Manga 🇰🇷: October Update

[Manganiello]

Yeah it's these girls you're going to remember when you're old. Honestly I still think about my last ex often, especially at times when I don't have a solid harem going. There is something about a monogamous relationship I could never quite replicate in the MLTR model, but I'm trying.

Ya I get that. She really wasn't just another tinder girl who's life was a gong show. She was a girl that other girls would look up to. So she was pretty special in that regard.

I think everyone has to do the model that's best for them. I mean you've made it this far. You'll probably figure it out.

If you think about we are actually priveledged to know about game and be in a position to choose what kind of girls/relationships we want.

Appreciate the post. Nice thing was that my life was/has been going pretty great before the breakup so there's no dramatic reversal I have to do with my life. Pretty much just keep growing and climbing

I read every word, super inspiring post

A lot of us have been there before, it's truly one of the most gut churning things ever, its understandable what you feel. It will go away, but the wound is fresh.

On the brightside, like you mention

Now, you will find out what you are truly capable of, and reach your full potential.

Beauty Lies Within The Unknown. I can't wait to see you discover it, huge moves on your part are in the making.

Take your time to heal, you know you've got everyone's support.

Really appreciate the support and selflessness dude. Guys like you make the community better.
This is one of those feel the pain now so you can keep going. I'm sure this will be another launching pad for what I do next.

Proud of you man

Also i hope this whole experience helps you realise something i learnt

Too many people judge relationships as failures because they ended. But dying old together isnt the only win condition. You can have great relationships that end naturally and that doesnt mean they werent a success

Thanks dude.

Ya this wasn't a failure by any means. Almost a victory because Ive ended a relationship, in my mind, the best possible way. And am allowing both her and I to go and live the lives we actually want.

I went through a heartbreak earlier in the year with the first girl I genuinely had feelings for. I'm glad you had closure and ended your relationship with a bang. Mine ended on a whimper and by being "ghosted". She gave some bullshit reason after I called her out on it. She was on Tinder days later.

The advice already given is fantastic. One thing I would add is perhaps storing all your pictures/videos of the girl somewhere for safe keeping. If it was bad breakup I'd suggest just tossing everything in the trash. However because you're still on good terms then store them somewhere so you can revisit them when you're ready.

There are no shortcuts to healing. Feel the pain, limit contact, understand love/heartbreak is like a drug so do your best to abstain from looking at her IG, stories, etc. Also understand overcoming heartbreak isn't linear. There will be days where you feel like you've moved on and then next day you'll sorely miss her. It's a cycle, but over time you'll start to notice that you'll think less of her. The sharp pain will turn into an ache and the ache turns into neutrality. And you'll soon realize you haven't thought about her at all. That's the turning point.

Good luck, bro.

Thanks man. Like I said it's surprisingly tough. But it's 11:51am and this is the first morning where I haven't felt some sort of 'ah damn this sucks'.

But it does go in waves. And as weird as it sounds it feels almost a shame that it won't bother me as much later, because I really don't want to feel indifferent, this felt pretty special even tho it had to end.

We both want to remain friends, but we're avoiding contact so we can actually do that. I think if we do friends stuff too much, too soon we'd be fucking again, and it would just needlessly complicate the situation.

I made it pretty clear to her, whatever we do it should be black and white, as much as possible. And she was on the same page.

I think I'm doing everything right as far as I know with managing the breakup.

One of the first things we did was create a shared folder where we uploaded all of our photos videos we created on dates/during the relationship. So it's cool we were amicably able to do that and just have it as a time vault. Lots of cool memories in there.

Great post man !

You managed the breakup like a champ !

I totally understand what you feel, especially the emotional rollercoaster between feeling free and miserable. I've been through it twice...
Now, the question for me is if I'm going for a third ticket because I'm in a similar spot with my girlfriend : she's great overall but I can't remove from my head the desire to explore more...

Anyway, I'm sure you'll feel better very soon as your breakup was "clean", not with a dose of drama and guilt tripping messages. Besides, you're going to meet a ton of new girls in Korea. You'll find a new shoe for your foot in no time.

Ya that's the thing, I'm going to be surrounded by Koreans .

Still have to actually put in the work to get there tho.

Ya pretty smooth breakup. Honestly has a lot to do with her being emotionally
mature as well.

... You probably should breakup then tho. Like if you have an itch, that itch will only disappear to come back later. Mono relationships are very nice but if you're going for a deep run in your dating/sex life you should be keeping your relationships either open or short. That's my opinion anyway & also what contributed to why I just broke up. Cuz you're basically on a doom train to frustrate yourself and break her heart later when she gets more invested.

Inspiring post. You're ambitious for sure. I'm impressed you have so much veterans players and coaches and mentors around you.

The only thing I'd add is that, yes, for a relationship to work at some point you should tell each other that you expect to be boyfriend and girlfriend.
The whole "don't tell her about your feelings" thing works to seduce a girl not to keep her as your girlfriend.
It's a normal thing to do in a relationship to tell your gf you love her

Ya basically agree now. Theres a transition from trying to sleep with a girl to being in date # 30+, and what works to attracts them might be counterproductive later on.

...

But about the mentors thing, I think colgate has done a good job of this as well.

You basically work your ass off and ask questions. Every noob asks questions, but if your work ethic is exceptional and your hunger is exceptional, big experienced players will take notice and want to help you.

I think I've had that as my advantage, I just wanted to do really really well and I worked for it. And guys started paying attention after awhile. So having those guys like that around is a huge asset. It does not guarantee success but it saves some time and frustration for sure.

I still think I can do better with this tho. I feel like because of the girlfriend I've been slacking on other areas I could be and actually should be better at.


...

Thanks for the love guys. It's nice to know there's brothers in your corner.

