I read an article this morning about the 5 stages of grief (confronting death) and how they apply to coming into acceptance of a previously rejected truth. Yes, I know, there’s no end to the ridiculous interpretations of this played-out pop-psych list, but I was curious about how this might apply to an AFC coming to grips with unplugging from the Matrix, so I did a bit of searching and what did I find on my blog roll search but this:
1. Denial – Still Plugged -In: “These game guys are a bunch of clowns, there’s no way this works on women. Women aren’t stupid. What a bunch of misogynists.”
2. Anger – Post-Red Pill: “This is ridiculous! Why should I have to jump through all these hoops for women? I just want to be myself. Why couldn’t I have been a Natural Alpha®? I blame my parents/siblings/teachers/God/liberals/feminists/media/society, maybe George Sodini, Andres Breivik, James Holmes wasn’t so crazy after all.”
3. Bargaining – Unplugged: “Well maybe it does have some good points…but, forget the hot girls, they’re way outta my league. I’ll give it a try if it can help me get around the bases with a plain Jane. Do I have to wear the fuzzy hat and black nail polish?”
4. Depression – Bitter Taste of the Red Pill: “Wow, women really respond to this puffed-up act? And guys spend big bucks on it and wind up with more ass than a toilet seat? And I just joined up for this? The world is sad and so am I…”
5. Acceptance – Game Awareness: “Maybe this IS the way things really work. I guess I should give up the gender relations mythology I’ve been holding onto…hey, what do you think of these negs I came up with?”
6. Jaded* – MGTOW Permutations: “Fuck learning all these rules. Sex isn’t worth it and women aren’t that fun anyway. The last thing I want to do is learn routines or the 5 stages of pickup. There’s too many websites, too much to read, I can’t remember it all much less sort it all out. Who has all that time to go out and chat up women anyway? It’s not like I see any women under 40 at work at my engineering job to practice on. Video games and porn are more fun and more available. I just haffta look good and let the women come to me”
* This is a late addition to the list, hardly original and arguably relevant, but I added it for precautionary measures.
Before I get the predictable howls of “someone did this before you” (h/t Badger) allow me to put my spin on it. I get a ton of PMs from forum members, and read threads about guys with friends or relatives in, or just getting over, horrible relationships and how they’ve tried to unplug them only to run into stiff resistance. Looking at this process to acceptance it’s no wonder why.
So my discussion question for today is this; how did you unplug? Was there some moment of clarity that opened your eyes? Did you go through a process like the one described here? Are you maybe still struggling with a certain phase?
I’m on stage 5, How did I get there? Having had relations with 2 girls before the age of 25, having not read ‘The Game’, i got in contact with Rock Solid Game. Krauser and co ‘enlightened’ me, over the past 2 years through building inner value and practice I’ve finally reached step 5. It’s a hard slog and I’m forever being enlightened as I found out 2 weeks ago in Zagreb with Jimmy Jambone, Krauser and co.
The woman I am seeing cheated on me with my best friend.
I just reached stage 5 for the second time in my life again and I refuse to look back. If you prove me wrong or right twice, then you’ve swayed me. For the last few weeks I’ve seen examples of everything the Red Pill world confirms. It’s time to stay awake this time. Red Pills and Crown Royal anyone?
I was what you might call a natural once I hit about 16/17. Not so much a natural because I always did well with women (I didn’t always, but with some I sure did)…..but more because I always questioned why men would tolerate such obvious crap behavior from women. I never tolerated it, and that in itself generated a lot of attention from girls. Then somehow the matrix sucked me in during a time in my 20’s. Only later to spit me back out when I discovered the mano-sphere. I do think that there is an alternate path to number… Read more »
Rollo, I’ve been lurking since you started this blog. First off, this is the first blog to which I send all my “recruits”. I can’t tell you enough how much I like your writing and incite. I’m 43. I unplugged 2 years ago. Before we had kids (almost 8 years ago), my wife and I had a pretty good relationship. She used to call me “the volcano” because I would occasionally blow my stack. Basically, she would push me on certain issues, I would repeatedly tell her to stop, and then eventually blow. Back then I used to suspect that… Read more »
When my friend introduced me to Alpha Gameplan, i could believe what i was reading. He told me everything that i had ever lived and experienced, and he never even met me. For weeks i only felt three emotions, and those emotions extremely powerful. Anger, sorrow, and lust were all i felt for what must have been 2 months. The Red Pill was worth the pain though, i would NEVER go back.
