So here it is today, for your leisurely reading:

For the past 3 years, I’ve attended the PUA Summit.

The first year I went, it was an exhilarating experience because I haven’t met a lot of the gurus at the time.  I was excited to meet all the guys that I’ve heard so much online about or in the book “The Game.”

There was a lot for me to like.  I got to see the vibe and the mannerism that each of the PUA had.  Because I was helping with the event, I got to interact with them naturally in ways where they didn’t have to hold up their “in the spotlight” persona.

In essence, I got to see for myself if they were the kind of guy I wanted to emulate or even hang out with outside of meeting women.

Being able to feel the vibe of these guys was really the coolest part of the PUA Summit for me.  If you are to go, THAT should be your real reason to go.

If you missed my first 2007 PUA Summit review, you can read it part 1 here, part 2 here… and another female perspective of it here.

However, I also found a lot not to like.  There were definitely parts of the Summit that felt weird to me… or mindsets that were promoted as dogma that were just plain unhealthy in my opinion.

Last year for example, I brought my now ex-girlfriend there to attend with me.  One of the most awkward moment for me was how one of the PUAs I introduced her to quickly turned to me after he acknowledged her and said right in front of her:  “Congratulations Khiem, she’s hot!!!”  I was mortified.  I’m sure he meant what he said as a compliment but I can only imagine how she must have felt.  She must have felt like a mere piece of ass instead of a human being.

I expected a little bit more social suaveness from that particular PUA since he actually teach guys how to meet women.

Every year since then has been more or less of the same story for me.  I like going because I get to see what’s happening in the Community.  I like going because I get to see some of the really cool guys I haven’t talked to in a while like Adam Lyons.  I like going because I get a little glimpse of what the latest teaching trends in the industry are.  More importantly, I like going because I get to watch how each guru has evolved over time.

At the same time, every year, I dread going because there’s always something weird about it there.  When you are taking a break in the middle of the day under beautiful California sun, how do you explain seeing at least 50 guys walking around dressed as if it was already night time and they were all ready to go clubbing?

There has to be a rule somewhere in the secret PUA guide book that says “PLEASE DRESS APPROPRIATELY FOR THE VENUE AND TIME OF DAY YOU ARE SEEN AT.”  I’m fine with peacocking or wearing bling bling to contrast your dark colored clothes to draw attention to yourself but there HAS to be a limit to how much you need to stand out to catch a girl’s attention.  Do you really have to always stick out like a sore thumb?

Hasn’t learning pick-up taught you anything about what truly attracts someone to you?  Your personality is the real attractor here, not the way you dress.

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Overall, I found the PUA Summit 2010 to be much better than the previous ones.  I only attended the Saturday portion but I appreciated the fact that they hosted it inside Level 3 club because it allowed for a much more enjoyable experience.  They had plenty of seats for people to sit and they had plenty of space for people to just walk around without bumping into each other.  It wasn’t as claustrophobic as the other years.

I also found that the general trend of the industry has changed too.  The advice I heard during the speeches was more “real.”  A lot of the suggestions made by the speakers were a lot less gimmicky.  The content was generally-speaking better.  There was a lot less uber-marketing talk.

As usual, David Wygant opened the event.  I may be a bit biased here because I do work with him but I always love his speech.  He’s the kind of guy who knows how to pump you up and get you motivated to take action.  This year, he talked about striving to live your life with passion and having faith that the women will follow.  Learning techniques can’t replace you being in the present and you being happy with your life.

It’s such a simple message but it is soooo powerful.  So many guys get tunnel visioned with learning pick-up that they forget how improving yourself involves more than just improving your social or dating skills.  It involves you changing your lifestyle and maybe even your identity as well.

I got the chance to meet Orlando Owen from www.magickmale.com after David’s speech.  I’ve never heard of him before but I’m glad I spoke to him.  He’s much older than your average pick-up guru and I wouldn’t consider him a pick-up guru either but he showed great wisdom during my conversations with him.  He really understood how the mind works and how our emotional experiences affect our behaviors and thinking and what we can do to overcome our negative habits or thoughts.  It turns out he used to work closely with Steve Piccus and that I did meet him once before.

