---
title: Episode 189 Stop Being A Pussy
episode_number: 189
era: late
source_file: Episode 189 Stop Being A Pussy.mp3
audio_size_mb: 58.8
duration_sec: 1927.8
duration_min: 32.1
language: en
provider: deepgram
model: nova-3
diarized: true
confidence: 0.998
transcribed_at: 2026-05-27T17:10:48Z---

# Episode 189 Stop Being A Pussy

**Speaker 0:** Hello. This is Tom Torero, episode number 189. Today, romantically entitled stop being a pussy. And I'm recording this episode for two reasons. First of all, I can in the future play it back to myself, listen to my own advice and hopefully more importantly take my own advice when I'm whining, playing the victim, having one of those dark days, overthinking, procrastinating. I can hopefully stop being a pussy. And number two, when I receive those lovely sweet daily emails from guys who are also moaning and whining, I can send them a link to this episode or at the end of a coaching session, I can give some brotherly love with a proverbial kick up the ass by also sending them this link. So there are good intentions behind it. I know it sounds flippant just to say, well, don't be a pussy, stop being a pussy, take action, get stuck in etcetera etcetera. But there's been times in my life where this kind of advice, real talk, straight talk is the only thing that cut it. It was a moment where I'd be whining or moaning or delaying etcetera. And somebody said to me, Tom, stop being a pussy. And the fog of war, the confusion, the forest that you are in suddenly clears. And I got on with what I needed to do. Recently, I was talking to a friend on a phone call about a situation I was in. I was having a back and forth exchange of emails with a journalist that wanted to interview me and I was overthinking, overly stressed, putting too much importance on this situation and he was very kind, he had a good listening ear and he was putting up with my moaning and ranting and at the end of the call, said, Tom, and he knows me well. So he said, Tom, don't take this the wrong way mate, but you could be less of a pussy. And just those simple words at the end of the call cleared my mind, cleared the situation and I got on with what I needed to do. So in that scenario, if he had just mothered me and put up with my moaning and encouraged it by going into more and more detail, it would have made the situation worse. I can also remember when I was doing my very basic diving certificate and I was fine with going through the checklist of all the things you needed to do underwater until that final bit on the test where you have to take off your mask underwater, you get a rush of water up your nose, you panic because you think you're drowning. And then you have to put your mask back on and clear it by kind of breathing out. And I couldn't do it because I kept freaking out. I kept thinking I was drowning so I would surface and the instructor again, was he a young guy and he was putting up with me, he was very nice for the first time, second time, third time, first day it happened, the second day it happened. And finally, he was like, you need to be less of a pussy. And to hear that from someone younger than yourself, I was like, yeah, just fuck it, just do it. And I know I've made other podcasts in a similar vein but every time you hear this advice perhaps for a certain person in a certain situation, it will help somebody. And it will certainly help me because it will remind me to take my own advice and perhaps in the future somebody will stumble upon this episode. And I'm usually quite empathic. Certainly when I started my coaching calls, I would listen to people's backstories for a long time, I would listen to their sticking points. But the more you do it and the more I do these podcasts, I see that that often is not the helpful thing. As I said, in some situations you need tough love, you need real talk and perhaps we are becoming too sensitive, we are becoming overly emotional, We are different from our fathers and our grandfathers and our great grandfathers. A really inspirational guy that I would like to video, but to do this I'd have to go to, I think Chicago in The United States, but it would be worth it for not just an episode of the Black Sheep Bandit but for a whole fucking documentary. I met this guy in his seventies on the tall ship that I crewed on when I was on the Atlantic and this was the most interesting guy on the boat. He was fucking tough as nails. So I'm using him as an example of, okay, we're whining about daygame and texting and dating and whatever. And this guy was a 70 year old or 70 year old guy working on a tall ship, climbing, rigging. He was a Vietnam vet. He was a private pilot also. And he had, he was a bit ambiguous about some of the flights he used to do between Columbia and Miami. But I will, leave that up to your imagination. Then he moved into explosives and he used to put on these huge pyrotechnic shows. He was an explosives expert as