#95 Speed Seduction (1988 to Present) with Ross Jeffries

[Angel Donovan]: Ross, it's fantastic to have you on the show.

[Ross Jeffries]: It's my pleasure. I always love being heard and it seemed that this is one of the most popular podcasts on this topic. I'm honored to be addressing such a large audience.

[Angel Donovan]: Yeah, well I've known about you for over 15 years. You've influenced me indirectly and all of that, so it's really interesting to finally talk to you.

Let's talk a little bit, just to get people a bit of background. You released your first book in 1992?

[Ross Jeffries]: No, 1988.

[Angel Donovan]: Oh, was it 1988? Oh, well tell me about that because obviously, I haven't got the correct information.

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, I had been working as a paralegal at the time, and while I enjoyed the work, I also thought, "I don't want to work for other people the rest of my life." And so in 1987, I stumbled upon NLP.

It's a long story, but to make a long story short, I was going through a self-help section of a bookstore, and people don't believe this, but you might find your own reasons to believe that you're listening to me talk or you may just find that you naturally agree with what I say because what I say resonates in that place where you find the truth. I think that's the process of recognizing really great learning is taking place for someone.

So in any case, what happened is my hand reached up, grabbed a book. It was Frogs Into Princes by Bandler and Grinder. And I got very involved in that. So in my spare time, my lunch hour and after work, I hammered through this piece of shit book and just declared myself an expert. We put ads, and in fact, you know what? Hold on just one minute. I dug through and this is actually the ad that started to build my empire.

[Angel Donovan]: Oh wow.

[Ross Jeffries]: We ran this in Gallery magazine, sort of a man's Playboy.

[Angel Donovan]: Could you read the headline out for people?

[Ross Jeffries]: Yeah. The amazing seduction secrets of a skinny, ugly, 6-foot geek from Culver City, California that can get you all the girls you want no matter what your looks or age.

Now, we sold a lot of books and then I figured, "Well, this is nice, but I'm spending everything I'm making. Let's see if we can get free publicity." I started getting on all the chat shows and that's basically how it went.

[Angel Donovan]: Well, great. So let's just count back just quickly, the last 27 years.

[Ross Jeffries]: There wasn't any internet, you understand? There was something called ARCNET where different academics could talk to each other, but really, there was no internet, no smart phones. I'm holding up my iPhone, this would have been something from Star Trek back in those days.

[Angel Donovan]: Yeah, it's like you've been through the whole information revolution, basically. Information, products, advice, seminars, all of these things is completely transformed in that period. You've seen it all.

So that's been interesting from a teaching standpoint because you're actually working with different tools. You've got different ability to teach people, just on that standpoint. What has changed for you in the way you deliver your information and your advice?

[Ross Jeffries]: Technology-wise?

[Angel Donovan]: Or maybe it hasn't.

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, I like doing the healing part of the work. Teaching guys how to pull women has become somewhat trivial and somewhat boring for me because they're the same message.

I like doing the interactive part, so I have a coaching program that I do through a platform called Instant Fellow seminar. I do occasional webinars.

The seminar business, I stepped out of for like a year and I'm getting back into it because I wanted to sort of revamp what I'm teaching and how I teach it. And then I love using Skype and the most fun is seeing clients privately. I used to do it back in the early days and I got away from it, but I want to reestablish that practice, and not as a pick up, but rather an overall healing practice.

I've been studying many different forms of personal development and healing work. I think a lot of men enter this path because they're trying to get into a healing journey; I, myself, am still doing it. So I want to make that more my focus.

And also, I found that the live seminar business just people can't afford. It doesn't monetize, at least for my business, the way it used to. It used to be where I could go to London, charge the equivalent of $1,000.00 U.S. Dollars and get 50, 60 people in the room, but that just doesn't happen anymore.

[Angel Donovan]: People aren't willing to pay as much for the seminars these days?

[Ross Jeffries]: People can't afford the travel. London is actually, I think, more lucrative because all of Western Europe is very close, you understand?

[Angel Donovan]: Yes.

[Ross Jeffries]: So I don't know if that answers your question or not.

[Angel Donovan]: Yes, it's very interesting. Actually, I'd like to follow on with how you've shifted to healing men.

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, here's the thing, I'm still on my own healing journey. You have to recognize or understand that I wrote that first book out of a lot of rage, pain and frustration. My real name is Paul, Paul Ross, I created Ross Jeffries as a character to teach through, but looking back on it, I think it was really a way to hypnotically disassociate from all that pain from which I created Ross. And that pain, in some sense, to some degree, is still there and it still flares up.

So there's an archetype called The Wounded Healer, which the healer has a wound and then comes through their own journey and returns healed, but that wound is always there in some aspect. It never really closes completely.

So through the years, I've been studying my own disciplines and personal growth and I think a lot of men are looking for community. Yeah, they want to be with women, I understand that, that's important, but they want to be with women as a different kind of guy. And the model that they're being presented as what that guy should be is not necessarily the healthiest and it involves a lot of self-portrait to get there.

And so I would like to remove the self-portrait and assist men in finding a healthier way to be attracted to women. Now I, myself, am guilty of this because of the sensationalist marketing that I've used and I have to say to my chagrin, continue to use. I've used the justification that that's what gets people to pay attention.

