Acing the Test

One of the first observations formal PUAs had when they were testing and refining their methods was that of the now ubiquitous shit tests women would present them with. It’s important to put this testing dynamic into context because, as most any guy who’s ever made an approach will tell you (not just PUAs) there comes a stage in that approach when a girl will set up a challenge for a guy. However, as any married man will tell you, that’s not where the shit tests end.

Over the holidays I was hanging out with my brother and watching my niece and nephew interact. My nephew is 16 and his sister is a very mature 12, but to see them interact, it’s one shit test after another. There’s the fluid teasing and taunting that comes from siblings that genuinely like each other (well, mostly), but as I watch these two interact I thought back to how my brother and I used to give each other shit, smack each other around and basically roughhouse like boys used to be able to do before a feminine-primary society decided they needed to be medically sedated for their ‘condition’.

I’ve explored this in Amused Mastery, but there’s a natural flow that’s learned between an older brother and a younger sister (or sometimes a capricious younger brother to an older sister) that translates to an intersexual relating with men and women later in adulthood. My brother is very conventionally masculine, a somewhat natural Alpha in his mindset, and his positive masculine frame carries over into his role as a father. This sets the environment in which his son and daughter are learning intertersexual interactions with one another. Both are very headstrong, but also respectful in a way that only a positively male dominant father can inspire.

I bring this up because I feel this learning illustrates both the problem most men later have with shit tests as well as the key to capitalizing on them.

No Passing

You’ll notice I didn’t say ‘pass’ the shit test. I think it’s a misnomer to view shit tests as a pass or fail proposition. Most men like that easy binary win-lose proposition, but the problem I have with that is that ‘passing’ a shit test implies finality. You will always be shit tested by a woman, so you never really pass that test, however you can and should turn those tests to your advantage.

Many a well meaning Red Pill woman (and a few Purple Pill ‘life coaches’) who don’t like offending the delicate sensibilities of today’s virtuous women like to call these tests ‘fitness’ tests. The renaming sprays a bit of perfume on an otherwise unflattering aspect of women’s Hypergamous psyches, but under that scent is the same truth,…

Women’s shit testing is a psychologically evolved, hard-wired survival mechanism. Women will shit test men as autonomously and subconsciously as a men will stare at a woman’s big boobs. They cannot help it, and often enough, just like men staring at a nice rack or a great ass, even when they’re made aware of doing it they’ll still do it. Men want to verify sexual availability to the same degree women want to verify a masculine dominance / confidence.

I think the early PUAs were correct in calling these test ‘shit tests’ because the nature of those tests they met in their field approaches were very much like the ‘shit’ they’d given and been given by their male peers throughout much of their lives. Part of the male experience is giving your friends ‘shit’, ribbing them, messing with them and otherwise talking ‘shit’ with them. If you’re in a fantasy football league you probably get that “smack talking” has been raised to an art form.

In this context it’s not so much a fitness test as it is a form of male-specific camaraderie – if it’s a test of anything it’s a test for the social intelligence that a guy gets that his friend is giving him ‘shit’ and can laugh about it and give as good as he got. This is part of men’s preferred overt form of communication which baffles women unfamiliar with it; if I’m playfully insulting you, if I’m messing with you, it means I consider you a friend and I expect that you’ll ‘just get it’ that you know this when I do.

Sadly this is often the first offense women take when they insert themselves into Male Spaces. They take the ‘shit talk’ personally, or at the very least have to make an effort (they believe they shouldn’t have to) to communicate in the open, often vulgar, but no less meaningful ways men do. Unless they were raised in the increasingly rare household of a strong masculine influence (fathers or brothers) it’s likely these women won’t “just get it” and bend their efforts to change that communication to something she’s more comfortable with, and something her feminine-primary expectations convince her is correct.

Getting the Test

Even if you had the benefit of having your bratty sister punch you in the arm after teasing her you may not realize this is a form of shit testing you. One of the most important aspects of dealing with a shit test is understanding the basic fundament of Just Getting It:

She want’s you to ‘get it’ on your own, without having to be told how. That initiative and the experience needed to have had developed it makes you a Man worth competing for. Women despise a man who needs to be told to be dominant. Overtly relating this to a guy entirely defeats his credibility as a genuinely dominant male. The guy she wants to fuck is dominant because that’s ‘the way he is’ instead of who she had to tell him to be.

Observing the process will change it. This is the root function of every shit test ever devised by a woman. If masculinity has to be explained to a man, he’s not the man for her.

