Do you think about laying in bed all alone, candles lit, romantic music playing in the background, with a bottle of KY lotion next to you, as you slowly explore your organ for probably the thousandth time this year? Is that self-love?

How about when you look in the mirror and you actually admire everything about yourself, when you stare directly into your eyes and embrace everything about who you are. Is that self-love?

Or when you actually write down all the amazing things about how you are, the type of friend that you are, the type of lover that you are, the type of boyfriend that you are, the type of man that you’ve become, and more importantly, through all those experiences, how you look at yourself. Is that self-love?

Self-love is by far the most powerful lesson when it comes down to dating. Without it, you are doomed. You really are. There is no chance in hell you are ever going to meet somebody great unless you love yourself.

So how do you go about loving yourself? Pretty simple. You’ve got to start looking at the good points of you, instead of the bad points. And this is usually where I get the “Yeah, But David” from my clients.

“Yeah, but David, I really, really don’t like the way my body looks right now and I’d do much better meeting the opposite sex as soon as I like my body.”

Do you hear the way that you are talking? Listen to what you are saying “when I like my body.” You’ve got to love your body.

Here is the deal: your body can always be better. Whose body can’t be better? All of us could lose a few pounds; all of us could gain a few more pounds of muscle; all of us could fix our hair, fix a tooth, or whatever it might be. But self-love starts every day because every single day you have an opportunity to meet the opposite sex; you have the opportunity to meet a great woman and if you are feeling down about yourself, there is no way in the world you are going to be able to meet that awesome woman.

Self-love is one of the most powerful journeys you can take and everybody needs to take that journey every single day. Otherwise, you might end up like this person:

“I am really waiting until the spring time to date because I figure by then, I will have the job that I want because right now I just don’t really like my job that much. And I know I am going to have a better job even though I haven’t sent my resume out yet but I know someone is going to want me once I send my resume out. Not only that but spring time, I am going to lose the 20 pounds that I have put on over the course of the holidays and the wintertime and I am going to start hitting the gym come March and I will look a lot better and…”

It doesn’t start in the future! Self-love starts in the present. It starts right now.

Self-love.

I live right on the beach in L.A., and I thought about something I noticed on my trip: the Atlantic Ocean in Miami sounds different than the Pacific Ocean. The waves are smaller, but have continuous little swells that come in, so you hear a constant whooshing sound. The Pacific has bigger waves that crash harder, so it’s a different sound. In Hawaii, the ocean sounds different too. When I’m in the South of France, at the beach in Cannes, the waves are totally different.

Nature has so many different sounds. Each beach has different birds with different sounds. Different forests have different sounds depending on the density of the trees. Each thunderstorm is different depending on where you are. If you’re in the mountains, a thunderstorm sounds far different than it does if you’re on flatland in Kentucky.

Getting in touch with nature can make you a far more interesting person, but not only that, it’s going to help you connect with the opposite sex better. You’re going to be more tuned into the environment and you’re surroundings.

Every day, lots of people here watch the sunset over the Pacific Ocean. But when you live on the East Coast, you watch the sunset over a city because the sun sets in the West. Different! And the reflection of the sun fading out as the day gets dark over the water on the East Coast gives it a different hue that you don’t get on the West Coast. On the West Coast, you get the red water, the red sunset.

It’s all about noticing these little things in those “torturous” sounds of silence that makes you really start to think about how beautiful the world is. When I was in Miami, I always looked up, and that’s something that I learned to do. I look at the Art Deco buildings and admire the architecture and I think to myself, “Wow! These were built by hand in a whole different era.”

I notice buildings. I notice the way the sand feels. It’s different sand in Miami Beach compared to the sand where I live in Los Angeles. Everything is different in the world. It’s up to you to explore it.

Start looking around. Start looking up. I remember when I was in Miami and I stared at this beautiful Deco building. It was an off-yellow at the base, and then as it went upward it became more white. And it had trees on the upper level, which means that somebody had a giant patio. And everyday they get to see the sunset on the East and the way that the beautiful sun reflects on the water as it sets.

I urge you all to get out into the world and start paying attention. Get in touch with everything that’s around you and you’ll never be lacking in conversation.

. . .

Some days I’ll walk down the street and I’ll see a woman and say, “Do you ever look up, because some of the most beautiful things are up there.”

I know, that was a silly question because everyone likes ice cream. One of the things we love about it are all the different flavors there are to choose from. Whatever kind of person you are, sweet or savory, there is a flavor for you.

In dating, like ice cream, there is an abundance of choices available to you. (Do you have an abundance mindset?)

Now watch this video and talk amongst yourselves in the comments below.

Okay, I don’t know if those are the lyrics at all, but I know that it’s all about the sound of silence.

For so many of you, when you’re out on a date or in a new relationship, the sound of silence really bothers you. But in reality, there never really is any silence. You can be standing there looking out at the water on a date, listening to the ocean, and feeling the need to talk, but in reality what’s the issue? If you just stood there and looked into the water together you’re forming a memory, you’re forming a union, and you’re both enjoying nature.

