I think my brain might have won. Well, my brain and Bobby Fisher.

Not the chess champion. One of my best friends is this guy who was in the army at the same time as me. That's actually how we met. It was the first day that I was in the army and I was already depressed because I didn't get into the unit that I wanted. I thought this American-sounding guy would be able to cheer me up.

I overheard him speaking with an American accent so I asked him, "Hey man. What do you think of the army?"

"It fucking sucks. You're going to hate every minute of it."

Checkmate

I wish I could say we were best friends from the beginning, but he was in a different unit and had been in for a year by the time I joined. But I would find out later that he lived in LA and went to high school in Beverly Hills, not too far from where I grew up.

Once I got out of the army and moved back to LA, I found out that he had moved back as well. We were both fresh out of the service and feeling like we could take on the world, so we'd go out to Jewish events together and try to hit on girls. We did alright.

Anyway long story short, we're still friends. He's... going through some difficult times now. Like really bad. Like he hasn't worked in years and just sits at home trading stocks. He does alright at that, although he does call me sometimes complaining about a trade gone wrong and how he just lost all his money.

He kind of convinced me to table the Vegas thing for now. But I'll get to that in a second.

I woke up this morning feeling downright awful. I'm not sure why, but I think it had to do with all that nasty food that I ate yesterday.

The first thing I did was grab my bag of weed and throw it in the garbage. Fuck that shit. It doesn't lead to anything good in my life and hasn't for years. All I do is eat too much, get paranoid about everything and feel sorry for myself. And god knows I can do that just fine on my own.

I was watching an interesting RSD video the other day where one of the instructors is making a distinction about the connection between drinking green juice (wheat grass, etc) and being good with girls.

He goes, "I never said that drinking green juice will get you laid. But if you're the type of person who hasn't had much success with girls, who is easily overstimulated, who effectively has the deck stacked against him, then yeah, you're going to need all the help you can get to get yourself in the right mindset for doing pickup."

The short straw

Straight up - some people have it easier than others in life. Some are born into money, some have better genetics, and some grow up with certain influences that make them better in social situations. What do they say? You can't control the hand you're dealt, but you can control how you play it. Something like that.

I think it was Bill Gates who said, "It's not your fault if you're born poor. But it is your fault if you stay poor."

Throwing my weed away actually felt really good. For a split second I worried that I'd desperately try to dig it out of the trash like some kind of junkie later in the day, but the feeling was fleeting.

I never should have started smoking again. That shit kills my motivation and I totally let myself go when I smoke it. I just can't control myself.

Whatever. It's over now. I had a nice productive day and at 8 PM I still have a clear head. Hopefully I'll have some cool dreams from this LSD tonight as well.

Speaking of which, I'm starting to think that my body is reaching a kind of homeostasis on this microdosing shit. No real reduction in effects from taking it every day for a week. Still stimulated, still have more clean energy throughout the day, and still fairly eloquent in social situations.

I've found that it helps to take a bit of noopept in the morning with it as well. It's good to take noopept regardless. That shit is amazing for focus, but when you combine it with a little Wellbutrin, Modafinil and some LSD - perfecto.

Tomorrow I think I'm going to add some MK-677 into the mix. Also known as Ibutamoren, MK-677 is a growth hormone secretagogue. In other words, it makes your body produce more growth hormone. GH is the bomb for a variety of reasons - it helps your skin, your hair, helps you heal from injuries faster, helps you build muscle... it's fucking awesome.

It gets a bad rap because of acromealgy, which is a condition where your skull and hands grow after your growth plates have fused, giving you a weird appearance. I think they call it giantism? But MK-677 doesn't do that because it just increases your natural GH spikes. It's not exogenous GH.

Anyway, none of that probably made any sense to most of you but the point is that it's fucking awesome.

How to be smart

There are two downsides to it though: 1) it makes you hungry as fuck and 2) it makes you tired.

Lucky for me, microdosing LSD seems to suppress my appetite and give me way more energy than normal. So my thinking is that it will balance out the effects of the MK-677 and I'll be able to reap the benefits without suffering any of the consequences.

MK-677 is actually fucking awesome. I remember being at the gym in LA back in the day and fucking up my back trying to do a clean and jerk with too much weight (those Crossfit workouts will getcha). The injury was bad enough that I should have been laid up for weeks. I took a little MK-677 and two days later I was back to normal.

I may have also had some BPC-157 on hand which is very good for rapid healing as well. Back in the day when I made money I would buy all these nootropics and peptides and experiment with them. I remember the first time I injected something. I nearly shit my pants. Then I did it and realized it's actually not a big deal at all.

There's such a stigma surrounding needles that people seem to forget the fact that our bodies process substances in different ways. Swallowing something means it's going to get absorbed through your digestive tract and be processed by your liver. Snorting something means it just gets absorbed through your... nasal membrane? And subcutaneous injection is different than intramuscular, which are both different than intravenous (not recommended).