well. He had in his sixties been to the Himalayas for the first time and climbed some of the lower peaks with local guides. He had been on this tall ship already in previous seasons and he had sailed round Cape Horn, undersail, not under motor, both in both directions. Extreme sailing, he had rode motorbikes and broken many bones in his bodies and I sat there for many days and he recounted to me and I took notes on his life because I said, look, you need to write this down, you need to preserve it, you need to write a book. I've got those notes somewhere but he would be a great man for a video because listening to a guy like that immediately, you feel like a pussy. And it's really, really good because all those little niggles and those, oh, I don't wanna get up. I remember thinking, I don't wanna get up for my shift. I had like a fucking 2AM to 6AM shift for a while climbing rigging in the dark and I was whining and moaning. And then you think, well, fucking hell, compared to what this guy's done or even zooming out even more, compared to what other humans on this earth right now are putting up with and getting through people's jobs, people's situations, people's health. And with that being a little pussy, it does put things into perspective. So anyway, at times you have to think what would this guy do? Or as I've said in the past, what would Chuck Norris do? If you know that meme, you can tattoo that on your arm. When you're being a little bitch, you can say what would Chuck Norris do? W w c n d. Let me consider and I have already, I've made a few notes by looking at YouTube comments or regular emails or regular talking points I get on calls. What are the ways that we play this victim? How do we, how do we whine? How are we little pussies? Then I'll come on to more importantly, how can we obviously correct it. And it's not just saying, toughen up, go outside. There are actual steps you can take, we shall come on to those but the most common thing you'll see under a video perhaps certainly under an infield is a guy saying this is a cool video, I like the idea of daygame but I would never have the balls to approach. So that's a guy, and I've taught guys who've been soldiers in Afghanistan. I've taught, I remember the head of security for top shop. Guys that regularly do quite dangerous, nutty things. And this is also a guy that says I don't have the balls to go up to a girl and even ask for directions. That's step number one. Or step number two, even to give her a compliment. Or step number three, to to be playful with it or step number four to ask her out. And these are grown men saying, I don't have the balls to talk to girls. They're on Tinder, right? And all over the internet is baby steps to help you go and talk to girls facing the approach anxiety, that's the biggest sticking point in the daygame and the PUA community, still is, always will be. So yeah, don't be a pussy. We should come on to how but if that's you, don't be a pussy. The second one is people thinking that they're doing something wrong. A guy will write me a massive email and he'll say, I love the idea of daygame, I'd love to do it but what if people find out? You know. He's so ashamed of talking to girls, he's ashamed of being a pickup artist or he's worried that people on the street are gonna be watching him. He's got the spotlight effect. He cares too much about what other people think or more importantly, he actually believes they care about him when in reality, the people around you don't give a shit. I used to do this when I was coaching in London and you'd walk past the guy who was asking for money or you'd walk past the guy slumped in a doorway. And then a few moments later, I'd say to the student, well, what did you think of those guys trainers or what color jacket was that guy wearing? Or somebody would walk past and I'd say, you know, what was she holding in her hand? And the student would look baffled, I don't know. He didn't even register that guy. Well, exactly. The guy you walk past, the guy you step over, that crazy guy shouting in the street, five seconds later, you're back into your own head. People have their own shit going on. You are not the center of their lives. That's very important to realize, it's very liberating. People have their own worries, people are fighting their own wars. So even if they look at you for a second, they'll forget you, in the next few steps. People, are living in their head, you are living in your head. So we use that with daygame because we realize people don't care. Another common one, oh, and I should, end up by saying, being a pussy. Stop being a pussy, people don't give a fuck, approach as normal. The third one, what if security people come over? People are obsessed with this. Again, men are obsessed with the idea of a security guy, he's not even a police officer, he's like an underpaid security guy standing outside McDonald's, you know, those mall police. What