My biggest respect for him goes towards the work that he does to emotionally heal some of the women who’ve been involved with PUAs.  I know that most PUAs mean well and intend to add positive value to the women they get involved with but the truth is that game playing and some of the techniques that PUAs use actually prey on the woman’s insecurities and become very poisonous to her well-being and self-esteem.  I’m just glad these women can turn to Owen when they feel lost after such a relationship.

Bravo from Stylelife Academy followed David Wygant’s act with his take on online dating.  I thought he had some really insightful content.  He used some great catch phrases and headers in his profile to create a compelling reason for women to chat him up.  He also offered great tips on how to carry the conversation online.  Overall, his presentation was good… except that I thought some of his advice would work best if you were mostly looking to hook up.  I wasn’t convinced that his advice would translate well into finding great relationships.

Adam Lyons as usual had a great speech.  This year, he discussed the 4 types of men women tend to be attracted to and which kind of women easily fall for them.  He described men who are seen as the provider, the leader, the bad boy and the nice guy and how being one of them would typically attract the extrovert woman, the psychotic or the neurotic one.

El Topo was someone I haven’t heard live before.  I heard his name before but didn’t know much about him.  He came across very “normal” and genuinely caring.  I actually liked that a lot about him.  It gave him a certain down to earth quality to him.  I don’t remember the details of his speech but I remember thinking that he’d probably be a good teacher to learn from.  In the Pickup Community, you can find a lot of guys who have varying level of success with women, but it’s actually harder to find a guy who truly cares about you as a person.  He just seemed to exhibit that quality.

I didn’t watch Mehow’s presentation this year but he went over one of his new in-field videos once more.

I didn’t listen to DJ Fuji’s speech this year either.  DJ Fuji used to be the lead instructor for Mehow but has since separated from him and started his own shop.  Since I didn’t listen to his presentation, I can’t comment on his content but I’ll say this:  that guy always has the most interesting hairdos.  This year, he had the highest Mohawk ever!  If he wanted to stand out in the middle of a crowd no matter where he was going, he surely is succeeding.

Every year that I’ve gone to the PUA Summit, I usually don’t hear any new material that really makes me go “wow, that was interesting.”  This year, I was surprised to learn something about photo reading from a guy I’ve never heard of before (granted, I don’t follow the PUA Community very much anymore) during lunch.

This seemingly unassuming Asian guy going by the name of “Technoslaughter” gave a presentation on how to read body language in your photos to gauge someone’s attraction level to you.  Ironically, he’s a medical doctor by day and PUA by night.  How’s that for secret identities?  Are you shaking in your boots yet Batman?!

Watching body language for cues of attraction or intimacy is not a new concept for me.  Anyone who’s half decent socially can subconsciously tell when two people like each other.  However, his explanation of the theories behind photo reading was just fascinating.  Instead of paraphrasing what he showed us, I’m just going to give him full credit and copy paste the basics from his notes:

General Rule: Heads that tilt towards a person mean that person is attracted or close with the person

The adverse is true: A head tilting away from someone shows there is no attraction or even repulsion

A head that is straight up: Neutrality. No attraction nor replusion.

In group photos, heads will tilt towards the alpha power in the group.

Body position: Separation of the body or heads means less attraction. Usually seen in repulsion positions.

Position in group:  Many times people who feel outcast or ostracized will stand away from a group in pics.  People who ARE ostracized are on the periphery of pictures, or the guys who kneel in the front

Mugging or hand signs takes away from intimacy or attraction in a photo

Hand on your body or leg means physical intimacy (The subjects have f-closed or are interested in sex, no matter what the head position)

Hand to chest is a pure sign of physical intimacy readiness or achievement

Bad Boy talked a big talk.  It’s always entertaining to watch him speak.  I honestly don’t know if I’d ever want to hang out with him on a personal level but he sure is fun to watch.  He’s such a character.

He spoke boisterously telling guys that every relationship starts with you fucking the woman.  I understood what he meant… but his way of explaining it came across so crude and heartless(?).  To me, a lot of guys learning pick-up need to learn to acknowledge and accept the sexual nature of a romantic relationship.  Most of the guys coming to this summit are nice mushy guys.  They are just not very confident or in tune with their sexual side.  Deep inside, they are uncomfortable with the idea that women like sex… and that women do want it (and from them).

