Routines 2.0

A lot of people will tell you that routines are dead. Material is dead. Canned lines are dead.

They're not dead. They've evolved. And, they're stronger than ever.

We all know the classics, "Can I get your opinion on something?" "Hey, I have to get right back to my friends, this will only take a second," or "Did you see that fight outside?"

A routine is basically anything you've done in one interaction that you repeat in another interaction. These are far more common than you think. So why all the hate towards routines these days?

Because the old routines, for the most part, don't work any more. What made them work before (aside from the confidence that comes in believing in them) was that they were novel. People hadn't heard stuff like them before. It caught hot girls off guard and stopped them from giving their default bitch-shield response. But now everyone has heard the lines before. They'll call you out on it, and most of the time if you're using a routine it doesn't come across as authentic. You learned it from someone else. It isn't congruent with your personality or how you speak.

This doesn't mean routines are dead, it just means some routines have died. New routines have entered the scene, "Hi, I think you're really pretty and wanted to meet you," "Your shit," or "Spin-and-in," are the new stock. The new routines are more physical and take advantage of technology.

But, they work by the same principles: people are confident in them and get a boost from believing in the routine, and they're novel. "You're really pretty and I wanted to meet you," can completely catch a girl off guard, especially when delivered with the right tone and body language.

And, for the new routines, the weaknesses are still there. Any time you use a line or tactic that comes from someone else, there's a good chance it won't feel authentic. Your conversation will seem forced or rehearsed, and people won't respond well to it. Of course, over time this can go away, just like you get better at telling a certain joke the more times you've told it.

You will never get rid of routines, nor should you try. What are you going to do? Never tell the same joke twice? You'd become dreadfully boring. The key to using routines well is to pick ones that are natural to you. The best way to do this is to make your own routines. I don't mean to sit down and write out a script. Just pay attention and make note of when people respond well to you and when they don't. Figure out what types of jokes you're good at, and what doesn't work for you.

But, the advice is completely different for the beginners out there: cling to routines like they're a pair of double Ds. Memorize a bunch of them, and then go out and use them to talk to every girl you can. When you're first starting out, you're not trying to be a legendary conversationalist, you're just trying to get a feel for what the environment is like.

Using lines from other people is like playing teeball. You know it's not baseball, but you're not pretending it is. You can't develop every skill at once, so don't try. Use crutches at first to help you work on other areas. When you're more experienced, more skilled and more comfortable, then you can drop the borrowed material and transition into a more natural style.