The Art of Seduction
Robert Greene  

Summary

Using examples from history, Robert walks through how to seduce anyone and use their psychology for your benefit

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Notes

Nothing will bring your more power in the world than the art of seduction

Once you understand your target’s psychology, you can cast a magical spell

Getting into the targets skin is the first move, understand how they see the world

Seducers are amoral in their approach to life, it’s all a game

Every solution has 2 elements: first what is seductive about you and the target, and the actions that will penetrate their defenses

The siren

• She must have men chase her and a bit of danger
• She creates fear by changing moods, keeping him off balance and occasionally intimidating him
• The most important element is physical
• Voice: Calm and unhurried
• Body/clothing that dazzles
• Movement and demeanour: gracefully and not hurried

The Rake

• Intense desire has a distracting power on a woman
• For women, the weakness is language and words
• It is tone that matters, not context. Give your words a loft, spiritual and literary flavour
• You must convey the sense of risk and darkness
• You must be able to abandon yourself to the moment
• Danger and taboo appeal to a repressed side in a women
• Ability to make women want to reform him
• Greatest asset is his reputation. Embrace your bad name

The ideal lover

• Study her, go along with her moods, find out what’s missing in her life and provide it
• You have to focus intensely on the other person
• Appeal to their better selves, higher standards of beauty. Make them feel elevated, lofty and spiritual
• Key is ability to observe: focus on the tone of their voice, not their conscious behaviour
• Hint at something for them to aspire to, reveal your faith in untapped potential

The Dandy:

• They are fluid and don’t conform to expectations often switching between masculine and feminine
• Poke fun at trends and styles, go in your own direction
• They don’t try hard for attention, it comes to them

The natural

• They have a fearlessness that most adults have lost
• Some sort of natural talent
• Learn to play with your image, never taking it too seriously

The coquette

• The ability to delay satisfaction and never offer it to the person
• We are only excited by what is desired by us, which we can’t possess fully
• Make others come after you, delaying their satisfaction
• Hot and cold, hot and cold
• Remain elusive and make others pursue you
• The key lies not in the tease but the step back, the emotional withdrawal

The Cleaner

• Learn to cast a spell by aiming at people’s vanity and self esteem
• Make your target the centre of attention
• Be a source of pleasure
• Lull your victims into ease and comfort
• Make yourself useful
• Time is the greatest weapon you have, keep in mind your long term goal

The charismatic

• Unusual confidence, mysterious, expresses a vision
• Purpose: people want to know you have a plan
• Mystery: add richness to your interactions
• Eloquence
• Larger than life presence
• Uninhibited, vulnerability, adventurous
• Express what others are afraid to express

The star

• Must stand out
• Show people peeks of your private life
• You are an actor so mold your image

Avoid anti-seducers, those too self involved and insecure

Suffocators: they cling too much to fill a void. Never be involved with them

Tightened: don’t be too cheap w/ time and money

Seduction is a game of attention. Distance and inattention creates the opposite effect and can be used as a tactic

18 types of people

• Reformed rake/siren
• The disappointed cleaner: give them part of their dream
• Pampered royal: recognize through turmoil in past, spoilt children
• New Prude
• Crushed star: make them the centre of attention
• The novice
• The conqueror
• The exotic fetishist
• The Drama queen
• The professor
• The beauty: validate her intelligence, skills and character
• Aging babies
• The rescuer
• The worshipper
• The Rave
• The lonely leader
• The floating gender

Mystery is the lifeblood of seduction, never settle into a comfortable routine

4 phases: getting them to think of you, gaining access to their emotions, going deeper into their unconscious and inducing physical surrender

Phase 1 - stirring interest and desire

1. Chase the right person: recognize the right target by the effect they have on you

2. Create a false sense of security - approach indirectly

• Learn about them and make them think they’re the ones seducing
• Make them come to you by giving them space
• Never mention love or emotions as they’ll begin to wonder
• Infiltrate through other people if you can
• Disguise your feelings and let them figure it out

3. Send mixed signals

• Show things that go against your physical appearance. Create paradox

4. Appear to be an object of desire - create triangles

• We are attracted to those attracted by others
• If there’s a women you’re interested in, pay attention to her sister

5. Create a need - stir anxiety and discontent

• Stir within them feelings of discontent
• Bring their doubts and anxieties to the surface
• Create a ‘need’ in your victim aiming at a chink in their self esteem
• Take aim at your victim’s past

6. Master the art of insuation

• Plant ideas in people’s minds by dropping hints, bold language followed by retractions
• Drop hints into conversations and cover them up, settlements where you quickly apologize

7. Foster their spirit

• To get people out of their shell, become more like them. Mirror them
• Focus intense attention on them and the person they want to be

8. Create temptation

• Create a glimpse of the pleasure to come. Find that weakness and hint you can lead them
• First stimulate desire then make it clear your target can’t have you
• Create inner conflict of excitement and interest, but you are unavailable
• Give them a temptation tailored to their weakness