As entertaining as he was, the one thing that stuck out from his presentation was the questions he used to gather information on whether a same night lay (one night stand) was possible or not:

• Who are you with?
• How did you get here?
• Where do you live/where are you staying?
• What’s your plan after this?
• What time do you have to wake up in the morning?

It was funny for me to realize that I use similar questions when I meet a new woman.  I always like to ask where she lives because it helps me plan for the next date or for me to know if I can go on an “insta-date” with her.  I also like to ask who she’s with because if I like the girl, I don’t want to worry about her friends coming in and spoiling the flirty vibe and conversation I’m having with her.

There were so many more gurus out there but I only attended the Saturday portion of the summit.  When you’ve been in the Community as long as I have, you realize that most gurus really teach the same core fundamentals.  Methods are many, fundamentals (and principles) are few.  Methods always change, fundamentals never do.  You just have to find the one that resonates the most with you and that suits the kind of guy you want to be the most.

If you’ve never been to the PUA Summit, I say go!  I think most guys can find some value in what each of the gurus had to share over the weekend.  If anything, you’ll look at dating, women and sex from a new perspective (good or bad).

Don’t be surprised if you are constantly being sold at the end of each speaker’s presentation though… but if you’ve met, heard or seen any of these gurus live before somewhere else, I think you’d be better off going out having fun, spending time with a girlfriend or even some buddies rather that discuss “game” with other PUAs.

On one hand, I love it!

It’s the one place where you can openly discuss dating and pickup with other similar minded people.  It’s the one event where you can meet and talk directly to the gurus you’ve learned and read from on the internet for years!

I would be a hypocrite if I didn’t admit that I learned a lot from it when I was still exploring the Pickup Community.

It’s thanks to the PUA Summit that I connected with Johnny Wolf, Vince Kelvin, Adam Lyons and other really nice guys!

This year, they had some of the big names again:  David Wygant, Adam Lyons, Speer, Asian Playboy, Hypnotica, Mehow, Daniel Rose, Bad Boy, Brad P., DJ Fuji and many more!  They even had Kosmo speak there.  If you forgot, he’s the season 2 winner of Mystery’s reality TV show “The Pickup Artist” on VH1.

No matter what you are expecting from a convention like this, you won’t be disappointed.  If you need a few new techniques to add to your arsenal of seduction skills, many of the speakers will share with you what they know.  If you wanted to ask some of them about your personal situation, you can get some quick Q&A in after each presentation.  If you just wanted to wrap yourself around the mindset behind how to be a cool and attractive guy, you’d get that too!

It’s at events like the PUA Summit that you can find out for yourself who’s the real deal.  Which guru do you connect and relate to the most?  How do you like their vibe?  How do you like how they carry themselves?  This is where you can find out if you really want to be like them, if you really want to continue learning from them.  Honestly, some of these gurus don’t have very good looking girlfriends.

Worse, I don’t know if I would consider some of these women “high quality”  (in the sense of… what do they bring to your life outside of sex and/or being your arm candy).

But again, I’m not judging here.  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

The PUA Summit has matured a lot since its first year in 2007.  This time, there’s no strippers dancing at intermissions, no smoke machines and crazy lights.  There are useful booths from various vendors that are meant to add value to your life.  For example, you can get a relaxing massage… or you can talk to Erin Stelzer, the fashion consultant who’ll give you tips for a quick image make-over.

There were also a lot more press coverage this time around.  I met a few people who were there on assignment to hopefully have a story for their respective newspaper or blog.  The other great thing about this year’s PUA Summit was… gasp… there were some women in attendance this time around

Isn’t that why you are trying to learn pickup in the first place?

On the other hand, I hate it.

I feel that for most guys out there, the PUA Summit is way too much information to digest at once.  There’s a lot of techniques discussed here… and for most of guys who just want a little helping hand in finding a girlfriend, it’s too much.  They aren’t ready for that.  Not everyone is trying to be the next Don Juan.

In some ways, I feel that PUA teachings sometimes over-complicate the whole process of man meets woman, man dates woman, man hooks-up with woman.

It starts with you developing some basic personality skills.  Can you engage a girl in a way that intrigues her, that makes her curious about you? Then it continues with:  can you listen attentively enough to her to relate to her and really make her feel special?  And it ends with… can you carry yourself normally, casually (aka in a non-creepy, non-threatening way), confidently and powerfully in the way you walk and talk?

