Primal Seduction Review

I recently finished reading Steve Jabba’s Primal Seduction (2nd edition) and am here today to give my review. Please note that I was able to get a free copy of the book by signing up to Steve’s newsletter though I think this offer is no longer available.

The book is set up in three sections with the first describing what Steve believes to be the cornerstone characteristics of an attractive masculine man: six essential and five supporting characteristics. Why 11? I don’t know, but each trait is described well and there’s a running interview between Nick Krauser and Steve to give further explanation for each one. In many cases there are actionable steps to improve this characteristic in yourself. However, I personally would have liked there to be a concrete list of actionable steps to specifically improve each trait provided at the end of each chapter. They could then act like a springboard to get you working on that specific trait.

Something to highlight is that the first section is already 200 pages into a 400 page book. It shows you that this is not your regular do-this-say-that textbook. The central focus is on Inner Game, identity and mindsets, and that’s why I think this book is best suited to solid intermediates and above.

I wrote about this in a previous post but in Primal Steve gives what he considers to be the three levels of Game: 1, the “what do I say?” level; 2, the frame imposition level; and 3, the identity based level, which you could neatly align with beginner, intermediate and advanced. The reason why I wouldn’t give this to a beginner is that I think you need to go through the beginner stage as a rite of passage and that you can’t skip a level. You need to go through the stage of applying a cookie cutter approach (which you found on the internet) before you can really drill into what’s important.

There’s also (quite rightly, in my opinion) many admonishments throughout the book that a guy will need to have some value for women to be interested in him. That’s something that a beginner/lower intermediate finds out during his 1,000 set apprenticeship and so he needs to work on himself first. One quote stood out to me in particular:

“Can you be a one eyed, zit-encrusted, short, peg-legged, one-armed, syphilis ridden, paranoid, shit-smelling, hunch-backed, pock-marked skinny pot-bellied Goblin of a man…. and pull Perfect Ten women with sufficient “game”?”

After the discussion of the attractive masculine characteristics we get to the section of what to do and what to say. There’s great discussion on IOIs and “forcing IOIs,” state and vibe, escalation and generally how to come across as a natural rather than a guy regurgitating lines he read on the internet, amongst many other topics.

Lastly there’s a 30 day action plan with step-by-step instructions on how to get into pick-up. This is another point where I think that the book isn’t suited for beginners. Not because a 30 day plan isn’t good for them, it is, but because I can see many beginners reading it and thinking “this isn’t enough for me, I need more instruction.” Now, the instructions given are enough, but I think that most beginners wouldn’t believe it.

Given all that, I highly recommend you go and buy this book. It will be part of my recommended reading from now on. However… On my first read through, I actually didn’t like it that much. I thought that Steve’s instructions were too blasé; things like “you just have to love women.” It reminded me of something from Bodi’s books where he complains that it’s easy for Steve to “just love women” since they only gave him positive reactions! But, as I got further into the book and started acting in accordance with its lessons in real time, I started to enjoy it more. I was able to attach my own meaning to certain points which previously I’d considered ill-defined.

Another example would be, simply: “what is authenticity and why is it important?” Steve talks a lot about authenticity but doesn’t define and explain it all in one place in my opinion. Instead you need to piece it together from different parts of the book to create your answer. I think I would have enjoyed it more on my first read-through if things were structured this way, especially with terms which we usually accept the importance of without fully defining.

The lessons contained in Primal did make themselves apparent to me, though, as I acted them out, but I would have got a better reading experience if things were more clearly defined from the start. But, on my second read-through, I started making notes… a lot of notes: nearly 5000 words, and added my own interpretation of the book into said notes where I saw appropriate. Every month or so I revisit those notes to remind me of the lessons I took from it.

Going back to my recommendation: yes, go and buy it (link here). I’ve found it very very helpful and I hope it does the same for you.

Yours unfaithfully,

Thomas Crown

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