Very insightful look into inner game's role in male-female relationships, groundbreaking content on situating women in your overall life
The Bad
Some misleading advice for attracting women at first, challenging for beginner's to apply in relationships because it explains vs. advises on specific actions
The Bottom Line
For those of an experienced level this book should be on your immediate reading list. Whilst it may provide value to beginners, for much of the book's discourse they will lack the experience to place its teaching into the right context.
DETAILED REVIEW
This book is a classic. It is widely recommended by students and instructors of dating advice.
Depending on your experience level and age you will get different things from this book. For the less experienced and younger, there are valuable inner game mindsets. For the more experienced there is a lot of good material on developing more fulfilling relationships with women, and integrating that into your overall life.
One of the Best Explanations of Women's Testing (AKA Shit Testing)
"A man should never think his woman's testing is going to end and his life will get easier. Rather, he should appreciate that she does these things to feel his strength, integrity and openness."
Testing is an important when it comes to both attracting women and relationship skills. David Deida provides the clearest explanation from a relationship perspective that I have seen. He brings excellent insights on this, that will help men in relationships in particular to strengthen their relationships with an improved mindset.
Advice for Healthy Relationships Not Found in Other Products
"Praise always magnifies the quality of your woman that you praise."
"A superior man sees his woman's moods not as a curse, but as a challenge and an amusement..."
"Talking with her helps, but not as often as humor and physically expressed love..."
Just three nuggets of relationships advice from hundreds dotted throughout the book. David Deida provides extremely healthy, yet effective, mindsets for relationship building and maintenance. This contrasts from many other relationship skills which tend to be effective for the man to keep the woman, but less positive, in that the woman ends up damaged or negatively impacted by the relationship. Ultimately this is also not good for the guy, either.
David Deida sets a very positive long term foundation for women in your life, and for them to benefit positively from that relationship. The majority of other products also neglect to examine how relationships should relate to your life.
This is extremely valuable content for any guy who hasn't been able to smoothly manage his relationships with women with the rest of his life's goals and activities. When I was reading this myself, I found many of my most effective mindsets that I have learned the hard way. Many of the insights I have learned through tough experiences in relationships, he outlines in excellent clarity.
This is a book, that I wished I had read a lot earlier. It would have saved me a lot of drama and helped me to save some great relationships that I let falter in the past.
Above and Beyond Relationship Management to the Inner Game of Life
"An older woman will tolerate less of your bullshit than a younger woman. Although this may be one of your reasons for preferring younger women, you must choose your priority. If you find yourself attracted to younger women, be careful that you aren't trying to find an easy relationship with a woman who will let you slide."
David Deida provides provocative insights into your deeper inner game, and how it relates to relationships with women. This is most helpful for guys who want to be more satisfied with their love life - becoming happy with your love life and female relationships takes a lot more than 'just getting laid a lot'.
This is a typical issue that guys who have studied dating advice and are getting a lot of success come up against. If you have got success, through getting laid, or getting girlfriends and you still aren't happier, it is time for you to look harder at your inner game.
David Deida comes back to address the type of women that are relevant to you, why and how to go about selecting the ones to fit your lifestyle and needs throughout the book. In particular, he provides some excellent insights into why and how to go about adjusting the role of women in your life to make it more fulfilling. This is 'Groundbreaking' and a must read for those who are experienced.
Caveat - Some Misleading Advice for Attracting Women at First
In some sections where David Deida discusses the first steps of attracting a woman, his advice is not good - misleading and of an inferior mindset. In Part Four - What Women Really Want - Choose a Woman Who Chooses You, he recommends an inferior approach that will not help you to improve the quality of women you bring into your life. What he says with respect to practical steps towards starting a relationship with a woman should be taken with a large grain of salt.
For instance, he advises 'asking your friends or even her friends' about a girl's attraction to you, to provide a guide as to what to do. The majority of guys don't have a good understanding of women, and starting the subject with her friends would completely sabotage your chances.
Challenging to Implement
This is not a practical how-to manual, like some other products. There are no techniques discussed. David Deida explains how relationships between men and women work, and provides a lot of insight into what works and what doesn't. But the reader will have to take this knowledge, assimilate it and apply it through his own understanding. In other words, 'Way of the Superior Man' provides a vision and some guidelines, but the concrete actions will be left up to you.
In addition to this, having to work through some misleading information on attraction, means it will be a lot more challenging for a newbie or beginner to apply effectively.
It will take several readings, and going back over it, and reflecting on your relationships to really get the value from this book.
The Bottom Line
For guys in relationships or interested in long term relationships with women this is an excellent resource. I have no doubt that it will change the mindset, or seed very positive change, in even the men that are most experienced with women and relationships with them.
For newbies or beginners this is a good book on relationships, but it should not be the only product you take advice from - you will need to combine this with knowledge on the basics of attraction, like that of Venusian Arts' Revelation eBook to ensure you apply it appropriately.
Summary:
This book is about the mindset of men towards women. What is your true purpose in life? What do women really want? What makes a good lover? David Deida explores the important issues in men's lives - from career and family to women and intimacy to love and spirituality - to offer a practical guidebook for living a masculine life of integrity, authenticity, and freedom. The book includes advice on empowering skills and body practices.
"It is time to evolve beyond the macho jerk ideal, all spine and no heart," writes David Deida. "It is also time to evolve beyond the sensitive and caring wimp ideal, all heart and no spine."
