Flirting Lessons: Impossible to Resist

Do I need to specifically learn to flirt, or is it like a centipede learning to walk? What do you need to do to always please yourself? Having attended a seminar of the world famous flirting coach in London, Svetlana Kolchik made some rather unexpected discoveries.

August 18, 2008

You must learn to have an orgasm from yourself.

  • James (on the left of the author) does not need to learn to get to know each other – he himself plans to open a pickup school for men in Scotland.
  • Lee dreams of “big and pure love,” but can’t find the right girl. Peta Heskel’s seminar – his last hope.

Having outlined the first phrase of the presenter, I look around in bewilderment. The hotel’s meeting room in the heart of London’s trendy Notting Hill. A couple dozen sleepy and rather unattractively dressed men and women of various ages sat in a circle with notebooks and pens at the ready. Nobody is going to undress yet. In general, fortunately, it doesn’t look like a tantra seminar.

“I can’t teach you how to flirt,” announces the host, taking a long sip of green tea from a tall transparent mug. “All you need is to return to yourself.”.

“The Way to Myself” begins on a chilly morning at 10:00 and has a rather strange name – Flirting Weekend (“Weekend of flirting”). It is led by Peta Heskel, a very colorful person, whom you will look 45 years old (in fact, she is much more), the owner of a shock of red-red hair, bright freckles (as it turned out later – tattooed) and a long colorful skirt, like a hippie youth of 60 -x.

I first heard about this woman a few years ago from my good friend Valera, who once brought speeddating (express dates) Flirtanica Parties to Moscow. Valera claimed that without meeting Peta, my life would be at least incomplete. Peta Heskel is really considered the number one flirting coach (in our opinion it is called “relationship consultant”), if not in the whole world, then in England for sure. She has been conducting her famous flirting workshops for over 10 years and has written several bestsellers about love and relationships (one of her books, The Flirt Coach’s Guide to Finding the Love You Want – “Flirting Coach’s Guide: How to Find the Love You Want “, Due out in Russia soon). Peta has appeared on TV many times – in England and America, has written a bunch of articles in women’s magazines … In general, you understand why my curiosity eventually prevailed and, despite the fact that flirting me, to put it mildly, I don’t need to teach went to London for her seminar.

I will teach you freedom to love

  • Lee dreams of “big and pure love,” but can’t find the right girl. Peta Heskel’s seminar – his last hope.
  • Salsa therapy ends with meditation, during which we focus on the solar plexus and try to restore the “continuous flow of energies”.

To begin with, Peta asks us all to sit on chairs so that both feet firmly touch the floor and are not criss-cross – otherwise we, in her words, “block the flow of energy,” primarily sexual. Further Peta urges us to immediately begin to monitor how and what we say. “Each word also carries a certain energy,” says Peta (she herself, however, does not disdain the word fuck, diluting it with quotes from Freud, Jung, Shakespeare and James Joyce). “There you are, Patrick,” she turns to the quiet brunette. – Why did you come to my seminar. “” I … I have … – Patrick lowers his eyes and blushes slightly. – I have problems with communication, especially with strangers … “” Stop! – Peta interrupts him with flashing eyes. – We are all used to focusing on problems and like to talk about what is wrong with us. But this is the position of the victim, so we attract even more problems into our life. Patrick, what do you really want? ” “I think I should be more confident,” says Patrick. “Do you have to or do you really want to?” Peta retorts. “What I really want is to learn how to be myself in the company of attractive women,” – after a short pause, Patrick replies in a more firm tone. “That’s better,” Peta nods and continues with pathos: “The trouble is that from childhood we learn to be what we think those around us want to see. We are used to hiding our true essence because we are worried about what they think of us. Although all our fears are often dictated solely by our ego “.