It’s really not that hard when you understand the basics, when you are more honest with yourself and when you really learn to respect the man in you, including the sexual creature in you.  Women feel that!  Women know when you are turned on by them.  But you’ve got to do it in a way that’s congruent and genuine.

When you do, that’s when women respond to you positively.

You’ve got to build that ability to emotionally impact her by your personality, by your lifestyle, by who you are.  You’ve got to develop yourself into the guy she can see herself with, to which she can feel inspired by.

In the end, attraction is a mirror.  You’ve got to develop yourself into that powerful and wonderful man that I know you are inside if you want to attract the caliber of woman I know you want.

So the question I ask now is… is it something you can learn through the mastery of an endless set of techniques?  Is there a magic trick you can use to get the woman you want?

I sure hope that’s not what you were looking for from the PUA Summit because you’d get that… but you may be chasing smokes and mirrors.

Being attractive is about your attitude, your mindset, your identity, your lifestyle.

The great thing about the PUA Summit is you’ll get a lot of ideas on how you can improve all the things I’ve mentioned above, but like in any other convention, the abundance of information may confuse you more than help you.  In addition, are you really going to take the time to apply what you’ve learned?  The PUA Summit gives you a great forum for you to find the knowledge AND the people to help you get where you want but if you aren’t going to apply it, what does it matter?

Take in as much as you can but don’t get bogged down by all the little details.  The worst thing you could do leaving the PUA Summit is to try to over-analyze everything you’ve learned.  Put into practice what resonated most with you and see how it works.

As much as I see the benefit the PUA Summit offers to many men, I can’t see it ever becoming mainstream.  After coming back for the 3rd year in a row, I still wouldn’t tell my friends that I’m going to a PUA Summit.

As soon as I entered the room, I saw a sea of men dressed in variations of Affliction style of t-shirts and jeans.  Lots of guys were dressed as if they were bad-asses.  Lots of guys were dressed as if they were going out at night.  Lots of them had bling bling that made no sense at all.

For Christ’s sake, this is day time!!!  Who dress like that?  If I didn’t know better, I would have called them douchebags.  Some of these men were definitely trying too hard to be cool… and honestly, that didn’t make me want to really associate myself with them.

In short, I recommend the PUA Summit to anyone who’s a little curious about the Pickup Community.  I definitely recommend it to anyone who’s an aspiring Pickup Artist.  Know what you want out of it, go to it, get it and get out.

However, for anyone who’s a little bit more mainstream, who just wants to know a few things or two about women, the PUA Summit would be too much and would turn them off more than truly help them.

I was your typical nice guy.  I didn’t have the confidence nor the edginess to really attract them sexually. 

Classes and school clubs were great to meet them but beyond that, I didn’t know what to do.  

Worse of all, I was your avid video gamer back then.  All I knew was study, play Counter-Strike, sleep and eat… along with the occasional booze party.  Out of that list, studying was the most optional activity.

Looking back, I don’t have any real regrets because I learned so much about myself through my “playing video games for competition” phase.  As funny as it sounds, I did learn a lot about leadership and how to gain trust with people because all my social interactions were internet based. 

However, if I had to do it all over again, I’d take more opportunities to enjoy the college social scene.  How often would you find yourself in a highly concentrated breeding ground filled with hot, sexy, beautiful, young women who are open to “have fun” while in school?

Yeaaaaa…  That’s what I thought.  I can see you grinning from ear to ear right now.

College is an interesting time for most of young Americans.  That’s the time when you can still go out and mess up without getting too much in trouble.  So take advantage of it!  Interestingly, a lot of the young aspring Pick-Up Artists (PUAs) I’ve met in Los Angeles are college-aged.  I see them go out a lot and “practice” but I think they aren’t taking advantage enough of their college social scene.

They are afraid that they will get burned by practicing pickup in their college social circles.  They’re right!  You can’t do newbie drills or practice random lines in a college setting.  You also can’t focus ONLY on pickup.  That’d be total social suicide… unless you truly understand how to navigate that social scene and know what to focus on.

Having lots of girls in your life, no matter what you do, is a LIFESTYLE.