The Way of the Superior Man presents a path to discover the "unity of heart and spine" through the full expression of consciousness and love in the present moment.
Table of Contents/ List of Topics Covered:
Introduction 1
Part 1 A Man's Way
1 Stop Hoping for a Completion of Anything in Life 14
2 Live With an Open Heart Even If It Hurts 17
3 Live As If Your Father Were Dead 19
4 Know Your Real Edge and Don't Fake It 20
5 Always Hold to Your Deepest Realization 23
6 Never Change Your Mind Just to Please a Woman 25
7 Your Purpose Must Come Before Your Relationship 27
8 Lean Just Beyond Your Edge 29
9 Do It for Love 31
10 Enjoy Your Friends' Criticism 35
11 If You Don't Know Your Purpose, Discover It, Now 37
12 Be Willing to Change Everything in Your Life 39
13 Don't Use Your Family As an Excuse 44
14 Don't Get Lost in Tasks and Duties 48
15 Stop Hoping for Your Woman to Get Easier 51
Part 2 Dealing with Women
16 Women Are Not Liars 58
17 Praise Her 61
18 Tolerating Her Leads to Resenting Her 63
19 Don't Analyze Your Woman 66
20 Don't Suggest That a Woman Fix Her Own Emotional Problem 69
21 Stay with Her Intensity-To a Point 74
22 Don't Force the Feminine to Make Decisions 77
Part 3 Working with Polarity and Energy
23 Your Attraction to the Feminine Is Inevitable 82
24 Choose a Woman Who Is Your Complementary Opposite 86
25 Know What Is Important in Your Woman 92
26 You Will Often Want More Than One Woman 96
27 Young Women Offer You a Special Energy 98
28 Each Woman Has a "Temperature" That Can Heal or Irritate You 101
Part 4 What Women Really Want
29 Choose a Woman Who Chooses You 108
30 What She Wants Is Not What She Says 110
31 Her Complaint Is Content-Free 114
32 She Doesn't Really Want to Be Number One 118
33 Your Excellent Track Record Is Meaningless to Her 121
34 She Wants to Relax in the Demonstration of Your Direction 123
Part 5 Your Dark Side
35 You Are Always Searching for Freedom 128
36 Own Your Darkest Desires 132
37 She Wants the "Killer" in You 136
38 She Needs Your Consciousness to Match Her Energy 139
Part 6 Feminine Attractiveness
39 The Feminine Is Abundant 144
40 Allow Older Women Their Magic 146
41 Turn Your Lust into Gifts 149
42 Never Allow Your Desire to Become Suppressed or Depolarized 152
43 Use Her Attractiveness As a Slingshot Through Appearance 157
Part 7 Body Practices
44 Ejaculation Should Be Converted or Consciously Chosen 162
45 Breathe Down the Front 168
46 Ejaculate Up the Spine 173
Part 8 Men's and Women's Yoga of Intimacy
47 Take into Account the Primary Asymmetry 182
48 You Are Responsible for the Growth in Intimacy 187
49 Insist on Practice and Growth 191
50 Restore Your Purpose in Solitude and with Other Men 194
51 Practice Dissolving 199
David Deida writes an amazing book and elegantly describes the correct behaviors for living a powerful life with woman. He describes the feminine attribute of testing a man to see if he is worthy to a high degree. This is one of the few books and he is one of the few teachers that really understands women to this degree. A must have and constant companion for all men.
The Bad
David often references spiritual concepts that may not make sense to the lay person, although this doesn't matter as it doesn't interfere with the understandings.
His views on masculine and feminine polarity and what creates sexual attraction and desire are worth the price of the book alone.
The Bad
Perhaps a bit too 'new age' for some people.
Would You Recommend It?
Yes
One of the best books I have ever read on relationships. I have been in the community for awhile but have never seen anyone explain the mind of a woman as succintly as David Deida does here. His reasons as to why women test men and the way to handle them are particularly insightful.
I believe there is something in this book for everyone. Buy it now.
Loved it; it had incredible insights that blew me away. Despite it's short chapters, it was incredibly dense with insight that took me 2yrs on and off to break down. It revolutionized my views on women and relationships before companies like AMP and others came along with similar advice.
The Bad
There seems to be a debate between advice in the community:
Some methods promote the man taking a complete leadership role (being THE MAN in the relationship) while others teach how to get her to do a ton of shit for you (flip the script).
This entire book seemed to promote doing EVERYTHING and letting her just be "feminine" (ie no accountability, responsibility etc - that's MAN territory) and let her only job be inspiring you, fucking you well and looking beautiful.
I'm on the fence about this personally but I do get irritated when I'm told to just let women get away with doing what would be lazy/shitbag behavior if it they were guys. Oddly enough, this is addressed in the book but all it says is "this will piss you off; sorry, you're a Man and women are irrational" albeit in new-age language.
There are a few good motivating quotes in the book.
The Bad
It was difficult for me to keep my concentration reading this book, I personally didn't find any new applicable information in it.
This book comes highly recommended, so when I started to read it, after the first few pages, I was immensely disappointed. I don't even remember if I managed to finish the book, which is something quite strange as I am a completion person. However, it might just be that my own character is not suitable for the book, as many people that I have communicated with, love it.
Overall rating:
4.0
Effectiveness:
4.0
Ease of Implementation:
4.0
Innovativeness:
4.0
Packaging/ Customer Service:
4.0
Value for Money:
4.0
Reviewed by Christophe Ze Moreno
December 31, 1969