Try-Hard
Quick Definition: Refers to a guy who tries too hard to win the approval of others.
Full Definition:
A “try-hard”, whether in pickup or other areas of life, is a person who puts a disproportionately large amount of effort into trying to win the approval of those around him. Paradoxically, the harder that a person tries to get other people to like and respect them, the less respect they will get.
This is especially true with women, who are approached by needy, approval seeking guys all the time. Rather than approaching women and trying to win their approval, the more successful approach for PUAs to take is to lean back, and demonstrate a degree of indifference, and frame interactions so that the women is trying to win their approval, rather than the other way around.
Typical behaviors of try-hards include things such as taking women out on lavishly expensive dinners on a first date, buying women they’ve just met expensive flowers and gifts, and dressing up way too nice for the venue that they’re in (e.g. a full suit and tie in a dive bar). What all these behaviors have in common is that they are all done in an attempt to impress people. However, the subcommunication of these actions is that the guy doing all these things has low value, so they end up having the opposite effect of what he intended in relation to women, as women respond to social value.
The worst try-hard offenders are wannabe PUAs who try to win the approval of other guys in the community, rather than working to improve their skills with women. Such FNGs often boast about their obviously exaggerated conquests, engage in useless debates on PUA forums, and overuse PUA terminology in an attempt to appear to be experienced PUAs. However, like all try-hard behavior, these end up having the opposite effect.
The important point to remember is to never try to be appear what one isn’t. Being inexperienced and pretending to be experienced is worse than just appearing experienced in the first place. Rather than being try-hard and seeking external sources of validation, the true PUA measures his worth by his own metric, and doesn’t care what other people think about him.
In RSD, Tyler talks about the period of being a “tryhard” for most newbies, in which a person must step out of their comfort zone to try something new. Because of the lack of reference points, the newbie will have to go through a phase where they may be perceived as “trying too hard”. As they gain more feedback and reference points, they can better pinpoint their flaws and re-adjust their behavior to ultimately meet their own pickup goals, rather than the expectations and perception of others.
Usage:
That approach was way too try-hard– try showing a little less interest next time.
Related Terms: rAFC, Approval Seeking, Beta, Incongruence, Identity, Inner Game, Outcome Independence
Definition by Vince Lin
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