Being a good conversationalist is a skill that will get you far in the world of pickup, and in any social environment whatsoever, yet conversations are the one thing that most people have trouble with. I know that carrying on a good conversation is sometimes a huge challenge to me, and I know of many people that share the same troubles. Let's first break down why we are good at conversations.

There may be several reasons for this on the surface, but they all come down to one thing: intrinsic thinking. Basically, intrinsic thinking is seeing yourself from third person in terms of your thought. In other words, if you are thinking intrinsically, you are perceiving how people perceive you, what you are saying, and what to say next. Intrinsic thought tends to slow you down in conversations, and your flow of thought will be choppy and deliberate. You might find yourself saying "Yeah" a lot, or simple monosyllabic responses to most things the girl says, saying something stupid because you thought so much about it, or not saying anything at all. All of this is simply over thinking your game and your conversation.

The opposite of intrinsic thought is extrinsic thought, and this is what you want to be aiming for. Extrinsic thought requires you to focus not on yourself, or intrinsically, but from yourself outward, or extrinsically; so you want to focus on what the other person is saying, and not be focusing on what you are saying or what to say next. You've probably noticed this yourself - on those days that your game just 'clicks' and you seem to be a natural, you may have noticed that you are not inside your own head, and all you are focusing on is the other person. The words come naturally, and the conversation carries a natural flow and rhythm to it.

How do you become an extrinsic thinker? This is easier said than done, because generally if you consciously tell yourself "Today I am going to think extrinsically and have good conversation", you tend to psyche yourself out, because you are consciously monitoring yourself and what you say to see if you are being more extrinsic, thus becoming more intrinsic in the process. This is more counter-productive than helpful.

So if you can't directly become more extrinsic thinking, you need to work on some superficial things that will lead to a deeper core change that encourages you to become more extrinsic thinking. Here are some exercises that will help you become a better conversationalist, and will help to eliminate the 'what to do next' complex:

1. Free-fall writing.

In my Writer's Craft class today, my teacher told us to take out a piece of paper and a pen. He wrote a sentence on the board, and told us the exercise was called "free-fall writing". What we were to do was to read the sentence he wrote on the board (an open-ended opening line that would start a story) and to start writing. You cannot stop writing for a certain amount of time, say 20 minutes, kind of like how a skydiver falls for a certain amount of time before pulling his parachute. The idea is to get whatever is on your mind down on paper with minimal censoring, overcoming the very common 'writer's block' that many writer's experience. Besides overcoming writer's block, though, this exercise will help you overcome your 'conversation' block. Here I will provide you with a few examples of opening lines to begin writing from:

"The gas station was dirty, but he pulled in anyway..." (This is the one we had in class today)

"He picked up the letter and opened it, afraid of what he would see..."

"She was always jealous of her sister..."

"I'm sorry, what is your name again?" (these can open dialogue as well)

"He polished off his car and got in, turning the ignition..."

"When he saw the girl, he froze up, became still, approach anxiety overcame him..."

Feel free to create your own, and write them as a response to this post and post them for others to see. This really frees your mind from itself and gets you thinking naturally and with a flow to it, which helps with conversations.

A next step for this exercise would be to speak the story. Basically, instead of writing, just start talking with the line, and continue it until you've run it dry. This will exercise your ability to take a topic or sentence that someone else speaks to you, and to elaborate and expand on it.

2. Free Association

This is a similar game that requires no writing, but a partner or other person to practice with. You could try it alone, but it really works a lot better with one or more other people to play it with.

One person starts by saying a word - any word at all, let's say "red" - then the next person responds by saying whatever word they think of when they hear "red" (it does not have to be related at all, there are no rules) - for the sake of this example, we'll take "blood". From there, the next person says what they immediately think of when they think of "blood", say "gun". Etcetera.

The idea of this game is to work on your improvisation and quick thinking. The game is supposed to be fast paced. As you practice this, you will begin to release your censoring of your thoughts and just learn to speak off of a simple initiator or trigger. So if someone says something to you, you respond without too much thinking, and your ability to carry on a conversation is drastically improved.

_________________
-Sharplin
My journal:
sharplins-journal-vt84603.html?highlight=

^Excellent.

It's a good issue to bring up, and there is a fine line between what you want other people to hear, and what you don't want others to hear. The censor I'm referring to isn't the censor that keeps you from saying completely stupid things, but the censor that prevents you from saying anything at all, which is only turned on when you are thinking intrinsically.

So this exercise basically works on your improvisation and ability to communicate your thoughts.

_________________
-Sharplin
My journal:
sharplins-journal-vt84603.html?highlight=

Yeah. Or you could just stop overthinking about what to say and just live in the moment.

As age age old phrase goes: it's not what you say, but what you convey.

If you really can't have a decent conversation with literally anyone, then it doesn't mean you're a social retard (it could mean that) but more likely that you're thinking too much.

Stop thinking.

Exactly! The thing about extrinsic thinking is it doesn't feel like you are thinking at all. And, in fact, you are in the moment completely and 100%. This is what I mean when I say that you need to focus only what what that girl is saying in that moment, and respond to it only when something comes out of your mouth. It will feel natural, and the conversation flows so much better.

