What do screenwriting and seduction have in common?

They say that:

One, in every scene, a leading character must drive the action forward.

And that two, in every scene different actors want different things. All good drama is the creative way that conflict gets resolved.

This is simplistic, I know. The best movies have those strange meandering sequences where nothing much happens. It’s in the pause, the blank space, where we taste soul, romance, the sublime.

But if there’s no action, no conflict, it’s just a moodpiece. Something to project on the backwall of a party—something that never gets watched.

Seduction also needs its stakes: two people who, at least on some level, have conflicting desires. I want to sleep with you, but part of you is not yet sure. That’s a pitch-perfect hot-plate on which any seduction can then simmer! The only question is how creatively, how deliciously, you can help solve this central tension!

If there’s never an obstacle there’s never seduction: it’s a boundaryless, storyless, orgy. A one-time thing that most men, if we’re honest, do not value and don’t care much to remember.

We are currently midway through the Mastery group. This community of men is bound by their bruising will to go deep, and churn through the lifetime of patterns reflected to them by the screen.

If I’m to sum it all up—the five films we’ve studied; the thirty hours of conversation so far—it is this:

The one unifying theme that will change everything about your relationship fate is understanding, in as many moments as possible, who drives the action forward in the couple.

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Have you ever really placed attention on this?

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Now you might say Jordan, you’re basically saying leadership. We’ve all known for years about ‘leadership’.

The problem with talking about leadership with women is that the term is far too vague. You nod your head, of course, but often can’t name the precise actions or qualities that comprise this worldly ‘leadership’.

Considering who drives the action forward in every single interaction is a clearer frame through which to explore influence, and power, in our affairs.

I’m inviting you to think very carefully. Think very very carefully about a woman you like right now—particularly if she feels out of reach. Think very very carefully about a current relationship—particularly if it’s losing its edge.

Scan your memory-banks and find where you’ve lost a woman, or caught yourself in the torture of dissatisfaction. When you think of these moments, who tended to be the first to drive the action forward? You? Or her? Or was it you, but only because she nagged?

In truth, our brothers enjoy a mixed level of leadership. They drive things forward, but go to sleep—they get passive—when stakes are high. Me too. I mean, in every year of my life there’s always some hidden thing that’s beyond the scope of my vision, that awaits me as a crack in the road.

And if I’m not aware of something, there’s no action, no leadership, I can offer around it.

If you’ve a moment to reflect today, you might take pause, and ask:

Are You a Driver or a Passenger in matters of Intimacy and Seduction?

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It might help, at this point, to give examples.

Have any of the following happened to you?

-> You ‘drive seduction forward’ by approaching her, by inviting her on a trip or a date with you. But in the sexual moment, alone, later, in the hotel room, you freeze up and wait for her green lights and consent. You’ve taken her this far but, nervous and flustered, you’re not sure you’re ‘allowed’ to do what you want to do, and you don’t know how to ask.

-> You get the strange sense that, after a couple of weeks’ knowing her, you’re starting to fall in love. You think of ways to get close to her, to speak your best truth, to sweep her off her feet, to look strong. But each time you get close it’s like she knows what you’re about to do… she pulls some deflective jedi trick, your ‘great move’ fails, and you fall even more in love. Truth is, she did like you at the beginning. But because the lag-time between you liking her, and you realising you like her is so long, you lost any sense of spontaneity or power. You’ve now fallen too hard to speak with any sort of strength.

-> You find yourself feeling irritated, resentful, scared… in fact, your emotions are all over the map… because a woman has entered the scene, and she’s pressing you to make decisions and sacrifices that don’t feel aligned with who you are. You’d like to set a boundary but you don’t know what to. Maybe you explode in anger. Either way, you wonder how did it get like this? Bombarded with a campaign of manipulative propaganda, you realise—all too late—that you’re stuck beneath her thumb.

-> She is the one that puts mischievous, taboo, dark erotic things on the table. That’s not really a problem but, as you soon discover, you wrestle with feeling jealous, threatened, naïve, insecure. Turns out that you feel like the less-initiated partner in your relationship, and it restricts your confidence to step forward, to guide her, to suggest. And every time a confident guy comes onto the scene and you see her become a little feminine, you feel helpless, insignificant… anxious amidst thoughts that it won’t be long until she leaves.

-> But maybe you hold the power in the relationship. Maybe you bring the status, the money, the worldly wiles. Maybe all she brings are youth and brightness and looks. Everything is set to your advantage. What on earth could go wrong? So why does she act out in these senseless little moods and irritations? Why does your state, your inner harmony, seem to deteriorate over time? How is it that her innocent, girly ways seem to coalesce into a sort of poison? What of her needs or motivations did you miss—what sides of her did you not account for in your ‘leadership’?