But to some extent now, I'm internally conflicted because on the one hand, I'm teaching something different from that message; on the other hand, that's still the message I'm sending out. My justification is that's what gets attention. But then on the other hand, I see people like Hayley Quinn, who I consider to be already at her young age, masterful and she doesn't have any of that kind of thing in her marketing.

[Angel Donovan]: Yes, I see your point exactly. It's interesting that a lot of things you've been just saying have been quite interesting.

I wanted to talk about one of the things that you brought up is that men don't have a sense of community. It sounded like you're saying that even after they study all of this that's out there, there's a lot of it out there now, they don't get satisfaction. Is that what you see as healing, getting to the point of satisfaction or is it something different?

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, you actually asked two questions. You sort of conflated the question about finding community and satisfaction.

I think finding community is important. Humans are meant to be social creatures and to have some kind of tribe. I just don't think making the "seduction community" your tribe is very healthy. I don't think there is a community.

Community involved face to face meeting with people and co-regulating by the eye contact and sharing smiles and sharing laughter. So I don't think it's really a community. First of all, I think it's a set of competing business. I'm going to circle back to that because there's a very interesting story there. So that's number one.

I don't think it really is a community. It's a bunch of guys sharing knowledge. The whole idea that there is a community, that's been around for a while, but it's really partially, the person responsible for that perception is Neil Strauss. He used it as part of a Secret Society or Secret World. I think you could call that a deviant subculture.

By deviant, I don't mean wicked or evil, this is a term from sociology. By deviant, it's just other than normal. The Hells Angels are considered a deviant subculture. They have their own way of dressing, their own rituals, their own way of speaking; that's what I mean. So by deviant, I don't mean it's evil, I mean it's simply off from the norm. So it's not really a community.

The second thing, when you talk about satisfaction, you know the old saying, "Be careful what you wish for because you may get it," and I think part of what the "community" is doing; community, I just said there isn't one. Part of what the various different schools are doing is they are promoting a lifestyle that ultimately, is not what humans need to be satisfied.

This is also from a Buddhist perspective. I've been studying a lot of Buddhist philosophy. The idea of the getting more and getting it with more variety and getting it quicker and larger will lead to satisfaction; I don't know that it's true.

[Angel Donovan]: I personally don't believe it's true, from my own journey. I went, like most guys, through that variety and number and eventually, it gets old.

I'm not sure, sometimes I wonder if it's due to getting older and more mature or if it's actually due to the accumulation of the experience itself. But you finally get over that when you get to a dark place where you're like, "I have no idea why I'm doing this."

From your perspective, because you've been through this whole journey I'm sure.

[Ross Jeffries]: By no means do I claim to be anywhere close to being the world's best seducer. I don't claim that I'm the best teacher, well now that Hayley's around. I claim that I'm an extremely good teacher for certain kinds of guys. Not all guys will find me a good teacher. But for a certain set of men, I think first of all, I'm an extremely good teacher and what I teach is the [unclear 14:57]. But by no means am I the world's best seducer. I'm sure there are guys who are naturals who would kick my ass.

[Angel Donovan]: Yes. And everyone fares different in their interests and a different level of intensity of this. Some people go out and get involved in it every day; other people, they have a more balanced approach or a lesser priority based on it.

[Ross Jeffries]: Sir, I'm 56-years-old and my health is okay. It's not what it once was. I'm on the mend, but I don't have the energy I had or the craziness, thank God, or the [unclear 15:32].

[Angel Donovan]: Yes. That's definitely better left in the '20s, maybe some of the '30s.

It's interesting because I was actually looking at your site just earlier today to kind of get an update on your positioning and marketing, so it's interesting that you just brought that up.

I was looking at one of the adverts and I found it to be very, very different compared to some of your earlier stuff. For the Speed Seduction 2015, The New Code, enjoy genuine connection with amazing women and become a better man.

So I wanted to talk to you about that because we're talking about what gets guys' attention or do we have to put out there to get their attention versus what's actually going to help them, thus always kind of the battle because you have to get the attention first. So are you able to get the attention of guys with that kind of thing now?

[Ross Jeffries]: We don't know yet.

[Angel Donovan]: Okay.

[Ross Jeffries]: This is something that we're trying out.

I only know that the real conflict began for me, and it hasn't been a pleasant one at times, is when I started getting into my Buddhist practice and the practice of compassion and seeing that all human beings, male, female, short, tall, stupid, fat, ugly, whatever, shared the same basic sufferance. And when you begin to really get that, it becomes a really great incongruity to teach that other people are something other than human beings, to get pussy. Not that there's anything wrong with getting pussy. I'm not, by any means, a feminist or any of that, but I just have conflict with it and we'll see. When I look at other people's marketing I go, "Oh, fuck. What is going on here? Is this the kind of thing that I want to perpetuate?"

[Angel Donovan]: I think the marketing is a bit like porn. Porn started off relatively normal in the '80s and has gotten more and more extreme as people have got desensitized.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes. And I am in no way contrite about what I've taught. What I've taught has done a lot of good. I've gotten a few emails the last 30 days, one was from a guy who sent me a picture of his kind and said, "Baby Nina thanks you for teaching Daddy."

[Angel Donovan]: That's very cool.