I am probably still in the bargaining stage. I am holding some hope in the back of my brain that I will meet “the right one”. I understand it’s futile, but it takes time for old ideas to totally go away. I think I went through the denial and anger stages before being aware of the red pill. I knew what I was doing wasn’t working, I could not believe that there were other options, and when I began seeing things work for “men who didn’t deserve it” I got angry. I think it was finding these blogs that ended… Read more »
If I’m to be honest, I’d say I was already at an advanced stage when I hit the manosphere. That is, I think I went through the earlier stages and was inert until I took the Red Pill. I probably sat at Stage 3 until the wife surprised me with the dovorce. So, I went through the earlier stages, but just didn’t see the connection to the Red Pill. In fact, I think the AFC probably goes through the first three or four stages. I don’t think I stayed in Stage 4 long, but I’ve always been a guy who… Read more »
That’s a great list because you added stage 6. Never thought about it before but I’m there. I’m in my late 40’s, divorced after living the middle-class wife/kids/house routine with a raging feminist. Learned LTR game and have been teaching it to my sons. My girlfriend is great but marriage will never happen (I know exactly how it would change the relationship dynamics, been there, not going back). Life is good because we make it good. Thanks Rollo for shedding more light on the adventure.
Rollo here is my unplugging: 1) Gf I was really into breaks up with me because I acted very blue pill beta. I was crushed and spend months looking for answers. 1) I get in shape but not much success with girls son I browse Seddit and the ball starts rolling. 3) I read the Way of the Superior Man, No More Mr. Nice Guy and Too Nice for Your Own Good and Feeling Good (by David Burns) and these books set a healthy foundation 4) a piece of the puzzle is missing though and I stumble upon Roissy and… Read more »
Someone asked me one day around age 17 who I was trying to impress. After a lengthy high school career of being the strongest and fastest person in my class, varsity football, good grades, lead act in the plays – none of it mattered to anyone. It never attracted anyone. I noticed that girls loved the guys who treated them horribly. Seven years of college and grad school confirmed this. Seven years where I didn’t even bother to lift, exercise, or make myself attractive in any way. There was no longer a point to any of it, as it was… Read more »
One thing I probably should’ve added to this post is that this, and similar lists, are based on the 5 stages of coping, and coming to terms with one’s impending death.
I think letting go of a previous personality, or deeply internalized ego-investments that contributed to your previous identity is analogous to killing that ‘old you’.
Once you Kill the Beta you, there’s a process of coming to terms with his death.
https://rationalmale.wordpress.com/2011/11/21/kill-the-beta-2/
The good news is you can be born again.
As with the 5 stages of grief, it’s important to note that the 6 stages of unplugging don’t necessarily happen linearly. There’s the shuffling back and forth between stages as ‘progress’ is made. My first unplugging came several years back in college after I ended the relationship with my gf at the time for crappy behavior. Things weren’t going smoothly for us and she pulled a ‘why don’t we just break up’ and so I called her bluff. She’s regretted it since. What followed was some of the best times of my life spinning 3 active plates, and having sex… Read more »
Unrelated, but who is the artist on that painting? Is it Zeke Derderian?
Half-way through my second decade with a scorched-earth BPD, God help me. Therefore I have a bit of 2 through 6 all the time. Once I finally extract myself, I might have something worthwhile to say. Until then I’m only a human sacrifice.
It wasn’t as easy as simply unplugging from the Matrix for me. I am a little pre-game in terms of age so I caught the front end of the Feminist movement, but it was actually worse than that. In retrospect I was born an Alpha in all my attitudes and inclinations and was encouraged by my mother for the most part. My father on the other hand was a dyed in the wool Beta. A good man and genuinely heroic soldier and officer during WW II, he turned into a somewhat depraved version of Judge Smales of Caddyshack fame when… Read more »
I was married for about 15 years (2 kids) when things started to get shitty. My wife was becoming angry more and more often, and she took it out on me. When I tried to talk to her about it, she’d vehemently refuse, as if the suggestion that talking might help was insulting. Each episode would last a few hours to a day, and then she would become cheerful again. The frequency of these episodes started increasing from once or twice a year (early in the marriage), to two or three times per week. By that time, I knew to… Read more »
A pivotal concept I was introduced to is called “personal fable” which basically means that people believe their own thoughts, feelings, and experiences are somehow unique and not experienced by others.
Before I started reading men’s stories, I read women’s for almost two years. As you read the same things over and over from different people, you begin to pick out behavior patterns.
Realizing we are all alike is both a blow to the ego and a revelation into our humanity as we finally feel part of the great life story.