Wish this level of backing on everyone else who is going through or will be going through this later.

 

[colgate / bulldog]

But about the mentors thing, I think @colgate has done a good job of this as well.

You basically work your ass off and ask questions. Every noob asks questions, but if your work ethic is exceptional and your hunger is exceptional, big experienced players will take notice and want to help you.

I think I've had that as my advantage, I just wanted to do really really well and I worked for it. And guys started paying attention after awhile. So having those guys like that around is a huge asset. It does not guarantee success but it saves some time and frustration for sure.

100000%. anyone who's new and wants to accelerate their progress needs to hustle as hard as possible, shamelessly spam every veteran with questions, and then do exactly what they say (that's where many people fall out). eventually you'll find mentors that are congruent with your goals and you'll catapult into greatness.

 

[Toast]

slowly turning vegan

lol Vegan

 

[Bman]

Looks like you are taking it well and have got some good advice from others here.

I recently went through a divorce and ended a 8 year relationship. It was a successful relationship. The divorce was amicable, we are still really good friends, really respect each other, and wish the best for each other. We just wanted different things in life.

With that, I just wanted to add a few pieces of advice that have helped me:

Sit with the emotions: Some days you're sad as fuck. You just lost a part of your life. It's ok to process the grief. Some days you're excited by the newfound freedom. That's ok too. Ideally, the relationship made you a better person and now you get to try out all that growth with other people. Some days you're indifferent. That doesn't mean you don't care. It just means life continues to go on, and everything passes with time. No matter the emotion, process it. Don't bottle it up.

Channel your emotions into a new goal: Emotions are energy. That energy can be used to help you with your goals. I was fortunate enough to find Andy's guide right before my ex was moving out. I also have a startup I'm building. Both of those things allowed me to focus all my energy into something productive. You don't wallow and ruminate as much. As long as you are following the advice to still process your emotions, than this can really help you leap start a new goal.

Sleep with another girl: It's cliche, but you do realize there are other fish in the sea. But if you deconstruct your past relationship, you can take note of all the things you really liked about that woman and make sure to screen for that in future women.

Box up the old pictures: I think its great you two were able to make a shared folder to share pictures. My relationship was 8 years long. I'm still occasionally processing the sad emotions. Looking at the old pictures of us smiling still hits really hard. So for now, they are boxed up and put away with other old photos. I plan on keeping them because it was a great chapter of my life. But now I'm in a new one and it's easier to take that mental leap without having them out.

Be grateful and share it with her: The relationship was great. We both grew as people and a large part of that growth was due to the other person. Tell them thank you for the years spent, the time, the dedication, and how much they helped you grow. My ex and I both did this, telling each other we had no regrets and would not have traded those years. It really helps with closure.

Get support from other guys: You knew this, but for others reading, it really helps just to have support from other guys. They know what it's like. They also know how to get you back on your feet and moving in a positive direction. Don't try to tough it out alone.

 

[Manganiello]

Looks like you are taking it well and have got some good advice from others here.

I recently went through a divorce and ended a 8 year relationship. It was a successful relationship. The divorce was amicable, we are still really good friends, really respect each other, and wish the best for each other. We just wanted different things in life.

With that, I just wanted to add a few pieces of advice that have helped me:

Sit with the emotions: Some days you're sad as fuck. You just lost a part of your life. It's ok to process the grief. Some days you're excited by the newfound freedom. That's ok too. Ideally, the relationship made you a better person and now you get to try out all that growth with other people. Some days you're indifferent. That doesn't mean you don't care. It just means life continues to go on, and everything passes with time. No matter the emotion, process it. Don't bottle it up.

Channel your emotions into a new goal: Emotions are energy. That energy can be used to help you with your goals. I was fortunate enough to find Andy's guide right before my ex was moving out. I also have a startup I'm building. Both of those things allowed me to focus all my energy into something productive. You don't wallow and ruminate as much. As long as you are following the advice to still process your emotions, than this can really help you leap start a new goal.

Sleep with another girl: It's cliche, but you do realize there are other fish in the sea. But if you deconstruct your past relationship, you can take note of all the things you really liked about that woman and make sure to screen for that in future women.

Box up the old pictures: I think its great you two were able to make a shared folder to share pictures. My relationship was 8 years long. I'm still occasionally processing the sad emotions. Looking at the old pictures of us smiling still hits really hard. So for now, they are boxed up and put away with other old photos. I plan on keeping them because it was a great chapter of my life. But now I'm in a new one and it's easier to take that mental leap without having them out.

Be grateful and share it with her: The relationship was great. We both grew as people and a large part of that growth was due to the other person. Tell them thank you for the years spent, the time, the dedication, and how much they helped you grow. My ex and I both did this, telling each other we had no regrets and would not have traded those years. It really helps with closure.

Get support from other guys: You knew this, but for others reading, it really helps just to have support from other guys. They know what it's like. They also know how to get you back on your feet and moving in a positive direction. Don't try to tough it out alone.

So much wisdom in this post man. This should almost make it a breakup master thread.

I'm gonna make a reminder to do this on my phone. Thanks for the wisdom again.

I can hear your empathy coming out through that sharing. Makes me glad we got people like you on this forum.

 

[Manganiello]

update on the breakup.


Another journal entry type update. For my own log and it's journey.

Went to a 3 day 45hour seminar this weekend.

And realized I didn't feel complete with the relationship.


Specifically I lied to her.


I told her there were parts of the relationship where I was committed when in fact I never was.



So I phoned up my ex, chatted really light hearted for a second.

Then said
"Remember how you asked me if I wanted something long-term earlier and I told you I did? Well that was never true. I had made plans to move away and didn't tell you the whole time."




So bang, felt like I just shot her honestly. She was silent for a long time. Maybe a minute, maybe two minutes.