A woman wants to know a guy Just Gets It, but she still needs a method to determine that he does – ergo she shit tests. For women, this method must be in as covert a form as possible to protect the integrity of not exposing her own sexual strategy to herself.

When openly analyzed this seems like madness to men’s striving for a rational solution to a problem, but her method comes from a subconscious want of not having to convince her hindbrain that he does in fact get it – and gets it so well that he neither acknowledges it overtly nor asks for her assistance in figuring her shit test out.

Observing and / or explicating a process will change that process, and a woman’s Hypergamous hindbrain knows this.

From Plate Theory VI:

Essentially a shit test is used by women to determine one, or a combination of these factors:

a.) Confidence – first and foremost
b.) Options – is this guy really into me because I’m ‘special’ or am I his only option?
c.) Security – is this guy capable of providing me with long term security?

I would also add that these requisites imply a testing for masculine dominance as well as his sexual market value. Women want a man that other women want to fuck, and other men want to be. The conflict inherent in women’s shit testing is that she must simultaneously determine a man has other sexual options than her while also attempting to limit those option and making herself his primary focus.

There’s always been some debate as to whether women are unaware of their subconscious shit testing or if those tests come from a fully aware and deliberate intent. I understand the rational want of men to hold women’s feet to the fire and accept a personal responsibility for their action – shit tests naturally seem like a huge waste of time, not to mention duplicitous and false to men who value straight-talk solutions – but I’m going to argue that these tests are both intentional and subconscious depending on the context in which she delivers a shit test.

However, whether intended or not, it’s more important for guys to get that a woman’s testing is rooted in her inherent Hypergamous uncertainty. And that uncertainty extends to both the Alpha Fucks and Beta Bucks aspects of her Hypergamy. Women’s doubt of a man’s Hypergamous suitability is a constant, though subconscious effect for her.

Active Testing

When a woman actively, consciously, shit tests you, understand that it is always intentional. This type of shit test is the most common one PUAs encounter in the clubs or whatever their preferred venue may be. With the exception of maybe Day Game, women in these arenas are expecting men to sarge them, and therefore the propensity to deliver a prepared shit test is a conscious decision on her part. For the most part these tests amount to a fun game for her that serve the purpose of determining a guy’s SMV and his Hypergamy optimization potential.

An active test is entertainment to her in the same way it is for a bratty sister and her older brother. There’s usually a lot of witty (hopefully on your part) push-pull to this shit test exchange, but the latent purpose is her subconscious probing you for the possibility that you might ‘get it’ – that you might be able to play the game rather than having to explain it to her or having it explained to you.

As I’ve stated before, a woman who is into you wont confuse you, but a lot of men (particularly overly conditioned Betas) come to believe that any impropriety on his part might be taken as an offensive so they never boldly push back on these test as they should. They fall back on the “Yes M’Lady” white knight script they believe will set them apart from “other guys”, but the guys who ‘get it’ aren’t confused by shit tests. A big brother hits his bratty sister back when they’re play fighting; not so much as to harm her, but just enough to show her who’s stronger, who’s in control of his situation and isn’t afraid to push her back.

If a woman is not testing you in an environment where she could reasonably be expected to actively be doing so, she doesn’t have the interest in you to do so. A lot of men mistake a woman’s “Bitch Shield” as a cue of disinterest or disgust, when in fact these are often calculated shit tests. There are many ways to push past a Bitch Shield for a guy with the brass (and interest) to do so, but it’s a woman’s indifference, not her poised contempt, that cues disinterest.

Active tests are what single men are most likely to encounter in women, and it’s important for these men to understand that this type of test isn’t something you pass, but rather something you capitalize on. For a guy with even a basic grasp of Game these test should be considered nothing but softballs for him to hit out of the park.

Things to remember are Amused Mastery, Command Presence, Agree & Amplify and a basic Cocky & Funny ambience while employing them. I should also add that women deliberately putting themselves into social environments (like a club) who are delivering active shit test are likely at the ovulation point of their Estrus phase – adjust your Game (and birth control methods) accordingly.

If you recognize that you’re being actively shit tested always remember, play with her, and play with her. Shit tests of this nature are opportunities to build attraction as well as arousal, and women want you to get that they are opportunities.

Passive Testing

While active testing is done in awareness with intent by a woman (with only a passing element of her subconsciously doing so), a passive shit test is a reflexive, subconscious test rooted in a woman’s Hypergamous insecurities. In an active test, the latent purpose is one of playfully determining Hypergamous optimization of a new prospective mate. A passive test is rooted in the Hypergamous doubt that a woman’s choice to settle with that man was in fact the best optimization her SMV could afford her.