[Ross Jeffries]: And I got something from Israel where the guy said, "Thank you for your teaching. I met the woman of my dreams. I have three children. Thank you from Golan, Israel." But some guys don't have that goal. I never wanted children.

Where was I? I'm rambling. I'm being as open and as sincere as I can in this interview.

[Angel Donovan]: I love it.

[Ross Jeffries]: Here comes one of my great loves. This is Prinilla Jones.

[Angel Donovan]: Oh wow. I know you had a few cats, right? Or at least two.

[Ross Jeffries]: I think cats are interesting animals. They're full of surprises; they don't listen; they change shape. They're very fluid creatures. A dog has got the same basic body shape, but cats when they move, actually change the shape of their body. You can see their muscles moving, so they're sort of living works of art.

[Angel Donovan]: I would agree with you. I'm a big cat fan. I've always been on the cat side myself. We've had cats. I've got a baby tiger picture with me when I was like four-years-old; it's a nice awesome picture you could ever want.

One of the things I want to talk to you about is how you've changed over time, in terms of what you've been teaching and just kind of your perspective. I understand you have moved to healing, but looking at the Speed Seduction, there was Speed Seduction 1.0. I'm not sure exactly the year of that.

[Ross Jeffries]: Let me talk about this. Originally, when I first got into this, I was very influenced by Richard Bandler and that sort of people in the NLP community. Originally, it was just about reciting patterns and [unclear 19:09] was supposed to sit there and just passively respond.

Now about 10% of the population, somewhere between 10% and 15% are highly responsive people. They exhibit the traits of someone who is very hypnotizable. Essentially, it was like locking in these patterns. And then I thought, "Well, that's a lot of work and it doesn't work as often as I'd like and besides, you never get to know the person."

So then we got into the next version that's a lot more about getting the woman involved and not so much about memorized patterns. And then I got into more lately, using your vibe and how you respond when she doesn't respond and just being able to generate your own kind of language that's century rich and it's able to attract someone and learning how to balance your personality.

Learning to be as comfortable being sexually forward as you are being supported. Learning how to be as fun and fun-loving as you are showing curiosity and fascination. It's more about developing these traits and also looking for the kind of person you want to be with. And there's absolutely languaging involved, but the languaging is a lot more subtle, a lot more subtle and developing the right belief systems. And so that's how it has really evolved and changed.

And also, I have to say over the years, I've had teams of people and they've come and gone. Some people would say I'm difficult to work with, that's partially true. And people just move on and do their own stuff. I would really like to get back working with a team, I miss that. There was a point when we went to London where I have five different co-trainers and they all brought something to the table, but it doesn't monetize the way it used to, so unfortunately, that doesn't happen.

[Angel Donovan]: It's more like the economics of the business has changed and it's forcing people to work in different ways.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes.

[Angel Donovan]: So what do you think most men struggle with today? We've kind of touched on it just a little bit because you were saying guys need to heal; what do you feel they are struggling most with?

[Ross Jeffries]: I think this is something that's part of western culture, and I don't know if it's as much in Europe as it is in the United States. I think we all struggle with confusing messages from the media.

We're looked upon as packages. Women think, "Well, I want the full package," like a car that you customize. I want the car to have this kind of gas mileage and I want leather interior and I want it all and blah, blah, blah. Western culture teaches us to treat other people as a commodity, do you understand? So I think this is a struggle for men and women.

And then the expectations that are put upon men. Oh, we have to be incredibly great providers. And no, no, no, we have to be someone who is incredibly good in bed. No, we should be someone who is spiritual and all these conflicting messages drive people crazy and they're confusing. On top of that, if you add the different schools of PUA and what they teach, then you've got confusion piled upon confusion piled upon confusion. I think that's a really, really big, big, big problem. A big problem.

[Angel Donovan]: So it sounds like there's two things there. It's the fact that there's so many things getting thrown at us and that's causing confusion. So we don't really know what we want and that's information overload. It's just too much input. We don't know what to accept or to reject.

[Ross Jeffries]: Conflicting information. The idea is designed to make you feel rotten about yourself so the only thing you can do is buy, buy, buy, buy more stuff.

[Angel Donovan]: Absolutely.

[Ross Jeffries]: And I think we're also much more isolated, which I find to be a terrible thing. Humans are meant to find real community.

[Angel Donovan]: So I also was thinking is I don't know if you would think about how much we buy as being some kind of measure of our self-esteem? That was just a point I thought of as you were saying what you were saying.

[Ross Jeffries]: I think that's what's pounded into our head.

[Angel Donovan]: I know I certainly felt better and more in control of my life as I became more of a minimalist. I threw away my belongings. I've been living out of a suitcase for many years now and I don't buy very much.

Coming back to the community thing because we didn't say it, but one of the reasons that the seduction community or what was art.seduction.fast.

[Ross Jeffries]: Oh, yes. I have a story for you about that.

[Angel Donovan]: Oh great.

[Ross Jeffries]: That was a Usenet group that didn't exist, but one of my students, Lou Payne, was a pretty famous computer hacker so he forged a control message and created it. It was all over the world.

[Angel Donovan]: That's cool.

[Ross Jeffries]: So Lou, I've had some interesting people, students, Lou was one of them. I've had people from the intelligence and law enforcement communities. I've had some very interesting people in my courses.

