his #1 priority of existence. As such, sleep is for the weak.
 
Filed Under: Alpha and Beta Male Traits, Sexy Moves

Reader Story: Noticing Her Making Little Changes…

November 30, 2011 By 5 Comments
Athol: A long but excellent comment by Ryan on yesterday’s post ”It’s Already An Unstable Relationship If She’s Hotter Than Him.”:
Ryan: I agree with Athol 100% because this is what happened with my wife and me over a year ago. I was not far from being the guy in the email. My wife is stunningly attractive – so attractive that many men feel intimidated to approach her. She was an ugly duckling and grew up fat and then in high school suddenly lost it all. I met her in college where I took her virginity. She was a 9 and I was an 8.
Anyway over the years her “betaness” became a turn off for me. I guess I never saw her as the “sexy vixen” even though she was beautiful. I just started thinking of her as a friend, and as a result our relationship turned similar to relationship in the email mentioned in this post. I even avoided sex with her because it was no longer a turn on. I spent my time fantasizing about nasty / dirty whores who “needed” sex. She’d complain about the sex of course, but I blamed it on some medication I was taking for stress.
She stayed a 9 over the years and I got fat and my sex rank started going down to about a 6. However, even though she was a 9, because she didn’t see herself as a 9. A 9 and a 6 can stay married without a problem as long as the 9 thinks she’s a 6.
But then something changed. One day she started saying things like “someday someone is going to sweep me off my feet”. I thought this was strange because she never said something like this before, however she said it a few more times over the next few weeks. I noticed that she changed her appearance a bit and was dressing different. She was also more into her exercise program. At the time I didn’t think too much more cause I knew she wouldn’t cheat on me. For one she never ever flirted and 2 she always avoided eye contact with men.
Then I got my dose of the red pill. It was about a month later when we were standing in a long line for the Dumbo ride at Disney World. I remember her looking at a guy standing next to us, and then looking again. This was the first time I ever saw her checking some other guy out. I know it’s normal for women to do, but it surprised me because she said she never did it. During the rest of the trip I wore sun glasses and kept an eye on her, and noticed she’d check out guys.
It was after this I started researching the whole alpha / beta thing along with the ovulation stuff. My wife was ovulating on that day in Disney World. This was all an awakening experience because it was the day I found out those women are kind of like men when they ovulate.
After the trip I came back and started over analyzing everything from sexy underwear I’ve never seen before to the way she was trimming her va-jay-jay. I was convinced she was cheating on me. As an IT guy I did a full investigation. Checked computer history, searched for hidden email accounts, Face Book activity and cell phone usage. I found nothing that was suspicious.
Whatever caused these changes in her were either in my head, or perhaps she started feeling attraction to someone outside and it never went anywhere.
I know this story is long, but it is proof that what Athol is prescribing here really works. Honest talking doesn’t work. Before these little things happened, I was way too secure in the relationship to the point I took her for granted. It was when I was faced the reality that other men find her desirable, and she found other men desirable too that made me want to change.
After this happened I started working out and brought myself back up to an 8. Even brought a few beta elements I was missing by helping more with the laundry and dishes. Before I’d make her do everything.

To the woman who wrote this email, your husband probably doesn’t think of you as a higher sex rank even though you think of yourself that way. There could be something you’re doing that is lowering your rank in his eyes. Otherwise he’d be putting the effort in with you.

Athol: I’m very glad that Ryan cottoned on to things and turned it around before they progressed any further. Well done!
 
Filed Under: Alpha and Beta Male Traits, The Male Action Plan (MAP)