if he comes over? Well, yeah, if you do daygame and shopping malls, security will know what you're doing and many times they've come over to me, they've asked me what I'm doing and I say, I'm talking to girls. You bring him into the fun, you know, you say you're looking for a wife, you say you're lonely. You one guy I remember in a shopping center in London, he laughed when I said I'm looking for a wife, you know, I'm tired of Thai brides on the internet. And then we stood there for five minutes and he was showing me girls that he was perving on, girls that he was looking at and he saw me most weekends and he just gave me a friendly nod. When they realize you're not nicking anything, stealing from American brothers, that you're not some crazy person, that you're not about to do something illegal then they calm down, that's all they're worried about. The only times I've had bigger problems where they might ask you to leave because it's private property is if you've got a lot of guys if you're running a big boot camp and you've got wireless mics and camera gear and all that and they just they don't like it because it's interfering with shoppers it's too big or it's, they can't get their head around it, whatever. So then they politely ask you to leave, nothing happens. So stop being a pussy, stop being a little bitch and try it. All these things in your head, all these worries in your head, a test your crazy hypotheses and see that nothing happens. The world doesn't swallow you up, people don't come over. It's okay. It's the same one with, what do you do if her boyfriend comes over? Tom, I'd love to do daygame, but what happens if her boyfriend comes over? Well, yeah, many times a guy will suddenly come into set. You haven't seen him, he's come out of a store, he's just been a few feet away on the phone, he comes over. What should you do? Immediately address him, immediately be polite, open body language, friendly. I always say immediately, is this your girlfriend? Is this your wife? And he'll say yes. And you shake his hand and you say congratulations, mate. I was just chatting her up at fair place, she's very beautiful. Have a good day both of you. Enjoy your day. Goodbye. That's it. It's social intelligence. You don't need to get confrontational. He actually walks away with his shoulders back feeling pretty proud, know, that he's got this girl on his arm, that you acknowledge that, guys love it when you acknowledge the fact, that they've got a hot girlfriend. It's like being impressed by another guy's car. They beam with pride. So again, stop being a little pussy and test your fears by going outside and talking to girls. The next one, a pathetic one. The guy says, okay. What if she rejects me? What if I talk to her for those two minutes, five minutes, seven minutes and she says, no. She's engaged. She's happily married. She's not gonna give me the number. I won't be able to deal with it. You know, the guy can swipe on Tinder, the guy can stagger over in a club when he's drunk, but he can't accept a no. Well, if you can't accept a no, then you can't be in sales, you can't do any kind of cold calling, you've gotta be able to take rejections and take them well. Again, it comes down to social intelligence, you wish the girl well. When a girl says she's engaged, don't storm off. What a fucking bitch. I stand there for another couple of minutes, we joke about, what's going on, she can upgrade to me etcetera. I perhaps try one more time, know. You can send me a message in the future if he dies in a hang gliding accident. That's an old Will Ferrell joke I think. I wish her well, shock horror. I'm nice to her. I wish her well for her marriage. We talk for two minutes about her country. She might give me a bit of information. We just vibe. This is a key thing, it's not a lose lose situation. You can end it on a win win situation. I shall talk about symbiotic seductions another time but that's a key part of having social intelligence that you leave her on a high, I walk away with a high, it's okay. It's just a no, move on to another girl who's more interested. Same with a guy saying, well, she's not texting back. How can I get her out? He's obsessed, he's overly obsessed with one girl, he's in scarcity, he's needy. I've said all this before, you can't get that girl out. The reason she's messaging you about going to see her sister in hospital or taking her cat to the vet or it's raining outside, she's caught a cold. No, no, no, no, no, no, friend. It's bullshit. Okay? And don't blame her for it, she's just not that interested in you. She's got another dude, she's already got enough dicks in her life, you're not her type, whatever, whatever, whatever. Just move on, go and get more leads. Often on a coaching call, will come down to go and get more leads. Stop focusing on that one girl, stop being a pussy, go outside and go and get more leads. Same with when the guy says she flaked, We had