The Art of Seduction - Part 3

13-DISARM THROUGH STRATEGIC WEAKNESS
AND VULNERABILITY

Too much maneuvering on your part may raise suspicion. The best way
to cover your tracks is to make the other person feel superior and
stronger. If you seem to be weak, vulnerable, enthralled by the other
person, and unable to control yourself, you will make your actions look
more natural, less calculated. Physical weakness-tears, bashfulness,
paleness-will help create the effect. To further win trust, exchange
honesty for virtue: establish your "sincerity" by confessing some sin
on your part-it doesn't have to be real. Sincerity is more important
than goodness. Play the victim, then transform your target's sympathy
into love.


14-CONFUSE DESIRE & REALITY:
THE PERFECT ILLUSION

To compensate for the difficulties in their lives, people spend a
lot of their time daydreaming, imagining a future full of adventure,
success, and romance. If you can create the illusion that through you
they can live out their dreams, you will have them at your mercy. It is
important to start slowly, gaining their trust, and gradually
constructing the fantasy that matches their desires. Aim at secret
wishes that have been thwarted or repressed, stirring up uncontrollable
emotions, clouding their powers of reason. The perfect illusion is one
that does not depart too much from reality, but has a touch of the
unreal to it, like a waking dream. Lead the seduced to a point of
confusion in which they can no longer tell the difference between
illusion and reality.


15-ISOLATE THE VICTIM

An isolated person is weak. By slowly isolating your victims, you
make them more vulnerable to your influence. Their isolation may be
psychological: by filling their field of vision through the pleasurable
attention you pay them, you crowd out everything else in their mind.
They see and think only of you. The isolation may also be physical: you
take them away from their normal milieu, friends, family, home. Give
them the sense of being marginalized, in limbo-they are leaving one
world behind and entering another. Once isolated like this, they have
no outside support, and in their confusion they are easily lead astray.
Lure the seduced into your lair, where nothing is familiar.


16-PROVE YOURSELF

Most people want to be seduced. If they resist your efforts, it is
probably because you have not gone far enough to allay their
doubts-about your motives, the depth of your feelings, and so on. One
well-timed action that shows how far you are willing to go to win them
over will dispel their doubts. Do not worry about looking foolish or
making a mistake-any kind of deed that is self-sacrificing and for your
targets' sake will so overwhelm their emotions, they won't notice
anything else. Never appear discouraged by people's resistance, or
complain. Instead, meet the challenge by doing something extreme or
chivalrous. Conversely, spur others to prove themselves by making
yourself hard to reach, unattainable, worth fighting over.


17-EFFECT A REGRESSION

People who have experienced a certain kind of pleasure in the past
will try to repeat or relive it. The deepest-rooted and most
pleasurable memories are usually those from earliest childhood, and are
often unconsciously associated with a parental figure. Bring your
targets back to that point by placing yourself in the oedipal triangle
and positioning them as the needy child. Unaware of the cause of their
emotional response, they will fall in love with you. Alternatively, you
too can regress, letting them play the role of the protecting, nursing
parent. In either case you are offering the ultimate fantasy: the
chance to have an intimate relationship with mommy or daddy, son or
daughter.


18-STIR UP THE TRANSGRESSIVE
& TABOO

There are always social limits on what one can do. Some of these,
the most elemental taboos, go back centuries; others are more
superficial, simply defining polite and acceptable behavior. Making
your targets feel that you are leading them past either kind of limit
is immensely seductive. People yearn to explore their dark side. Not
everything in romantic love is supposed to be tender and soft; hint
that you have a cruel, even sadistic streak. You do not respect age
differences, marriage vows, family ties. Once the desire to transgress
draws your targets to you, it will be hard for them to stop. Take them
farther than they imagined-the shared feeling of guilt and complicity
will create a powerful bond.


19-USE SPIRITUAL LURES

Everyone has doubts and insecurities-about their body, their
self-worth, their sexuality. If your seduction appeals exclusively to
the physical, you will stir up these doubts and make your targets
self-conscious. Instead, lure them out of their insecurities by making
them focus on something sublime and spiritual: a religious experience,
a lofty work of art, the occult. Play up your divine qualities; affect
an air of discontent with worldly things; speak of the stars, destiny,
the hidden threads that unite you and the object of the seduction. Lost
in a spiritual mist, the target will feel light and uninhibited. Deepen
the effect of your seduction by making its sexual culmination seem like
the spiritual union of two souls.