And then all she could whimper out as she started crying was 'that really hurts'.



I had to stick in that conversation and actually hear her out and get how my actions effected her and see how she felt in her world, without trying to justify, defend or even blame myself.



That was tough, but I gave her the opportunity to actually be close and that I would have her back as we moved on and even went her seperate ways.





Y'know. I just realized we're all busy looking out for ourselves no one's really looking out for each other. So it was important she got that.



And it was equally important to myself I was saying that because I was choosing to, and not because I felt like I had to make myself look or feel like a "good guy."


Ya I acted as if I was an asshole. Doesn't mean I was tho.


And that was a very important thing for me to understand. I think for pretty much a lot of my life I've been meaning to look like a good guy. And as much as I wanted to look good, it was more important to empathize and empower her with the breakup. Not to sugar coat or alter what happened.




So very uncomfortable.


Anyways she phoned me later on and said she came down with Shingles and said she was upset and thought what I did was selfish, but still enjoyed our time together. All of it. I agreed.


And I went to her place last night, stayed over, talked til 2am basically, the next day i went to the doctor with her. Banged later that day.


What does this mean for the relationship? I'm seeing it actually doesn't mean anything.

It just matters that she feels empowered and supported. Today it meant being with her.

And whatever happens as we go on we will deal with it as it comes.


++++


So long story short, coming around to being honest to girls. Even in a very difficult situation like this.

But it's important I brought it up because if I can tell her that and still feel like I'm not a bad person, that means I can basically be told by whoever I'm a bad person and have it not mean that I am.

If that makes any sense.

 

[goldfish]

I told her there were parts of the relationship where I was committed when in fact I never was.

Huge respect for you doing this. If you had asked me if you should open up to her about this or not, I would've told you not to do it. But in hindsight, I think you made the right decision and I'm sure that she appreciates you more for being honest with her and having that uncomfortable conversation.

 

[Manganiello]

Last 5 months briefly


Sup lads

Haven’t posted in a bit. But I’ll fill out a bit more of a detailed post on a bit.


I secured a job, a place to live and have roughly 2 weeks before I have a visa to go live in Korea.


Entire process took 5 months and had its own challenges, ups and downs. But it’s nearly done.


So I thought I’d use this limbo period to write out my backstory since guys like colgate and Mimbe393939 were asking for it. And I thought it would be a nice way to wrap up the year and begin a new one.


I’m not here to proclaim anything really. But just to show where I came from and explain how I ended up being a virgin til 30, and then having pretty decent rookie year.


I’ll talk about 2022 and 2023 later.


This post is about the lead up to 2021, and how I got into pickup for the 2nd time. At the very least it’s here as a marker for my own journey.





Backstory 1/2




Highschool


I was neither cool nor a loser. Straddling social groups never really belonging to any, but not an outsider either.


My friends were the smart kids who would have sporadic parties. That was one group, and then my other friends were giant nerds, and mostly people at the bottom of the social totem pole. (One got into pickup but never really performed well, and the other unfortunately had a mental breakdown and is now trans).


I graduated highschool with the 2nd highest mark in the graduating class. Mostly carried by my near perfect music grades.


I entered music 8 years late, but practiced my ass off 2 hours every and despite not being able to read music, became one of the top players in 6 months. I ended up winning every award I possibly could. Despite having 1/5th of everyone else’s experience level.


A lot of people thought I would go on to be a musician in some European symphony, or I’d be a millionaire entreprenuer. People just always thought no matter where I go in life, I’ll do well.


And as good as that sounds, that is not a good fucking thing hear early in life. It fucks with your head.


I was blessed in some ways and cursed in others. Most of my 20s could be thought of as paying the price of those curses and learning how to work with them.


Like a lot of people, I had this giant vision of how successful I was supposed to be, without any actual skills to execute on it. Things came easily to me, but not everything.


And it was that ^^^ that was largely the downfall of my 20s.


Who I was, really, was just some kid who liked to play a lot of videogames, not take risks, and then when I had to, get super competitive to be considered ‘good’ at something.


I was basically a sometimes hardworking, sometimes Lazy guy, who was pretty comfortable, and definitely entitled.


With women,
I had one giant crush in highschool to a girl who had absolutely zero interest in me. Never went on a date. Never had girls who were friends.



University



Loner


University was a shock. I went from coasting on my ‘smartness’ getting 90s to dropping to 50s and 60s. My friends moved away or were in different programs. Save one cousin none of my large extended family ever went to post secondary.


I was out my depth with no real guidance.
My grades and my social life were total garbage. It wasn’t like one was good at the expense of the other, no. Both sucked. I was an underperforming loner.


At the periodic meetups, my highschool friends would invite their cool new friends from their programs, and I would have nobody to invite.


I didn’t make a single friend in the first year of university. Not one.


So girls were just some magical by product I’d get after maybe making a friend or two.
Of course that never happened, and I started to accept that I needed to figure out how to be social on my own, and eventually meet girls (or however that was supposed to work).



Pickup part 1



2nd Year of University, a close friend of mine called me up one day, raving about this forum he found on the internet about women.


So I checked it out.



~~ Enter the redpill ~~



After reading one paragraph of content, I got fucking hooked on redpill. I spent an entire week devouring every single article and piece of content I could find.


I saw how the womenverse worked, the mystery was solved. The path was laid out, all I had to do was be an alpha confident chad and finally it would be raining hot girls.


I just needed to get confident, not be some beta chump, and I would have parades of hot women and watch all my friends get jealous as they saw me hang out with these super hot girls they felt afraid to talk to in class.



Fuck ya. I was pumped.



I got my ass into the gym. Not knowing a thing about working out. Figured out macros, protein, creatine, time under tension, all that shit.


I was gonna get jacked, get confident, and get girls.