all this texting but I couldn't get her out. Tom, what's the three secret messages to get this girl out? I'm willing to pay you for an hour to just get this one girl. Mate, she's not interested. Once again, zoom out, look at the metadata. The no is the answer, she's not interested, go and get more leads, stop being a pussy. Same with the guy saying, I took this girl on six dates and I still couldn't kiss her. Well, friend, you have friend zoned yourself, you lacked boundaries, you are allowing, you are encouraging this bad behavior like a bad parent, like a bad teacher, like letting a puppy dog do whatever the fuck it wants, the puppy resents you, right? And then the guy will get more and more angry with this girl, with all girls, that's when you get those guys saying, she's such a bitch and all women in this situation are bitches. No, my friend. Often I'll say on the call, she's not a bitch, she was just a bitch to you. To her ex boyfriend, to her future boyfriend, she's gonna be fine. She's gonna be lovely and sweet. She was a bitch to you because you didn't have frame. You allowed this bad behavior, so stop being a pussy. Escalate on the date. The guy says, well, I'm I'm I'm afraid she won't kiss. I'm afraid she won't come back. The girl's respecting you less each time you're a pussy. She's already got one pussy, she doesn't need another. You're friend zoning yourself which disgusts her. So better to get to that no and find out, is she yes, no or maybe, then delay it and delay it and delay it. I think it was sin that, John Sin, an old school pickup artist that wonderfully said, we're not trying to get her to a yes, we're trying to get her to a decision. That is a profound pickup statement. We're not trying to get a girl to a yes, we're trying to get to a decision. So the more you delay finding out that decision, the more you're being a pussy, the more you're being a little bitch, and more importantly, it disgusts girls. Alright. Same with, what if she sees me approaching other girls? Well, my friend, you don't understand jealousy and preselection, you don't understand pimping and harings, you don't understand how it works. If she thinks you have no other options, again, it kind of disgusts her. When girls find out what I do, yeah, they, are a little bit pissed off for a couple of days and then it increases counter intuitively increases their attraction for me. It's good if she calls you a player. It's good if she calls you a bastard. It's good if she calls you a dick. Yep, you don't hide it. It's the same with being a PUA. I know guys that don't want to say they're a PUA, they pretend they're not in this to have sex. They say they're a life coach, they say they're just, doing social experiments. No, my friend, stop hiding your dick. You like sex, embrace it. Again, being the jerk, being the fuck boy as girls call us now. It's all a good thing when she digs you in the elbow, digs you with her elbow and she says, Tom, you are such an idiot. That's the sign of a good thing, that's the sign of attraction. More tragically and a lot of calls I have with this theme going on right now, this is much much more damaging to your life. It's when a guy says I can't break up with this girl, I've been with her for four years, it's a terrible situation, she's taken all my money, she's, it's just a disaster but I can't break up with her, Tom, because I'm gonna be lonely. My friend, stop being a pussy, this is damaging your life. It's also wasting her time. Often on a call, I'll explain why when a girl's 26, 27, 28, even in her early thirties. It's good for you to cut the cord, I say shoot the puppy but it's also good for her. You're wasting her time. This girl just needs to meet a nice guy from the office and have babies. Stop delaying the process and I'll always remember a girl who I was kind of semi dating but I was messing her around. She sat me down in Costa Coffee in London and she said, Tom, you are the man. You make the decision. If you want to end it, just tell me. End it now. I could see that she, that would create respect. And a few weeks later, I know I did end it and then I went back to her as you do and then I shot the puppy properly and ended it. And that will leave a girl with more respect for you and she's more likely to cut try and come back to you than if you drag it out, you're being a pussy, you're, ripping off the plaster and then fiddling with the wound as I say, not letting it heal properly. It's not a clean break. It's bad for you. It's bad for her. This thing drags on and on and on and on. If you've seen the movie swingers, you'll see what damage that does to you. You're in scarcity. Perhaps you've got that one it is. You need to go outside, talk to girls, go and get more leads. How many podcasts can I make with this message? But it's important, I say it again and again and again. Okay, slightly wider topics that I see in comments or on calls, guys are being pussies when