I guess it started for me in the 90’s. I was talking to my friend, saying obvious stuff about who chicks go for, and I had a revelation: So chicks are stupid. We should find a way to use that stupidity for our advantage. My friend told me that it’s not possible. It took years of stumbling in the dark later, but in retrospect on that day I gave up on “the One”, tuned out the “it will happen on its own” crowd and picked out behaviors that I will not indulge in for any kind of pussy. I still… Read more »
Around stage 4-5 still. Like others, I would up here after a handful of relationships that didn’t work (interspersed with dry spells). Beta and shat on too many times, I just couldn’t understand why because I was “doing everything right”. Now I’m at the point where I’m flabbergasted why women respond so well to being treated as an afterthought in my life. Once I actively sought to understand things better (chose the red pill), I made the simple decision to NOT allow myself to get into a relationship for the time being, until I figured things out a little better.… Read more »
Your “jaded” stage is really a mix of 4 and 5, leaning more on 4 with a little mixing of 2 in there for good measure.
I think people think you go through these stages in order and that once you’re through one, you’re done.
Not so. Your mind will come back to earlier stages, events will kick you in certain directions and you can be mentally in more than one stage.
Assuming you take the pill of course.
As someone noted earlier, they backslid and got kicked in the teeth again.
And yes, this was originally for dealing with death, but the massive resistance people have to the red pill is, as you noted, a resistance to the death of self which in a peculiar way is similar to some religious teaching about transcending existence. And I can’t tell you how many times the stasis mode of “people are the way they are” gets spouted out of people’s mouths, especially women and especially if you change or the person doesn’t want to change. As if learning a new skill, or ability, or practicing something, until you are good at it, isn’t… Read more »
Stage 6 definitely. Reviewing previous interactions and outcomes retrospectively it appears to me that the game model is more accurate more often than not and there would be benefits in acquiring more game skills. However at this stage I can’t see myself improving my skill set, I’m not convinced the rewards are worth the effort in this field. I don’t begrudge exponents of game the rewards at all. I do enjoy the theory and concepts though as well as now being able to articulate them. For me I probably mentally retired from the whole process around the very late 20’s… Read more »
For me unplugging means that I’m now naturally very cynical on motives and have a sort of “MGTOW + fun with the best prospects but not taking any of it too seriously” attitude – disposable pleasures over any meaningful pursuits. The prize is worth a lot less than it was so I have a lighter attitude to it all.
^ “A lighter attitude to it all.”
I went through the first four stages with regards to feminism, liberalism and political correctness when I first became an MRA blogger, long before I heard of game. Then I discovered the red pill regarding diet and nutrition. By the time I found game on teh interwebz, I had already become quite open to rejecting conventional wisdom and mainstream society’s mass media indoctrination. When I first encountered the now-defunct “Reality Method” blog and his description of shit tests and hypergamy, I immediately “unplugged” and found myself at stage 5. Complete epiphany. As for stage 6, there’s another permutation you might… Read more »
Interesting question. As a young men I happened to be attractive so it was pretty easy with chicks for me in those days. They were all in acquisitive mode – so they were all nice and all good to me. I presumed them to be the sweetest persons in the earth – constant source of pleasure and unconditional love for us, men. I have not studied game I did not need it in the first place. In my mid twenties I begun my job as an advocate dealing with divorces. I was determined to protect those angelic women from baaad,… Read more »
How did I unplug? Sleeping with all her friends.
It works.
I had a gf at 21. Funnily, i used some game on her. I escalated on every occasion; didnt text her much or called. After two weeks, we fucked. Then, she dropped the bomb; this 23 y/o lady wanted me to pay for her boob job. I refused and got dumped. A year later, i met this girl and i caught oneitis. White knighthood, texting all day, long calls, i made her a diamond pedestal, not paying attention to her action, you name it. I told her my feelings and then it all disappeared. But she insisted on keep being… Read more »
Great post and the comments are the most insightful I have seen anywhere. G, you need your own blog. Want to hear the rest of the story. Athol Kay could use the competition. And I could use the help. Running MAP but will take more months of hard slogging. Don’t want my sons to have to go through a late awakening so am force feeding them red pill wisdom, including Rollo. Keep up the good work.
I jumped straight from Stage 1 to Stage 5. I didn’t have much choice. I started out as a classic Nice Guy. My mother hated my father, and my father was a loud, overbearing Alpha, who (as time as a family man wore on) became increasingly unsuccessful, dishonest and angry. So, by the time I was in college, my idea of healthy masculinity was pretty much shot to hell. I was determined to be “not like other men,” which was a euphemism for not being like my father. I got married in my late 20s to a girl who is… Read more »
“Misogyny is certainly one of the primary active ingredients of the red pill”
I disagree. Taking women off the pedestal does not require misogyny. I agree that there is a certain allure to women when you pedestalize them, but I don’t miss this at all because it was tantamount to living in fantasyland. I’ve left the theme park now, and while things might look a little more drab sometimes, at least it’s real.