Me and my friend worked out 3x a week, spent weekends figuring out girls, and every day we were trying to improve ourselves.


Despite all this self-improvement, we made zero attempt to talk to girls tho.



We thought, once you’re a goodlooking, confident motherfucker, girls will open you and give you their number after a smooth sexy convo.



That’s what we thought would happen. It’s cringe, but we actually thought that’s how it worked.



Being Dumb


It started to hit me after 8 months, when we would be talking about redpill shit in a restaurant… and then a hot girl would walk by…. And I would want to talk to her, but I couldn’t. “If we know so much, why can’t we just talk to her? WTF?” I thought.



And this was also where I started to realize my close friend was a lazy bum, who just wanted to feel like he’s progressing, but didn’t want results. But that harsh (albeit true) accusation is hard to level against your closest friend, so I didn’t really bring it up. I just wanted to carve my own path.



Hiring a coach


So I got a coach. I paid him $250/month. Which was a lot of money for me at the time. We met weekly, and he was a smart motherfucker.


First month we worked on confidence, just how to be a confident guy. And I started to see changes. I went to some house parties thrown on by old highschool friends, and interestingly the girls I liked in highschool, who blatantly ignored me, now were intersted in me. I remember one cute girl finding excuses to touch me.



Woah, this shit works.



I was still fat actually. But I was intoxicated. I was stronger, more muscular, still fat, but I was easily the most confident guy in the room at that point. Life was awesome. I went from getting ignored by women to actually getting attention.



That feeling coasted for a bit, but after a few months, it hit me again, although I was starting to get some interest, I was still not getting numbers.



How the fuck do you talk to girls then?



GLL - first exposure



So in 2013 I discovered GLL, and started reading through Chris’s AA program.
“Fuck, this must work.” I just knew chris was the real deal, and I could trust him. So I took his AA program, skimmed it, the whole exposure therapy thing made sense, so I started doing my own program. Asking for directions at malls, and on campus, slowly challenging myself.


I couldn’t hold a conversation with these girls once I opened them tho. So I thought “hmm, I need more confidence so I can hold these convos”… so I went back into working on confidence for another year.



It's almost comical to recall this, I was so dumb, I needed to talk to girls, not get confident, but I was just trying to figure it out thtime…And to my defense, my coach had no Interest in getting me laid and my close friend just wanted to talk about theory.


Basically , I was in an environment that didn’t want results.




Confident Motherfucker that's a pussy


So what happened with all this confidence building was… I got a fucking crazy good frame, it was noticeable. I don’t think I’ve been able to duplicate it since. Hard to explain it, but I was peace with myself and the world and all of it’s challenges. Friends would say I had this different aura, and most importantly, girls started getting closer friends with me.


This is so fucked up, but girls were striking up conversations in class with me. Just like I imagined they would. Anytime I was in class, or in a group, girls would ignore me, but after some time, and my confidence became known, it was normal for some girl, atleast one, to want to sit close to me. So the confidence thing was working.


I think that year I counted up I had like 47 girls or something show explicit interest in me some sort of way… But… I didn’t know what to do with it. I was busy soaked in validation to even care actually. I wasn’t trying to get laid. I was just trying to convince myself I wasn’t a loser.


47 girls take interest in me (not saying they were hot or special), but that was better than anything else in my life before.


And to some extent I had accomplished what I wanted, my friends were seeing me hanging out with the cute girls in class, and girls were talking to me. But I was never really friends with them. I was still a giant pussy. But I had enough balls to atleast talk to them.



A lot of focus, but no results?


So after a full year of working with this coach, I started to think again… hmm, I’m confident ok. My life is probably cool, and I have chicks into me… but how come I have no numbers? And why is it when I talk to girls nothing happens??


I started getting pissed.


AGAIN.


I told my coach, unless he was going to encourage me to take actions that actually got girls, I didn’t want to talk to him. He didn’t like the email I sent to him detailing my issues, but to his credit he forced me to approach. It was a fucked up situation, but I didn’t move an inch unless he gave me permission to do it.


Anyway, that month I ended up actually approaching chicks in malls. Talking to maybe like 100+ girls that month. Going absolutely nowhere btw. Cuz I was still opening with “Do you know where the closest gas station is?”, but I would atleast segway into a convo.



I couldn’t get passed the fear of asking for the number. So that was the next step. I was getting closer… my progress was glacial, but I was getting closer.



I had 1 year left of University.



And despite an intrinsically rewarding focus on chicks, I had zero results.
My friends had internships and I still had zero idea what I wanted to do work wise.
And I felt like I had 12 months left to figure that out or else calamity would hit.
And as frustrating as the girls thing was, the career was more urgent.


So I shelved talking to girls til I had my career sorted out.
 



Massive Career Detour



Longstory short. I spent awhile soul searching for ‘my calling’. And I decided I wanted to be a career coach. I thought I had some duty to do it actually. Because I felt like the advice on finding a good career path for people in University was more or less useless (I still do).


So…



Coaching


I decided to start my own practice, with zero experience and zero credibility, I just decided I was gonna do this shit. I had no business deciding to do that, but fuck it, I was confident af.


I got clients within like 3 months, I wasn’t making any money. I was offering free services to build up my skills. But it was a gratifying early win, my friends weren’t doing shit, and I was doing this hard thing. So it felt good to feel like my life was going somewhere.



This unorthodox decision to be a coach, and actually getting (free) clients caught the eyes of people who were somewhat connected to me in the local business community. I got some pretty elite mentors actually. Like a former VP for IBM. So things were looking promising when I was about to graduate.



My plan was get the best possible job I can, then throw myself into building up this company.


But the timing sucked.



Life gives you lemons...


