How to Build a Strong Reality and Frame of Mind

Today’s inspiration: the unshakeable frame of Steve McQueen

What is charisma? Charisma is the ability to draw someone else into your world, win them over to your side, and accept your frame of reference as the accurate frame of reference.

This word - “frame” - has a lot of connotations. What is it? It’s hard to define, but I’ll give it a shot: your “frame” is the reference from which you observe the world. When you have a strong frame, you tend to draw other people into it. When you have a weak frame, you tend to fall into others’ reference points. The stronger your frame, the more relaxed and confident you’ll be; the weaker your frame, the more self-conscious.

You “have frame” when your view of reality dominates the room. You “lose frame” when you place too much importance on the other person’s view of you.

The dance between your frame and my frame is the basis for a great many social interactions:

• Men “ribbing” each other is a light attempt to see who will “lose frame” first. Quick wit is a sign that you’re relaxed and not self-conscious; when you lose the wit, it’s a sign that you’ve lost frame. This is why you’ve seen countless movies of a guy “losing” when he doesn’t have a comeback.
• It’s a frequent theme in pickup circles that women will test a man’s frame to see if he’s as confident as he’s expressing. There is actually no way to “pass” these tests; with proper frame, you merely dismiss their legitimacy.
• A political debate is less about substance and more about which politican seems in “command.” It’s another word for “frame-holder.” Many people believed that Bill Clinton won against George H.W. Bush in 1992 not because of his substance, but because of unflinching eye contact and charismatic delivery.
• James Bond is seen as “suave” because he rarely loses his cool - he never loses “frame.” Even when he’s locked up by supervillains or betrayed by some saucy minx, his frame remains somehow independent of his circumstances.
• This scene in Gandhi shows that you can maintain a powerful frame while being nonviolent and wishing your neighbors well. Frame is not lashing out nor is it cowhering in fear. Sometimes, frame is merely not flinching.

Frame is attitude. In short, frame is everything.

But I’ll take it a step further and say that practicing frame is to building suaveness what lifting large weights is to building muscle.

Rick H. of “Double Your Dating” fame puts it simply: how strong is your reality? Strong enough to draw other people into it, or so weak that you walk from frame to frame, accepting everyone else’s view of the world?

This is an abstract concept, having a powerful frame of mind, but there are tangible ways you can improve your frame and, thus, your confidence.

On Frame and Suaveness: Having a Strong Reality

You’re already a master of frame. You just don’t know it. Why? Because one can actually have a strong frame and still turn people off.

Think about the word “frame” for a minute. Let’s consider the metaphor of a frame on a window. What’s the actual content that fills the window?

If your window is full of positive beliefs about yourself - that you are high-value, that you are kind, that you are generous, that you are worth knowing - then you’re going to have a heck of a lot of fun talking to people.

If your window is full of negative beliefs about yourself - that you’re low value, that you have no friends, that you’re a loser - then you’re going to have your work cut out for you.

It’s possible to believe 100% that you’re strong and high value…and believe 100% that you’re weak, and low-value. It’s not only the quality of the belief that matters, but the content of it. If you know with 100% certainty that you’re a social doofus, then guess what? Your frame will win out every single time. But if you know with 100% certainty that you’re high-value, that your life is interesting, that knowing you is fun, then that frame will win out, too.

Becoming suave isn’t just about having a strong sense of your own reality; it’s filling that reality up with fun and positive things.

Take a minute here and think about your own life, your own reality. How do you walk through a day in your life? Would someone else find that life worth entering? If someone enters your reality for a day, are they better off for it?

If a beautiful woman were to enter your life, would her life improve, or would grow…bored?

But you already know how to start building a more interesting life - that’s an entire section of this subreddit. You also know how to build yourself into an individual with higher social value - that’s basically the mission of this subreddit.

But what you don’t know how to do is strengthen and change your frame.

Let’s do that.

Ways to Improve and Strengthen Frame

Don’t look at frame, except in rare occasions, as something that you “do,” a technique. It has to be something you are as a matter of course in your life.

Trying to “win frame” with someone when you have no frame to speak of is pointless…you might as well try to flex your muscles when you haven’t been to the gym in a year.

Frame is built day-by-day, activity by activity. Frame is built by good habits, by meeting new people, by exposing yourself to failure and coming through clean on the other end.

You can’t buy frame with gold. With frame, you pay the iron price.

Tool #1: Expose Yourself to Failure and Rejection

• Be bold in job interviews
• Approach beautiful women everywhere
• Talk to everyone everywhere
• Keep trying for that one thing you’ve always wanted to do
• Be a newb in a social situation: take a class somewhere

No, don’t go out and try to get rejected; that’s stupid. That’s replacing confidence with boldness. No, what you want to do is actually try to suceed, thus “exposing” yourself to the possibility of failure. On a daily basis, you should expose yourself to failure in some way.

In “How a Suave Man Handles Rejection,”, you saw how rejection can make you stronger. Why? Because you watch yourself go through your greatest fear and come out on the other end, none the worse for wear. By building up a tolerance to failure, you fear it less. Your frame grows, because you’re investing less emotional importance in the other person’s frame.

