Getting Naked: Five Steps to Finding the Love of Your Life (While Fully Clothed & Totally Sober)
320
Getting Naked: Five Steps to Finding the Love of Your Life (While Fully Clothed & Totally Sober)
320Paperback
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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780312611781 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | St. Martin's Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 04/24/2012 |
| Pages: | 320 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.25(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.72(d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Getting Naked
Five Steps to Finding the Love of Your Life (While Fully Clothed & Totally Sober)By Harlan Cohen
St. Martin's Griffin
Copyright © 2012 Harlan CohenAll right reserved.
ISBN: 9780312611781
LESSON #1
We Learn … Sharing Our Feelings Is Stupid (or Just a Very Bad Idea)
It all starts with a first crush. That’s when we first smell danger. It’s also when we first learn that sharing our feelings is a VERY BAD idea or just plain stupid. From the first “like” our knee-jerk reaction is to avoid letting anyone know. We might confide in a friend or two, but the only way we are willing to openly share our feelings is if we are 100 percent certain the person we like will like us back.
We’ll flirt, ask friends to ask questions, creep on Facebook, ogle, Google, and investigate, but rarely say what we feel. We get as much information as possible without letting the people we like know we like them. We want to know if someone is available and interested. We ask friends to do our dirty work for us. The reason we use friends is so we can distance ourselves far enough to deny our feelings ever existed should the person we like not reciprocate or others find out about them. Technology and friends give us a safe buffer to cast blame and run like hell should rejection or humiliation find us.
As a result, we have imaginary relationships with people who don’t know they’re in relationships with us (thank you, Facebook). We get jealous of people who like the people we secretly like. We have friends find out information about the people we like, which inadvertently gets the people we like interested in our friends because they are the only ones talking. Most friends won’t date the people we like, but some will. It’s difficult not to blame them. It’s hard to meet people.
If we do share our feelings and our crush shares our interest we breathe a sigh of relief. If a crush doesn’t share our feelings the results can be devastating. It only reaffirms why it was wrong and stupid for us to share our feelings in the first place. We quickly learn that sharing our feelings and not having them reciprocated is about the worst thing that can happen. We can’t stand the pain of not being liked by the people we like. If other people find out it’s that much more humiliating. So we learn to hide our feelings and run like hell when we smell rejection coming.
* * *
Step 1 will give you the power to say and do what you feel without the fear of being rejected and/or humiliated.
My biggest hang-up was me. I was so worried about how I was perceived by other people that I didn’t get involved. It was self-preservation.
—Heidi, twenty-six, married
Copyright © 2012 by Harlan Cohen
Continues...
Excerpted from Getting Naked by Harlan Cohen Copyright © 2012 by Harlan Cohen. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Before Step 1 xi
The Philosophy of Getting Naked xi
This Book Is Written For… xii
The Naked Truth About Getting Naked xiii
Before Step 1… xv
Three Promises xix
Part I Why We Think Men Are Assholes, Women Are Bitches, and Couples in Love Suck: Our Informal Relationship Education 1
Lesson #1 We Learn… Sharing Our Feelings Is Stupid (or Just a Very Bad Idea) 7
