The author-formerly-known-as-the-world’s-most-famous-pick-up-artist is 47, short and slight, with slim limbs and a nose that he says is too big for his face. His bald head glows in the soft light of the hotel bar, which is decorated like a drinking den for men who dig dark wood and slow-turning ceiling taiyouinc fans. Neil Strauss sits on a stool at the bar by a battery-operated candle and hears heartbreak and love ache, longing and loss, lilting across the room. The beat of cold nights and arms to hold you tight, of loners and soulful moaners. He laughs as Lionel Richie sings that “love will find a way”.
The most famous PUA of his time, a guru to thousands of men around the world, recently announce his divorce. Maybe it’s because he allegedly ran up thousands of dollars with cam girls due to an addiction? After publishing the book, Strauss temporarily retired as a pickup artist and settled with a longtime girlfriend Lisa Leveridge, who played guitar in Courtney Love’s band The Chelsea. He now says that trying to manipulate someone into having sex is horrifying. He insists he wrote The Game to teach men to be more self-confident. Instead, many men used it to learn how to bed women.
They are unsure if having sexual desires for women they see in public is indication of their addiction or a normal male desire. “So far this program is as effective at teaching monogomy as a prisons are at teaching morality.” The goal of the program is to teach true intimacy in a relationship so members to seek outside sex. Neil is great with telling descriptive stories that appeal to all 5 senses to paint a vivid picture in the mind. The book is an entertaining story embedded with personal life lessons he has acquired through his unique experiences.
I’ve been with my wife for four years, and things are getting better not worse. I think I already have quite a lot to say about happy long-term relationships, but I don’t think it’s that credible until we have a few more years together. Therapy, marriage, fatherhood were not the only things that prompted Strauss to change his thinking. There’s a fascinating moment in his new book when he describes being the target of an unwanted seduction himself.
On the other side of this debate are those who believe that society has become unjustly intolerant of masculine values, with men increasingly made to feel that their very natures are under attack. Fray reports that most wives leave their husbands not because they’ve committed any “major marriage crimes”, but because of an accumulation of smaller offences, endlessly repeated. He is, he tells us, a well-meaning person who felt fully committed to his wife. His own small crime — the one he repeated over and over — was to leave unwashed dishes and glasses on the counter.
He tells me that, without knowing it at the time, he was a pretty troubled man when he wrote The Game. Indeed, in the decade since the book’s publication, he has been through all manner of personal difficulties – periods of therapy, loneliness, heartbreak, depression. A new book, out this month, describes these upheavals and the eventual inner peace the author found in domesticity.
And the hit movie Hitch, starring Will Smith, is based on his observations. Strauss also has a chapter of advice in Tim Ferriss’ book Tools of Titans. An article in the Sunday Mirror suggested that Leveridge broke up with Strauss in February 2006 to date Robbie Williams. Strauss denied the Williams rumor, but confirmed his breakup with Leveridge on his mailing list a few months later. After graduating from high school at the Latin School of Chicago in 1987, Strauss attended Vassar College, then transferred to and subsequently graduated in Psychology from Columbia University in 1991. While in school he began his career writing for Ear, an avant-garde magazine, and editing his first book, Radiotext, an anthology of radio-related writings for the postmodern publisher Semiotext.
As soon as the testosterone therapy kicked in she wanted to “fuck everything that moves” and she immediately understood a guys perspective. She talks about meeting him as a ghost in the bookstore and that he must cremate her before anyone knows about her death. Being relational is being in the moment here and now with someone else.
In Neil’s imagined conversation with his father he discovers that his dad has lied to him and wasn’t there to question his mom’s arbitrary rules. He felt abandoned and also feels that his dad felt like a cripple inside his mind. You are often stuck in your own story whenever you feel less than or better than others. You may draw more conclusions than actually there to support your own perspective given as a child. When developmental needs are not met, they are considered childhood trauma. A family is a system and a sick person is a product of a sick system.
The divorce is going to be a very long one, but as long as he keeps away from his ex-wife, and she doesn’t find out about his long-term affair with another woman, it is not going to be a long one. Both parties in the relationship feel more freedom to have sexual and emotional desires for other people, and once they get approval from their spouse, they can sleep with other people. I was fortunate to have a conversation with Neil at a conference a week ago when I happened to be listening to this audiobook.