The economy basically went off a cliff. 3 months before graduation, the city dramatically collapsed into the start of a 5 year economic freefall. Unemployment went up to 11%. And what was a buffet of top-tier jobs soon became a post-apocalyptic survival-fest. There were no jobs. Like actually nothing. We were (based on previous histrorical stats) expecting 90% of the class to be employed in their field within 6 months, 12 months later 90% were not. It was pretty shitty.



So like everyone else, I swallowed my pride and took the first job that would take me. It was some shit warehouse job. Nobody gave a fuck about my degree. You just had to do your job fast enough.



Basically in the span of 3 months, the promising sunny avenue to success was now stuck in dead-winter trench warfare.



People lamented their life, and now was not the time to take risks. Everyone believed I should just get a good job, and shelve this business idea I had.



I was in an environment hostile to my dream.


I hated fucking Calgary.


Everything about it. The recession made the entire city a pessimistic shit hole. People were just trying to get by, and I let their pessimism get to me. I couldn’t stand it, so I left. Went to Vancouver. I thought if I’m going to build a company I gotta change my surroundings, I atleast want to enjoy my life if I’m going to do something hard.



Problem was I was moving to one of the most expensive cities in the world with no income and barely any savings. So I spent all my money buying a truck with a camper on it, I took out a line of credit to act as my cash reserves and made the leap.




 



Homeless in Vancouver

Lemonade


I moved to Vancouver, lived in my camper van, basically homeless. And restarted my life to have an honest go of building a company.


I still had no clue what I was doing. But the new environment brought a lot of positive changes. Where I was timid, I felt bold. I wanted to learn sales, because I knew my future success in my work totally depended on my ability to sell. So I found an expired job ad for a door-to-door sales position, found the owners number and phoned him.


He was surprised but I think he admired the initiative I had. So he agreed to meet up with me. It was fucking cool. Instant connection.


He was about 2 years older than me, used to do pickup, and was on his own track to start his own company. So right off the bat I felt like this guy at the very least could be a good friend.


I devoured as much sales content and training as possible over the next week and started. And within a matter of days became the top salesman. He quickly gave me a raise, and gave me a setup where I could work 16 hours a week, cover my homeless bare-ass expenses, and build my company up.


Still had no fucking clue what I was doing tho, so long story short, the company went nowhere that year, but I got really fucking good at selling shit. Really good.


For a while I got no special favours and only made money when I sold something. I only ate what I killed. I loved sales for that reason.


Next year, my life was humming, I sold my truck, bought a new car, and was rooming with my boss/now friend, in an ocean front condo in Vancouver.


Life was fucking rocking . My life did a total 180.




Career Coaching grows wings



With my now sharpened marketing and sales skills, I knew the way to grow my business was through Massive volume in Google Adspend, I just had to turn a profit, and then optimize the campaigns. And more or less I did that.


I sold my first client for $400 from a lead generated by google. That was huge. Got a proof of concept that this model could actually work.


Then another for $2000


Then a few more.


As nice as that was, my adspend was still profusely expensive. The revenue was matching what I was making in my sales job, but the expenses were shredding me. I was working for free basically.


The selling season started slowing down, and I needed more money. So I left Vancouver, headed back to Calgary to save money on rent, and found another door-to-door job. I was trying to tweak my advertising campaign for awhile, but nothing was working.


In September 2018, I decided would be the last month I had a real job. I have no fucking clue where that boldness came from, but I just decided on it. And followed through. I was making maybe $600/week from sales. But I was spending $500 on advertising. $500 is a lot of money to spend when you’re only making $600.


But it worked.


My schedule got slammed with sales calls, and consultations. And that $2000 in advertising converted into about $8000 in sales. And best of all, it was done using an automated marketing system that could duplicate it’s own results.



Boom. I made it.



… Finally fucking made it.



Very quietly tho. I didn’t realize how well I was doing until one tired evening I added up the numbers in a starbucks and found out I had effectively earned a living income. I was proud, but there was nobody around to celebrate, it was just my quiet struggle I had overcome.



I took a week off to celebrate, went camping. Came back. And tried out a few optimizations that was going to cut my ad expense in half.


It didn't, In fact it ended up destroying the system I worked so hard to perfect.




Circling the drain


And that week off in celebration quickly turned into an 18 month nightmare, where I hemorrhaged money off pretty much to the point of bankruptcy with the false pretense I had a viable company.
 


No one gives a fuck about your sacrifices



I ended up selling nothing the next month, and then next to nothing the following month. What followed was a 6 month dryspell where I couldn’t sell a fucking thing. I made zero sales from December to May, despite spending money on ads.

My money situation was circling the drain.
I refused to go back to work because, well, I still had declared my life as a worker was over. I had worked my last real job already.
But after living off of a line of credit for awhile, and consistently failing to sell. My confidence was shot.


It failed, I failed. I’m out of money. So I swallowed my pride and went back to work.


…Now the normal thing to think would be to just recover and rebuild the biz back up… But this was different, the prospect of working that hard again didn’t interest me, because well, I was probably just going to hit another financial wall. I just didn’t see it working.



That sucked. Because I had to accept that even tho I worked as hard as I did, the literal hundreds of nights where I had no social life, I just worked, all the things I gave up, moved to Vancouver, was homeless, spent a courageous amount of money, personal development, sleepless nights, mornings with resolve… it didn’t work.


And all the fucking naysayers were, actually, probably, right. All the people who thought this would not work turned out were right.



…
So I know people are reading this thinking it was just a hiccup, but to me at that point in time. My life was over.
…



I was borderline depressed, but my money situation caused so much anxiety I couldn’t afford to sulk.



So in 2019, I saw the dream I had worked on from 2014 (the last 5 years) implode.
I was working a job I didn’t like, with a debt repayment plan that didn’t just put the nail in the coffin for my sorry fate, but bolted it in. And there was no rally call, no inspiration, I was just out.