Lesson #2 We Learn… We Are All Defective 9
Lesson #3 We Learn… Hooking Up Is Faster and Easier Than Dating 13
Lesson #4 We Learn … We Don't Know Where, When, or How It Happens (But Still, It Happens) 17
Lesson #5 We Learn… Men Are Assholes, Women Are Bitches, and Couples in Love Suck 19
Despite What We "Learn" 23
Part II The Getting Naked Experiment: 5 Steps to Finding the Love of Your Life (While Fully Clothed & Totally Sober) 25
Introduction: The Getting Naked Experiment 27
Step 1 Embrace the Secret Truth 33
Meet the Unspoken and Undeniable Truth 33
Embrace The Truth 36
Thousands of People Will Want You 39
Give Thousands of People Permission to Want You 42
Millions of People Will Not Want You 44
Give Millions of People Permission to Not Want You 47
Put Yourself in More Rooms 50
Talk to People in Rooms 53
Date or Hook Up with People in Rooms 55
Demand Respect In and Out of Rooms 58
Welcome to a Bigger, Brighter, and More Forgiving World 61
Step 2 Train in Your Thong(s) 65
Intro to Training 65
Training in Your Thong 66
Why a Tight Thong? 69
The Naked People in Your Corner 71
Why You Must Train Physically 74
How to Train in Your Physical Thong 76
Why You Must Train Emotionally 79
How to Train in Your Emotional Thong 81
Why You Must Train Spiritually 84
How to Train in Your Spiritual Thong 86
Change What You Don't Love 88
Love What You Can't Change 93
You Don't Need to Creep, Plot, Plan, Drink, or Puke 98
You'll Want a Complement, Not Just Compliments 100
Hooking Up Will Never Feel the Same Again 103
You Can Find Thousands of People Who Want to Date You 105
Assholes, Bitches, and Couples in Love Will No Longer Suck 107
Once You've Trained… You Will Date, but Never Settle 109
You're Almost Ready for Your Getting Naked Experiment to Begin 111
Step 3 Stop Making Excuses 113
Excuse #1 I'm Too Shy to Approach Someone 115
Excuse #2 I Never Know What to Say 117
Excuse #3 I'm Old-Fashioned (aka I Don't Do the Approaching) 120
Excuse #4 It's Hard to Meet People 123
Excuse #5 I Don't Want to Look Creepy 126
Excuse #6 I Can't Tell If Someone Is Single 128
Excuse #7 I Don't Want to Lose a Friendship 131
Excuse #8 I Don't Do Online Dating 134
Excuse #9 I Don't Do Setups 138
Excuse #10 I'm Not "Experienced" 140
Excuse #11 I Don't Want to Hurt Someone's Feelings 143
Excuse #12 I Don't Like Dating 146
Excuse #13 I Don't Like Playing Games 150
Excuse #14 I Don't Want to Get Hurt 152
Excuse #15 I Don't Want to Commit 155
Excuse #16 I Don't Have Time 157
Excuse #17 I'm Too Picky 159
Excuse #18 I Don't Do Long Distance 162
Excuse #19 I Don't Want to Lose My Job 165
Step 4 Take the Risk 169
How to Take Your Risk 170
Risk #1 Do It Online 172
Risk #2 Do It Blind 179
Risk #3 Do It with a Friend 182
Risk #4 Do It on the Job 185
Risk #5 Do It at School 190
Risk #6 Do It Commuting 193
Risk #7 Do It at a Bar 196
Risk #8 Do It at a Party 200
Risk #9 Do It with a Neighbor 205
Risk #10 Do It on Vacation 208
Risk #11 Do It Religiously 212
Risk #12 Do It in a Group 215
Risk #13 Do It Adventurously 219
Risk #14 Do It Voluntarily 222
Risk #15 Do It Randomly 225
Step 5 Celebrate, Reflect, and Repeat 231
CELEBRATE: Finding a Date or Hooking Up 233
CELEBRATE: Not Finding a Date or Hooking Up 235
REFLECT: Don't Be a Hater 237
REFLECT: Don't Be a Hider 240
REFLECT: The Three Forms of Adversity 242
REFLECT: Umm, Is It Me? 243
REFLECT: Umm, Is It You? 246
REFLECT: It Is What It Is (and It's Called The Universal Rejection Truth) 249
REFLECT: Turn to the People in Your Corner 252
REFLECT: Take Time to Recoup 255
REPEAT: Take the Same Risk Again-or Find a New One 257
Naked Final Exam 259
Part III The Getting Naked Experiment 263
My Getting Naked Experiment-Part One 267
My Getting Naked Experiment-Part Two 273
Your Getting Naked Experiment: A Recap 283
10 Getting Naked Experiment Tips 291
Getting Naked FAQs 293
Naked Acknowledgments 297