How did I unplug? The hard way. Implosion of of 12 year marriage with kids. Usual story, I think. Cheating wife, etc. I’ll throw in that the females in her family have a history of this but I was too much of a naive pup when we met to think that it would happen to me. Stupid mistake. The history was concealed until after the first kid was already here so in for a penny in for a pound I suppose. Anyway, in the aftermath I had sense enough after getting my feet back under me to get a divorce.… Read more »
How did I unplug? You guys! Seriously. I’m still in the process and I back
slide but I’m fighting it and I won’t turn back. My old me disgusts me. I’m in a sexless marriage and looking for advise when I found Athol thru Vox and then here and Dalrock and Keoni and some others. I may not be able to save my marriage but I can save my life, now.
There’s only three stages for The Black Pill. (1) The omega believes that everybody gets somebody. He tries everything he can, including game, and fails to pull any women to which he is attracted. He is essentially a 5’6″ person trying to dunk in hoops. (2) The omega realizes that everybody gets somebody…if they are willing to take anybody. The omega realizes he has standards. The omega honestly assesses his place in the SMP. He takes a good hard look at his strengths and weaknesses. He comes to the sobering conclusion that he is in the small minority of men… Read more »
I disagree. Taking women off the pedestal does not require misogyny. I agree that there is a certain allure to women when you pedestalize them, but I don’t miss this at all because it was tantamount to living in fantasyland. Perhaps you misunderstand my use of the term “misogyny.” To clarify: Feminism and SWPL-mass media society uses the term misogynist to marginalize and dismiss any man that expresses politically incorrect beliefs and opinions regarding gender and sex without having to address the man’s actual argument. It is a scapegoat term equivalent to calling someone that points racial descrepencies in the… Read more »
@G ” My reaction to game was “shit, why wasn’t this obvious to me? I had all the pieces, I just never put it together. ” Yeah, that’s exactly how I felt. I was like okay so that’s why such and such worked in a positive way with this girlfriend and this is why such and such had the opposite effect. It was like I knew it and I’d seen it in action with myself and watching others, but I had never had put in front of my nose in black and white in one spot. Instant light bulb on… Read more »
Personally, I think that the entire knowledge of “Game” can be categorized into three parts: 1. Life/Lifestyle 2. Approach Anxiety 3. Calibration or Communication Skills Your lifestyle determines what kind of girls you attract into your life. Approach Anxiety determines the number of shots you will have and Calibration will determine the probability of success you will have with your shots. Most PUA or Game advice can be categorized into 2. and 3. Starting to get unplugged from 2. and 3. is merely impossible. The point where I have started because everything was so new and so fascinating for me.… Read more »
@Razoor
SolveMyGirlProblems was some of the best shit I read. I wouldn’t compare it to Roissy and Rollo, and not in a bad way.
Damn, Shark was legit
Long-time reader. first-time poster. I’m so glad to be unplugged, as I don’t quite know how I’d respond to this article: http://www.fem2pt0.com/2012/07/25/chivalry-must-die-on-womens-expectations-and-mens-obligations/ “As with most gender relations, the problem lies in the power differential. The woman may be on the pedestal, having doors opened, chairs pulled out, and meals paid for. But actually it is patriarchy that is asserting its power. How? Simple. The woman may be on the pedestal, but it is the privilege of men that has put her there.” So apparently now we’re keeping women down if we pedestalize them. What do the rest of y’alls think?… Read more »
I unplugged this past New Year’s after spending the night with a girl I had been seeing for a few months and the next day found out through a buddy that she was also sleeping with 2 other dudes. I was simply unaware that women naturally Spin Plates and that she was simply a Carousel Rider, riding three at a time, possibly more. After the New Year’s experience, I sought answers and stumbled upon sites like Sosuave, and blogs like The Rational Male, Roosh V, Spearhead, Cheatau, etc. I’m 34, single, never married and no kids with a notch count… Read more »
… what is the trajectory of the men whose first stage was joy ?
^ It’s feminism, bro — the rain-delay-at-a-baseball-game of shit tests. Ridicule, agree/amplify, reframe + backturn.
They bask in their victimhood. And nothing, nothing will ever mollify them.