Just like I was after graduation working another fucking job I didn’t like, with some broken promises. But unlike last time, I didn’t have a dream inspiring me. I just felt defeated.



But at somepoint, after I dug myself out of the hole, and reclaimed some form of stability I started remembering all these broken promises in my life. I mean how can you not? I was on fire, doing some cool shit, and now I just looked at the sorry state of my life. Working a shit job I didn’t like, making no money… being fat, jerking off each night, eating too much food, and being shit with women. Like who the fuck cares.


...continued

 

[Manganiello]

Backstory 2/2



You worked hard, so the fuck what?



You’re eating like shit, jerking off, working some shit job.


Go fuck yourself.



I was supposed to be great with women, I worked with a dating coach… I was still a fat virgin.



I was supposed to have a great career, I had great mentors, I had a good degree, I made the leap to start a company… I was working a hard as shit job, my coworkers were druggies and I was making no money.



Life was telling me to fuck myself.



I mean it’s a few lines of text here, but man that shit was my life. And this wasn’t the movies. There was no promise that this would turn around. It looked like it wasn’t going to. Life hits you hard. The cavalry doesn’t come. No one cares. It’s just you, living a shitty life. And that’s your fate.


That’s how it felt. For months. It felt like a good life was just not gonna happen. I was gonna be 40 as some fatass guy with some fatass wife, bitter, lifeless, working a job I don’t like. Just like everyone else.


Because you know what?


That’s actually the most common outcome. There usually isn’t a good turn around.


That’s just written in books to make you feel better about yourself, but that’s not real life.


Usually people get hit with shit, and it buries them.


And I totally felt that as a probable outcome for my life.


So…


I was a year away from turning 30.


And life was hitting me hard.


What the fuck are you doing?!


Like seriosuly, what the fuck are you doing right now?


Why is your life so shitty?


If your so good, why does everything in your life suck massive balls?



I didn’t have an answer.



Here I am a part-time career coach that my clients look up to, working a shitty ass job. About to turn 30 with really nothing but hardship and uncompleted goals to show for it. And I had no girlfriend… never been on a date. If someone asked me what a girl’s pussy feels like, I’d have to lie and guess. I had basically lied to all my friends that I had girlfriend before, because I didn’t want to admit I didn’t.


Like who the fuck am I?



A hit that big gets your attention.



And I realized I had some deep, deep flaws. Being naturally good at shit, like music, school. Meant absolutely fucking nothing. In fact it was this blind optimism, and trusting my own ‘smartness’ that lead to my downfall. Impatience, quitting on my big goals to chase newer sexier goals, all these small faults became painfully,
Painfullyyyyyy obvious.



I started looking for advice again. Just trying to make sense of the way forward with my life.




When you’re in a big setback like this, you’re basically being fed two views of life.


2 potential pathways:

1) You can accept some eastern philosophy and learn to accept less in your life, or
2) You fucking go back into the jungle to get killed again… or figure it out.




And to be honest, I wasn’t sure which piece of advice was right.


I was just trying to build trust that my life had some hope to be good again. It was a thread of hope man. Like I felt like the door had all but closed, except for a tiny sliver of light, that was slowly getting dimmer.




Intervention



In February 2020, I was taking a course with my friend on communication. We were eating lunch with the groups we broke off into.


And he basically said. “When are you going to start dating?”


I shrugged it off. I didn’t want to deal with it. It was still a painful sore wound.


But he pressed into me, in fact he stopped everyone at the table from talking, and told them: “everyone, we need to talk to Brandon about his dating life.”


So literally 4 people were there talking to me, telling me why I needed to go back and try to date again. I hated it, didn’t want to hear it. But honestly, at this point, being wrong so many times with my own decisions, I knew I had to listen to other people. So I listened. And they were probably right.


So we ended the conversation with me agreeing to get 10 girls numbers that week. Or atleast try.



I failed miserably. But it planted the seed. I realized I needed to do the AA program, for real this time. And I started reading through Chris’s content again.



Good fucking god. This GLL man was right.


Life happens in phases. You need to look good and tlak to girls. One goal at a time.

Man fuck, so simple. But I was doing everything wrong. I was ending all my phases prematurely. Starting my career when I wasn’t done my dating phase. It made so much sense. Even going back into dating withot having a profitable business was a mistake.


I knew I needed to stick in one lane, one goal, and not stop til I finished it. There was no failure, only quitters. I started writing quotes about focus, everywhere I could. My phone, my notepad, I needed to be hyper aware to the dangers of not focusing.


F – follow
O – one
C – course
U – until
S – successful


Damn. SO fucking true. See I was focusing, I could focus, but I missed that “until successful” part. I was doing a lot of cool shit, and then stopping and doing something else.



Golden Handcuffs


It was around this time (keep in mind, my career was shit, I was working a job I hated and making no money), my old friend from Vancouver offered me a job to run sales for his company. Lucrative as fuck. He offered 3-4x what I was making. To someone who hates his job, and his finances are shit, that was a pretty damn good phone call.


But I had to say no.


That was a really fucking hard thing to say no to. But I had devote a portion of my life to this goal. I had to say NO to shit, I had to Follow One Course Until Successful.


So, I turned him down, and started the AA program.




Pickup Part 2



I felt so unsure about this decision, tbh. This wasn’t a moment where the clouds parted and I felt sure about my life.


It wasn't like that at all. I was second guessing my decision literally, like literally, every day. It was mental agony, but on blind faith, I started Day 1 of the program. Breezed through it up until where you need “high fives”.



Then Covid hit.


Literally right when I needed to to do the High Five day.


Worst. Possible. Fucking. Timing… Again.



This felt like graduating into a deep recession again.


Man what the fuck?


