Not that any of you guys here will EVER take a bootcamp, however, I decided to post my review of the last and only bootcamp I ever took. It was recommended to me by a person I truly respected and admired so I decided to give it a shot.
It was my worst investment of 2008.
Without further ado I post the review I did after that pathetic experience.
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Took the bootcamp in late 08.
Had just broken up with the girl I was in a relationship with, so I was looking to get out and explore. I have to say I was still hurt from the breakup so I don't know how different my bootcamp experience would have been had I been single and over it.
Nevertheless, here is my review.
Met with Chris Orleans and two other dudes whose names I forget, but were plastered all over Vin's website. One of the guys was in the marketing page for the drills bootcamp claiming to have laid swedish twins, having fucked: a stripper, the gf of a pua and a famous celebrity.
The student to instructor ratio was pure gold. It was just me and another dude who was about 40.
Side note: it was really sad seeing this 40 year old taking a bootcamp given by 3 instructors in their early 20s. Made me question, why the fuck did I spend so much money on this?
Anyway, we got personalized attention and going through the drills was certainly a challenge. Now in my opinion, doing those drills for 2 days did very little for me.
I have to say the drill I got the most benefit from, was about threading. Basically you practice having conversations without asking questions, by making statements off what the other person is saying. It's just a useful tool for keeping the conversation going.
I had fun doing the drills but something felt off. Even though they are taught as being part of natural game some of them were a bit too manipulative for my taste. As we kept on doing the drills, this was my impression. It was too mechanical for my taste.
It was also kind of awkward and flat out stupid now that I think about it, that we practiced these drills among dudes. Seriously, it's so lame now that I think of it since the instructors sometimes played as the women giving us shit. Man do I feel like a turd for falling for this crap.
At one point I remember being very curious about mentality and inner game, and the instructors let me know that all inner game work is mental masturbation. They had a valid point and I respect that, but wasn't quite impressed with that answer. After all I was paying them to help me out.
When going out or practicing in field, I remember that the feedback I got was crap. I give the instructors credit for pushing me into sets, especially Chris Orleans, but that's about it. I was supposed to have learned everything from those drills like a machine in order to be able to act like an natural alpha man.
Herein lies my biggest criticism of the bootcamp. It would be far more effective to do all the drills one at a time while actually approaching women, than it is to practice them for two full days with a 40 year old dude. It's just not the same, so don't expect to have these behaviors hardwired after so little exposure.
The dude that recommended the bootcamp to me told me that this was the most valuable aspect of the bootcamp for him. He attributed his major improvement with women to the drills.
No one can teach you how to be playful or how to have fun with other people. Trying to create drills to do that defeats the purpose.
So I went along set after set, and tried out what I learned doing the drills. I had many conversations and approached a lot of women. Got many numbers, about 10 that night, but that doesn't mean shit. I don't think that accounts for anything.
Chris just watched me approach and gave the following feedback: "You need to be more aggressive." "You are too passive, you need to be more sexual." "Why did you stop talking to that girl? Who cares what she says, just keep the interaction going."
In other words, the actual field practice consisted of me having to approach women like a mad man, at the bar and on the street. Chris and the other two instructors congratulated me for having the balls to approach and get numbers. I have to say I didn't share the same enthusiasm of my "success".
Their pats on the backs did little for me as I was expecting much more. I felt that it was a lame attempt at making me feel good about what I was doing. Again, all I did was go and talk to women.
The other guy I took the bootcamp with was dying to see the instructors do demos of their skills. Again, massive FAIL. First of all, they made it clear that they wouldn't do demos unless we pulled them into the conversations. In other words, we had to seek them out and introduce them to the women we approached.
Fair enough.
Did that and I have to say I wasn't impressed whatsoever with their skills. Chris Orleans, is a short dude. He has a deep voice and a very soothing presence, but when it came time to seeing him in action, lets just say I didn't see anything that came close to resemble a guy getting paid to teach this.
This might sound arrogant, but if I am paying top dollar for a program like this, I expect that the people teaching me walk the talk and actually deliver. That did not happen. All I saw was some guy talking to 2 girls and tried pulling them closer by showing them his tattoo. That's it.
I remember one of the other instructors joining in on my conversations with the women I approached, and he had this thing were he thumb wrestled the girls. Seriously, $3000 and all you do is thumb wrestle a girl and leave it at that? LAME.
I approached these two lovely women, mother and daughter and started chatting. They seemed positively surprised at first, but it went nowhere. One of the "instructors", came in to bail me out by apologizing to the mother. I appreciated the gesture, but come on, why did he apologize? Why did I have to apologize for trying to talk to them?
I have to say the instructors were really nice and supportive, but for $3000 I guess I wanted to get something more out of it. The 40 year old guy managed to get numbers as well, but he didn't get helpful feedback either.
It seemed that we had paid $3000 to have someone hold us accountable for our commitment to approach women. Too steep of a price, but it sure got me approaching like never before.
I have to be honest and say that this bootcamp experience was not for me, even though it has certainly helped tons of other guys. This bootcamp has rave reviews, but in my opinion it under delivered big time.
Make sure you do your research and really ask yourself why you want to take part in a bootcamp. It has certainly made me shy away from ever getting into these overhyped type of events that only yield post retreat highs.
Hope this helps.
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Man reading that again was painful.
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