It’s Already An Unstable Relationship If She’s Hotter Than Him

November 29, 2011 By 20 Comments
Following up on Girl Game vs Fitness Test, a few commenters were horrified at the advice I gave that the wife express very mild disinterest and disloyalty to her husband in order to spark him into some kind of action in self-improving, as opposed to just talking about it. My reply being…
Some of you are missing the point a little. She’s hotter than him, a female 8 to a male 6 or 7. It’s a fairly natural and probable result that she will leave or cheat on him. The relationship is already unstable because of that difference in Sex Rank. She’s gotten more attractive, he’s gotten less attractive since the start of the relationship.
What she’s doing and I’m advising, is openly (as opposed to in secret) slowly inch toward the door/another man, in hopes that her husband wakes up and starts pulling himself together about the marriage before she does something crossing the event horizon of relationship failure. She’s already verbally expressed herself in conversation that basically boils down to, “Look I’m an 8, I’d like you to become an 8 too, so we can have a better relationship together.”  In response his talk said he’d become an 8, and then he didn’t perform any action toward doing that.
So by the time she finds MMSL, she’s already passed the point of (1) just tolerating things. His options are to, (2) be cheated on, (3) get handed a surprise filing for divorce, or (4) pull himself together and improve his sex rank and re-attract his wife.
She wants option (4), but he wants option (1) to continue. However once she’s taken option (1) off the table, the story will inevitably head toward finishing up in an option (2), (3) or (4) ending. The only outcome that the husband can actively choose to affect the outcome is (4). If he is passive, it heads toward option (2) or (3).
MMSL isn’t creating the situation of destabilization, so much as managing it for best advantage.
And to underline the true seriousness of the husband’s situation – he likely lives in a no fault divorce state, there’s nothing illegal about her starting the divorce paperwork tomorrow, cheating on him, or getting pregnant to someone else and thus making the husband liable for supporting the resultant child. I’m trying to get her to feed him the red pill in tiny little divided doses before the shit like that hits the fan.
It is to her vast credit that she is consciously aware of her situation and trying to communicate that to him.
Filed Under: Body Agenda and Sex Rank, Monogamy and Marriage 2.0

Girl Game vs Fitness Test

November 28, 2011 By 30 Comments
Reader:  I have a theory question: If the objective of the male-view MAP (penned by you) is to increase the amount of sex, what would the objective of the female MAP be? Does this translate?
For a man, MAP is an attempt to fulfill his natural desire for polygamy within his marriage by enhancing sexual variety with his wife (amount and quality/enthusiasm) through self-improvement. For a woman, MAP is an attempt to fulfill her natural desire for hypergamy within her marriage by enhancing the quality of her husband (as leader and provider) through self-improvement.
Of course this stems from personal experience….
I am running a form of female MAP currently, but I’ve seen no progress. It’s been a few months of training for my first 5k, taking salsa classes, teaching myself to cook, and subsequently losing ten pounds. I’m now entering the third month of taking a couples dance class full of single men without him, and not a speck of interest in attending. He started talking big game (‘I’ll start exercising soon,’ ‘I really do hate this job, I’ll start applying for a transfer in a couple months”), and not doing anything. FYI if anything I’m too enthusiastic about sex for him. After some due contemplation of why the plan was falling flat, I’ve come to the conclusion, that I was simply working on the wrong traits. To be honest, I already held a higher sex rank than him, so losing weight and gaining a dancers’ ass wasn’t really the critical path. Though I had increased my attentions to beta traits, I clearly needed to spend more on them. Things like being appreciative, letting him be a man, supporting him in his decisions, etc.
Athol: Your theorycraft seems about right. Ultimately both men and women seek an intense sexual relationship and experience. Monogamy does have limitations and benefits for sexual experience, MMSL simply attempts to maximise the monogamy strategy for a couple.
As such, I’m guessing you just want your husband to Alpha up a bit for you. Here’s where you’re going wrong…
“FYI if anything I’m too enthusiastic about sex for him.”
That means there’s nothing he needs to do to change the relationship for the better, because you are already giving him exactly what he wants. The behavior you reward (his lack of interest in self-improving), is the behavior that you will see continue.
He’s actually a little bit concerned about what you’re doing, salsa classes with single men are getting his attention, but you’re so good on the trustworthy / stable / good girl / Beta front, that he’s only mildly put off about it all. He’s very comfortable in the relationship because of all your Beta Traits used so far. Certainly not uncomfortable enough to make him do anything to intercede and go all Alpha on you.
My suggestion would be to start actually removing a little of your Beta and making him start to feel less comfortable in the relationship. Most guys start seriously running the MAP for themselves when faced with the prospect of their wife/gf leaving them for another man. So suggest you start exhibiting some mild disloyalty and see what that gets you as a result.
Cut down your interest in him a bit, be a little mysterious, come back from salsa class a little late, buy some fancy underwear that he knows about but doesn’t get to see. When you get a text or a phone call, leave the room to answer it. Do it as an experiment. He’s not going to up his Alpha because you upped your Beta.
Or put more cynically… I’ve yet to receive an email from a guy trying to deal with the problem of his wife laying him like tile and pampering his ego for which I recommend immediately putting the MAP into action. But I do get an awful lot of email from husbands in emotional free-fall from hearing “I love you, but I’m not in love with you.” the discovery of the wife’s affair, or impending divorce. For those men I do recommend putting the MAP into action.
It sounds like you are the higher Sex Rank half of the couple, so something to consider before you get too deep into things with the salsa lessons…. give him a fair warning.
The difference between running some Girl Game and The Mother of All Fitness Tests is largely a matter of perspective.