[Angel Donovan]: That was his responsibility?

[Ross Jeffries]: He did it. He told me. He was the first one to tell me about the internet and bulletin boards and then he was the first one to tell me about the worldwide web. I said, "What is that?" He said, "Never mind. Let me hook you up with some people that will build you a website. What the fucking hell is that?"

[Angel Donovan]: And then here we are today.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes.

[Angel Donovan]: So you could say that was responsible for starting the more community focus where there was a lot of guys able to connect to each other?

[Ross Jeffries]: You mean Lou, not me.

[Angel Donovan]: Right. It's his fault. I remember in my first days, I really enjoyed the kind of brotherhood of hanging out with some guys, having a common purpose, these kinds of things. I'm completely on board with that. Today we have things like these men's groups that seem to be popping up. I think there's many other ways to get this sense of community. I do it in other ways today.

Are there any ways you would suggest like if guys acknowledge that, "Ah, that's one of the things I'm getting out of this, but maybe this isn't the best way to get it," where else would you look for that kind of thing?

[Ross Jeffries]: Forgive me. Prinilla is actually looking at your image move and she's like, "Hmm. Attack it? Do I eat it? What do I do with it?"

Everyone's got to find their own community. I happen to be someone who's into comedy so I'm taking comedy training classes and that's sort of a community. And I do some other things related to meditation. Here's the big thing I have found, a lot of the men who come to my courses just never had fathers or their fathers weren't around. My father was a very dedicated man, but he worked three jobs to put food on the table. I don't remember ever having any kind of much of a serious conversation with my father. My older brother didn't have a clue and basically subjected me to ridicule. I think my experience is rather prominent.

The guys who grew up with brothers and fathers who showed them the ropes never have to get into this stuff. I think a lot of men, I would say 50% of the guys that go to any course need some help and there's a certain percentage that I turn away or I refund them and say, "Look, you need some professional therapeutic help that I can't provide you with." There's a lot of, I don't want to say damaged, there's a lot of injured to a lot of psyche. And I know I certainly started this out of injury. Community helps to heal that, however you find it.

If you find it by getting support and getting together with a bunch of guys and you go sarging, great; if that works for you, great.

[Angel Donovan]: Yes. I think you gave some great examples that are basically your hobbies, your passions?

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes.

[Angel Donovan]: If you follow those fruit to their logical endpoint and just get more involved.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes, it's part of becoming an attractive guy. Part of it is how you communicate, I absolutely believe that, which is where the language patterns and other things come in. If you're leaving that out, you're making a big error. The idea that language can move human emotions, can communicate, the unconscious mind can move people into act, that's not new with me; that's the basis of oratory political speech making poetry, do you understand?

[Angel Donovan]: Yes.

[Ross Jeffries]: Plays, play writing; just talking about the human experience and moving people through the motion and imagery. It's not a recitation of facts. And this is one of the things I get across to guys is if your communication with women is strictly factual, something you put on your curriculum vitae or on a résumé then you're not getting women in a way that's particularly attractive.

[Angel Donovan]: That sounds like we're getting back to what you were saying about society, everything being looked at as a package. I guess you're saying we're looking at women as packages and they're looking at us as packages, these kind of CVs and lists. How do we get past that?

[Ross Jeffries]: If I knew the solution to that, my friend, someone would shoot me. It would undermine the whole way that our consumer capitalists exploited system works. And by the way, I'm by no means a socialist or communist, I just see the destructive aspects of what we're doing.

American culture, American pop culture, junk culture is the most irresistible weapon on the face of the planet. Not our weaponry which my tax dollars impoverish me to pay, but American culture is everywhere.

[Angel Donovan]: You're right, it's getting absorbed everywhere.

[Ross Jeffries]: It's everywhere, even the Jihadists who hate us. I can remember this poor Jewish journalist who got executed. He was kneeling and they were making a video and I noticed that one of the Jihadists, he was dressed all in black, had Nike, I don't know if they were real or not, Nike shoes. I'm like, "This is just embedded everywhere. Even the people who hate us will love our movies."

But what I'm trying to point out is it has tremendous impact, mostly unconsciously, on how we think about what makes us a good person, what makes us mate worthy. I think it has a "deleterious set." It has a damaging effect on people.

[Angel Donovan]: Yes, absolutely. One of the things that I've found that's helped me when I'm relating to some of the things you've been talking about is meditation and becoming more prisoned in the moment. I know that's kind of a cliché, but basically being able to direct my attention versus always thinking.

I think when you're always bouncing around ideas in your head, you're always kind of looking for those package things you're talking about. You're always thinking about those, whereas, if you can just focus and give your attention to someone.

[Ross Jeffries]: I did about a 10-minute practice of that and then a 10-minute practice of something called TRE before our interview.

[Angel Donovan]: What was the second practice you did?

[Ross Jeffries]: Something called trauma release exercises. I don't know if your listeners are even interested in this. I think they want to hear about banging chicks.

[Angel Donovan]: No. No. We talk about everything that helps in this area. I like to explore everything that can help in this area and so we've had a great variety of guests. And honestly, like on my own journey, I found there's also some things I've pulled and have made it better and so I just want to introduce guys to the tools which can help them.

