Yuppies.
Having the latest and the greatest just for the sake of having the latest and the greatest.
Before I start writing about the Yuppie mentality, I’ll tell you the key to attracting women.
Ask a woman what the most important quality they look for in a man is, and the most frequent answer will be: confidence.
If confidence is the key to attraction, how does one come across as confident?
Well, after talking to many intelligent women who can better articulate their thoughts than most, I’ve found “confidence” is better explained as self-assurance.
It’s also something that you are, rather than something that you do. All that is required of you to come across as confident, is a healthy love for yourself. Being completely grounded and comfortable in who you are. This includes knowing all your values, beliefs, your standards and purpose for living, what kind of life you want to lead, etc. All these things should be worked out if you want to be grounded in yourself and have a high level of self-assurance.
In terms of image, women want to know that below the surface of your appearance, you have a solid self-assurance that is congruent with what you are projecting on the outside.
Let’s break down “self-assurance” into an even better concept:
Authenticity.
What women want is a man who is authentic to the core. Not a fraud who is merely projecting a false appearance to the world.
This led me to think about the way most people in society are more focused on their outer appearance rather than their inner appearance as seen in their own minds, creating a huge gap of inauthenticity between who they appear to be outwardly and who they truly are inside.
It’s like focusing on orchestrating a massively fabricated volcanic eruption with the help of pyrotechnics and giant smoke emitters, when underneath the surface the volcano is as dormant and peaceful as a sleeping baby. A woman will investigate the scene, and looking closer, she’ll eventually discover that it was all a phony simulation. The volcano is no longer cool or fascinating, it’s just stupid.
Just to be clear: I am not saying that you should abandon any attention to your outer self, but that your appearance should be communication of YOU, not a practice in conformity.
I’m reminded of the movie American Psycho, where the main character Patrick Bateman (played by Christian Bale), takes you through his rigorous morning routine in the beginning scene where he narrates:
There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman… some kind of abstraction… but there is no real me… only an entity… something illusory… and though I can hide my cold gaze… and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours… and maybe you can even sense that our lifestyles are probably comparable… I’m simply not there.
Everything that is seen on the outside of Patrick has no connection with who he truly is inside. He’s trapped trying to keep up with the rest of the world and wishing he could escape it at the same time. The movie is a great representation of the Yuppie lifestyle.
What Is a Yuppie?
Yuppie is an informal name for Young Urban Professionals (YUP) that arose in the 1980’s. It is used to describe young affluent business men and women who are employed in a well-paying profession and who live and work near a large city. But the term can now be used to describe anyone who will pretty much take any opportunity to flaunt financial abundance, whether money is truly there or not. They are basically people who find their self worth through brand names and high-status activities rather than just enjoying life as they truly want to. They are forced to enjoy these things because society says they are enjoyable, only to find that it’s not filling the gaping hole of security within then. They buy brand names not because they truly like the items they buy, but to keep up with their neighbors.
In American Psycho, Patrick Bateman is obsessed with comparing his possessions to that of others. Here is one of my favorites scenes in the movie where his co-workers are unconsciously one-uping each other through ego-based competition over something as small as a business card.
Becoming Authentic Inside Out
True self-assurance comes from how authentic you are to your image.
Is your outer appearance a bona fide representation of who you are inside? Or is there a huge gap of authenticity between your outer-image and your inner self-image?
The bigger the gap, the less core confidence you’ll have. The less core confidence you have, the less authentic you’ll be in social interactions, whether meeting women, in the business world, or amongst friends. People can easily sense when a guy is inauthentic, and this builds a lack of trust, resentment, and especially a loss in attraction with the opposite sex.
On the surface, you might seem like the man, but are you really?
Sooner or later your mask is going to slip.
It’s a lot easier to create a false image of who you are on the outside than to push yourself to actually become who you want to be - from the inside out. People will say “fake it till you make it,” but the concept is incomplete by itself, because there is no “making it.” Faking your outer image may buy you some time to back it up authentically in the future, but if you’re continuously fronting an illusory image, you’re always going to try to catch up to that outer image, causing the gap to grow.
It’s like a race between a hare and a tortoise, the hare being your outer reality and the tortoise being your inner reality. Expecting the tortoise to one day catch up is just foolish. It won’t happen unless the hare stops and takes one, long, nap.
If the outside simply took care of our inside and gave us authentic confidence, then we should all just go into debt buying ourselves the most luxurious clothing, cars, and consumer items that we can possible possess to get as much self-assurance as we can.
So how do we build a truly authentic image?
You need to first be honest with yourself, and to other people. We’ll always easily fall into projecting a false image to impress others, but from time to time, you must be honest with where you truly are. This is the only way you’ll ever grow.
I am NOT advocating giving up all your possessions and going back to wearing your free Pepsi t-shirt with your gym sweats. I only want to make the point that all these outer things do not define you. Your outside should be a showcase of who you are inside, not what others say it should be.
It’s not about displaying an image that will make you fit in, but cultivating your own sense of style that is the BEST representation of who you are inside. Don’t be afraid to stand out as an individual, it’s what is more attractive than conforming to the masses, and it also liberates others to start doing the same.
Escaping the Yuppie Mentality
The yuppie mentality is what holds us back from authenticity.
The yuppie mentality is comprised of constantly measuring oneself in the social hierarchy by getting a sense of worth through knowledge of popular culture and gossip, the newest up and coming bands, as well as all the important classics, and having the most expensive food and clothing that money can possibly buy.
