The strategy of the Iron Curtain for (doom) couple.

The Iron Curtain concept was developped in the climax of the cold war. The Communist East european countries, lead by the Soviet Union, litterally and physically separated Europe into two parts. The West: the decadent capitalists (so they said). And the East: the brave new world of communists.

Nothing was coming out the communist states. It was hard to know anything. How they live? What they were up to? What’s their thoughs and trends? Etc… We only knew what they allowed to west to know. And then. They were surprising every ones at the Olympics with the quality of their athletes. Or at Universal Expositions, they were stunning the world with their technological, social, education breaktouts…

In short. The Iron Curtain strategy implies that you develop, grow and improve better than your opponent. But you let know nothing of your improvements to your opponents. So while they sleep and think that every thing is good under the sky, you on your side, are deploying massive efforts to eventually overcome your opponent.

A few years ago one of my good friend had a wife (noticed the verb time here?).

She was one of the worst bitch I have ever seen, She took him for granted. She was complaining all the time. Nothing was too good for her or well made enough for her. My friend could not talk to her. Every time he did so, it was turned against him. She took all opportunity she had, even publicly to morally emasculate my friend. Here is a few examples he told me:

He decided once to take boxing class (nothing to do with her). When he happily announced it to his wife, she looked at him scornfully and said something like “you wouldn't be able to strike a mouse…” Every time my friend talked about a project he had, she turned it down. Every time he proposed an idea or a solution to what ever situation in the house, for the kids, etc… it was never good. And she always reproched him his opinions as stupid, unclear, unrealistic, what ever.

So my friend closed himself. For five years that this situation went on before the break up, he took boxing class, got promotted, proposed stuff that were accepted at work or in his cummunity, went to movies with friends without sharing toughts and opinions about it to his wife, he read books that he ketp for himself. He trained his body. She probably had noticed the change but didn’t say a word about it. He even took salsa class and became good at it. Without his wife knowing or caring. And that is where he met his current girlfriend.

All along he never shared a single thought, opinion, suggerstion with his wife. The conversation was to the effect of mundane things: “pass me the milk please… don’t forget to cut the grass… bla bla bla…” No shouting, less complaints and critique from his wife because she had nothing, no ground, no material on which she could critique.

On his side my friend was evolving, learning new things, meeting new people. He improved his finances and managed to make some savings on his side. His self-esteem increased because he was not slaped on the head anymore at every breath he was taking. And at one point he got enough self-esteem, accumulated enough pride and confidence that he left his wife and started a new life with salsa girl.

See what my friend did is to use the Iron Curtain strategy. In the face of total adversity. Some times it is better not to fight up front. There is no use. You will end up depleting your energy and that’s it. Instead, stay quiet. Mind your own business. Do not offer any thought, any opinions, any help that would be scornfully dashed anyway. Evolve the way you want to evolve without sharing it with the source of your… resistance.

You will come to a point in which you will feel more full, more accomplished. And you will feel higher self-esteem because you will have accomplished all that by your own, without help or support (help and support that would have not come anyway). And you will accomplish all that without the critique, complaints, the derision from your “opponent”.

When you start such a strategy. It must be clear in your head that the relationship you have with the “opponent” is seriously severed. Some time to the point of no return. But for some reasons, you cannot quit, leave, let go or break the relationship all together for now. Therefore you rely on the Iron Curtain strategy for the time it serves your purpose.

Poor choice of strategy.

The other day I was tired so I decided to play couch potato and flip the channels on the TV. I got to the season premiere of a show we’ve got here. They place six guys and six girls in a house and the couple that comes out of it with "true love" gets to win a house, furniture and money.

On the season’s premiere the girls gets to pick the guys that are going to be allowed in the house. There is about 12 guys and only 6 will be chosen. But this year they introduced a twist. In the previous season, I’ve been told by a girl friend of mine who watch the show, that the guys presented themselves one after the other and all the girls decided together if they want to keep the guy or not. This year, once a girl decided to keep a guy, she then lost her "vote" to keep any further guys. She then had to rely on the remaining girls’ choice for further candidates. Each girl had to choose one guy and by doing so, loosing their right to choose for now on.

So the first guy comes along, presents himself and then while the girls were deliberating, they passed a little clip of the guy before he met the girls. The guy said "I want to be the first to pass because in the previous seasons the first was always selected". When the guy came back on the stage to get the girls’ result, what I suspected happened.
The girls decided to let go of him and not to choose him.

I knew it! This guy made a very bad choice of strategy. What he did is to ignore the state of the environment. The rules had changed and he played his strategy by the rules of last season… and lost.