And prior to all these podcasts, I'd get a lot of email from guys and kind of telling the guys in the audience here, but I get a lot of email from you guys when there's been an episode that you didn't think you'd be interested in and you started listening to it.

I've got a lot of email about the recent polyamory couple we had on and they were just talking about managing jealous and things like that and people were like, "I'm not interested in this," but when they got into it they're like, "Wow. I learned so much about relationships. I learned so many things about the way I relate to people," and things like that and they got a lot of value out of it.

So when these things come up and you're obviously getting value out of it and it's something you're doing, you've got a meditative practice and TRE every day, I think is valid.

[Ross Jeffries]: TRE, I stumbled onto it back in February. You do some exercises that stress the various different muscle groups and then what happens is the body begins to shake itself. It's literally shaking off trauma and anxiety and stress and you're not doing the shaking, these are involuntary shakes. They are neurogenic, they're coming basically from the brain stem.

You're subjected to so much fight, flight, freeze and collapse and it really helps people to self-regulate and it's a wonderful complement to meditation. So my practices are TRE and meditation, and maybe every three or four days some self-hypnosis, and then occasionally, some other things.

I want to plug my stuff, but look up TRE, trauma release exercises. Go on YouTube and look it up and you'll see.

[Angel Donovan]: So would you teach it to people?

[Ross Jeffries]: I'm not qualified. There's a whole training curriculum that takes nine months and I'm not qualified.

[Angel Donovan]: Great. I know you're on a pace of healing; do you feel more connected with people? I know you said you're not really sure about it, but do you think that some of the journey has been made to where you think it might end up?

[Ross Jeffries]: I don't know what units of measurement you measure connected. Sometimes yes; sometimes no.

[Angel Donovan]: Great. Great. I know it's a complex question.

[Ross Jeffries]: By the way, I just want to throw something in here. If you're enjoying this podcast and for whatever reason you find that that's true, if you'd like to have me on your podcast or speak to your group or sponsor an event where I could travel or you get me to travel, go to rossjeffrieslive.com. That's my speakers page. So if you'd like to have me give a talk or you want to arrange a seminar or have me on a podcast, that's where you'd go.

And then I have a free course, it's called learnhowtomeetwomen.com. It's got some really good tips on how to get out there and start meeting women. So that's learnhowtomeetwomen.com.

I think anyone listening to this would go, "Ross would make a good guest or a good speaker," and find themselves going through rossjeffrieslive.com.

[Angel Donovan]: Is that a bit of speed seduction right there?

[Ross Jeffries]: No, it's some vague language.

[Angel Donovan]: So I'm guessing some people attribute the whole of the pick up artist community and what it's become to you, I think I've heard you bring that up as well; in terms of if you were going to leave something going forward, because I know you have views that maybe the pickup artist selection community hasn't been that helpful to a lot of guys, what kind of things could we leave to go forward that you think would be more helpful?

[Ross Jeffries]: You're putting a lot on me.

[Angel Donovan]: If it wasn't for you, I wouldn't be here today.

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, Christ almighty.

[Angel Donovan]: Potentially, right?

[Ross Jeffries]: Oh God. I don't know whether I should think of myself as an Einstein or a Frankenstein. I just came up with that; that's pretty fucking funny. An Einstein or a Frankenstein. Probably both.

I don't know, you're putting a big burden on me. I just hope people develop practices that turn them into more compassionate human beings; ultimately, that's all we have.

And also, looking at life as art. Artists work with whatever they're presented. If they're in pain, they work with the pain, that's part of the color they paint the canvas with. So having a radical, right down to the root, a radical approach to life where you don't turn away from pain and you don't grasp on the pleasure, they're just different colors that you use to paint.

Pushing past your limits, breaking free of the bonds of fear or sadness, being able to utilize what's ever there, life as art, I think is very courageous. Very, very courageous. I would like to see more of that.

And I'm getting into teaching persuasion and some other things. Frankly, if I could, if there's anyone out there that's interested in buying my intellectual property rights and my trademark, I'd sell the whole thing; not all of it, I would want to continue to coach. I would want to continue to coach and to teach.

And also, here's something I would love to do if there's anyone out there who would like to get the exclusive rights to teach my stuff in Spanish, I would love to talk to you. I would love to discuss licensing; it's a huge market. So again, go to rossjeffrieslive.com, you'll find out how to communicate with me.

[Angel Donovan]: So I heard you once say, actually last year in the London seminar, you said you have a learning problem not a women problem; is that something you still believe today?

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes. I think with many guys, the ratio of acting, the thinking is gigantic. For every one unit of action they've got 5,000 units of thinking about it. That's the big learning problem, they just don't do enough to get the skill. And the confuse knowledge with skill. They confuse understanding with developing skill in the real world.

The third thing they do is when you come into an area of life that's very emotionally difficult, you tend to see your efforts through that haze, that filter of that pain. And so if you do something that's 90% effective, but 10% you left something out, then you slide back the learning curve and the feeling hopeless; this is a big, big, big problem.

In a sense, the problem is how they give themselves permission to learn, what works and what doesn't. And how they can move around their pain or move past it or move with it in a way where it doesn't cripple them. This is what I want to encourage guys to do.