If only it were that simple! Once again, I am amazed at how fundamental things in a matter of minutes are laid out on the fingers in the genre of “twice two – four” at trainings. Life immediately begins to seem so understandable that it’s not even interesting. For example, in order to learn to understand oneself and other people, according to Peta (who at one time took an intensive course in NLP – neurolinguistic programming – and now practices it with might and main), it is enough to be “here and now”. “Do you know how much invaluable information we can get when we communicate with a person? And not from what he says, but from how he moves, how his posture, eye expression, pupil size, skin color, tone of voice, etc. change during a conversation, she explains. – And when we walk down the street, we usually look at our feet, we are even afraid to look into the eyes of others. And when we are afraid, we are not free! “

Who have you for lunch?

  • Exercise called “Know thyself”: with eyes closed, touch the tip of the nose.
  • Seminar participants go out to get acquainted “in the fields”.

Letting us go to lunch, Peta gives an assignment: look in the eyes, smile and compliment three strangers. Although it is a little easier to start smiling at strangers in London than in Moscow, my classmates are in no hurry to carry out the task – they cannot wait to first speak out about what made them pay almost fifty pounds for a flirting workshop. Patrick, the one who was interrogated in the lesson, admits that at 34 he never personally invited a girl out on a date – the guy meets either on Internet sites or on blind dates that good friends arrange for him from time to time … At the same time, he works as an engineer in the international Internet company Skype, and around him, as he put it, “there are always many beautiful girls,” but he is afraid to take the first step. Patrick, although shy, is very charming, and I tell him that the girls will most likely be happy to go on a date with him. He thinks differently: “I am very afraid that she will say“ no ”. Perhaps the fact is that my mother was a real tyrant. ” What a stupid habit we have of being our own psychoanalysts! His friend, a pumped-up brunette with a strange Chinese name for a 100% Englishman, complains that he is tired of attending dating parties, where “girls come with their girlfriends and gossip all the time.” Then he says a significant thing worthy of a separate series of “Sex and the City”: “I need love and a serious relationship, and lately I’ve come across girls who only need sex!”

Lee and another character named James, whose speech I can barely make out due to their strong Scottish accent, are actively courting lunch. This is especially clever with James, who gives me one compliment after another, asks a lot of smart questions and “mirrors” my gestures. A little later, James admits that he is a professional (again – in NLP) and is gaining experience in London to open his own flirting school at home in Scotland – for men. “British men urgently need to learn to make eyes at you,” he laments, gallantly raising the napkin I dropped and pouring water into my glass. – We are very squeezed and often do not even know how to approach a woman … “” Really. “- I flirtatiously smile at James, and to myself I think that he seems to be a good businessman.

Salsa therapy

  • To get to know each other successfully, according to Peta Heskel, you need to relax, stop worrying about what they think of you, and most importantly, love and accept yourself. Will help, sincere interest in the interlocutor and spontaneous compliments to strangers.

After lunch, Peta Heskel invites us to forget about flirting for a while and take up dancing, namely “salsa therapy”. A specially invited dance teacher named David, whose wagging gait is suggestive of homosexuality, puts his hand on his lower abdomen and makes some desperate hip jerks a la early Michael Jackson. Cool. “In Western civilization, we are used to thinking too much, and we usually dance with the upper body, and the lower one is tense and constrained,” says David. “In Brazil, for example, everyone dances with their hips because they are not afraid to be sensual.”.

They turn on the music, we pair up and try to portray a semblance of salsa. David, who, despite his tall stature, is far from young age and not the most slender build, really dances like a god, exhorts: “Don’t think about technique! When you start thinking about HOW to move, your ego begins to speak in you. Cut off the ego, just dance and enjoy life! “

My salsa partner, a tall, balding companion of indeterminate age, took the appeal literally: taking his gaze out of my cleavage for a second, he asks what I am doing tonight. (Bravo! He is not wasting time!) I hasten to disappoint him, because I have other plans for the evening: on Peta’s instructions, I and three other girls from the seminar are going “into the fields” – to get acquainted with one of the trendy pubs of Notting Hill.

If we drink, then on our own

  • “Were you sent? Switch to a new object! ” – all the walls of the room where the Flirting Weekend is taking place are pasted with such pseudo-encouraging posters.
  • A method of communication imported from the USA is to give a half-familiar person (a drunk man in a bar is also a person) back massage (fingers, fist, elbow).