But people hear the word "injecting" and immediately they think someone is a junkie who is shooting heroin. TLDR: it's not.

LJBF

How the fuck did I get off on this tangent? I have no idea. I think I was talking about... I dunno.

Whatever. The point is that today was pretty good. I had my 11 AM meeting with the Falafix guys - two Hassidic Jews from Brooklyn who busted my balls about my proposed social media strategy for their little restaurant.

I won't go through the entire conversation, but I was kind of hesitant about pushing for the deal on this one because I had it in my head that I didn't really want them as clients anyway. In my experience, having hardcore Jews as clients is more headache than it's worth. At least that's what I thought at the time.

Several hours later, I regret not pushing harder for the deal because I could tell these guys were dying to hire me.

I do this sometimes and always regret it - I'll talk to a potential client about signing them up for something and decide that they're "difficult" and quote them an extra high price, or not follow up hard, or something else that will "accidentally" let the deal fall behind the filing cabinet so to speak.

And sure, there are difficult clients out there who are a nightmare to work with, but these guys were not that bad. It was just my preconceived notions getting the better of me, once again.

I spent about an hour and a half there before coming home. Fortunately it's just a five minute walk from my house. When I got back I watched a little bit of Social Circle Blueprint 2.0, which is this expensive ass online course that I bought from RSD. I don't want to get into it in too much detail right now, but basically it's about how to create the illusion of status in a short amount of time in order to reap the benefits in your personal and professional life.

$700 later, I'm working my way through the first module. The instructor is one of the best pick up artists in the world, if not the best. Strange because he's kind of under the radar, despite being an instructor for the biggest pick up company in the world.

I watched a bit of that before some of my roommates came home and started making noise in the living room. Sick of listening to their conversation, I decided to pick up my balls and brave the cold New York weather and run to the gym for a workout.

I decided that working out 3x a week doing powerlifting was cool and all, but I'm really way too ADD to only workout three times a week. I need that shit in my life because otherwise I'd literally just sit at home and stay on my computer all day. Now that the weather is getting really cold, I don't know what I'll do in a few months when I need to get to the gym. Maybe I'll break down and take the subway. Maybe.

My third passport

But wait a second, aren't you going to Vegas? What happened with that?

Yeah, so about that... remember how I said my brain and Bobby Fisher won? Well all day I've been questioning my decision to go through with this course. Yes, I want to do it. Yes, I think I would benefit greatly from it. But I just don't think it's the right time.

And I KNOW that it's probably just my brain playing tricks on me because any time I have the opportunity to let my mind wander, it inevitably drifts to this thing in Vegas and whether or not I should go. It really just comes down to the money. I'm not in any danger of going broke any time soon, but with crypto in the shitter and a recent ban wave on 50% of my client's accounts courtesy of Instagram, I can't rightly justify an additional four-figure expense on the balance sheet.

These are all things I logically know to be true. It's not like the thought hasn't crossed my mind that maybe, just maybe I should fucking wait until my income stabilizes before moving across the country to take an immersive course on picking up girls. I get it.

But hearing my good friend, brother in arms and chess champion Bobby Fisher echo the same things my LSD-soaked brain has been screaming at me since buying my ticket... I dunno, I guess it just feels different hearing it from another person.

And look, let's be real: I'm in fucking New York City here, not some podunk potato-farming Midwestern town where people fuck their cousins. There's 9 million people in this city. There are girls, clubs and wingmen here too.

My rationale, as I explained to Bobby, was that I'd be able to surround myself with a bunch of guys who were also committed to the goal of getting better at cold approach. And while I still believe that there is immense value in that, I can find that here if I just commit to putting a little effort into looking.

That's really what all of this comes down to: effort.

Somehow, it was easier for me to avoid the effort and mentally commit to budgeting $5k on this course, rent, plane tickets, food, etc just so I wouldn't have to put in the legwork in finding people to help me here. Yeah, they probably have some structure there. And all things considered, if I went I would probably improve faster there than somewhere else.

But all of those things I can do on my own. In fact, I'm beginning to think this whole thing was just an elaborate way for me to continue procrastinating, to continue avoiding what I know I really need to fucking do, which is start going out seven nights a week.

Yes, seven nights a week. That is the answer here. Not a course, not an ebook, not a bunch of videos. Not sitting around shooting the shit with a bunch of dudes and theorizing. Not writing about it on Steemit. But going out seven nights a week, even alone if I have to, with the goal of cauterizing these nerves and letting my adrenal glands chill the fuck out for a bit.

That's the solution here. And you know what? That's actually the reason I started this microdosing experiment in the first place. I wanted to do a 3 month experiment where I microdosed every night and went out to do pickup. I was going to call it "Micropimping." I even let myself fantasize about documenting my progress with videos and shit.