^ @hipstersshouldbekilledpolicy
I discovered it after being chased by a girl who I couldn’t have cared less about, then getting hooked on her, then having her disrespect me repeatedly to the point that she flaked. I googled “when she cancels a date” and suddenly discovered a whole new world, the world of pua. Unplugging didn’t quite work. I was still focusing on one girl each time instead of multiple girls or “spinning plates”. After two more unsuccessful bouts of one-itis i started to fully unplug. Then I got into an LTR for a year with a girl I had gamed. The whole… Read more »
At the moment I keep bouncing between stage 4 and 5. Working on trying to spend more time in stage 5 than stage 4 but my financial situation is making this ‘challenging’ (yeah I know Rollo, probably another ‘Buffer’ ;] ) My unplugging story. I got divorced 3 years ago. I didn’t waste much time trying to jump back in the dating pool and started using PlentyOfFish. I wrote my fair share of lengthy, custom-crafted, heavily-beta love letters to women I’d never met and enjoyed a dismal response. Then one time when I logged out of POF, it showed an… Read more »
Its interesting that you could plot blogs’ participants along that spectrum, this place is definitely a 5 while something like the spearhead is a 6.
I wonder what would be the female equivalent, I guess it would track their dating value as it declines.
For me, I don’t think it was one moment of clarity, but rather years of flashes and hints (“glitches” in the Matrix, so to speak) that added up – from friends getting dumped by their wives because of classic beta behavior (wives’ hypergamy kicking in), to me suddenly being able to pick up materially more girls as I went past age 30 and achieved business/monetary successes (realizing my SMV). And the older I got, the more “glitches” became evident. So I went looking for the proverbial red pill. My first exposure online was nomarriage.com that I found a few years… Read more »
Rollo, are you sure that #6 is a progression from #5? It seems to me that #6 is a regression back to #1, perhaps a different #1 but #1 none the less. Acceptance seems to me to always have been the final step to any difficult situation, thought or feeling. At the point of acceptance I am liberated from it and it no longer burdens me. It seem to me that some of the MGTOW is a bit of burying the head in the sand. I’m sure there are some guys that feel really happy and healthy to go their… Read more »
I’m 42 years old with exactly 42 female notches since the age of 16. I would have had more success, but I was in a fantastic 15 year relationship which ended w/my losing her to breast cancer. Those 15 years w/her were in my prime (24 – 39), and I stayed relatively faithful (6 one-offs), mainly due to still being a blue-pill beta provider, but also because I WAS happy, no doubt about it… and I would have stayed w/her to the end. Those 6 affairs were ‘must-haves,’ low points while partying, etc., but no one that I would have… Read more »
I think there are 7 stages. 5. Acceptance. 6. Success. Having more ass than a toilet seat by applying Game. 7. Jaded. Having f*ed a lot of women, you don’t feel the same enthusiasm for sex that you had when you where a beta loser. All pussy is pussy. It’s like being fed up with some food. When I was a child, I loved chocolates because they were forbidden by my mother. When I grew up, I ate lots of chocolates for years. Now, I see a chocolate and I don’t feel any desire. The same with women. Diminishing returns… Read more »
1) I think it says good things about what you’ve done with your blog that you’re able to link a bunch of your posts in each of the stages. Part of why I like this blog and consider it a good place for a lot of men to start unplugging is that you cover a wide spectrum of stages. The more hardcore PUA sites tend to start from “okay, you’re unplugged and ready to embrace this, let’s get crackin'” which is hard for a lot of new guys to get into. 2) I think a stage called Embracement could be… Read more »
Off-topic, but speaking of ‘honor’:
http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/25/opinion/bennett-aurora-three/index.html?hpt=hp_c2
Look at the comments, it seems that the red pill might have been taken more than people think
How did I get here? 1. Thirteen years of being with a BPD wife (before realizing that BPD was even a “thing.” 2. Upon being separated from wife, becoming infatuated with a slut approaching “the wall” and trying to prove myself and “rescue her” in consistent Nice Guy fashion, only to be used as her emotional tampon in between Alpha bangs. 3. Encountering No More Mr. Nice Guy, realizing that I had a parallel story for every single vignette in that book. 4. Internalizing that I have options — more options than I did at 23 when I met my… Read more »
Nearly 19 years old, all I can say is that I am glad I found this so early in my life.