By midnight, we have already uncorked the third bottle of Australian Chardonnay, and I already know all that is possible and what is not about girls. For example, that 27-year-old blonde Lucy (super-sexy!) Until recently dated only “inaccessible men” who never found time for her. And that 38-year-old businesswoman Lydia men tend to run away during a date. And that 41-year-old pharmacist Soraya has not met anyone for 8 years, because she was busy with her career and raising her daughter, and now she wants to get married and have more children, but her problem is that with men she was always “too good and not knew how to say no. ” “Do you know that 40-year-old women are now the most active in giving birth to children?” – Soraya takes a long sip of wine and throws a dreamy glance towards the bar, which is crowded with a lot of guys. Frankly, I am sincerely touched by girls. Neither 38-year-old Lydia nor 41-year-old Soraya have ever been married and are not particularly worried about this, apparently following the philosophy fashionable in Western megacities that “forty years is the new thirty.”.

“And after all, no one will come until we call them! – already quite drunk Lydia complains to me about English men. – They are so frozen – while you spin them for something, you will turn gray. Tell me, do Russian men pay for a woman on a date? ” “They pay. And they get married with us much earlier than with you, ”I answer with a laugh. The girlfriends liven up: “Where can we meet Russians ?!” At this moment – probably to restore international justice – a very nice guy, somewhat similar to Jude Law, talks to Lydia. For about ten minutes they chatted enthusiastically, and finally the gentleman asks: “Girls, do you want something to drink?” “Thank you, but we are already drinking wine,” Lydia answers honestly. “Okay, then we’ll go to the bar and buy ourselves.” There is no limit to the girl’s disappointment: “As always! Always something is wrong! It all started so well, and now he probably won’t come back. ” “Why didn’t you let me buy you a drink?” – I am bursting with curiosity. “We already seemed to be drinking wine, and I didn’t want to bother it …” – Lydia draws uncertainly. “And yet why didn’t you give him the opportunity to court you?” – I am interested. These words – absolutely obvious in my opinion – have the effect of a moment of truth on her. “This is one of the most valuable advice I’ve received in my life!” – Lydia, whose best years seem to have been ruined by feminism, looks at me with all eyes as a guru of sinful love descended from heaven.

10 tips from Peta Heskel

  1. Always watch your body language – yours and those around you.
  2. Watch your voice – the softer and more velvety it is, the more actively people will reach out to you. We respond to voice timbre more sharply than to words..
  3. Don’t be afraid to touch the other person. It builds contact more effectively than words..
  4. Always observe how the other person looks and moves. If you copy his gestures, he will penetrate to you faster..
  5. Practice the state of me at my best every day..
  6. Always try to breathe with your belly (focus on a point 4 cm below your navel). It will help you concentrate and find balance..
  7. Think about what you really want in life..
  8. In every unpleasant situation, ask yourself a question: what can I learn here?
  9. Do not rush to judge others, try to discern at least something good in each person – you will be healthier.
  10. Don’t be afraid to look people in the eye.

“I’m at my best”

The next morning, the ranks of flirting enthusiasts thinned somewhat, and a good half of those who showed up had a severe hangover. My girlfriends are vying with each other to report on the adventures of yesterday evening, which continued with them already in my absence. We do strange exercises: we practice collective throat singing (to supposedly feel that we are all connected to each other), hugs (to “make up for the lack of hugs”), learn to look in the eyes and say “unrehearsed” compliments to each other. I find the exercise “me at my best” most useful. First, we are asked to write down on paper the qualities that we value and love in ourselves, as well as hobbies, hobbies and other things that please us. Then we are asked to recall a recent situation when we felt harmony and happiness, and try to feel this state again. “Happiness is the starting point for all life’s accomplishments,” says Peta. – Your eyes begin to shine, your shoulders straighten, your muscles relax. You become incredibly attractive. This is an orgasm from oneself “.

On the faces of many of the participants, there is poorly concealed disappointment – they were counting on a more specific master class “on the rules of removal.” If they want specifics, let them come to Moscow – in any nightclub (yes, in a club – in any office) they will be shown how it is done.