Posts Tagged ‘woman’
A man is charmed essentially by what he sees and a woman is charmed essentially by what she hears. A man then obviously wants a good-looking woman; but he is charmed not just by the bone-structure and its covering of flesh and skin, but by everything he can see. He is charmed by a woman’s total physical appearance. That appearance includes her physical beauty, cleanliness of appearance, clothes, posture, her overall deportment, her air of confidence, the look of detached aloofness in her eyes, and especially her smile. Men live on women’s smiles.
There is no reason, then, why a man who knows that women are vain should ever have to be insincere. There is much he can legitimately praise. He is charmed by what he sees, and he knows that women know that men are charmed by what they see. He ought to capitalize on it. Even if he were an immoral opportunist, he still ought to be sincere when he can. After all, the first rule of being a spy is to tell the truth when you can and lie only when you have to. Here there is no need to lie.
The moral man has only to analyze which of the many things a woman possesses that charm him and tell her so with deliberate flair.
If a man were not charmed by a certain something, he wouldn’t be trying to win the woman in the first place. Since he is charmed, he might as well find out what attracts him and spend some of his time telling her about it.
Now women want to be loved and they know that men love attractive-looking women. Being told she is attractive is synonymous, to most women, with being told she is loved. We all have our own self-interest at heart, and it is a man’s best interest to appeal to a woman’s self-interest.
As the quote says, “Flattery will get you nowhere unless the woman you are talking to is vain; but as most women are vain, flattery will get you almost anywhere.”
This of course would not be true if attractive women were secure, but that is one thing they are not. Although they should be, they aren’t. Now, a woman’s charm is locked in her genetic structure, but a man’s charm is as high and as wide and as free as he can find words to give it utterance. A woman is limited romantically by her physical appearance and if fate should make her physically attractive, it is doubtful that her bone structure will change overnight. If she were beautiful yesterday, she ought to be beautiful tomorrow. She ought to feel secure if the things most fundamental to her charm are not apt to change.
The truth is, however, that women are more insecure, for while a man’s interest easily runs to the heights of captivation with a single glance, his interest is just as easily distracted by another glance at some other attractive woman.
Being told she is good-looking or attractive to a woman is her single best indicator of a man’s love. Telling her you find her attractive is expressing to her that she is loved, but she requires your constant daily reassurance to continue in that state of mind.
The only problem with this flattery is that she may not believe you’re sincere. Gently point out to her that you have no reason to lie or else you wouldn’t be pursuing her in the first place.
Women think they resent the man who gives them a line. Moral men, hearing how women detest lines are apt to believe they will avoid this error and bargain with sincerity. Men should learn that women often do not say what they mean but there is always meaning in what they say.
Men are just as bad. They say they don’t like forward women. What they really mean is that they don’t like forward women that they don’t like. They do like forward women that they do like. Women should learn to understand themselves, but then they wouldn’t be women. Besides, a man can’t resist qualities in a woman that she herself doesn’t know she has. So perhaps things are better as they are.
Anyway, women resent lines that are not good. In fact they don’t even resent a bad line as such, but they do resent being given a line they are expected to believe, for their intelligence is slighted.
Actually, any woman resents being taken for granted. She doesn’t want to feel that she is just like all the others a man has flattered. After all, she is a prize to be given only to the man who understands that she is unique.
The object in giving a woman a line is to compliment her on her uniqueness in not believing it. That strategy wins her. Let’s try a melodramatic example.
Passing a beautiful blond, our man stops her and quips, “Hey, haven’t I seen you somewhere before?”
She says, “I don’t think so.”
“But I remember your eyes; you have the most beautiful eyes.”
She grins, “Ah, come on, you’re just giving me a line. I don’t believe that.”
“You’re right. I’ve never met you before, but there wasn’t any other way I could get you to stop and talk to me. You’re very interesting.”
Flattered and a bit surprised, she says, “Well, yes, thank you then.”
“Do you still think I’m trying to give you a line?” asks our man.
She says, “Yes.”
With twinkling eyes, our man declares, “You are right, but I flatter you only because you’re worth the effort.”
“What effort?” she taunts.
“Like the risk of asking out a very lovely woman that I have never met before.”
She smiles, “I say yes, not because I believe a word you say, but because I like the way you say it.”
A line is nothing more or less than a way of overcoming the social obstacles that a lack of an introduction can pose. What is at first a problem can be turned into an advantage. The lack of a formal introduction is the obstacle that you use as a dramatic way of meeting her.
Your line is the way you have devised to reach her. You use a line that you know she will not blindly accept in order to catch her attention long enough to tell her that she is unique and worth a man’s effort. If she doesn’t believe the line because she knows what’s going on, she really is worth your effort.