Michael Chief Interviewed on “Flaking”

So this new PUA on the scene named David McAlpine wanted to interview me on the topic of flaking. This is a very prevalent issue with guys trying to learn pickup, so I thought it’d be important to share my thoughts on the matter. The questions below are from David and my responses follow:

David: A lot of newer guys coming into the game have a fairly high flake rate. They get the number but the girl rarely ever wants to meet up. Why do you think this is?

Chief: I used to have this same problem when I first started learning Mystery Method, thinking of “closes” like stages in a video game. A lot of the discussion in pickup treats a “number close” like it’s some sort of significant accomplishment in a seduction, or at least as a really big indicator of interest. The truth is, though, even though it would take a lot of balls for some guys to even think about asking for a girl’s phone number, it really doesn’t take much to get a number. A woman might give you her phone number just to be polite even if she doesn’t give a damn about you. You can even use silly little tricks to get phone numbers without exchanging any signs of interest. Hell, you can literally annoy a woman into giving you her phone number.

I was eventually getting phone numbers left and right every day thinking that I was so awesome, and all that led to was my ego getting in the way of my learning. In reality, a guy who has zero game and never gets any phone numbers can turn into a guy with zero game and gets hundreds of phone numbers daily overnight. The only change he needs to make is that he just asks. But in the grand scheme of things that really doesn’t mean much. A guy who starts learning pickup will get a lot of numbers but a lot of them will flake because getting numbers is really all he can do at that point.

D: So, do you find that flaking ever stops once you hit a certain level? What are you doing differently compared to guys getting flaked on a lot?

C: It stops after you get enough experience to have enough real confidence to use direct game (for faster, more isolated one-on-one kinds of seductions) effectively and smoothly. It stops after you stop treating pickup like a sport and start treating it like an art. It stops after you stop treating women like numbered crops to harvest phone numbers from and start treating them like people with personalities you’re genuinely interested in.

Even something as shifting your mindset can make a huge difference. After I started to get the hang of letting myself become more genuinely interested in women before getting their phone numbers, it was easier to create these tiny intimate moments that made the women eager to hear from me. The tiny intimate moments I’m talking about can be something as small as a second of sexualized eye contact or one light little touch, but it makes a world of a difference when you’re in a real state of being interested, and in the end it prevents a lot of flaking.

In truth, though, flaking will never go away 100%. Sometimes people are really busy.

D: How often is “busy” a legitimate reason versus her just not being into you?

C: It really doesn’t matter to me and it really shouldn’t matter to you. You can potentially control every variable in seduction when you’re face to face with a woman, but as soon as it enters any sort of long distance territory you will lose calibration capabilities. That being said, give every woman the benefit of the doubt and follow a three strikes rule.

I understand when people are really busy sometimes because I’ve got a pretty busy life myself. If someone I don’t mind seeing tries to contact me to hang out, it’s very possible for me to have to flake on them a couple times in a row. Between those times, though, I’ll make an effort to free up some space in my schedule for them if I actually enjoy their company in any way. This is just what normal busy people do, so if you follow a three-strikes rule with women you can pretty safely tell that she’s not interested in you if she flakes three times in a row. Either that or she just isn’t the type of person to respect other people’s time and/or interests. Either way she won’t be worth your time.

D: If they flake three times, do prefer to send their phone numbers into the abyss or are there ever any exceptions where you persevere in attempting for the day 2?

C: Where there is a will there is a way. If you really want to be persistent, be sure to tell her of your three-strikes rule if she flakes twice. I’ve had really flakey/busy girls make time to hang out with me after I told them about my three-strikes rule when they’ve flaked on me multiple times. If she seems sorry about flaking and tries to set aside a time to meet you, she was most likely genuinely busy, so it might not be worth dropping her contact info into the abyss just yet.

Don’t let that bit of advice serve as an excuse to act out of a scarcity mentality, though. Always, always, always have an abundance mentality.

D: I personally believe flaking is a direct result of your initial interaction while other guys think that flaking is more a result of poor text game. What do you think?

C: I mostly agree with you, but of course it’s always a bit of both. Especially in this day and age of advancing technology, texting is becoming more and more relevant. I hate to admit it because I’ve always been stubbornly old fashioned when it came to matters like this. I generally advise guys to text as little as possible, and a few years ago that was the norm. It really worked well to focus 99% of your game efforts on the face-to-face interaction because, like I said before, that’s where you can stay in control.

I’ll admit that the possibility of entire seductions happening over texting today is far greater than ever before, but technology will never trump nature when it comes to face-to-face interactions being the most effective and impacting part of seduction. So, I believe that flaking will usually be more of a result of the initial interaction, but there will always be some instances where bad text game will screw things up. I have definitely lost some opportunities before as a result of texting mistakes but I was eventually always able to compensate with awesome face-to-face game.

The reality is that times are changing, though. You used to be able to get away with texting as little as possible, minimizing the risk of screwing things up as a result of some texting variables you couldn’t control, but more and more the opposite seems to be becoming true. Here in Korea, one of the world leaders in phone technology, you absolutely need to text A LOT. So this texting stuff is definitely a new language we guys have to learn if we want to keep up.

Keep in mind, though: this is a new language we have to learn ON TOP of all the old fashioned awesome face-to-face game because, like I said, technology will never trump nature. This texting stuff is just something that will play against us if we don’t learn it, and will only keep our heads above the water if we do learn it.

D: Last question. If a chick flaked on me, was it really my fault?

C: It could be because your first interaction sucked and you were just treating her like just another number you’re harvesting. Or it could be because she’s really busy. In the end it doesn’t do you any good to worry about it. Just let it go and move on (after three strikes, that is). The best thing you can do is to solidify your game by making sure your regular face-to-face game is tight. Are you actually planting time bridges with the intent of following through on those future plans? Are you projecting a variety of strong useful emotional states (are you making her feel good)? Are you creating tiny intimate moments to give her a little preview of how much fun she could be having with you? If you’re getting flaked on a lot that’s usually a sign that your regular game isn’t tight enough in your initial interactions. It will have more to do with your texting in the upcoming years, but it will always be more about your face-to-faces.

David McAlpine regularly blogs about pickup at goundy.com