This is a KEY point: approach beautiful women not only to see if they’re interested, but to build yourself up into a better person. There is no reason you should not expose yourself to this life-altering skill.

When you fail, it’s like working out until failure in the gym: you’re forcing yourself to grow stronger. If you get embarrassed, you have to start learning a habit like being internally-validating, because there’s no other choice. Eventually, your voice loosens, and deepends. You talk louder. You give more eye contact. All that failure and social awkwardness is not for nothing: with it, you grow stronger socially.

Tool #2: Overcoming Non-Suave Challenges in Your Life

• Take a cold shower
• Exercise: run faster, swim longer, lift more
• Ditch a bad habit and resist temptations
• Take effort towards your dream every day
• Daily, monthly, and yearly goal-setting

Tool #1 is by far your most important tool, but it also helps to see yourself as someone who overcomes challenges. Frame, after all, is not only about socializing; it’s also about your approach to life itself.

When you’re on the last lap of a 10k, the physical pain will challenge your frame. What wins out? The pain, or your will to succeed?

When you get another rejection from a publisher, it will challenge your frame that you’re a good writer. What wins out? The rejection, or your confidence in future success?

When you try stand-up comedy for the first time, you’ll get heckled. What wins out?

When you’re tempted to smoke that cigarette despite the fact that you said you’d quit, what wins out? Your will to succeed, or a craving?

Are you more than your pain? Are you more than rejection? Are you worth more than some craving?

Hell yes. When you’re tested to your limit, I want you to ask yourself: what the fuck wins out? You’ll know the answer, and your frame will be the stronger for it.

Gale Sayers of the Chicago Bears wrote once that he worked so hard in the off-season that when training camp came around, it seemed like a relief. Overcome difficult challenges. Test your mettle. Work so hard that when time comes for you to talk to people and flex your frame muscle, it feels like a walk in the park.

Tool #3: Control Your Thoughts

• Meditation 15 minutes daily
• Affirmations
• Visualization

Since your frame is basically the sum total of your daily thoughts, learning how to change those daily thoughts is an essential key to changing your frame.

The first step is through meditation. When you practice mindfulness or merely concentrate on your breath for fifteen minutes, you learn how to quite the mind and focus. You give up distractions. If you’re doing it right, you should notice a more even keel throughout the rest of your day - things just don’t bother you as much as they once did.

The second is affirmations. It’s not enough to vacate thought; you should affirm a new thought. You should give your mind someplace to go. An affirmation might be something like “I am totally confident around everyone.” It should be positive - you’re affirming the present existence of something. It might feel like self-delusion at first, but soon you’ll start to notice instances in which you are confident…and the dominoes fall from there.

The third is visualization. Visualization is a popular technique amongst athletes. Jack Nicklaus has said that he won’t even take a shot at the golf ball until he’s given himself a clear visualization of where he wants it to go.

Tool #4: Handle Frame Tests: A Refresher

A frame test is something that people will throw your way to see if you’ll lose your poise/cool and enter in their frame.

An example might be a woman saying “you’re just a player!”

By saying “you’re just a player,” she’s announcing her reality as she sees it, trying to see if it will hold ground against yours. If you lose your cool, get flustered, or enter her frame in any other way, the test will “work” and you’ll lose the good vibrations.

So what do you do?

In “Attracting Beautiful and Exceptional Women Naturally, Part III,” I outlined how to respond to frame tests:

How to respond to a frame test:

• Never lose your cool. Losing your cool is the first and most immediate sign that your frame test has failed. Stay cool, baby, ice cold.
• Ignore. Not a great solution, but it generally beats overreacting, losing your cool, etc. Simply move on with the conversation.
• Shut down. This isn’t my favorite, because it’s not generally smooth, but at least it shows that you’re not going to take any guff.
• Agree/disagree and amplify. We’re getting a little closer. If someone says “you are just a player, aren’t you?” you might disagree and say “Actually, I’m a virgin…and I’m really sensitive about it. Thanks!” in a clearly joking tone. Or you might agree and say…“Yeah, thanks! I’m actually thinking about turning pro.” Point is, you’re not taking a frame test seriously, which means you’re passing it.

The key takeaway: frame tests do not get “passed.”

If you’re trying to “pass” a frame test, you’ve already failed - because you’ve entered into the idea that it’s a test that has meaning. Instead, you should just dismiss it amusedly.

Key Takeaways

• “Frame” is your reality: the window from which you perceive the world. If it’s strong, and the beliefs are positive, you will be suave - it’s that simple.
• The key to frame is not dominating others. It’s merely refusing to flinch.
• Frame is not a technique. It’s a strength you build by the way you live your life: conquering obstacles, pushing past your boundaries, learning to be self-validating in the face of rejection.
• Your frame comes from you. YOU set it. No one can set it for you. It is YOU who must assert yourself as a high value individual and believe in the same.
• There is no “passing” frame tests - there is only dismissing their value.