The last few weeks I have spent travelling on the road. Firstly doing a series of talks for Pannar Seed International in Delmas and Klerksdorp and last week to Nelspruit in Mpumalanga. I felt really silly about that trip because I didn’t know they had an airport in Nelspruit and so I ended up driving over 330kms from Johannesburg. This kind of driving is really good time for contemplating your life and the direction it takes or the challenges you are facing.

Anyway one of the joy’s in my life is discovering amazing new podcasts from time to time. One of? these is called Living Dialogues hosted by Duncan Campbell. These podcasts are extremely provocative in the selection of guests and the manner in which the interviews or discussions take place. The guests are people who the mainstream science would consider to be on the fringe. Certainly many of them are unknown to me and I am listening to the familiar names slowly but surely. There are multiple dialogues because the interviews tend to be broken up into segments less then 30 minutes in duration.

Here’s some of my favourite dialogues:

• Joseph Chilton Pearce: author of numerous books like Crack in the Cosmic Egg and Magical Child. He’s work was referenced in a article Life Within The Machine, also published in Biophile article on the impact of television on development of children. Reading some of his interviews has confirmed my own research into the psychological impact of technology.
• Byron Katie: this interview is with her husband Stephen Mitchell, a very famous translator of ancient and Eastern text like the Tao Te Ching. Byron Katie is the creator of The Work, a revolutionary way of asking simply questions to accept things as they are and gain inner peace and acceptance. I first encountered her on the Conscious Media Network

If you found any of these dialogues fascinating I’d love to hear your comments…

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David DeAngelo, an American dating coach has a famous saying online, ?Attraction isn’t a choice.? Those words in fact became the title of the 2nd ebook he published after the hugely successful Double Your Dating. Both of these books were the starting point for what has turned into my life purpose, improving my own dating life, and in turn helping others improve their dating and relationships.

Let’s starts by giving attraction a definition: the force that brings people together. Repulsion is what pushes people away. Thinking about magnets you realise how opposites attract and similarities push apart. However, in human relationships you’ll notice that in the short term opposites may indeed spark attraction but its people who have more similarities who are the ones who stay together over the longer term. Someone once told me friendships last longer than most marriages. That is a certain ring of truth to that even without any supporting evidence in the 21st century.

What makes one person more attractive over another person? This is a mystery because philosophers and poets have written about it for thousands of years. And recently many scientists have contributed to the parade. Dr Paul Dobransky defines Attractiveness or Power as positive emotional energy and mature boundary function. In physics power or energy is the amount of work that can be done in a particular length of time. The more potent you are is a core metaphor for masculine power. It’s this potency men advertise to women that creates attraction without using any words or deeds. A woman notices a man, and says to her friend, “I don’t know what it about him…” referring to her initial experience of the masculine energy.

Self-esteem or self-worth is directly linked to attraction. The more self-worth, the higher your self-esteem, the more attractive you are to people. Again from Dr Paul, self-esteem is made up of confidence and well-being. Confidence is what you get from transforming your anxiety into courage. And as you look deeper into this you’ll realise removing uncertainty has the same effect. Well-being is more of a motherly energy. You have enough money, enough friends ? your needs is are met - enough peace, enough vacation. Mature adults need to learn to father themselves through courage and mother themselves through what’s called assertiveness. If you don’t have well-being you take anger you feel and you use it in the form of assertiveness. Assertiveness is defined as going out and getting what you need. Again the more assertive, the more attractive.

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Popularity: 35% [?]

This post is a continuation of ideas I started exploring from Osho’s Love, Freedom and Aloneness book…

There is an belief that it’s better to give then to receive, it’s better to sacrifice yourself for the good of others, your country, your family or your children. Osho says this is a lie, a blatant lie. The priests and the politicians have held against you from the beginning of time. Even the Oracle at Delphi saying, ?Know Thyself? got it wrong because how can you even begin to know yourself if you do not love yourself? Dr John Gray said in the movie, The Secret, you have to give more to yourself, so that you can begin to overflow, and then you share with others.

When you do not love yourself it’s nothing more than avoiding yourself. Everything you do, watching television, listening to the radio, socialising, working, lovemaking, is all escaping from yourself. So how do you begin to get in touch with that part of you that you have been denying or ignoring? One way is to bring to the conscious mind those good things that you know others see in you, and you see in yourself from time to time. Do the following exercise and share the results with me by posting a comment below.

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There was a young man called Ramon
who was tired of being alone.
Imagine his stress
when a man in a dress
blew him kisses and followed him home.

How many of you have encountered a man dressed up like a woman? Aha! Fortunately it’s only happened once in my life ? so far.

A few years ago I attended the first ever speed dating event held in South Africa in Melrose Arch. I read on a website that an SABC3 was going to record the evening’s events. So I jumped at the opportunity to be on tv ? I mean after all who does not want to be on tv? Normally I don’t do skydiving or bungee jumping but doing this was a very big thrill for me.

How speed dating works is as follows: you normally have 10 guys and 10 girls. The girls sit down on tables and the guys rotate after 5 minutes so they are guaranteed to meet all the woman ? as you know this does not always happen in a bar.