Let’s face it. We live in a highly materialistic society, where many people become obsessed with fashion and high-end consumer products. All the marketing out there is basically conditioning our minds into believing that some product will bring us more self-worth or fulfillment. We then easily start to fall into the trap of identifying with what we own.
For example, sex sells, we all know this.
But instead of just reacting to it. We have to stop and think, am I getting it because of an advertisement, or do I really like this item?
This advertisement is genius in getting the masses to link pleasure to this product. There is only one thing stopping you from getting intimate with this woman, and it’s the bottle of cologne.
Even ask yourself if you’re following the news, popular culture, and listening to certain music because you’re truly interested in it or because you’re trying to keep up with your peers.
A lot of people think that having great style is about having all the best clothes and products out there. That’s not style. It’s called being fashionable.
Don’t misunderstand, I’m not frowning upon buying high quality clothing or being up to date with the latest trends, because you should build an eye for finding quality, as well as having the knowledge of what’s in trend. But if you’re just buying clothing simply for an expensive brand name, you’re really not being creative with an authentically unique style, you’re just wearing your money.
True style is not merely a popularly accepted facade, but a representation and reflection of the best self within.
Even by wearing whatever is the newest and hottest high-end trend , you are no different from the people who wear lower-end clothing just to blend in with the rest of their crowd. You’re still blending in, just on a higher scale.
If you want an example of the Yuppie mindset on a lower scale, look at all the high school kids who travel in packs wearing Abercrombie & Fitch. Rather than stopping and taking the time to think of ways to express their unique personality, they let themselves be spoon-fed by whatever is being mass-marketed towards anyone looking for direction. They don’t buy it because of special material or quality, but because of a brand name.
It says, “Hey, I saved up all my lunch money and bought a $50 shirt that normally would cost me $10 somewhere else, but it says A&F on it!” Again, you’re just wearing money. If an Abercrombie sweater didn’t have any of it’s brand name labels on it, it would be a pretty bland sweater. Why do you think the models in their advertisements are not even wearing the clothes? HA! Because they are just selling the BRAND name with hot bodies, not the quality or look of their clothing. Personally I buy clothing for the quality, fit, and whether I like it or not regardless of the brand. In fact, I rarely wear anything with a logo on it, I think it’s cheesy. But hey, there is nothing wrong with that, you just have to ask yourself whether you’d buy the clothes even without its logo.
The Yuppie will buy a Burberry trenchcoat because all his co-workers have one and he must get one to fit in. Any other coat and they’ll laugh at him behind his back. His co-workers are clones wearing the same Oliver People’s glasses, Cross Pen, Ralph Lauren Suit and Rolex watch. They only find individualism in having the latest model or color. There is no unique sense of personality in anything they are wearing, they are simply carrying whatever it is that makes the fit in with the rest of their peers.
Doing this will attract a certain breed of people. People only trying to one-up each other with the newest trend or better quality product. It becomes an ego battle and survival of the highest bidder, pushing everyone into higher debt and eternal enslavement to their jobs. Yuppie men will mostly attract materialistic women who love getting their sense of worth from wearing designer dresses carrying their expensive purses, but rarely will they attract the true beauty. Truly high-caliber women have so many options, that money and bling alone do nothing to grab their attention anymore. They want a man who is authentically confident, and not an insecure man who has his identity rooted in all external possessions.
Finding Authenticity Amongst a Yuppie Culture
Make sure your clothing represents who you really are inside. If you’re going to buy high-end trendy clothing, make sure it’s because you really like the items you’re buying, and you would buy for the quality, fit, and look even if it wasn’t a brand name. Whatever you’re buying or getting for yourself, make sure you don’t at all feel like you’re being forced to buy it to fit into some mold. This will keep you authentic, getting more trust from women as well as give you more core confidence.
Without a strong core sense of self, you’ll never bring a confident presence into a social interaction. When you’re out meeting women, they’ll see that your image is just a front. A transparent veneer under which your lack of authenticity is transparent.
It’s also important not to fake what you know or do. This happens to us when we’re comparing ourselves with other people around us. This can be effective in the short-term, but in the long-term, you’ll gain more respect and trust from other people - as well as love - for admitting where you truly are. If you don’t know anything about fashion, admit it. If you don’t know anything about cars, stop acting like you do around your friends. If you don’t have any women in your life, stop pretending to all your guy friends that you’re some massive pimp. They all know the truth, and ultimately they don’t trust you because you make things up. The only way you’ll truly grow and stay authentic is to admit where you are in any situation.
I’m not perfect, as I catch myself falling into this mindset as much as anyone else. But this is a reminder that we need to constantly stop and think for ourselves. To stop and ask why we’re buying certain image-enhancing products. Our style should be congruent to the unique identity that we each have within, wearing what we truly like rather than wearing what we think we should to fit in. Stand up and be an individual, be who you are, rather than conforming to the world around you.
Note: When you’re out shopping for clothing, this is not to say you shouldn’t explore new things and break out of your comfort zone. But if you’re honest with yourself, you’ll know when you’re getting a new piece of clothing because you actually love it, or because all your friends are wearing it.
Find your style.
Stay ahead of the masses,
Jae
If you’re looking for a fast track to building personally unique authentic style, check out our consultation page and sign up for a 1-on-1 consultation. You’ll receive expert training on how to convey your personality in a powerful way that is congruent, resulting in a highly potent first impression that will give you a massive advantage with women or in business. Every consultation is highly personalized to your own individual needs. If you have anymore questions, don’t hesitate to shoot an e-mail to Kinowear@gmail.com.