I’m struggling at Stage 3 right now with some ethical questions. But, first, how did I unplug? 1. Denial – Still Plugged -In: I’d had a couple of girlfriends before 18. I could never understand why they “chose” me in the first place. It was a mystery to me that they would be turned on so much by simple actions of mine, like the fact that I never exactly gave them what they wanted, had a successful life of my own. Then, I became super-religious (fundamentalist, in a monk-like Buddhist kind of way) and broke up painfully with my girlfriend… Read more »
well, i’m 29 now, and i did go through every single step you listed here, with a special focus on points 2, 5 and 6. all of that happened right after a 10-year-long relationship with a BPDed university student… the first 4 years i was quite an alpha guy, than she turned me (tnx to my ignorance) into a complete douche beta chump, some friends of mine told me what was going on in those days, and… here you got fase 1, than i found up that everything was actually as that guys told me… fase 2. left the witch… Read more »
I’m a pre-game-theory dinosaur. I was a jock & soldier and was kind of crude, but I’d go beta pretty easily. Still I got laid a good deal, since being fit, aggressive, loud and ill-mannered passes for Alpha in a lot of places. I didn’t get laid enough though and had dry spells sometimes lasting 3-5 months – I realize now this was because I’d go Beta when I got into an LTR. So in good form, I’d do shit like this. I was dancing with this one hot girl, maybe a >8, but I wanted to get some. I’d… Read more »
My mother married several times and had sex with men who were married. She also was violent and psychologically abusive. Very much a modern woman as they move toward behaving in ways that were reserved for men and you will see this reflected in women failing in ways similar to men such as prison, addiction and homelessness. This behavior that is usually the domain of men freed me from the trap of thinking women were morally superior to me as an extension of a healthy maternal love between mother and child. I was able to see women with the same… Read more »
I’m not sure what stage I’m in. I’m 28 everything I’ve experienced and observed leaves no doubt that the game folks (rollo, heartiste, roosh, etc) are right. I’ve come to terms with it and understand that that’s the way it has to be. I’ve helped friends tighten their games; they still ask me how to handle girl problems. The problem is with me. I can see it working for other men but have a hard time implementing it myself. I have this unrealistic(?) fear of creeping girls out. It’d be one thing if they were girls from my social circle,… Read more »
Reblogged this on B and commented:
Unplugging, the best thing for a man to happen
Wow, the timing. I just wrote a post today about one of my first unplugging experiences. I’m still struggling with the process as, you even mentioned about those getting out of bad relationships – I’m struggling with getting out of a relationship with a BPD. I’m starting to wonder if I myself am Borderline. That’s a scary thought. I feel like I’ve become borderline by being with a borderline. Though, you and others have given me hope in that I feel like I will at one time be a much better man for having experienced the terror that was this… Read more »
@beingacoolguystm: “Is it healthy to base so much of your happiness and self-esteem on your success with women and your status in society?” I don’t think so. You should be happy with or without a woman in your life. It’s ok to want to up your status, but you should get yourself to a place where you’re generally happy with it. You don’t have to beat yourself up if you’re not the highest status person around all the time. You always want to better yourself, but bettering yourself isn’t always about status. Status and women are not the magic ingredients… Read more »
Women should only ever be a compliment to a Man’s life, never the focus of it.
And Rollo summarizes the whole problem with the blue pill and how to swallow the red pill in one short sentence.
It’s a gift.
“No. You don’t tie your happiness to being better than everyone else. You are simply happy with who you are, where you are in life, and where you’re going. If you’re jealous of the guy who makes twice what you make or gets women easier than you, then there’s something wrong, because that guy is always going to exist.” Ok. So, if I understand you correctly, you’re saying that I should just do my best and enjoy whatever results I get. The aim is not to beat everyone else, it’s just to have as much fun as I can. “Women… Read more »
One last comment: “Would it be wiser to try and base your happiness on the work you do in life…” You’re right that work is something that might be a little more under your control, but ‘basing’ your happiness on any one thing can be a recipe for eventual catastrophe. Sure, go ahead and build your work skills so that you are marketable. You can be happy about that, and about the work you produce. But life isn’t just about work. Cultivate friendships and relationships, travel, get good at some things other than your profession, read and learn… just a… Read more »
Rollo .. Im at the jaded point .. but its with full acceptance that steps do ..have to be taken .. SO when you have a wee bit of free time (between research and the next gig) can I get some help?Right now the only thing I got going is gonna be turning 42 . no kids ,never been married ..email me at bravolupo@gmail.com .. Ive had struggles with the password loops on Sosuave .. thanx
I was sitting at a table at a sports bar with a pilot, a truck driver and a Marine MP. All of them have screaming hot wives and are 15 years younger than I am. We were discussing eye contact. “Want to know something about eye contact with a girl?”, the pilot asked. I nodded. “If you make eye contact with a woman, NEVER be the first to look away. Trust me.” I didn’t. For the next week, I tried it on the college girls I went to school with. To a girl, their attitudes towards me improved…vastly. Every. Last.… Read more »
Stage 5. 4 years of all-boys school. 4 years of engineering college – little to any females. In college “the pickup artist” on vh1 aired and I got hooked. For some reason game made sense to me. It also helped that I kept in touch with a natural alpha friend who acts like an asshole and would always share stories with me about his sexcapades.