See. Since the girls will loose their right of choice as soon as they choose to keep a guy, then they won’t want to waste their right on the first candidate. There is still plenty of men to come therefore the cost of letting go of the first one is minimum for the girls. The guys should have fought to pass somewhere when around 2/3 of the guys were passed. Because by then the girls’ choices would become scarce and would practically take anything that comes that fits their lowest standard, based on their fright of the next candidate being worst than the present one. Know what I mean?
So unless you are a drop dead Calvin Klein model, don’t pass first on those condition.

This set up is the same thing as in life. And several studies had been made on this. See. When women are young, they are picky. They play difficult. But as time past, when they see all their friends getting married and getting kids, while the only thing they can rely on is… they carrier. Then they get less picky. Their clock is ticking and the studies shows that as more the time past, the lower the standards gets.

So you want to get a gorgeous woman on your arm? Look at those single 30 to 40 years old women. There is less competition in that niche and women are more willing to bend their... rules of choice.

To finish with the morale of the story: When playing a game. Any games. A game of love on TV or the game of life. Make sure you understand on which rules you are playing. And to get an advantage over your opponents, understand the others’ responses and behaviour under those rules. By not understanding the rules of his game, our first guy got dismissed and lost.

Best BJ Strategy

Yes my friends. Your eyes does not deceive you. We are actually going to talk about oral sex.

Sir. You want more of it? Don't push your woman toward the sensitive zone. It won't do any good trying to "force" her. And you are going to get just the opposite result that you are seeking. Get clever about it. Shave the entire area.

When your woman gets to see that the area is all nicely clear and smells good, two things will happen to you. 1. she will tend to go down there more often. 2. She will tend to stay down for a longer period.

Believe me I live to tell. It works.

That is part of being a strategist. Strategy can and is applied to every aspect of your life. Its a commitment. A way of life.

Oh! And what if you woman is not the "type" doing that? Well lets not be a pussy here and lets call a cat a cat. Here I will answer with my cheese cake parable.

Lets say you love cheese cake. But your woman does not like it at all. And she says that as long as you live with her, you will have to avoid cheese cake. You love her. So you comply. You might resist the temptation. You may resist for a week, a month even for years. But sooner or later you will hear the cheese cake calling. And you're going to have to make a very important decision for yourself.

Avoiding the matter won't take it away. You're just borrowing time.

Chubby or top 10? A very interesting dating strategy.

VS

This week-end I witnessed a very interesting conversation.

I went out with two of my friends for a beer and have a little chat. My friends are considered handsome boys and have no problems in dating beautiful women. But they have both a diametrally opposed strategy about it. One of them (Eric) likes small, chubby and not too fuzzy about make-up women, but very cute ones. The other (Joseph) is attracted by tall, long hair, drop-dead beautiful top-model type women.

So came a discussion between them that I witnessed. I was moving my head right to left like I was watching a tennis game.

Eric said that he prefer the short and more... discreed ones because he feels that they are more true, close to their heart and they tend to be more "giving women". They have more consideration on what their partner feels and wants to make sure that he is happy. They are women that puts value on one's innerself and are not attracted solelly by the physical aspect. "And", he says, "as an added bonus, since they are women that are somewhat less popular with men, you get the benefit that your're girl won't be hit on each other minute thus the temptation to jump the fense is less."

"Non sense!" Said Joseph. "I like drop-dead women because they tend to be more sure of themselve, know more what they want and are not affraid to go get it." He continued "when they get out with a guy, you can be sure that the guy is special because there is so many fish in the ocean that they are very careful in the picking. Thus when they end up with a guy, in the girl's head, its the one and for the long term." And he concluded "and the added bonus is that they are hit on so much that they get immuned against it. So I know that when my girl has a girls night out, she's there for the fun, the dance and that's all."

Eric: "Wait a minute. Are you implying that when the chubby kind women goes out, she is more prone to be unfaitful?"

Joseph: "No. What I am saying is that the chubby does not get hit on as much as the model. Therefore when she gets hit on, it affects her much more than the model and thus creates a more dangerous situation for you."

...

And the conversation went on... on sports, women again, politics, women, philosophy and then of course... women.

But what I got from my friends conversation is a very interesting "insssurance policy against cheating" strategy in dating . Lets recap. If you date a more natural woman, you are less likely to be cheated on because since she gets less offers, the risk is less. The downside to this (according to my friends) is that this strategy can backfire if the woman actually gets hit on. Since it is more "rare" (once again according to my friends) for her, the temptation to give in will be higher.

On the other side if you date models, they get immuned against flirts. Therefore you get more chances that she will be fateful if you're THE one for her. The downside of this is that if you are not THE one for her, or if she wants to get even with you for some reason, or she wants to hurt you in some ways, then she just have to go out and roll her hips a little, and you're history in no time.

Which strategy is best? Honestly in this case I don't know. Both have their pros an cons.

