30/30: The Importance of Writing

When I was younger, I would write my own stories. At primary school, I would always be excited for the creative writing classes and my mind would spin with ideas on what to write. I became a teenager (through no fault of my own), and naturally, writing stories didn’t seem very cool anymore. The fire didn’t entirely die out though, it just hummed along in the background and emerged every now and then in an email or text message.

Then Game came along and I found I had a whole new subject matter to write about and an actual audience. It began with me writing up lay reports and sending them to a couple of friends. The first one ran for about 100 words of a WhatsApp message (hardly a report) and then they grew and grew. Each time I got laid I’d send some friends my reports (the audience had grown, whether they liked it or not). In each one I’d divide it up into sections: one part for the story; one part for the tools used (I’d even mark out any time one of them was used in the report so you could reference where they were used); and a last section for my learning points. It was all very nerdy.

Over time they grew in word count and would be around 2500 words. They also grew into true stories, rather than mechanical I did this then that reports.

What was the point of all this? Honestly, I saw the big shots had lay reports and thought I could do it to. I looked up to them and wanted to do something similar. Then it became a habit, and even though my audience was only a couple of people, I stuck at it. I’d finish work and have the whole evening booked out because “I needed to write my report”. I’d even bring my laptop with me to work and begin writing the reports during my lunch break.

Once writing about Game became a habit, I even started to write mini blog posts which I would send to the same group of people.

But why continue to write? Firstly, I admit, there is a narcissistic element. There are many Daygamers out there who are better than me, but I’m advertising my anecdotes rather than keeping them as war stories for the pub. In fact, that has been a revelation of this year. I didn’t know they were there, either because they were low key or Daygamed at different times or in different areas. I just thought that the best Daygamers were the ones who were PUA-famous.

Let’s look at the real benefits of writing. The ones you get even if you keep your writing private.

Firstly, the benefits of introspection are immense, especially in the beginner days where you haven’t reached the point of diminishing returns to technique improvement. I marked out whenever I used some form of Game in my reports and this accelerated that process. I would also look back and realise when I inadvertently used forms of Game. Doing so let me see what worked, and what didn’t. Over time, the focus shifts from Outer to Inner Game, because you can see that your technique is there or thereabouts, but your mindset is wrong. You’ll also focus on the emotional impact of Daygame a lot more, especially once the beginner’s euphoria has worn off.

Secondly, it’s massively helped in identifying my own style. I thought about what I was doing and how it was working on different types of girls. I thought about the similarities between the girls I was having success with and I began to realise my niche.

Thirdly, you get to “empty your teacup”. There’s a proverb, I think, that to let new tea in you have to get rid of the old tea. That is, for new information to get into your brain you have to get rid of the old information. Now, you can hardly just forget things on cue, but you can write them down. That gets them out of your active memory and into your mental filing. If you ever want to recall what it is that happened, all you have to do is fire up your laptop. It’s like zipping a folder. Sometimes I’ll even go back and read my old stuff (pre-blogging days) and remember things which I’d completely forgotten. I’d think to myself oh that’s good, I should do that more.

This process of writing (nearly) every day has been an intense teacup emptying exercise. I’ve had to dig deep and latch onto small seeds of ideas and then expand them into posts. I originally said that the posts would be around 250 words each, but in truth they have been much longer. Maybe the “250 word” promise was actually a clever trick my brain played on me: I promised a small investment action and then realised that once I was there, I wanted to do more. I ended up taking those seeds and focusing on them. Then I realised that they’re not seeds but trees with deep roots. Then I go down each root and try to say everything I can about it. In most posts, I ended up writing more than I intended to, but I always get the feeling that there is more to say.

But I’m just starting out, I don’t have lay reports to write! Fair enough, you can’t write lay reports. But you can write date reports. You can write field reports. You could get even more specific and write, for example, about the effect of a particular tease or spike. But what about analysis paralysis? It could be a weasel, but as long as you’re still doing enough sets each week to not feel guilty then there is nothing wrong with it. Maybe promise yourself you’ll write 250 words about each Daygame session once you get home.

That’s for writing privately, but what about making it public?

There are a few extra effects from writing publicly. For one, your quality considerations go up. You wonder whether anyone will actually be interested in your post. Honestly, it’s hit and miss, but it’s tough to say because what do you look at? Views? Comments? Both can be throwaway, so it’s better to focus on just writing something that you are happy with yourself and remembering that the writing process is primarily for you.

Then there are “Daygame fame” considerations too. People will get to know you intimately and you can become self-conscious. Given they have incomplete information, they’ll frame you in polarising terms as well. But it’s all motivation, because you think to yourself that you should quickly identify the negatives from your Game and eliminate them, and expound of the strengths.

But in both cases, your self-consciousness melts away into acceptance because you remind yourself that you are writing for you. Daygamers are always hungry for new stuff to read anyway, as long as it’s not utter tosh, so just be aware of that.

So there we have it: writing is a fantastic tool to develop your Inner and Outer Game.

Yours unfaithfully,

Thomas Crown