I’m just lucky I’ve found this stuff out early.
@Anon:
You’re absolutely right. What I meant by “your work” was more like “your creative output”, not what you do for money. It would include everything from your profession to your hobbies, challenging yourself (intellectually, physically, socially), learning to think better, building a great character, expanding your comfort zone, etc.
Things are clearer now and I’m taking more action with a similar-minded friend of mine. Thanks for the comment.
I came across a link to the Roissy/Heartiste site a couple of years ago on reddit. Some guy was bemoaning losing a girl he never had, suffering severe oneitis and realizing he was irrevocably trapped in the friend zone despite doing everything “right”, a fate that I had far too much personal experience with. A commenter just wrote “dude…” and a link to The Chateau. (Its funny how the mind remembers life-changing events like that comment, similar to how people recall what they were doing when the space shuttle blew up or when they first heard about the WTC bombings).… Read more »
Hell since we’re sharing. I took the red pill officially 8 months ago. Dissolution of my LTR bought about by beta backsliding led me looking for answers. A friend introduced me to Roosh, Chateau, FFY, D&P and I stumbled upon SMGP and Rational a little later. I still find myself running through stages but more and more I internalize the teachings of the manosphere and like minded individuals I associate with and as my friend said you start seeing life as full of possibilities. “The mission not the girl is most important” this in particular rings true with me, throwing… Read more »
Just wanted to share a video that helped me alot in understanding the concept of splitting yourself from work/career mode and game pulling ass mode. If you’re a man that has his shit together and wants to pull every weekend the balance between the two can be very fulfilling. Not sure if it’s appropriate posting rollo, feel free to remove.
“maybe George Sodini, Andres Breivik, James Holmes wasn’t so crazy after all.” Im from Norway. Andrers Behring Breivik killed 77 innocent children and teenagers on the Island of utøya – including friends of mine – due to his hatred for a multicultural society. How the fuck can that be rational and not crazy? Even if a multicultural society is not the way to go – how can the killings of innocent teenagers not be crazy? I love the manospehere, Rollo – And your blog is rare due to the fact that, judging by your writing you do not have any… Read more »
[…] Rational Male – Case Study – Wanted: New Daddy, The Five Stages Of Unplugging, Pathologizing Male Sexual […]
Any interest in this? The existing “manosphere” is basically negative, for good reason. The two main ideas it is built around are “women are sluts” and “the socio-economic-political system is operating as it was designed (meaning it is logically moving forward based on its assumptions and ends).” These concepts do not illicit happiness, hope, or goals. This justifiable lack of enthusiasm seems to have led many “manosphere” personalities to endlessly find new frames and examples to continuously drive home these two ideas with little content on what happens after they are accepted. This leads to the vast majority of readers… Read more »
I take your point and I think pro-active is always better. But you have to look at how most of us got here. In some way or other we were had, cheated and mistreated and by those family and institutions we should have been able to rely upon and usually at formative stages. Nobody likes being made into a sap, and one thing about the manosphere is we come to the realization that we are not alone and that our instincts and experiences are actually widespread. It is only natural for men want to vent and get it out. Take… Read more »
I was an aloof alpha turned beta bitch by ‘the girl i thought was the one’ who was damn good at being the alpha. Basically a guy in a girl body.
Lost and confused, found borderline personality stuff, and somehow found these sites.
Got married young….lasted 3 1/2 years…one daughter….was lonely and destitute afterward. Took me ten years to work my head above water. Became a male nurse where I basically work with unhappy and needy women all the time. (coworkers…not patients..lol) Anyways was like an all you can eat poon buffet!! Bad decisions, bad LTR’s….but obtaining the attitude that “Nothing gets you over the last one…like the next one”…kept me sane and moving through the swamp. Finally was at the point that I did what I want…when I wanted….had and continue to have an awesome relationship with my now grown daughter…and got… Read more »
It’s been a year since I divorced my sexless wife of five years. It’s funny how it got worse and worse and I was totally oblivious. Dude her parents were in the next room and I would rub it all over her pussy and she would be wet wet wet… while we were still engaged. She had vaginismus since the start of our marriage. I was understanding and waited, poor little stupid me. (Rollo, how does vaginismus compute from the game point of view?) Towards the end of the fifth year I could no longer stay sane, and she would… Read more »
[…] The 5 Stages of Unplugging […]
Stage 7: Ghost. I’d been physically and mentally abused by my mother and older sister, and my dad did nothing to stop it. I’d been told that I was selfish and immature, and had feminism drilled into me since kindergarten. I was a sub-omega sap, bitter and fearful. In 40 years I’ve been on perhaps 10 dates, and never actually had sex. It was really frustrating in my teens and twenties, but the biological urges are mostly gone now, and I have no alimony, child support, consumer debt, etc. The redpill/hypergamy/game stuff is fascinating to read, and illuminating, but ultimately… Read more »
[…] Unplug – http://rationalmale.wordpress.com/2012/07/25/the-5-stages-of-unplugging/ […]
I’ve been a red pill guy for almost a year now. It happened after my 3 year LTR gf broke up with me back in may of 2011. Her home state was on the other side of the country and she kept me on a string for the whole of the coming summer up until about october. I kept giving her self-affirmation like a proper beta but eventually i found solvemygilrproblems.com shark unplugged me. I remember when i first read the site, i was in utter denial and im assuming because of the volatile cocktail of chemicals my mind was… Read more »
I have been going back and forth through these steps for two reasons:
1) Lack of solid arguments (initially everything was too unscientific)
2) An “alpha” friend would always ridiculize me every time I was trying to unplug
Last weekend, for the first time in my whole life, I went out alone and ended up with two girls in a bar.
