Body Language    Compare

A concentrate of body language research

Before watching this again for review, I did NOT remember how good it was, and expected something so-so. I had forgotten how much I learned from this when I first watched it a few years ago.

The first DVD and a half is all David DeAngelo, and it is very solid content – he basically gives you (in about 2 hours or so) a concentrate of research on body language, much of it coming from academic books on evolutionary psychology. The rest of the program is handled by guest speakers, and unfortunately not all them shine (more on this later).

The “human mating dance”

On DVD I, David DeAngelo starts by explaining the concept of the “mating dance”. Animals go through precise movements, without rehearsing them, and females use this to judge their value and decide to mate with them (or not). This is not learned but hardwired from birth.

Well, there are courtship displays that humans go through, just like animals do. This is body language – the “human mating dance”.

Body language is a method of DIRECT communication. It’s the oldest and most universal language. Male or female, we all have this non-verbal, built-in system for communicating. We all read subtle cues in others, all the time, unconsciously.

The problem is, most men are clueless about it. Women are FAR better are sending and receiving these signals.

Using your body as a signaling mechanism

The idea here is therefore to use your body language as a signaling mechanism to women. You can and should use your body language to amplify attraction and communicate high-status. You want to trigger that unconscious attraction response. You do NOT want to leak insecurities or have low-status body language, as this kills attraction.

So, in order to improve, you need to “be conscious of your body language until it becomes unconscious.” In other words, you need to watch yourself and practice good behaviors until you do it naturally.

David DeAngelo then goes in detail about the behaviors you can practice: strong, secure eye-contact; dominant, confident posture and walk; slower than usual movements and gestures; un-self-conscious demeanor; leaning back not forward; slow motions; leading; etc etc. This is all demonstrated on volunteers from the audience.

Quote: “Attention and approval is truly a CURRENCY of communication; learn to spend it and invest it very wisely”.

We then go through a list of the body language issues to avoid (nervousness, darting eyes, fidgeting, tentative gestures, staring at the floor, etc); then we get a list of signs that a woman is attracted to you.

Mystery, and his crazy outfit from outer space

And then, around the middle of DVD II…Mystery shows up as a guest speaker. This is quite entertaining because Mystery was not famous at the time, and you can’t imagine someone more different than David DeAngelo in terms of speaking style, looks or techniques. It’s clear the audience doesn’t know what’s hitting them. They start laughing at his outfit, but within a few minutes of hearing him speak, nobody is laughing anymore.

In a breathtaking hour or so, Mystery basically gives away most of the key principles of the Mystery Method, reviewing Peacocking, Indicators of Interest, Proximity, locking in, negs, Demonstrating Higher Value, the 3 seconds rule, why we have approach anxiety and how to fight it, Kino escalation and how to do it properly, women’s last minute resistance (LMR) and how to overcome it, and more. While this is all developed more thoroughly in other Mystery products (such as The Mystery Method Video Archive or the more recent Venusian Arts’ Revelation ebook), this is a great summary and a good introduction to the man.

At this point, unless you are advanced and knew all this stuff before, you should be panting for breath, because those first few hours pack a lot of good info. Unfortunately, Mystery finishes his bit and we move on to new guest speakers, and it starts to go downhill from here.

The guest speakers don’t shine

First come Steve P. (aka Steve Piccus of White Tiger Tantra’s fame) and Hypnotica. Their speech is mostly NLP, inner game stuff - how it’s important to change your inner beliefs to improve your outer game. All good points, unfortunately much time is lost in exercises that either don’t work or at least do not translate well from video (maybe it worked in the seminar, who knows). More worrying is that Hypnotica‘s body language and voice tone show very visible signs of nervousness, which is quite ironic as he is giving a speech on inner confidence and body language. Hypnotica is a good guy, I guess he probably wasn’t used to speak in front of 150 dudes at the time.

Next guest is a woman called Patty who demonstrates confident body language. Nothing very ground-breaking. The next 2 speakers, Craig and Will H, give short talks on body language that again are not especially memorable.

The last guest speaker is Tyler Durden, who is a bit better (this is a few years back so he had not developed into the better teacher he is today – check out Real Social Dynamics’ Blueprint to see the difference). He talks about displaying value and alpha qualities, taking up space, and using posture to change your internal state.

A solid product on a key skill

Overall, this DVD set is good, mostly based on the first 60-70% or so. It’s a shame that it loses steam in the end, but what comes first more than makes up for it.

David DeAngelo is not overstating the importance of body language; it CAN really destroy your efforts if you don’t have it down, so it IS worth learning this stuff, and there aren’t many products out there about it. This is great for beginner to intermediate guys, who will no doubt pick up a lot of good tips from it.