_________________
-Sharplin
My journal:
sharplins-journal-vt84603.html?highlight=

Great post - I would also add one thing, I found what helped me and a few of my pals is talking to people you know already, whom you have comfort with or even people you would generally have to have a conversation with. For instance, the people who run your local store/corner shop, workers in a bank, teachers etc... try and force a conversation when necessary so you get that comfortable feeling knowing it really isn't that hard. Ideally you should aim for any females you may know even in your family, at the end of the day they're all girls and it should help with your general confidence. The key here is to push yourself and in a weird way you begin to really learn things about yourself.

Adding the above methods with this exposure should really help, and you should eventually be comfortable around not just one but multiple women.

GOOD LUCK!

The reason I often recommend taking writing classes is for people to learn and ACTUALLY PRACTICE lessons as described by Sharplin. Classes actually FORCE YOU to practice.

The number one response for self improvement suggestions on this board: NO!

Number two response for self improvement suggestions on this board: Oh yeah! Good idea! I know this already! I would suggest that you also do this, that, and this and that. (While demonstrating through every post that he doesn't actually practice any of it)

If you LIKE the idea, give it try and actually practice it. Sharplin didn't suggest that you "think about doing something like this". He fully described the actual METHOD to improve your communication abilities. Patting him on the back alone won't improve YOUR communication abilities at all. Thinking about it won't improve your communication abilities at all. The absence of thinking about this won't improve your communication abilities at all.

Action.

thanks Sharplin and Kasabi. Sharplin for the post, Kasabi for the boot up the ass.

I do Free Association almost most of the times when having a convo. Its a very good thing to control and practice, and if you become good at it you'll never run out of things to say. You will start creating all these multi-threads all together making the conversation fluent and fun.

You can also see comedians doing it A LOT while performing, when gathering information from the audience.

_________________
"Despite all the giggling, blushing and talk about having a deep connection, it all ends
with a cock in her mouth." ~60 Years Of Challenge

This is good, one question though:

When i'm writing a sentance I often seem to be thinking of the next one in advance. It could be my writing not being able to keep up with my mind, but does it mean that i'm thinking intrinsically whilst trying to be free flowing?

This is pretty common, and it isn't necessarily a bad thing. As SpeXXX touched on, a lot of the time when you are having a good conversation, and I mean a fluent, fun, lengthy, in-depth conversation, you might notice that you actually do have a lot to say. In this case, you might be thinking of the topic that you want to talk about next, and when you start to talk about topic A, you begin to think about topics B, C, and D, all of which have tons of sub-topics, which lead to more topics. The point of a conversation is to run the topic dry and lead into anything else that is related - this is the 'free association' portion of the conversation.

Think about that, but to give you a more specific answer to your question, this isn't so much of a problem with writing, but it can begin to be a problem in conversations, because the main problem is thinking of what to say.

Think of it this way: don't think of what exact words to say next, but think of what you want to say next, in general.

Example: Let's say you're talking about Airplanes, for whatever reason. Let's think of all the subtopics you could get into from the topic of airplanes:

1. Travel
2. Crashes
3. Careers (pilot, stewardess, etc.)
4. Airplane companies
5. Skydiving
... There's probably more, but you get the idea.

And all of these subtopics have their own subtopics...

1. Travel
- Countries
- Places you have / she has traveled
...
2. Skydiving
- Extreme sports
- Crazy lifestyles
...

This is where free association comes in handy.

One way you know you're having a good conversation is you have too much stuff to say. You'll want to say more about one thing, but the conversation flows to the next topic. Keep that in mind: flow is important.

_________________
-Sharplin
My journal:
sharplins-journal-vt84603.html?highlight=

I love the idea of living in them moment and thinking 100% in the present. It's the same mantra the sports psychologist for my wrestling team gives, telling us how we should empty our preconscious mind before a match (or, in this case an approach) to improve our performance.

Often our thoughts are clouded by worries about the present and regrets about the past so it is important to empty our preconscious, in order to keep our conscious mind focused on the task at hand. Such distractions destroy our potential performance and prevent us from accessing our optimal frame of mind.
Just as with wrestling or any sport, it would also be wise to empty your mind of distractions before a sarge and set your focus on the present task. Worries about how an approach might end up or how one went bad the last time will only hurt your performance and prevent you from accessing your ideal self and achieving your goals.

Next time you're out try to empty your preconscious mind and focus on the present; hopefully you can attain peak performance and find more success than usual.

_________________
Them mommas gonna hate and I love it, fuck 'em

i don't know how, but when i started i ended up with like a 3 page short story... Is the point to write ANYTHING that comes to mind, or just anything that comes to mind that can be transitioned too?

I think everybody does Free Association 'in their minds'. Most just don't say what they're thinking of, because they're already thinking of the responses they might get etc.
So the point really is to stop thinking (too much, that is. Don't stop thinking at all, shrimp).
Thinking about it... I tend to think WAY too much. But how do you block yourself from doing that and just say what comes up to your mind?
American people just seem more extravert then say, Dutch people when it comes to this. At least, that's what my experience says.

_________________
A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.

John C. Maxwell

1. Get yourself a pad and paper.
2. Put a spoon on the table.
3. Look at the spoon.
4. Write.


If any of you want to try this and discuss it here, let me now . . . I think it could be a lot of fun.