I am now in the Matrix scene: “He is starting to believe”
more I read, more I realize that cunts aren’t worth even a fraction of the effort. had a personal account these past five months which confirms that there are no bitches which are exceptions to the rules of the game and that they deserve all the drama and predations visited upon them by psychos.
Hookers are were it’s all at. Any sane man would just look out for himself and leave these split tails to their well deserved fate.
http://www.hulu.com/watch/187916#i0,p19,d0
I’m currently fleeting between Anger and Depression. I’m pissed off at the lies society give us and after taking the Red Pill I see examples of it constantly. I’m in Depression because I have, until now, spent my 23 years ridiculing something I viewed as obnoxious, shallow and disrespectful and now realize I could’ve just copied them to be popular. All the sex not had during my teens takes me back to Anger. I’m thankful age of consent is 16 here – I will have mine. Whenever someone comes off as a Natural or generally present strong values which attracts… Read more »
[…] the process that one goes through in learning about the red pill and I have little problem with it. It is part of the process. Most move on in the process and some just don’t. Some complete the process and can only […]
I’m 51 and am somewhere in the Post-Red-Pill and disinterested stage. I started off reading NMMNG, then onto MMSL, and then WOTSM – that was last fall (so only about 6-8 months into the understanding the whole thing). I am a child of late 70’s and was hitting my stride in the 80’s. But what brought me to this point – of consider anything of this information – was my failed marriage, separation, and pending divorce. I still fight the mental fight about loving my STBXW and wanting to “convince” her that we need to get back together and being… Read more »
[…] like it, we can presume was much like Neo’s. Shock, disbelief, denial, depression and finally acceptance. The experience Cypher and Neo, and anyone else so unplugged, would somewhat follow a predictable […]
[…] Rollo hints at this with his work, on The5StagesOfUnplugging […]
I am never eager to approve of killing. However comma, the people that Breivik killed were on the island for the purpose of further ethnic-cleansing the Norsk people. They were not innocent children. They started a race war; Breivik terminated their ability to continue their genocidal ideas.
A girl showed me r/theredpill about a year ago. Being the beta I was I declared to her how stupid and mysognistic those lame virgins were. Then when my ex moved away and we started our invisible friendship. I looked into it more but it hurt to read, it was scary but I felt like I was too far in. I tried to ignore it for a while and focus on my LDR and told myself that everything would be OK and how I was different (lol) but eventually we broke up and it crushed me. She fucked another guy… Read more »
I unplugged after a long relationship with a single mom. I saw the dark side of the male/female relationship.I saw that women are not special snowflakes who should be put on a pedestal and treated with the most respect. I saw that the more you depend on them, the more they screw you over, the more you give, the more they take. I would definitely say that I am on the depression stage. Knowing what I know now, there is no way I can see the world different. At 24, I have realized the only one you can really trust… Read more »
Michael, read this next:
http://therationalmale.com/2014/09/29/a-new-hope/
What is the name of the painting?
Life is but a dream…
Where am I? You think you know with some sense of certainty, until you have to write down your journey, in public. I divorced at 35 from a seriously crazy BPD after a 10 year marriage. I was a serious Beta pedestal-izer. Thankfully she was compelled to undergo a psyche eval as part of the divorce proceeding and that coupled with documented episodes of placing the kids at great risk, and a state with gender neutral family law statutes and I was awarded full custody of two elementary school children. I elected to not date or enter any LTR while… Read more »
[…] totally confident about your exes, breakups, etc. Remember, she didn’t spend two hours earlier tonight doing her hair and make him turned […]