But what is interesting is that it gives an interesting hint on the hidden computation part of our brain when it comes to relationships. Because my friends had this conversation very genuinelly without back thoughts. They were not aware that what they were verbalizing, is their internal premisses of odds calculations in a relationship. Odds of being cheated on or not... And in some ways, it affects their choices of potential dates.

Of course one has to realize that this is an over simplification of relationships and women characters. One must not take this to the letter and apply it as is.

But this is nevertheless interesting... for a Strategist.

The Mirror Strategy, beware of what you might find

Have you ever found that, in a relationship, sometimes, there is always one partner that does most of the effort for the relation compared to the other?

We've all seen that. Perhaps you lived it. And if you feel that you are actually living it right now, here's a trick: The Mirror Strategy. But be warned. This could be the start of a spiral down to the end of you relationship! Use this with caution.

The Mirror strategy consist of mirroring your most significant other's affection patern. If he/she gives you affection, you give some back. If he/she don't, you don't. Its as simple as that.

There is two ways on how your significant other might respond to that. First he/she can realize that you're getting farther and colder, and he/she might want to win you back by giving more love, attention and affection. If it is so. Then you made your point. Resume with your relationship, you know it's worth it.

The second response is a significant other that mirror you back. If it is so, you have two ways to deal with it. First you end the "cold war" and resume to your relationship the way it was. Willing to accecpt the consequences of this relationship. Second, you continue the mirror strategy in giving even less attention and affection.

This last path is dangerous. You can end up in a spiral down of less and lesser attention and affection from your significant other and you to him/her. At the extreme, this can spiral down to the end of the relationship. If it does, would you have provoqued the end of the relationship? You might. But the true question is, if the significant other doesn't respond to less and less care and affection, is this relationship worth it?

That's for you to find your own answer.

Strategy: Cuban missile crisis vs couple management

I met one of my friend for coffee during the weekend and we had a very interesting conversation about couple management and the Cuban missile crisis. What leads one to the other? Read on. You'll see.

My friend is what we could consider an average nice looking guy. He is doing ok with women, like most of us, but he is not a Calvin Klein model type, like most of us. About two years ago we went out to this club. It was one of those night where you could say "tonight its on". We met a group of girls and there was one girl in the group that was the local incarnation of a brunette Scarlett Johansson. One thing leads to another, he ended up going out with the girl. I always thought that everything was nice and easy while they were together but yesterday my friend told me differently.

It's the classical case of a superb woman going out with an average guy: every guys were hitting on my friend's girlfriend. But on his side, not much women were hitting on him. "There was a clear disadvantage for me". Said my friend.

How so? I asked.

Well, she was more popular than me. And I could sense in her that, even if she never verbally mentioned it, she always took pride in knowing that she could get any guys she wanted if I was not up to her... expectations. And I always was able to sense that, with her unsaid words or non verbal behaviors. So I decided to use the Cuban missile strategy with her.

The Cuban missile strategy? I went, with, I imagine, my most puzzled face ever.

Yeah! Went my friend. See. The United-States repeated acts of aggressions against Cuba to overthrow Fidel Castro's regime. Now it was easy for the USA to do so without fear of retaliation because Cuba was a nation that was opposing no military threat. This is not strange that they don't use the same strategy against North Korea. They oppose a bigger threat: they are a more militarized country, they have the atomic bomb and China support them. That is why nations stay away from North Korea. This was not the same for Cuba.

So in order to make the bullies stop from a stronger opponent, one has to ether develop its own strengths or seek alliance with a stronger bullier. That is what Castro decided to do. He seeked alliance with the Soviet Union and got to an agreement to install Soviet nuclear missiles on Cuban land. With this sort of parity, the United-States would think twice before trying to kick Cuba in the teeth again.

Ok but I still don't see where this leads to your relationship with Martine (the local Scarlett Johansson's name is Martine). I said to my friend.

Well you see. She had a appealing & seduction advantage on me. She could go out and get any guys she wanted. And she knew it. But me? This would require a lot more work.

So?

So I decided to develop my sex appeal, get better in meeting women and attracting them. I wanted to become a pickup artist. To be at par with her.

Now I see where this change of behavior came from and why you wanted me to join the PUA community with you.

Yes. And it worked. I did not do that to cheat on her. I didn't. I did not do that to make her jealous neither. I just wanted her to understand that she did not have the upper end anymore. That I could get mostly any girl I wanted for now on and that if she wanted to keep me, she would have to treat me as well as I treated her. See... parity. Just as Cuba wanted.

And did it work?

Very well! Once she noticed that girls were around me more the territory protection cells kicked in her mind. And she was "fighting" and "competing" to keep me. Now you can say what you want because we are not together anymore. But we managed to keep our couple running for a year and a half never the less.

Moral of the story: International relation politico-military strategy can apply to our little lives. My friend used the Cuban missile strategy to overcome his ex girlfriend advantage on him. And it had more success with him than Castro had with his.