Don't follow my map, but don't stick with your own either. Sail off the edge of your map and to do that, you have to give yourself permission to walk into the unknown. Give yourself permission to walk into the unknown. Be okay with whatever you're experiencing by grounding it through your feet. Let it flow in your body.

Go do the thing and find a way to extract out what worked and what you might learn to do differently, and also accept a big part of this as random and chaotic. You can do everything "right", whatever that means and then the person disappears for whatever reason or has something else going on in their life. So I think there's a real issue with learning, a big issue.

[Angel Donovan]: And it sounds like you think the major thing there is, as you said, it's really acknowledging it's going to be uncertain and I don't know what's going to happen, but you have to, in fact, walk towards that whenever you see it? Would you encourage people, if they're uncomfortable about something, to focus on that?

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes. And also learning to reinterpret the signals of this comfort. The fact that you feel uncomfortable gives you no information about how the other person is going to respond. It's just giving you information about what's going on inside your own neurology. The real learning I want guys to have is just because something's going on inside your own neurology is not a good prediction of how the other person is going to respond except that being shaky and trying to hide it just sort of makes the other person unconsciously feel that way too.

More like a tinning fort, if you're vibrating at the frequency of being anxious or whatever, that other person will tend to vibrate like that. They won't know what's going on, but in fact, it's because you're your own experience.

I facilitated someone's healing. He had a terrible fear of speaking on stage. I said, "Look, it's not that you're afraid of speaking on stage, it's that you're ashamed of it," which is true. I said, "So the admit you admit it in a certain way, the minute it'll go away."

So what I had him do is I said, "I want you to feel terrified, but go in front of the audience and say, 'Listen, for the first minute or so when I speak to you, I'm terrified, but sometime between a minute, maybe 90 seconds, that terror is going to disappear and probably won't be longer than 100 seconds, but certainly won't be sooner than 50.'" Everybody looked at their watches and see the moment it disappears. And so he looked out and saw everyone looking at their watches. Immediately that reframed it that all these people are judging me. Hey, they're doing what I tell them to do. A lot of what's going on with guys is they're fighting that experience of discomfort and when you fight something, you only make it stronger and then you walk up and freeze up. Does that make sense?

[Angel Donovan]: Yes. Yes, it does totally. It's hard for guys to see that sometimes because the discomfort tends to make us look away from that.

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, tighten around it. For example, I don't believe there's any such thing as approach anxiety. When I was a kid, I used to break my little brother's toys just because I was a fucker and liked to squish things to the edge.

So my sister bought us a toy robot for Hanukkah, I'm Jewish by birth. And back then toy robots in 1965, they did three things, you could make their eyes blink, you could make them go forward, you could make them go backwards. I pressed forward and back at the same time just to see what happened. The robot started shaking, it fell over and blue smoke came out of its ass because the wires melted. The robot got approach anxiety.

Because essentially, when guys have "approach anxiety", whenever that happens throughout the whole phase, whether it's "making your move" or whatever, what happens is part of them is saying move forward, another part is saying, "No. No. Stay exactly where you are." And those two contradictory signals make you shake and it feels like you're in danger, so guys interpret that as, "Oh, I'm in danger. I'm going to be humiliated and rejected," because they don't know what's actually going on.

And this is a big part of my mission for everybody, whether it's teaching persuasion, doing healing work, teaching guys in seminars, to de-thingify their world. Stop looking at things called anxiety, or a thing called confident, or a thing called a 9 or a 10. This is a big one, how to get the 9s and 10s.

I've had guys say to me, whether in private or at events, "I'm good with 7s and 8s, but I can't get the 9s and 10s." Well I remember saying to a guy, "Has it ever occurred to you there's no such thing as a 9 or a 10? There's only the level of sexual excitement you feel in your body." He went, "Oh."

And then I showed him some things he could do like ground it through his feet, et cetera. But as long as he was thinking about it as a thing, a person outside of himself, he lost the ability to make contact with what he was actually doing in his body. What you can't make contact with, you can't change; what you can make contact with, you can change. Does that make sense?

[Angel Donovan]: Yes, it does for me, because the whole thing is about numbers, as you've said. That sounds very much related to what you were saying about us being packages as well.

[Ross Jeffries]: More importantly, it's directing your attention towards not looking at things outside yourself, but focusing on the process that's going on inside you gives you a different degree of control; a different degree of being able to modify what's going on.

[Angel Donovan]: More.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes.

[Angel Donovan]: Gives you a lot more control. So I did see you do that exercise you've brought up a couple of times where you talk about grounding; so since you brought it up, could you describe it for the audience, how that works?

[Ross Jeffries]: It basically involves simply putting some of your attention on your feet when you walk through the world; maybe 20% of your attention goes on your feet. And if you feel like you're being overcharged sexually or with anxiety, you simply just bend your knees slightly, as you exhale, and then as you straighten up, inhale and then blow it out. And when you do that, a lot happens when you involve your physiology. It takes that overcharge and just grounds it out through your feet.

[Angel Donovan]: So in different circumstances, you could do that and it would give you more control under the circumstances, whether it's social anxiety, approach anxiety or whatever.

[Ross Jeffries]: Even if you're in bed with someone, just grind the balls of your feet together or put the ball of one foot into the surface of the middle of the other foot. Grounding yourself is really, really important; it works.