I tried doing the program for a few days, but I was on “High fives”


This was early covid. Toilet paper rolls were gone, people were freaking the fuck out. Schools shut down, and it looked like the world was gonna go off a cliff, and I had to get high fives while everyone was fucking paranoid that they were doing to die from human contact.


Not the best time for the AA program.

So. .. that was hard. I tried for a bit, but realized I couldn’t do it.


And it asked a hard question. Do I go and work for my friend who phoned me earlier?


I’m still in this dating phase. But what do I do?



Weight Loss Transformation


The only thing I could think of was to lose weight. I was already making progress going from 227 lbs. down to 200. But I needed to go deeper. So the next 9 months gave me a lot of time to very inconsistently (but successfully), lose weight. And ponder life.


(someone will see that I started the program again in June, but I realized I needed to do weight loss first, and then the program).




Turning 30


I came to my 30th birthday, and it was interesting because I still had really nothing to show for my 20s, besides a degree I wasn’t using. But the last year had real legitimate progress. I had dropped about 50 lbs, and was applying the lessons I had learnt (Sticking to one phase of life at a time).


I turned 30, and had a profound experience, I think people fear that number, and I did too, but I saw it as a rebirth. It was the end of a chapter, but also the start of a new one, and unlike going from 27-28, or some number like that… when you go from 20-30, you see 10 years ahead of you and nothing but blank paper to write whatever the fuck you want on your life story.


30 was a reinvention. I took 2 weeks off for my 30th birthday. Went to Vancouver and spent the next 2 weeks with nothing but time to sort out goals and ambitions, and journal about who I wanted to be in the next 10 years.



What became clear was, I wanted to be known for my work-ethic. I wanted to earn praise for what I had done, instead of being told I was some high-potential individual. I wanted my 30s to be the retribution of my 20s. And it was for this reason I go by “Manganeillo”, taking the last name of Joe Manganeillo who had similar realizations, and made a similar turnaround in his 30s.




*AA Program – Lockdown Edition*


So I’m turning 30, I needed to get the the AA program done. I needed 2021 to be a year that made such a big mark on my life that it banished the incompletions and failures over the last 10 years. Not because I was trying to recover from the past, but it was more about mere necessity. I wasn’t going to have a good 30s if I sucked ass on my first year. I needed the first year to set the tone.


So 2021 rolled around and I was fucking ready. Do the AA program, move out, approach girls, move to a new country after, have fun, get dating out of my system, then… and only then, focus on my career.


Lockdowns were still on when I started the AA program, but at that point, I wasn’t fucking waiting for anything, if there was any feasible way to interact with a human, I was going out there and beating the program. I honestly don’t think anything at that point could’ve stopped me from doing the AA program. I was willing to die for it. Plus, vaccines were coming through, so hopefully by the time I was done the AA program I could go on to approach.


KYIL


And that’s where my log really starts.

Finished AA program (1st to do so during Covid I think)
Secure a pay raise and Move downtown
Approach a bunch
Lose my virginity in Toronto from Day Game
Go Online
Work on retention, etc.
Get a gf
And breakup for Korea.


There’s some very rich and profound lessons from this year. But I’ll detail that later…


So there’s a few overarching things I want to say here.



Big Lessons


- Do hard goals because it’s here you learn all the good lessons. Anybody can master the easy comfortable life, but I became a specialist being able to pull off what wasn’t supposed to be doable. Losing 70 lbs is not normal. Cold approaching girls is not normal. Fucking 12 girls in 3 months after 30 years of being a virgin is not normal. I had no business setting these goals. But I set them anyway. And figured it out. Doing super hard shit, teaches you how to do other super hard shit.


- Other thing is that you are your environment, I actually credit a lot of my underperformance to my old friends. Sure, there’s self-accountability and all that good stuff. But my old friends were not successful and still aren’t. My peer group now is not even remotely the same to what it was 5 years ago. My life took off when I started getting better friends. And think about this. How cool is it that I had a friend sit me down with 4 other people and say, “ you need to take care of your dating life.” That moment changed my life, and it wasn’t even me who initiated it.



- Every lesson stacks. My second date ever was from cold approach and it ended in a lay. That was pretty much because despite the date experience being new, knowing how to sell and close a deal in a ‘high-pressure’ situation wasn’t. I knew exactly what mindset would work in that situation. Even going online and having good results on tinder came from spending all the money I did on advertisements. As soon as I saw the “boost” feature. I immediately knew this was the secret to having massive volume. I knew if I had enough leads, my dating problems would be totally irrelevant from the sheer volume of girls coming my way. And it worked out. From September to November 2021, I went from needing advice from my friends to most of my friends needing advice from me. Having 10-20 dates a week lined up definitely teaches you a lot of shit. After it wears you out haha. Most of my dates flaked tho, so I’m not sure if the volume argument is the best for some people. But it worked for me.





…

Will post more day to day stuff in a bit.
But just wanted to get the backstory out of the way first.

 

[Manganiello]

Just a simple post.


I'll do a recap of the year later.
There's a quick summary of 2022 for anyone curious now.


Jan 2


Actions

- 1455 calories
- Planned/scheduled week
- Found and purchased a few teaching courses
- consumed 3 hours of content on teaching


Notes

- 1455 is meh. Could do better. I was at 850 til I ate some extra pasta at 7pm that I didn't need to. Forgive, learn, and move on.
- Still no update on the visa. Might be flying out in 2-3 weeks.









...


Quick talk on 2022 & 2023



- 2022 was the year of having a great gf but feeling conflicted. Treasure trove of lessons here. Life was perfect(ish) but I felt like I was settling prematurely. Got back together btw, and it's going great, but we both know it's ending in a matter of days.

- Visa for korea. Spent 5+ months working on it. Takes forever. Got a job, an apartment in Seoul. Just waiting for the final step of processing.