20-MIX PLEASURE WITH PAIN

The greatest mistake in seduction is being too nice. At first,
perhaps, your kindness is charming, but it soon grows monotonous; you
are trying too hard to please, and seem insecure. Instead of
overwhelming your targets with niceness, try inflicting some pain. Lure
them in with focused attention, then change direction, appearing
suddenly uninterested. Make them guilty and insecure. Even instigate a
breakup, subjecting them to an emptiness and pain that will give you
room to maneuver-now a rapprochement, an apology, a return to your
earlier kindness, will turn them weak at the knees. The lower the lows
you create, the greater the highs. To heighten the erotic charge,
create the excitement of fear.


21-GIVE THEM SPACE TO FALL:
THE PURSUER IS PURSUED

If your targets become too used to you as the aggressor, they will
give less of their own energy, and the tension will slacken. You need
to wake them up, turn the tables. Once they are under your spell, take
a step back and they will start to come after you. Begin with a touch
of aloofness, an unexpected nonappearance, a hint that you are growing
bored. Stir the pot by seeming interested in someone else. Make none of
this explicit; let them only sense it and their imagination will do the
rest, creating the doubt you desire. Soon they will want to possess you
physically, and restraint will go out the window. The goal is to have
them fall into your arms of their own will. Create the illusion that
the seducer is being seduced.


22-USE PHYSICAL LURES

Targets with active minds are dangerous: if they see through your
manipulations, they may suddenly develop doubts. Put their minds gently
to rest, and waken their dormant senses, by combining a nondefensive
attitude with a charged sexual presence. While your cool, nonchalant
air is calming their minds and lowering their inhibitions, your
glances, voice, and bearing-oozing sex and desire-are getting under
their skin, agitating their senses and raising their temperature. Never
force the physical; instead infect your targets with heat, lure them
into lust. Lead them into the moment-an intensified present in which
morality, judgment, and concern for the future all melt away and the
body succumbs to pleasure.







23-MASTER THE ART OF THE
BOLD MOVE

A moment has arrived: your victim clearly desires you, but is not
ready to admit it openly, let alone act on it. This is the time to
throw aside chivalry, kindness, and coquetry and to overwhelm with a
bold move. Don't give the victim time to consider the consequences; and
create conflict, stir up tension, so that the bold move comes as a
great release. Showing hesitation or awkwardness means you are thinking
of yourself, as opposed to being overwhelmed by the victim's charms.
Never hold back or meet the target halfway, under the belief that you
are being correct and considerate; you must be seductive now, not
political. One person must go on the offensive, and it is you.


24-BEWARE THE AFTEREFFECTS

Danger follows in the aftermath of a successful seduction. After
emotions have reached a pitch, they often swing in the opposite
direction-toward lassitude, distrust, disappointment. Beware of the
long, drawn-out goodbye; insecure, the victim will cling and claw, and
both sides will suffer. If you are to part, make the sacrifice swift
and sudden. If necessary, deliberately break the spell you have
created. If you are to stay in a relationship, beware a flagging of
energy, a creeping familiarity that will spoil the fantasy. If the game
is to go on, a second seduction is required. Never let the other person
take you for granted-use absence, create pain and conflict, to keep the
seduced on tenterhooks.


APPENDIX A:

SEDUCTIVE ENVIRONMENTS/
SEDUCTIVE TIME

In seduction, your victims must slowly come to feel an inner change.
Under your influence, they lower their defenses, feeling free to act
differently, to be a different person. Certain places, environments,
and experiences will greatly aid you in your quest to change and
transform the seduced. Spaces with a theatrical, heightened
quality-opulence, glittering surfaces, a playful spirit-create a
buoyant, childlike feeling that make it hard for the victim to think
straight. The creation of an altered sense of time has a similar
effect-memorable, dizzying moments that stand out, a mood of festival
and play. You must make your victims feel that being with you gives
them a different experience from being in the real world.


APPENDIX B

SOFT SEDUCTION: HOW TO SELL
ANYTHING TO THE MASSES

The less you seem to be selling something-including yourself-the
better. By being too obvious in your pitch, you will raise suspicion;
you will also bore your audience, an unforgivable sin. Instead, make
your approach soft, seductive and insidious. Soft: be indirect. Create
news and events for the media to pick up, spreading your name in a way
that seems spontaneous, not hard or calculated. Seductive: keep it
entertaining. Your name and image are bathed in positive associations;
you are selling pleasure and promise. Insidious: aim at the
unconscious, using images that linger in the mind, placing your message
in the visuals. Frame what you are selling as part of a new trend, and
it will become one. It is almost impossible to resist the soft
seduction.