Jennifer: Are you’re doing that thing where you want him to be the leader, but telling him to be the leader means he isn’t the leader because that makes you the leader? Sometimes you just have to tell them. Like Athol said, give him a fair warning.

Filed Under: Captain and First Officer, Girl Game and Sexy Wives, Nice Guys and Betaization

Seventeen Years

November 26, 2011 By 9 Comments
11/26/94 was our wedding day, so 17 years together tomorrow.
That’s about it really. I’d love to say that I had some major plans for tomorrow, but I don’t. I actually slept for twelve hours last night as opposed to my usual seven. Supposedly I’ve been off all week, but it’s just been one thing after the other. Eldest daughter’s school was locked down all Wednesday for a “Columbine-like threat” on Facebook. All safe and sound, but not exactly restful.
I think the only plan is a quiet dinner out. Sounds good to me.
Jennifer:  Wow, seventeen years seems like a long time, but it just keeps getting better. Quiet dinner out, check.  Fabulously wonderful anniversary sex, check.  My job is done. 
Filed Under: Captain and First Officer

Happy Thanksdoing

November 25, 2011 By 6 Comments
When I was little there was a boy who lived up the road and along the next one from me, four or five years older than I was. I don’t remember getting directly bullied by him, but I do remember giving him a very wide berth and thinking he was a bad tempered bastard. We never really had any connection beyond his sister being in my class.
About twenty years ago though, I learned he had died of a brain tumor when he was 26. My feeling then was that he probably deserved some kind of karmic payback, but that karma over delivered by quite a large margin.
As small as our connection was, I do think about him once in a while. Now I’m just appalled by the randomness of it all. It’s one thing being elderly and dying of a brain tumor, but 26 it’s just freakish.
****
Of Jennifer’s and my parents, my father was the healthiest and most active. He was racing go-karts very competitvely at 62 years old. As in 3rd in the nationals in his division. I would have bet serious money that he would have been last man standing. He died last year at 65. A bit unlucky is all.
Or maybe he was lucky. He met Mum on a blind date and they were married for 45 years.
****
I get email once in a while from someone Jennifer and I very affectionately call “Church Lady”. Church Lady had a wonderful vibrant marriage to a great guy. House, kids, the whole deal. When she talks about him I can feel the same vibe between them as Jennifer and I have between us. She taught marriage classes in her church and was generally the go to girl for advice. Coming home from a business trip though, there was a car accident, and he died.
A few years later she remarried. It’s been a disaster and if even half of what she tells me is true, she needs to leave and leave now. I am willing to put the effort in to helping anyone save their marriage, but with her I have pretty much begged her to divorce him from the get go. But she won’t because of her religious beliefs about divorce and the social shunning that will occur in her church. She no longer teaches marriage classes.
So some wonderful luck and some terrible luck.
****
I know a guy who was a wonderfully nice guy, but just a little socially awkward. I’m not sure he had a serious girlfriend in his life before meeting the girl who became his wife. But then she was gone with breast cancer within two years of the wedding. Just appallingly bad luck.
****
I worked with a girl for a few years, one of those rare girls that somehow managed to be a party chick, but still have a genuinely warm personality and charm. Driving to work in the morning at 5am she stopped at a red light and was hit from behind at over 60 mph by a drunk driver. She spent two days in the ICU at St. Mary’s and died in a panic stricken anguish at age 25.
****
My life primarily involves eating nice food, living in a nice house, spending time with my kids and living with a wonderful woman who loves having sex with me. For sure I’ve put some effort in, but it’s really not bad at all as an outcome.
Jennifer and I have had two brushes with breast cancer scares. We’re 2 for 3 on successful pregnancies. We’ve come close to losing our house twice. These are in retrospect, merely stressful near misses compared to what has happened to others.
I get to teach what I do about marriage, because of Jennifer. I am profoundly grateful for her allowing what she does of her life be discussed on the blog.
****
So anyway…

I hope that at age 41 I’m somewhere around the halfway point in my life. I’ve been very lucky about a great many things, I’m very grateful for it, and I would like that to continue…

… I also wish the same good outcomes for you. Though I cannot really offer true spiritual comfort for when bad things happen to good people. I’m limited to things such as making suggestions like keeping the medicine in the downstairs bathroom so you can get to it faster…   (time 5:55 – 9:58)

…my truly sincere apologies if my advice came too late to stop the bad things happening for you. I did take too long to really start writing.