[Angel Donovan]: Great. So if you're in bed, why would you be doing that? Is it to get over sexual anxiety?

[Ross Jeffries]: Because you don't want to shoot your load.

[Angel Donovan]: It's better than thinking of football, right?

[Ross Jeffries]: By the way, I've found meditation to be extremely useful in controlling when I cum or if I want to. It was a side effect, I never thought about it, it just happened to be how it turned out.

[Angel Donovan]: That's a great point. Would you know how many students you've had?

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, there are those who have bought stuff and then those who have pirated stuff, and then those who had stuff passed along.

As far as readers and fans, I couldn't count them. As far as actual customers, I won't count them because that's my proprietary business information.

[Angel Donovan]: All right. But just in seminar?

[Ross Jeffries]: I get recognized all the time, at least 2 or 3 times a week and sometimes in some interesting conditions. I have to tell you something else. Doing what I do for a living I think has made it more difficult for me, in some sense, than for guys who never have to tell a woman what they're doing. If you're an engineer doing this, you never have to say, but sooner or later if I get involved with a woman, I'm going to show her my marketing.

If I tell her right away, she's going to be very cautious. It tends to scare the crap out of women with trust issues, which is nearly everybody. Then again, those who think this kind of thing is cool they're like, "Okay. Very cool."

One of the reasons why I want to start teaching persuasion and such is we have an entire audience of men and women, and by virtue just of being on stage, it's attractive.

[Angel Donovan]: That's a very true point, actually, being on stage.

[Ross Jeffries]: But I'm curious about how the other gurus, how they deal with it; do they just conceal it or at what point do they reveal it? I tend to say, "Well, I do a lot of different things. One of the things I do is I do healing work with men who have social anxiety and that sort of thing. I teach them to communicate." And they go, "Oh, you're doing God's work." And I say, "Yes, sometimes, but my marking is really, really offensive. If you choose to, you can look at it and then either you're going to think this is the most interesting man I've ever met. I want more. Or you're going to have a different reaction."

[Angel Donovan]: My take on it is all of the girlfriends I've had have been fine with it.

[Ross Jeffries]: Well, at one point did you introduce it?

[Angel Donovan]: I'll meet them first. I'm not famous. People don't stop me in the street. So I'll introduce it to them when we're starting to get into a relationship. I tell them what I do from my perspective.

[Ross Jeffries]: Does that mean before you fuck them? After you fuck them? What does that mean?

[Angel Donovan]: A relationship normally comes a bit later for me, so I've been sleeping with them a bit and maybe it's a month.

[Ross Jeffries]: And how did they respond? Did they sometimes feel betrayed or angry?

[Angel Donovan]: Never. I've never had any response like that. I'll basically tell them and then I'll show them the website and things like that.

[Ross Jeffries]: What if they ask to see it?

[Angel Donovan]: No. No, I show them after I've spoken to them. I'm sure they listened to the podcasts, but most of them tell me they don't, but I'm sure they do.

[Ross Jeffries]: This is after you've been involved?

[Angel Donovan]: It depends because some girls will find out because they're at my place and they see something on the computer or something, but I think it's best if you talk about it. And most girls are going to ask you what you do pretty soon, so I'll say I'm in dating and relationships and stuff.

So what I was going to say though, I think it depends on the girls a lot. It's a lot to do with selection and I think the girls that are going to suit me are going to be okay with what I do. Well, Ross, this has been a very straightforward conversation which I think is really cool and always really helpful for the guys. I just want to ask you a few more questions. I was just curious actually, as a sideline, Eric Weber published his book How to Pick Up Girls.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes, I remember reading it in college.

[Angel Donovan]: Did that help make you think that this was something you were going to do?

[Ross Jeffries]: No. Although I had an odd experience at UCLA. I got rejected so many times where women would accept and then they'd cancel the dates. I had a scrapbook of ridiculous rejection notes. I'd find them on their door when I would go to pick them up.

[Angel Donovan]: Oh wow. That's interesting. How it's changed.

[Ross Jeffries]: But looking back, in perspective, there actually were women who were attracted to me, but I felt such incredible shame about my body, body dysmorphia and other things that I just didn't take advantage of it.

But in any case, I remember like the 10th girl, and this is my story, several girls had canceled on me in a row and I remember yelling out loud, "When am I going to solve this?" And my own intuitive voice said, "When you solve it for everyone, you'll solve it for yourself." Or maybe it said, "When you solve it for yourself, you'll solve it for everyone," I don't know.

And I remember as a child having, not a vision, it wasn't like the Virgin Mary, but a kind of semi-dream or something like that where I was teaching a lot of guys; teaching a big group of men or a big group of people. I've often thought this is what I'm ideally suited to do.

[Angel Donovan]: Yes, I've seen you on stage, you're good. It's difficult and it takes a lot of skill. You said women find you more attractive on the stage?

[Ross Jeffries]: They absolutely do. If I go to London and teach, there is always a lot of Swedes there and the hottest one is definitely going to be all over me. And I'm 56, these are women in their mid to late 20s. And at my age, frankly, I really can't or don't go out to the supermarket and talk to women that young, you understand? When I was 10 years younger, maybe I would do it; that gap is really, really big.

