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Thursday, February 09, 2006
The power of a sincere compliment
Hey! Hey! It's exciting to see the Submit Form being used.
VictorM's comment:
The link supplied by Mark is for a book that you can purchase. Now, I don't know Mark at all and please Mark, don't take this personally, but for all I know this could be spam. On the other hand, it's possible that this is legit and a good recommendation. So Mark, my man, if you're reading this, I think it would be great if you could write a paragraph or two about how this book helped you. If you write that I'll know you're not just a spam bot, I'll post the link, and we'll all live happily ever after.
While we wait for Mark to reply let me say that when I became single, after being with the same woman for 20 years, I needed all the help I could get to start dating again. Reading self-help books was my way. I have quite a bit to share in this area, but let me start with this story.
From each and every self-help book that I read I always got something useful. In same cases, it was just confirmation of something I already knew, but in many cases there were little tidbits that made the difference. Most of the self-help books I read were in the personal growth area, but I bought one book called something like How to Pick-up Girls (I can't remember the exact title). Despite the cheese title, there were some useful tips in it. I'll talk about one such tip and how well it worked.
One of the tips in the book was about paying compliments and how you should do it on the first date. The book was clear that it needed to be an honest compliment and that if said the right way and at the right time it would have enormous impact.
At that time, I had agreed to meet one of my co-worker's friends as a blind date. She and I had talked on the phone once, but I had no idea what she looked like. We met at a bar close to her house. When she arrived, I was relieved that she was quite attractive. She told me she only had about 30 minutes because a friend of hers was coming to meet her at her house.
Of course, the first thing I thought of was that she must have been reading the same books I was, because she took the words out of my mouth. (Remember, always, always set your first date to be a short one in case you want to bail out. You can always "cancel your obligation" if things are going well, but you have a great excuse for a getaway if thing's aren't working out.)
Anyway, so we sat down and started talking. We got along really well, but I was determined to try the tip from the book. So, when I started talking about something, in the middle of my sentence I said: "My... you have stunning blue eyes... oh... sorry, where was I?..." and continued on with what I was saying. Well, this woman had a permanent smile on the rest of the night, and of course, there was no friend coming to meet her. In fact, she had arranged for her 2 kids to sleep somewhere else that night in case we got along. We did.
I think the reason my compliment worked so well was because of one reason: she really did have stunning blue eyes.
We got along really well for a little while, but one day, when I was taken in handcuffs by the police because of her (indirectly -- but this a story for another day), I thought that was enough. Time to move on.
Tags: self-help, singles, books, compliment
Mark, 39 from: London
Says: Hey, I totally relate to your blog...it's really a jungle out there mate, and I'm glad there's somewhere I can log on and feel better about myself!! You might want to share this with your readers, it's an ebook written by a girl in her 20s. Talks about dating as a business project - I tried a few of her tips, and I reckon others might find it useful [url omitted] thanks my man, Mark
VictorM's comment:
The link supplied by Mark is for a book that you can purchase. Now, I don't know Mark at all and please Mark, don't take this personally, but for all I know this could be spam. On the other hand, it's possible that this is legit and a good recommendation. So Mark, my man, if you're reading this, I think it would be great if you could write a paragraph or two about how this book helped you. If you write that I'll know you're not just a spam bot, I'll post the link, and we'll all live happily ever after.
While we wait for Mark to reply let me say that when I became single, after being with the same woman for 20 years, I needed all the help I could get to start dating again. Reading self-help books was my way. I have quite a bit to share in this area, but let me start with this story.
From each and every self-help book that I read I always got something useful. In same cases, it was just confirmation of something I already knew, but in many cases there were little tidbits that made the difference. Most of the self-help books I read were in the personal growth area, but I bought one book called something like How to Pick-up Girls (I can't remember the exact title). Despite the cheese title, there were some useful tips in it. I'll talk about one such tip and how well it worked.
One of the tips in the book was about paying compliments and how you should do it on the first date. The book was clear that it needed to be an honest compliment and that if said the right way and at the right time it would have enormous impact.
At that time, I had agreed to meet one of my co-worker's friends as a blind date. She and I had talked on the phone once, but I had no idea what she looked like. We met at a bar close to her house. When she arrived, I was relieved that she was quite attractive. She told me she only had about 30 minutes because a friend of hers was coming to meet her at her house.
Of course, the first thing I thought of was that she must have been reading the same books I was, because she took the words out of my mouth. (Remember, always, always set your first date to be a short one in case you want to bail out. You can always "cancel your obligation" if things are going well, but you have a great excuse for a getaway if thing's aren't working out.)
Anyway, so we sat down and started talking. We got along really well, but I was determined to try the tip from the book. So, when I started talking about something, in the middle of my sentence I said: "My... you have stunning blue eyes... oh... sorry, where was I?..." and continued on with what I was saying. Well, this woman had a permanent smile on the rest of the night, and of course, there was no friend coming to meet her. In fact, she had arranged for her 2 kids to sleep somewhere else that night in case we got along. We did.
I think the reason my compliment worked so well was because of one reason: she really did have stunning blue eyes.
We got along really well for a little while, but one day, when I was taken in handcuffs by the police because of her (indirectly -- but this a story for another day), I thought that was enough. Time to move on.
Tags: self-help, singles, books, compliment