Thanksgiving is usually when people talk about how they are thankful. I would like to think of myself as finally starting to act thankful.

Filed Under: Humor and Everything Else

White Knight vs Horny Knight

November 24, 2011 By 7 Comments
Jennifer and I were going out for breakfast this morning. We fluffed about in the morning and I had my shower and then she had hers. I’m messing about on the computer waiting for her to be done in the bathroom when she comes barrelling down the hall with her phone to her ear in her high alert / panic mode.
It turns out that instead of going to breakfast with me, she had scheduled an online meeting… ten minutes ago, and now she was (1) late for her meeting (which is utterly bizarre for Jennifer to ever do lol), and (2) standing me up for breakfast.
In the moment I was mostly hungry, but I was slightly annoyed, but also had the “oh yeah I remember she had that meeting now” as well. So in the final analysis I was still hungry.
So I left her to have her meeting.
Due to Connecticut state law requiring that a Dunkin Donuts be placed with a half mile of any traffic light, I arrived at my destination within a few minutes. I ordered coffee and food and made the return journey back home.
Jennifer was still in her meeting of course, and I dropped off a medium Pumpkin coffee light no sugar, and an egg white and sausage on a croissant next to her. In return I received a doey-eyed look of gratitude.
A few minutes later I noticed her glasses on the counter in the bathroom next to her curling iron. Scooped them up and dropped them off to her slightly squinting self. Again she had that look of a three-year-old being given surprise cotton candy.
After that I pretty much ignored her and let her have her meeting. About an hour later she finished up and to her credit she did immediately make a beeline line to me and commenced the cuddling, kissing and thanking. In days gone by, that’s likely where it would end and I would have been happy enough with having been nice to her. She didn’t intend to screw me over, I do enjoy being nice to her.
However, having just shovelled on a metric ton of Beta support and comfort building, all that does is get me to ”white knight”. One must maintain a little Alpha and take a slightly more mercenary tone by being a “horny knight”. As such, it’s fair to mention the blowjob I received was quite fantastic.
It’s all about balance.
Jennifer: Some how I knew this was making the blog… You were very nice to me this morning though. (and I didn’t intend to stand you up…I’m on vacation mode…TOTALLY forgot about the meeting…hate that…and hey, you got a blow job out of it, didn’t you?!)
Filed Under: Captain and First Officer, How To Choose A Wife, Instigate Isolate and Escalate

When He Doesn’t Text Back Immediately

November 23, 2011 By 6 Comments
I’ll spare you the back and forth, but I got some email from a female reader who was starting to over think things about why her husband was slow to respond to texts…
Athol:  Oh wow, your hamster is going 100mph. You’re having a disproportionate amount of contacts starting from your end, and that’s what’s driving you crazy. If you contact him three times for every once he contacts you, you’re going to get a little nutty about what everything means. He likely has no clue about any of this stuff in your head happening lol.
Let’s make a new rule for you and experiment for a week with it. You can only initiate a text contact with him once a day for a week. But you can respond to his texts for as many times as he sends them.  That should even out the balance.
He’ll text you after a while.
As I recall the golden rule as posed by Roissy is to contact her two times for every three times she contacts you. It’s still fairly constant contact, but makes her work for it (i.e. be emotionally engaged) just a little more. But as you can see a one to three ratio just makes it go from “stimulated” to “starting on the road to batshit crazy”. Specially sensitive as this reader is long distance as well.
I think in a marriage you can contact more frequently than the two to three ratio. Captains can’t actually lead First Officers on a two to three ratio all that easily.
Filed Under: Alpha and Beta Male Traits, Instigate Isolate and Escalate