There are so many beautiful sounds that are around you at all times, there’s never really complete silence.

Don’t be afraid of the silence. Enjoy it. And after sitting next to your date in “silence” for 20 minutes, listening to the ocean, look at her and say, “God, that was amazing. I love listening to the ocean; it’s such an amazing, rhythmic, incredible sound.” You can share silence together; you don’t have to be afraid of it.

It’s amazing how we always feel the need to talk, or to fill the airspace with words, or thoughts, or anything. But through silence we actually get deeper in touch with our emotions and we connect back to the Mother Earth; we connect back to the way things really are.

I’m writing this as I’m sitting on Miami Beach listening to the water, listening to the birds, watching the people leave the beach, watching the sun get lower into the sky, checking out the art deco buildings, looking at the way that these lifeguard stands are painted, and just listening to the water and to the sound of the ocean.

It’s that easy. Get peaceful. Learn to enjoy the silence.

So it’s the middle of the week. I love the middle of the week because it gives us an opportunity to look at the first couple days and see what we can do better, then go and kick ass for the rest of the week.

There were some of the best play off games ever this past Sunday. What kind of chatter do you think is going through Billy Cundiff’s head?  You guys think you have issues. You look at a woman and you can’t walk up to her.  Imagine right now being Bill Cundiff of the Baltimore Ravens and hooking a 30 yard field goal and giving the Patriots the Super Bowl.  Imagine being Lee Evans and dropping a sure-fire touchdown pass, directly in your hands.  Dropping the ball to the ground because you weren’t focused in the end zone.  Imagine being him.

Don’t you think he’s got a lot of monkey chatter going on in his head?

Now I want to fast forward to your life. Life is about repetition and believing in yourself.  Here’s the deal guys: you’re not playing in front of 70,000 people.  There are not 70,000 fans whose heart you might be breaking when you drop a pass or hook a field goal.

Let’s put it in pick up terms: when you approach a woman and you hook your words and you don’t go anywhere with them.  The reason why you’re hooking your words, the reason why you’re dropping the easy ones, is because you’re not going out and doing the work every single day.  In order to become amazing at meeting women, you need to go out every single day.

It’s hump day fellas. Set an intent. Set a goal.  Write down: I’m going to approach 15 women per day for the next seven days.  I guarantee you that if you do that and you check back the following week, things are going to be a lot better for you.

Life is about repetition, and in order to become good at something, you’ve got to practice, practice, practice.  So get out there and practice.

. . .

PS. Don’t look at practice the way Allen Iverson does.

PSS. All jokes aside, do you go out there and play every ‘game’ like it’s your last? Food for thought…

So you are out on a date with somebody, it goes fairly well. Pretty soon, you’re waiting for them to call you back and you become obsessed about that person. You call up all your friends to try to figure out what you did right, what may have gone wrong, when they might call you, or why didn’t they haven’t called you yet.

“How come they didn’t call! What did I do wrong?”

And then all of sudden it’s six weeks later, you’ve been talking about this person constantly, and you haven’t dated anybody else since that date. You basically just wasted six weeks of your dating life.

Here is the deal: if you go out on a date and your date never calls you back afterwards––it’s over. Once it’s over, there’s no reason to think about it ever again. That person was not your dream person, that person was not your soul mate, that person was not the person you really wanted them to be since you went out on that date.

What you need to do is realize that all of that time that you’re wasting being obsessed about somebody you once dated and who doesn’t feel the same way about you is really just time wasted not going out and meeting anybody else. It’s time wasted not living your life the way you want to; time wasted on somebody that doesn’t give a damn about you; time wasted on a person who won’t even give you the time to call you back.

That’s the reality of it. This person who you’re obsessing over did not care enough about you to call you back. So now what do you do with that? You stop thinking about that person, you stop obsessing over that person, and you start realizing that there are so many more people out there. The world is abundant. There is an inventory of amazing single people to date everywhere you look.

I’m tired of the complaining, I’m tired of the obsessions.

Now is the time for you to get real with yourself, and stop the complaining, the whining, and start reengaging with the people around you.

Look at your life right now. Look at the people you’ve dated that didn’t work out. Look at how many hours and how many days you’ve obsessed about those people and think to yourself, “Why did I do it? Why did I drive everybody crazy talking about it?”

Stop.

. . .

It’s 2012. You’re all growns up now. Let the past be the past. Look around you and be grateful for all the attractive people you’re going to be dating soon.

Now get out there and engage life. Stop obsessing and get into your best relationship yet.

You deserve it.

PS. Whatever you do, don’t be this guy.

When I sat down to write my new book, Naked, I realized that I was writing to a very diverse audience. Some of you live on the coast, some of you live in the middle of the country. Some of you live in Europe, some of you live in Japan. But all of us have very different lives and we have different choices to make every single day on how we’re going to live our lives.