I love you, you love me

But then I think to myself, what the fuck am I even doing? I'm gonna be fucking 35 in a few days. Maybe the boat has sailed for starting this kind of journey. In my mind I always thought I had until 40, maybe 45 to fuck around. Not that he was fucking around by any means, but my dad was 45 when he had me. So I guess I always had that as a benchmark of my own for "settling down."

I hate that phrase. I really do. And to further complicate my LSD-fueled inner conflict, I have this little escape route in Tel Aviv into whose bosom I could easily bury myself in. And she'd love to have me back, too.

As much as I talk about wanting to get better with girls, I'm actually already pretty good. Every once in a while I can get a girl infatuated with me to the point where she says shit like, "I haven't felt like this about someone in such a long time!"

Those words are music to my ears. And I heard them last month when I was in Israel. Normally when I do, I clear the next few months of my life for a torrid relationship, full of jealousy plotlines and intense sexual experiences until the whole thing falls apart, preferably suddenly so neither of us have to suffer in the purgatory of unsatisfying extended pair bonding and insecure attachments.

But this girl.. this one is different. She's got such a positive outlook on life, so friendly, so expressive. And you know the best part? She works with autistic kids. And she's so good with them, so patient. Maybe that's why we get along so well.

It also helps that I met her when I was chock full of Tel Aviv Swagger, tan and chiseled from copious amount of Middle Eastern sunlight and shawarma. I was in and out like fucking Zorro, gone before the illusion of romance faded and she found out who I really am.

I dunno, maybe I'm overthinking this whole thing. I quite literally exhaust myself with this shit. And really, part of me just wants to book a one way ticket back to Thailand and sweat it out in the gym with some ex-Lumpinee champions who took too many elbows to the head.

There I wouldn't have to worry about pickup, money, or anything. Just jab, cross, knee, kick and elbow. Live in a hostel and have a weekly rotation of sexually liberated Europeans coming in and out of my life. And if I get really desperate, I'm never more than a ten minute walk from a few $30 freelancers.

I could even probably get my LSD delivered there too. I don't think the Thai authorities even know what that shit is. But then again if they do, they'd probably lock me up in Thai jail for the rest of my life.

The sad truth is that there's not going to be a perfect place or situation, ever. I was watching a video where the guy talks about letting go of always trying to make things get better and better. Accept the good with the bad, the pain with the pleasure, and take it all as necessary steps on the journey to life. That doesn't mean don't strive, but don't cling so desperately to the way you think things "should" be that you're too afraid to get out there and risk a little pain.

Yeah, easy for me to say that. But meanwhile I do literally everything I can to stay inside my comfort zone, even to the tune of spending thousands of dollars to avoid putting myself through awkward situations. And realistically, if I actually thought about it, these situations would only be awkward until they actually happened.

In other words, it's the ANTICIPATION of the awkwardness that causes the fear response. Not the actual situation itself. Like Will Smith says, once you jump out of the plane, you're not scared anymore.

I was thinking about it earlier today: I never really have any "bad" nights out. Once I actually start talking to people, it's kind of fun.

When I was in Tel Aviv last month, I went out with some friends. I told myself I would go out for 20 minutes and if I wasn't having fun, I could just leave after 20 mins. But I'd have to actually spend those 20 mins talking to new people.

I wasted no time. The first set of girls hooked and as we were talking, I couldn't help but wondering what the fuck I was so nervous about this whole time. THIS is what I was avoiding? Talking to some dumb girls? And the ones who "rejected" me, what did that even look like? Literally them just turning their bodies away from me.

Nobody saw. Nobody pointed at me and laughed. Nobody cared.

All of this bullshit, these drastic life changes, this inner mental drama... just to avoid what would be AT WORST an awkward ten seconds? What a fucking joke. Especially when the upside is unlimited confidence, social proof, new and interesting people coming into your life, and perhaps most importantly: having some actual fun for once.

Yeah, I'm canceling this trip to Vegas. Gonna micropimp it from New York for a few months and THEN fuck off back to Thailand. Or maybe Cape Town. We'll see.

My temporary Tel Aviv girlfriend is coming here in a month to visit her family. We'll see if the magic is still there. But even if it is, I can't check out now. I only have five years left before I can't justify this fuckery to myself. And if it means that I miss out on the childbearing years of Ms Positive, well then I guess that's the price I'm going to have to pay to kill those demons.

Previous microdosing entries:

Microdosing Day 6: Just Call Me Monsieur Creosote
Microdosing Day 5: Raw, Uncut
Microdosing Day 4: That One Time
Microdosing Day 3: Don't Fuck With Lucy
Microdosing Day 2: Three Steps Forward, Two Steps Back
Microdosing Day 1: Removing The Adhesion