If I was in school again, I’d want to create that lifestyle with the help of Mark Redman’s Conquer Your Campus e-book in my backpack. 

Yep, forget clubs and bars.  Do you realize how many women are DYING to meet you in college?

I personally go on the UCLA campus once in a while just to watch people interact.  Every student there is in their own coma.  When’s the next test?  When’s the next project due?

If you wanted to approach, meet and talk to someone, there is no competition.  It only takes one tiny bit of courage and energy for you to take girls out of their daily routine and for you to get them completely enchanted by you. 

A while back, Christian Hudson from The Social Man sent me a preview copy of Mark Redman’s e-book.  I didn’t have time to review it until now but the e-book focuses on how to meet women while in college.  I just finished reading it and it’s totally awesome.

You see… each environment has its perks and pitfalls.  When you learn natural game, there is a point when you realize that in each environment, you’ll want to play out the traits that makes you most attractive for that situation.  Based on that, you’d leverage your social networking power with your natural charisma to meet, connect and eventually pickup the girls that you like (even pickup guys for that matter… no, not for sex.  For social purposes!). 

You want to create a system, or a lifestyle that allows you to maximize your social potential.  You do that by knowing the way of the land.

However, a lot of new Pick-Up Artists (PUAs) ignore that simple truth.  They believe there’s a universal method to meeting and/or picking up women.  They don’t realize that some methods are better geared for certain types of venues. 

Mystery and Style’s material are best used in clubs and bars.  Natural-style techniques are a bit more versatile because they rely on bringing your best CURRENT personality and identity out but in the end, how do you tailor what you learn from the Community to make it work for you based on your current lifestyle?

What I am saying is college life is a bit different than your after-college life.  During college, you don’t have to go to clubs and bars to have fun.  You can meet women through class, the greek system or the school clubs.  If you work it right, you have an instant “in” with the girl.  You just need to understand how the social cliques work.

Mark Redman is the guy who started totally hopeless and with the help of a few mentors, ended sleeping with 71 girls in the last few years of college.  I know that for some of you guys, bedding women is not the ONLY goal in life and 71 women may sound like a little bit too many for you but trust me, there’s a lot of lessons you can learn from him on how to create a more charismatic college life.

In his e-book, Mark writes in depth about the differences between Freshman, Sophomore, Junior and Senior girls but he also describes how you can become the fun, easy-going, dominant leader in college and how you would want to build your social circle to maximize your chances of meeting women.  He goes on to explain how you can turn normal openers like “what’s your major?” into an opportunity to show your unique personality and where you can lead these types conversations. 

The best thing about the e-book is that it’s not technical at all.  He gives you real life examples and explains the types of things you can or would want to do.  For example, he has a chapter on the various drinking games you can play with girls, what kind of posters you can hang to decorate your room and how to use Facebook for follow-up. 

If you are familiar with natural game techniques, you may actually see the “reasoning” behind what he does.  Having studied theApproach’s material, I can definitely see the parallels in Mark’s e-book and what Sebastian Drake would teach in his bootcamps and I also see the influences of Christian Hudson himself in there.

In the end, it’s all about knowing your target audience and tailoring your specific skills to attract the types of women you want.  If you want to be involved in your school social scene, Mark Redman’s Conquer Your Campus is a great guide to have by your side.  Actually, it is probably the ONLY guide out there specifically tailored for meeting women on college. 

If you go to school and go straight back home without socializing on campus, learning foundation social skills like the ones David Wygant or theApproach teach are plenty to make you successful with women.

But even if you aren’t in college anymore, you can still find value in Mark’s writing just because he truly shows you what it means to be the cool, fun, dominant and easy going guy and how you can achieve that for yourself.

Do I think Mark Redman’s e-book is the best e-book out there for college-aged guys?  Yes, I do.  It is the ONLY book out there that addresses college-specific situations.

Could older guys get something out of it too?  Yes, they could.  Mark really gives you an insight on what it means to create that social and fun lifestyle, to which you can probably replicate for your own specific needs.

So if you are a tiny bit curious, go to the Conquer Your Campus site now.  There is currently a limited time offer that comes with 60-day full money back guarantee and 30 days free access to his ”Master’s Program” monthly interview series.

Hmmm… is that whip cream or [...]?