Anyway I moved around on a few dates and low and behold I faced the Baroness. The camera crew swooped in to capture the moment. As I sat down and she/he extended her hand, ?Well, well, well… aren’t you a handsome fellow…? Why thank you was my quick reply. ?Tell me…Ramon…where would we go on a first date..,? was her next question. This is where I had to think really, really fast. ?Oh maybe we’d go on a picnic, so we have lots of time to talk and get to know each other.? Those 5 minutes felt like an eternity with the Baroness.

My next speed dating event was a huge improvement. Popular Johannesburg radio station 94.7 Highveld Stereo ran a special competition for Valentine’s Day 2005, which turned out to be the biggest speed dating event ever. We had over 50 people and you could smell the excitement in the air. Because of the amount of people we were split into two groups, and Fastdate, hosted the function. This lead to use being split up into two groups. Now as I entered the building going upstairs where the event was taking place. I was followed by a gorgeous girl with a big smile. She had a certain energy about her, a girly, bubbly type, which so many women over 30 seem to loose. As we reached the 2nd floor, a table full of small champagne bottles waited for us. I grabbed mine without a straw as usual. This girl, Lauren, took hers and innocently placed the straw in hers. The gas in the champagne reacted and almost like a volcano this thing erupted….”Oops! I did it again”, Was the expression on her face and she giggled her shy hello. We hit it off later on and I left the venue with a kiss and a her cellphone number tucked safely in my back pocket. So in fact I broke the rules, because I didn’t bother completing the speed dating forms, evaluating all the other women.

If you’re keen on trying speed dating start by download my speed dating ebook, The ABC of Speed Dating.

Popularity: 32% [?]

Recently I was out at the Mall of Rosebank and I was doing some shopping. My approach skills have been slack because in 2007 I was in two long term relationships. So I’ve been going out more often to brush up on my pickup skills. One of my strategies has always been to go to clothing stores and find a sexy girl to help me decide what clothes to purchase.

Sometimes there just isn’t any attractive women or more specifically the women who are working in the retail stores are just plain average. But if you look around you’ll find the niche locations where the hotties be found. So I was in Truworths and headed over to the cosmetic section. You’ll notice in the cosmetic section there can be either female clients or female employees. I noticed a tall, sexy girl who was dangling over the checkout counter and called her over. Another less attractive woman had approached me to help me and I sent her packing and chose the HB.I flirted with her from the get go. And I also touched her, getting her to touch me back as I sampled the new Light Blue Dolce&Gabanna. Asking her the following line, I learned from Ross Jeffries, was the clincher, “Have you ever met a guy in a place like this you thought was just fascinating?” And she responded, yes. What this question does is allows her mind to go back into her memory and begin to think of what meeting a fascinating guy feels like. I then touched her wrist to anchor that feeling to myself. This was a little judo trick to create instant attraction with a woman you’ve just met.

Now just before I left I said to her, “I’m hosting an Anti-Valentine’s day party on 14 Feb and I’d love you to join me…” next I wrote down my name and cellphone number and left it with her. I didn’t even say goodbye and just left. About 15 mins later I was still walking around other parts of Rosebank, Johannesburg, and received a call on my cell. Answer in high spirits it turned out to be this woman, from Truworths, just letting me know this is her number and that I should have an awesome day.

So in summary what I did was I linked the feeling of fascination in her mind to me, and I then proceed to ask her out to join me at a party. We’ve spoken since and she’s keen to meet before the Anti-Valentine’s Day party. The key thing to remember about asking woman out is NOT to drag it out. Forget getting her phone number and calling later. Suggest meeting immediately (going for a drink) or later the same day and leave your cellphone number with her. You cut to the chase when she calls because its undeniable interest. We’re all very, very busy these days so there’s no time to waste and drag out the dating process.

Popularity: 35% [?]

A song that’s been mulling in my head since I first heard it is Bleeding Love by Leona Lewis. Maybe I’m late to the party but I don’t get very excited about new music these days…However this single and the singer is absolutely stunning. There’s something deeply provocative about it and that’s in fact the clincher. You can buy her album from Kalahari.net or Amazon.com

FJ Shark once wrote about why following the advice from love songs is a bad idea for men. And how the love songs that women sing usually describe a failed relationship (think sinking ship). He says the guys they want to keep around just doesn’t put enough into the relationship and now she’s “bleeding love” because she’s investing so much with little or no return. When you read the lyrics of Bleeding Love you become instantly aware of how she puts herself down and puts this dream guy on a pedestal. So the song in itself is a typical example of misguided belief on how someone else, outside of your control, is supposed to make your life better “in this world of loneliness.” STOP that!

On a side note Leona Lewis is multiracial. Her father is a Guyanese Afro-Caribbean youth worker, and her mother is a social worker of Anglo-Welsh descent. She is also of Italian and Irish descent on her mother’s side. What an interesting mix and this likens her to Mariah Carey, famously multiracial, in more ways than just their music. Now it could just be a coincidence but the video below starts out with a black guy being thrown out by his white/blond girlfriend. He moves onto another white/brunette women, who’s latino boyfriend eventually walks on them. Why the black guy with the two white women I wonder? Yep, it could just be a sign of the times or fabricated subliminal messages of what is acceptable sent to you by the Merchants of Cool.

Anyway enjoy the song for what it is here…

Popularity: 21% [?]