But when I'm on stage, that's it, not just because I'm very powerful as a speaker, but I can embed little suggestions. So as we move your thinking in a new direction that you didn't know inside yourself that you really, really desired to have, I think something can come up between us. It's a really powerful learning.

And I see the moment where women get it. They really get it. And then they get it later.

[Angel Donovan]: That's great. Do you think a big part of it is leadership? Because you're a leader. This is what you've done. You've led this whole movement and you're up on stage and that's what you're doing.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes, but you can be a leader and still not be a good speaker and not have charisma on stage and simply not know how to embed demands and suggestions in your language at all.

[Angel Donovan]: Excellent. Okay, cool. Who besides yourself, you said Hayley Quinn, are there other people you'd recommend in the world to learn from about this stuff?

[Ross Jeffries]: Hayley is marvelous. You know how you know you're getting older is when you look at a beautiful young woman not as someone you want to bang, but as the daughter that you never had that you wish you always had. I look at Hayley in that way, like she's my kid. Hayley's a marvelous teacher. I love Hayley. There are some guys who are more into the better man movement, who I really like. There's a guy out in Arizona, Steve Grosch. I don't know if he still goes by BravoPUA. I really like him. He's a good sincere guy.

Who else? I love Steve Mayeda. He's really into genuine masculinity. Here's an old joke, an old guy goes to the doctor. The doctor says, "I have horrible news and I have bad news." The guy says, "What's the horrible news?" He says, "You have terminal cancer." The guy says, "What's the bad news?" He says, "You have Alzheimer's." And the guy says, "At least I don't have cancer." He calls himself the Red Mole. Steve Mayeda, have you interviewed him?

[Angel Donovan]: No, I haven't. I know of him.

[Ross Jeffries]: I really like it because these are guys who are part of a genuine masculinity thing.

[Angel Donovan]: That movement is really spreading. I think it's going mainstream.

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes. I want to piggyback onto that.

[Angel Donovan]: I think it's a very important trend. It's definitely one part of the puzzle.

[Ross Jeffries]: That's why I'm saying if you're moved by this and you want me to give a talk to your group or want me on your podcast or give a speech, go to rossjeffrieslive.com. That's rossjeffrieslive.com, and you'll see how you can do that. And I'm open to giving talks anywhere; it doesn't even necessarily have to be from someone who does PUA. There could be someone listening who goes, "This guy understands personal development and change, we want him to talk to our business or whatever."

And then if you are more specifically oriented towards meeting women, go to learnhowtomeetwomen.com. That's learnhowtomeetwomen.com and I have a free course on doing that.

And finally, if you're anywhere near Southern California and/or you're willing to travel, we are doing a seminar July 18th and 19th and that's Speed Seduction, The New Code. If you just go to seduction.com you'll see the big banner.

I've giving people too many things to look at here, which is [unclear 53:09].

[Angel Donovan]: You are. You're supposed to just give them one to focus on. Is that a speed seduction thing, you're supposed to give them one?

[Ross Jeffries]: If you want to have me as a speaker in any form, go to rossjeffrieslive.com. If you want a really good, easy to absorb course on meeting women, go to learnhowtomeetwomen.com.

[Angel Donovan]: All right, last question. If you had just 3 recommendations to give to guys and they're new to all of this, but they want to improve their life with women and dating, sex, relationships, what would you say to them?

[Ross Jeffries]: On women and relationships?

[Angel Donovan]: Dating, sex, relationships. It's part of their life they're not happy with and they're starting from scratch, they don't know anything; what would be the 3 things you would tell them to do?

[Ross Jeffries]: I would say look at my material. Definitely do something to have... I almost said bondage. Oh, my God, I'm tired.

[Angel Donovan]: Not hoping that's the first step.

[Ross Jeffries]: Do something to form bonds with other men and do some kind of practice, like mindful meditation.

And if you're my age, like 50 or older, take care of your health. Take care of your exercise, your nutrition because man, having a heart attack really, really woke me up to mortality.

[Angel Donovan]: Are you doing okay?

[Ross Jeffries]: Yes, I think I'm doing pretty good.

[Angel Donovan]: Great. Glad to hear it.

[Ross Jeffries]: I had some serious health challenges, but I think I've turned the corner on that and feeling better.

[Angel Donovan]: Excellent. Great to hear. To your note, we coach guys and I think some of the issues come from health. It's not acute health issues, it's not a heart attack, but even in their 20s and 30s they have some chronic stuff and that's interfering with self-development, it's interfering with their brain, all sorts of things.

[Ross Jeffries]: I want to make this point and the TRE's point of view stresses this. Life is traumatic. By trauma, we don't just mean car accidents or watching an attempted murder, but there's chronic trauma; the trauma of being isolated, trauma of being ignored. This is traumatic and people need some way of releasing that that's helping.

[Angel Donovan]: Ross, thank you.

[Ross Jeffries]: Great interview. You've asked intelligent questions and you've encouraged me to just be open about what I do. I appreciate that.

[Angel Donovan]: I've enjoyed it a lot. I've enjoyed talking to you and I feel like I've got to see where you've come from and where you've got to, and I think that's really helpful for our users. So thank you very much for being so straightforward.

[Ross Jeffries]: Sure.