Blind at the wheel, action drives itself forward. We all drive off-road a little. I simply hope you don’t crash.

-> Some men are ok with women, but they are insecure in their relationship to other men. Or insecure about their position in the world. What do you do when a more powerful man—an employer, a boss—comes into your life, and pulls you out of centre? How do you take problems with finances, with neighbours, with taxes, with—I don’t know—garbage that’s no longer collected, or trees that fall in monsoon rains and damage the roof of your home? When I don’t drive action forward in life, but life instead drives me, I am on the fast-track to loss of trust: and when she talks from seething contempt it’s the most painful feeling in the world.

-> And what do you do when your woman changes? If you’re into personal growth you cannot be surprised when your partner has a change of heart, a new philosophy, a guru, a psychotherapist that tells her to put herself first. Maybe she follows an influencer that guides her thoughts in more self-centered directions, or perhaps in pursuit of a dream… What if she gets ill, gets enlightened, goes mad? Can you drive the right action forward when she wants to drive a different way—and have tolerance for growth pains and change? I mean, no relationship wants to drive the same way all the time… and if it did, you would not have a lover, but a slave.

I hope, for your sake, there’s a part of you that can read this and laugh.

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Love comes with a knife! said the poet, Rumi.

Perhaps the purpose of relationships is that they cut the ego away.

The hardest thing about driving action forward with women is that 1) we can’t see the possibilities for action, and 2) we’re often slow at recognising the territory we’re in. We are driving, most of us, without maps.

I grew up in a paradoxical culture. Constantly called into leadership, but conditioned, also, to be nice. Under the guise of ‘ease and delight’, and a cultural preference for ‘personable’ men, I confess I have not been the type to consistently drive action forward. In some instances, yes, the fire—all kind of instinct lower and higher—won out.

But with women I’ve really wanted to like me, an almost default reaction has been to wait and see what she wants, and to check my ‘leadership’ by her. This is the hardest conditioning to overcome, so I’ll say it again: with women I’ve really wanted to like me, an almost default reaction has been to wait and see what she wants, and to check my ‘leadership’ by her. This is not leadership anymore, but self-censorship, deference. I defer myself, my desire… in hope that, for good comportment, she’ll give me a slice.

Beyond anything said in culture, the leadership she wants most is that you own your great desire.

A number of men are begrudging about action, about leadership. Why can’t she show up? they complain. Why do I always have to be the one—I’m exhausted! That’s fine. I understand you. After everything you do to keep life afloat, you need to drive action forward with women as well?!

You can keep that attitude. It’s ok to bemoan things. But it typically weakens you at seduction, and it will weaken your relationship. This is not my preference—just how it seems to be. Things work better when I’m up early and seize the day: passive men receive little from life.

Is there hope for the passive amidst us?

As they say, awareness is curative. 

Let us revise what is needed to drive action forward:

1) the quicker you recognise the territory you’re actually in with your woman,

then 2) the more possibilities you’ll see for driving action.

This double-recognition will straighten many of you out. As soon as you realise how your dignity is bent out of shape, right here and now, like most men you’ll find the fire to do the bold thing needed to reorient and realign. It’s only the mist of confusion—freezing, over-thinking—that covers this inner fire.

The older I get, the more I realise I need regular time apart—I need space to hear myself think—to keep this fire burning. It is hard to have leadership direction, on multiple fronts, when things are constantly breaking, with goals eternally expanding, and this samsara forever complexifies if I don’t hack through the growth and the foliage and the people that talk talk talk in my office when the door is purposely closed! And with every new project I have on the table, that’s less end-of-the-day clarity I have to drive action forward with my woman.

It is easy to have a good run in dating, to be the consummate lover on vacation. But to live a life where you, through force of presence and habit, drive forward… takes something else.

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Driving at night, in heavy fog, with the headlamps bust

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There is a pithy conclusion we could nod our heads to right here: that you cannot lead your woman—lead anyone—through terrain you’re unable to see.

But that’s too simplistic an idea. Because no matter how smart we are at manoeuvring life, we will always run into blindspots or situations we’ve never before faced.

So is there an art of staying connected, of taking her hand in the depths of the cave, of assuming the first step and together probing the dark? Is there an art of driving action forward, with eyes wide open, in deepest black?

The third thing that screenwriting and seduction have in common is to end things, wherever possible, on a cliffhanger. Let the action—unfolding so quickly—come to a stop.

Though the righteous mind wants to finish its tidy expression, keep the target of your affections wanting more.

~ Jordan

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