Jennifer on The Fungible Wife

November 22, 2011 By 30 Comments
Elhaf said on The Fungible Wife
@Anonymous, I think the beauty of Athol’s blog is that he dares to question whether it is, in fact, always all the man’s fault as you seem to suggest. By following all the steps as outlined above, a man gives himself a chance that if it turns out that some woman somewhere is actually to blame, and that woman is his wife, the man might have a shot at happiness.
If we always assume the woman is a precious snowflake and therefore never at fault, and she can’t control the fact that she doesn’t give the man the one thing that he got married for in the first place, and no matter what the man does it won’t change, where does that get us? Where we’ve always been, bowing down to the almighty women’s needs, meeting them without reciprocation.
Jennifer: I agree, but it’s worse than that. Athol’s advice is harsh but it’s basically realistic. My first gut reaction when I read that post was something to the effect of ”Hey, what nasty things are you suggesting that guy should do to his wife?”  But then I thought for a second and realized that if Athol was a woman writing advice for women, no one would think twice about him suggesting a wife should simply dump her husband if he wasn’t doing his share. Athol’s approach is tediously slow to get to the dumping part by comparison to what happens in some relationships.
Filed Under: Body Agenda and Sex Rank, Girl Game and Sexy Wives, How To Choose A Wife, Monogamy and Marriage 2.0

The Fungible Wife

November 21, 2011 By 45 Comments
Reader: So here’s todays issue.  I have been doing everything you told me to do — okay everything you tell everyone to do in your blog and in the book.  One of my favorite plays was to spend some time with a very attractive female friend of mine who has kids.  Added benefit is that the wife does not like her, so it gets her attention when I meet with her…
…It was one of those moments when you think to yourself:  Why am I putting all this bloody effort to seduce the one woman (i.e. the wife) who doesn’t want to be seduced by me?  What the fuck is the point?  I feel lonely with my wife.  I feel like I don’t connect with her anymore, and given the choice I would have preferred to keep talking to the other woman.  I think about divorce more often than I should.  But I have two children…
…Am I falling for another woman, am I falling out of love with my wife, or am I just tired of feeling like a jerk in my own house?  I just don’t know if this is worth all the effort when I could just say I am done and be with someone else in one day.  I know I can.  Women like me, I like women.  What am I fighting for?  If she isn’t interested why should I be?  I feel like I am begging for scraps in one restaurant when I could go next door and have a feast.
Athol: It seems like you’re getting closer to the fork in the road where things either start getting better with your wife, or they start getting worse as the situation starts heading toward a resolution.
The truth of the matter is that for the most part, women are fungible. Meaning one can be replaced with a different one and life can move on ahead much the same as it was. It’s like, as you say, a restaurant where everything sucks, is easily replaceable with a restaurant that doesn’t suck. What really makes one woman more special than another one is our feelings for her.
So if she’s special only to you, but not really anyone else, then she’s not really truly special. If you start thinking someone else is special, and your wife is no longer special, then she will very quickly become uncomfortable about what is happening.  
The one angle where they aren’t 100% fungible is that often they are the mothers of our children, and that complicates things as I’m sure you know.
From your wife’s point of view, the options that are starting to come in focus as being made available to her are either (1) Be a better wife / more positive relationship, or (2) Get shunted off to one side by either your affair or divorce. What she wants is to keep the status quo, but that is vanishing quickly because you need to consent to keep things as they are.
Therefore your wife is going to be terrified that you’re attaching to this other woman. Your sudden emotional response to the fungible factor frightens her further. Your feelings for her are starting to change and that’s whats holding you in the relationship rather than anything she does for you. This may well create the spark that makes her realize what she has in a marriage with you. There’s nothing like a takeaway to make someone suddenly clutch on tight to it and declare how much they want it.
My advice is to keep this relationship with your friend as positive of a friendship as you can. I’m fine with demonstrating the ability to attract another partner, but you do have to keep the moral high ground as best you can or things can get very messy later on.
The fungible approach to women is on one hand very pragmatic and emotionally cold. The idea that a wife could be simply discarded like a broken toilet seat so you can install a new one, is extremely unsettling to women. The old terror of being dumped for a newer model runs deep.
However the flip side of the fungible coin is that is that when a woman knows you can think this way and could actually reasonably easily replace her with a woman of equal or better value, she knows you love her from a position of strength. A “strong man” being an attractive man she can more easily respond to.
But when you stick around because she has what you can’t get anywhere else, you love from a position of weakness. And she knows that, so it’s a turn off.
 
Filed Under: Body Agenda and Sex Rank, Captain and First Officer, Monogamy and Marriage 2.0
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