- For 2023, I have only one goal. Despite the chaos of moving to an Asian country my focus is on completing One Thing: Making an mental shift towards subconsciously feeling entitled to really good looking women... There's subgoals, but that's a topic for another day.

 

[Crisis_Overcomer]

And it was for this reason I go by “Manganeillo”, taking the last name of Joe Manganeillo

Who is this Manganeillo character?

Great story, didn't know half of it. I had a big "aha" when you highlighted how much you were boosting with OLD in one of your logs.

Excited to see you crush your goals and, hopefully, eat some meat

 

[MILFandCookies]

Respect man. We've had different journeys but a lot of it resonated with me, especially feeling entitled in my 20s because everyone told me "you'll go far!" and that I was really smart.

You've learned some good lessons. You've got this man.

 

[AskTheDom]

I'm without words

A lot of your story has similarities to mine in terms of when life gives you a shit pie straight to the face.

I throw my hat to you Sir

 

[Manganiello]

Jan 3


Actions

- Ate 1655
- 3 hours of study on teaching
- weekly accountability call


Notes

- another day wildly off calorie target. From the same identical mistake too. Had a perfect day cruising at 800 calories all day and then in one meal I take that up to 1500+ or whatever. Need to anticipate situations where people will invite me to eat and where I'll be tempted. I need to create mentally prepared responses the day of or the night before.
- Still waiting on the visa.

Excited to see you crush your goals and continue to not eat meat and be a wonderful man.

Thanks!!

feeling entitled in my 20s because everyone told me "you'll go far!" and that I was really smart.

You've learned some good lessons. You've got this man

Thank dude. Nobody has a perfect upbringing, I just wish I learnt all this shit sooner lol

without words

A lot of your story has similarities to mine in terms of when life gives you a shit pie straight to the face.

I throw my hat to you Sir

Appreciate it man.

 

[Manly Cockfellow]

What a story, thank you for sharing!

- For 2023, I have only one goal. Despite the chaos of moving to an Asian country my focus is on completing One Thing: Making an mental shift towards subconsciously feeling entitled to really good looking women

Psycho-cybernetics is a book with a ridiculous name but an extremely important lesson:

How to change your subconscious self-image to that of a man who knows he can get what he wants.

https://youtu.be/k3abAWWoHeM
(The Chapter on Imagination [Chapter 3] is the one I mention below -
there is also a 45 min abridged audiobook, but I couldn't find a link, sorry)


Although the book has many recommendations, the most important is lesson is in taking advantage of your subconscious mind's inability to tell the difference between a memory of you succeeding and you vividly imagining yourself having already succeeded.

The key is to conjure up as much detail as possible while imagining the scene where you have already succeeded and repeat it as often as it takes to feel a shift in your self-image.

So for your goal of feeling entitled to really good looking women you would want to imagine yourself lying in bed with an absolutely stunning woman -probably one you have actually seen or maybe even met, just so it's easier to fill in the details- and play out the scene that would happen immediately after you two have had incredibly sex.

I'm not a good enough creative writer to effectively describe a vivid scene like the one I'm suggesting you imagine, but try to notice how she smells (flavored lube? pussy? your semen?), what's her (and your) breathing like, what does your mouth taste like (her pussy? her lip gloss? your sweat?), how are your bodies are positioned, what time of day is it and what is the lighting in the room and outside the window like, what color and pattern are the sheets and floors and walls, where is the furniture and what does it look like (again you can use a room you are familiar with that you might actually bring her back to to make it easier on your imagination), what does she say to you (and more importantly how does she look and sound while she says it), how does she touch you, and what do you say and how do you touch her, how are you feeling as you look at her and touch her and remember the amazing sex you just had... I think you get the idea


And just so you know I'm not pulling this out of my ass and recommending something I haven't tried, pretty much everytime I've had amazing sex with a beautiful new women I have fantasized about it first in exactly this way.

Many of these times were before I knew about this book and could even describe what I was doing.

And everytime it made me insanely confident and relaxed, because as far as my subconscious was concerned I had already had amazing sex with her!


Good luck!

 

[IntellectualMuscle]

Mang, are you in Toronto right now? I understand you're looking to go to Korea but are you currently here for a bit? I have been looking for some action taking wings for a while now but never had any luck so far.

 

[Manganiello]

Mang, are you in Toronto right now? I understand you're looking to go to Korea but are you currently here for a bit? I have been looking for some action taking wings for a while now but never had any luck so far.

No. I was actually gonna move there in mid 2022, but decided on Korea instead.
september is there. mac0 as well, tho not sure if he's still active or not.


...

Manly Cockfellow I'll respond in a bit.

 

[Manganiello]

Thanks for the share Manly Cockfellow. Pretty familiar with the book and the concepts. More or less done them before. It works, but it takes practice.


Ultimately the end goal is to feel entitlement without a pump-up. I actually feel entitled now to women overall, but not quite with the really attractive girls so that is what I'm gonna be focusing on.

 

[Manganiello]

Jan 4

- 1283 calories
- 30 minutes of teacher studying
- back still hurts like a mofo. Been affecting sleep.
- And got the ***VISA***








Finally. Fuck.


This has been a goal sitting on my mind for about 24 months.

The visa process itself started the week I broke up and itself took over 5 months from start to finish, full of dodged landmines and conflicting government instructions.

I'll be landing in Seoul and staying there for a year.



Just need to receive the passport back in the mail and I'll be jetting to Korea possibly by Sunday or Monday.




---

 

[colgate / bulldog]

And got the ***VISA***

holy fuck another mfer going to asia

Just need to receive the passport back in the mail and I'll be jetting to Korea possibly by Sunday or Monday.

wave at the window when you fly over japan