they say, I'd love to quit my job but I can't right now because of this and this and this and this. It's like, you know, because my family will be annoyed with me, they'll think less of me. Well, I say apologize in retrospect, do it and then apologize later. Be selfish, I've made podcasts on the topic of sorting yourself out first. Why being selfish is often a very very good thing because you sort yourself out, you, increase your own happiness and then you can worry about the happiness of others around you and just by others, let's say your family seeing you in a happy situation, that's all they want. They want to see you happy, they want to see you healthy. Then in retrospect, they realize well that was a good thing that you quit your job. It was a good thing that you changed countries, you changed cities. A guy will say I'd love to travel but I can't because of this, this, this and this. Those my friend are excuses. 99% of the time they're excuses, your fears about that city being dangerous, that city because you've read something on an internet forum. Shut the fuck up my friend. Go and test it, go and test your fear, go and see for yourself. Don't believe what you read on an internet forum, go and see. Is that city really that dangerous? Is it really that bad for girls just because one guy said it was a few years ago on a post? Go and see. Stop being a pussy. Remember that guy on the tall ship, the Vietnam vet who in his late sixties with no mountaineering experience went to the Himalayas and got a guide and said, fuck it. Let's go up a hill, then let's go up a slightly bigger hill, then let's climb a low level peak and he kept going. What's your excuse? Okay. Last bit of the podcast because we can't it can't just be a rant saying, stop being a pussy, man up, go outside. How can you practically? Well, yes, at the the core of all this is the cheesy title of that book, Feel the Fear, Do it Anyway. But we can summarize it and perhaps one of these points will strike a chord with you, which one is the underlying reason why often you pussy out of things. The first solution is to stop playing the victim. Stop seeing yourself as the victim and people are stopping you doing things, it's your family that is stopping you, there's a government conspiracy that stops you from doing all these things, that it's women, that it's bitchy women, there's nothing you can do about it, the world is going to hell, the problem is your country, the problem is the political situation. Shut the fuck up, Okay, with this global mobility, you can simply move, you can simply distance yourself from that person, that thing, that situation and take personal responsibility. We'll come back to that but the minute you stop playing the victim, the minute you say I can do something about this, it's massively liberating. Stop expecting sympathy from girls. Right? That's a big one. Their pussy is not a charity, they don't owe you anything. They have the right to reject you. If you were a fucking nine or a 10 walking down the street bombarded daily with attention, yeah, you too would have that bitch face, you too would shit test, you too would filter for a high value guy. I love it when guys moan about the fact that girls are looking for high value guys. Well, you're looking for high value girls, right? You upgrade to the new iPhone, so does she. It goes both ways. So improve yourself, stop being the victim. Number two, it goes along with that stop whining. All that whining you're doing online, all that whining you're doing, in comment sections even worse on Twitter all day, you can turn that fuel because whining is just low level anger. What's that saying about it? It just being, anger coming out of a small space. That's what whining is, is turn the anger, use the anger. Anger is good if you can turn it into action. If you can say fuck this situation, fuck this thing that is holding me back, do something about it. Yeah. Think of people in much much much much much worse situations than you. Physical situations, their job, their what's happened to them, their health, something tragic with a woman, with a family member and then think of your situation, right? And turn that whining into action. Number three, goes along with the Twitter thing. Stop the passive aggressive thing. This is very big with guys who write a lot about game. This is why I say stay away from the monosphere, stay away from politics, stay away from the anonymous Twitter trolls or anonymous blogs. The passive aggressive thing has to be stopped, you have to step out of the shadows, you have to have skin in the game and real world feedback. You have to take real world feedback and it's not very nice. If you think you're the shit, perhaps you write online all day and then you go outside and a girl rejects you, it's a shock. But that real world feedback aka the girl is your mirror is what changes you. I've said many times chanting mantras in the mirror is