Passive testing always asks the question that her nagging, hindbrain Hypergamy can’t give a voice to, “Did I make the right choice? Is this guy really the Alpha I thought he was or could be?’

Passive testing is constantly exacerbated or defined by her previous sexual experiences (or lack thereof) or the fantasies of what could be if her circumstances were to change. For women, this is the mental space where the Alpha Widow dynamic is harbored. This is a where the subconscious testing of the man whom she consolidated monogamy with meets her unconscious comparing of him with her past, idealized experiences – or the experiences she believes could be possible if she could determine his suitability for her.

For the most part these tests are ones of measuring his performance and provisioning capacity against his Alpha tingles generating capacity. Passive tests are insidious in that they need a satisfaction of so many Hypergamous elements: Alpha Fucks, Beta Bucks, the outperforming of past or fantasized sexual competitors, pushback masculine dominance, status, and many other prerequisites of long term Hypergamous optimization.

As you’ll probably guess the passive test is usually reserved for marriages and LTRs (live in arrangements being common). Any woman not familiar enough with you wont give you a passive test, however you might get one from your mother or a close female relative who needs some reassurance from you (or wants to put you in your place as a Beta). Passive tests seem to be the most hurtful, but it’s important to predict when they’ll come, what’s triggered them and the root insecurity behind them that women either aren’t consciously aware of or can’t openly reveal because, once again, it ruins the game and her determining if you ‘just get it’ without being told.

As with active tests demonstration, not explication, is the key to resolving and capitalizing on them. These are the types of tests that aggravate most men because they generally feel they’re locked into solving them. Thus, they make grandly overt affairs of bringing a woman’s ‘bull shit’ to light in an effort to quell her insecurities, but also to feel like they’re reasonably holding her personally accountable for her “stupid shit testing”.

And as with most similar efforts, appealing to a woman’s reason never ‘solves’ her problem. Hypergamy doesn’t reason, Hypergamy only feels. Demonstrating you get what she’s doing will help you capitalize on her insecurities far more than explicating that you know what she’s doing by shit testing you.

You’ll probably have guessed that passive tests are most commonly generated while a woman is in the luteal phase of her menstrual cycle, but it when that insecurity relates to her partner’s Alpha suitability there is some crossover into her proliferative phase. It’s important for married men to determine the nature of his wife’s insecurity with regard to her tests and when they’re most commonly delivered.

If she’s testing you at or around her ovulatory window, if she’s regularly insisting on a Girls Night Out around this time (yes, it’s a shit test), if she’s not sexually interested in you during her estrus, it’s likely she’s uncertain about your Alpha Fucks suitability to her. If her tests come during her luteal phase, if she’s nagging or provoking you about money, emotional availability or even how she wants to live closer to her parents, it’s likely her insecurity is based on her perception of your status, provisioning capacity or your Beta Bucks potential to make more of it.

While these types of shit tests based on Hypergamous insecurity may seem like a lost cause, understand that many of the same techniques used to capitalize on active tests still apply. Not all passive tests are delivered in the negative, and applications like Command Presence and Agree & Amplify demonstrate to a woman that you get it, that you see her tests for what they are, and you’re prepared for them without revealing the game you both know you’re playing.

Even well timed Amused Mastery (after you’ve established mastery of her) is enough to defuse a shit test with potentially negative implications. Once the precedence of your mastery is set it’s an easy fallback she’ll expect from you.

Granted, there are more direct ways of demonstrating your optimization to her – staying in better shape than she’s in is an obvious one, casually emphasizing passive dread (a.k.a. married social proof) is another – but the important part is recognizing what aspect of her Hypergamy is generating that insecurity.

In closing here I feel it’s incumbent upon me to address the most obvious response most guys will have to all of this: “Fuck that, I’m not dealing with her shit, just don’t get married, just don’t put up with it, just go your own way, call her on her bullshit” to which I’ll say, “yeah, you’re right, it makes more sense just to disconnect entirely”.

It would be great if women could be relied upon to be rational, reasonable agents as most would like men to believe they are. I mean, they should be, right? You should just simply be able to say to a girl or your wife “Hey I know all the games your playing and why you’re playing them, so lets just drop all of the pretentiousness and get down to fucking and living, OK?” But all this amounts to is negotiating for her genuine desire. Real desire on a woman’s part never comes from rational, reasonable explanations of why she should desire you, it comes from your demonstrations and your example.

Even the men who rule their women with an iron fist will still deal with women’s tests directly or indirectly without even realizing they’re doing so.