Phase 2: Lead astray - create pleasure & confusion:

9. Keep them in suspense - what comes next?

• Behave in a way that keeps them wondering, give a thrill and change direction
• You need to create constant tension and suspense, nothing is predictable

10. Use words to sow confusion

• What can you say that has a pleasant affect on your listeners?
• The person unable to write letters and notes never becomes a dangerous seducer
• Focus on feelings and sensations, not real info. Create emotion in the reader
• Flattery is seductive language in its purest form and aim at their insecurities
• Appeal to people’s hearts rather than their heads
• Use affirmative language, never ‘I believe’ ‘In my opinion’

11. Pay attention to detail

• Fill people’s senses with details, little rituals. Never ignore details
• The more you get them to focus on the little things, the less they notice the bigger goal
• A gift has immense power but the gesture and emotion is far more powerful
• Never tell someone what you are feeling, let it come out in your gestures

12. Poeticize your presence

• Familiarity destroys seduction. Never be ordinary or limited
• Stir a bit of doubt every time you see someone so they can’t stop thinking of you
• Find a way to share big experiences w/ your target so they remember you

13. Disarm through strategic weakness and vulnerability

• Play the victim and transform your target’s sympathy into love
• Make the other person feel stronger, more in control of things

14. Confuse desire and reality - the perfect illusion

• Create the illusion that they can live their dreams with you
• Feed the emotions which have least control. Find out their unsatisfied desires
• Start w/ the appearance of normalcy and then set up the illusion
• Role playing is immensely pleasurable

15. Isolate the victim

• Slowly lure your target away from affairs that fill their mind. Offer them something erotic/unfamiliar, be different in your manners and appearance
• Isolate people from their safety nets, get them to spend time in your environment
• Crowd out the past w/ attention on the present

Phase 3 

16. Prove yourself

• Resistance is a sign that other people’s emotions are engaged
• 2 ways to prove yourself: spontaneous action with a favour and go beyond what’s expected, or brave deed
• Make your deed as dashing and chivalrous as possible
• Show that you have a reckless streak, a daring nature
• Not only what you do matters, but how you do it
• Make people compete for your attention, make them prove themselves in some way

17. Effect a regression

• Give people a feeling similar to that protected/dependent feeling of childhood
• Transference is a powerful way of creating emotional attachment. Make them talk about their childhood and pay attention to their voice/anything that makes them emotional
• Listen closely for recurring themes/stories
• Discover what your target never got as a kid

• Infantile regression: reproduce a sense of unconditional love a mother has for his kid
• Oedipal regression: play a parental role but also scold/instill discipline
• Ego ideal regression: reproduce the innocent mood of youthful infatuation
• Reversal parental regression: here you play the role of a child

• Play the role of the therapist, let your targets open up to you

18. Stir up the transgressive and taboo

• Hint that you have a cruel streak, a dark side
• The moment people feel something is forbidden, part of them wants it
• Make yourself seem forbidden by engaging in somewhat dark behaviour
• Tease your targets
• Create public moments in which you know something that others do not

19. Use spiritual lures

• Play up your divine qualities, speak of the stars/destiny
• Don’t focus on physical but focus it on something beautiful in the world
• Employ the spiritual strategy as close to your bold move as possible

20. Mix pleasure w/ pain

• Instead of overwhelming them w/ niceness, try inflicting some pain
• Create the excitement of fear
• Create moments of sadness and enough highs/lows
• Alternate b/w harshness and kindness
• Create tension so you can release it
• Never let them get too comfortable with you. Show them coldness/flashes of anger

21. Give them space to fall - the pursuer is pursued

• Once under your spell, take a step back and let them chase you
• Always best to keep some distance from your targets
• When they are ripe with desire and interest, take a step back. Be distant
• Reveal your interests in your target sexually but assume nothing when you see them
• Shower your targets w/ affection and then step away

22. Use physical lures

• You must make your body glow w/ desire for your target. Appeal to their senses
• Let go of your own inhibitors, own doubts. Exhibit a lightness of spirit
• Be undistracted, present in the moment and the target will follow suit
• Make the look short and to the point and then look away. Close the distance and make the target feel alluring

23. Master the art of the bold move

• Once your victim desires you, overwhelm them with a bold move
• Boldness is required at the end, no matter what
• Don’t plan it in advance, be attentive to feasible circumstances
• Infect the target with emotions you can portray as they often mirror

24. Beware the after effects

• If you are to part, make the sacrifices swift and sudden
• Never let the other person take you for granted. Use absences, create pain/conflict
• Maintain mystery, maintain lightness (don’t try to change your victims)
• Avoid the slow burnout. Break it quickly
• Create theatrical effects. Keep it crowded. Distort their sense of time. Create moments

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