not going to change you, reading a self help book is not going to change you, going to a seminar is not going to change you. This podcast is not going to change you. But this podcast will make you go outside and talk to 10 girls. The feedback from those 10 girls will change you. So there you go in a way, in a way this will work but the caveat is this is just the push. I push you off the bridge, it's the bungee jump, it's the act of falling and the massive hit of adrenaline and then serotonin you get, that's what changes you, not the physical act of somebody pushing you. Okay. I'm ranting but this is good. Let's get through the end of this list. Say no more. So for mister nice guy, learn to say no more. That simple word, two letters, n o. I remember at school when I started gaming, it started changing my relationships with other teachers and even the management. And previously, I would stay at school as the Mr Nice Guy after hours, I was there late into the night not getting paid, I would work on weekends not getting paid, I would volunteer for things, thinking that that would somehow endear me, it would make them respect me. No, just like with girls and with life, it makes them respect you less, you're a pushover, you're a little bitch. And I remember saying no to the head teacher, she asked me to do something and I remember seeing the amazing reaction. She then respected my time, she then saw me as somebody that had boundaries and limits. So bringing it back to girls, don't put up with her shit. Alright, be willing to walk away, my way or the highway. Goodbye, not getting reactive but moving on, going getting more leads, talking to more girls. No, saying no. Let's wrap it up with the important ones. I've said realize that you're on your own. That's a huge one for the black sheep bandit. Nobody is coming to rescue you. This is the essence of the black sheep bandit. Personal responsibility. Yep. That's why I said, don't expect sympathy from girls. You sort yourself out, then she's the cheerleader when she sees you're the top dog in whatever situation. She's not impressed with you telling her how you're going to change and you're going to make things better in the future. You don't tell her all about this stuff, you just show her the end product and you sort yourself out, you're on your own. We can go into that in future black sheep bandit videos. That's the essence of stoicism. That's the essence of sorting your life out with girls but also your personal situation. So if you've seen episode one of the black sheep bandit series two, there's the plug, you'll see how Johnny is not just sorted himself out with gain but his life situation, his job, becoming his own boss, living where he wants to live, all good stuff. The next one, which is, what Johnny does and if you've watched my travel videos in the past, you'll see that I do it too. Do stupid shit. Alright. And then think about it later. Tell your your mother later that you did a bungee jump, that you did a skydive, that you got into a situation where you got punched in the face and you took a lesson from that. Real world feedback, yeah? You go and swim in a freezing lake. It sounds cheesy, feel the fear, do it anyway. But essentially get used to that feeling in your stomach. Get used to that very uncomfortable feeling just before you go on stage and do a seminar. It's the same feeling as just before going and speaking to that hottie in Starbucks. It doesn't go away. Just before you jump out of the plane, it's still there that fucking feeling. But you embrace it, you desensitize yourself to it as much as you can, you come to look forward to that feeling, you come to enjoy it. It will be there when you approach, it will be there when you escalate, it will be there when you bounce, it will be there when you dump a gill, when you end, when you shoot the puppy. But doing stupid shit, yeah, as cheesy as it sounds, you're expanding your zone of comfort. And finally, watch the movie Fight Club if you haven't already, if you're new to this whole game PUA cold approach black sheep bandit thing. The Fight Club movie was what kick started a lot of this. Take lessons from it. You can at the same time, if you want to do a bit more of the keyboard work, you can write down a list of things that you're fearful of, that things you're putting off and no, this is not an Oprah Winfrey episode, this is your life as Fight Club says, it is ending one minute at a time. So you have that list in your hand, you've seen the movie Fight Club, you've listened to this podcast. Now is the time my friend for skin in the game. You're going to go through that list one by one, even if it takes you the next ten years. And that my friend is how you stop being a pussy. That's all we can say there. Father time is upon us. That was half an hour. I hope that was a good one. Episode 189. You can sample what I'm about to say. Put it on loop in your phone. Stop being a pussy.