Some of us love consistency, like waking up at the crack of dawn everyday. We like to have the same exact food every single morning. Or going for the same walk, and then we take our nap at the same exact time every day. At night we like to go to bed at the same time after we watch our favorite Sesame Street or Sponge Bob show.

And then, some of you thrive on inconsistency. You prefer to go with the flow, or with how you’re feeling in the moment.

You’ve got to realize what your consistencies and your inconsistencies are because you’ll need to find somebody that will be able to embrace the way in which you choose to live your life. If you’re someone who consistently lives your life by a schedule, then you can’t be with somebody like me who loves inconsistency.

I like to wake up at different times every single day. I like to start my day off differently every single day. I don’t really enjoy my life when it’s the same every single day. I don’t like to go on the same vacations at the same time each year. I like to go for a beach vacation one month and then, six months later, go on a city vacation.

And when I sat down to write Naked I realized that there’s no way in the world that people will ever be able to meet their perfect match if they don’t know about their consistencies and inconsistencies. There’s no way in the world they’ll be able to do it or figure it out. Because what happens in life and who you meet is a reflection of how you conduct your life.

So let’s think today. Are you a consistent person or an inconsistent person? When it comes down to all your mannerisms in life, do you fully embrace and love every single one of them? Are there things that you would like to change? It is very important.

Before you go and go out and date people, figure out who you are first; that’s what’s really important.

And I also want you to buy my book Naked on Amazon and write a review when you’re done. That’s super important too.

I remember when I was 19 and a sophomore at American University, I got broken up with by my high school girlfriend for the third time. (Thanks, Chris, for breaking my heart three times—now I know why I’m such a cold person. …Just kidding.) But anyway, my heart was broken. And I remember going to American University and thinking to myself, “You know, I want an abundance of girls I can date. I want to be able to meet girls whenever I want. I want people to know me for the person that I always dreamt myself to be.”

You know that superhero version of ourselves that we have in our heads? That incredible, awesome version of you that goes on all the adventures and saves the world? Well, we get so caught up in that superhero version of ourselves, but we don’t really know how to execute it. But here’s the deal: every day when we wake up, we’re naked. We are raw and vulnerable to the world. But then we put on this shell and our shell is all of our past experiences of failure and people that hurt us. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

When I went to college my sophomore year, I decided that I was going to become the person I always dreamt of because nobody knew who I was. I was able to portray the most confident version of myself because that is all they knew. They didn’t know about my past failures, they didn’t know anything about my past.

That’s how the world looks at you every single day. That girl that you are looking at in the corner at the grocery store, she has no idea that you are insecure. She has no idea that you have approach anxiety. The girl that you are checking out in the line at Starbucks has no idea about your approach anxiety or about any of your fears. It is about really becoming naked, open and vulnerable every single day.

For all of you that haven’t heard yet, I have got a brand new book out called Naked. Naked is all about stripping down all of your fears and all of your insecurities and allowing the world to see the amazing superhero version of yourself. It’s only $10 and it’s something that I think all of you need to grab because it’s a wonderful starting point for the new you.

When my publisher asked me when I wanted the book to come out, I said I wanted it to come out in the beginning of the year, so that everybody who is working on their resolutions and their new self will actually have something to work with. Naked is full of exercises. It’s a step-by-step guide to becoming totally raw, open, and vulnerable and so that you can go after what you want, not only in dating, but also in life.

They had good pedigree. They were successful and age appropriate. They were good-looking. They followed up with phone calls. Then all of a sudden—poof—they just vanished.

You’re in shock. You can’t believe that this one went away. You felt like it was the perfect kind of a relationship. You really felt like you were ready for it. You really needed this relationship because you were so tired of dating. You were tired of putting yourself online and having nothing happen. You were tired of going to the parties and heading out to the same bars and restaurants. You felt like this was the one.

Here’s the deal: everything that you’ve ever known about dating is wrong. During those three weeks you never kept a dating journal. See, Mr. and Mrs. Perfect do not exist. What we do when we date is we get caught up in what I call the oxytocin moment. We get caught up in this wave of emotion, like a drug is released in our bodies.

It feels so good to be rescued from being single. But in reality, the warning signs are there from the beginning. I tell everybody in my very new book, Naked, to keep a dating journal, and write down how you feel at the end of each date. How does this person make you feel? Do you feel desired? Do you feel excited? Take it even deeper. Do you keep a journal where you know exactly the way you need to feel in a relationship?

My new book Naked goes really deep into dating. It gets you to fall in love with the most important person in your life: you. Because when it comes down to dating, most of us date based on needs. I need to have a relationship. I need to no longer be single. I need to find somebody different because the last person didn’t treat me well.

What Naked does is it takes everything down to the root and allows you to forgive everything that’s gone on in your life and allows you to embrace all the lessons you’ve learned. But more importantly, it gets you to fall in love with who you are as a person. It allows you to realize that you’re an amazing catch.

Naked is almost 200 pages of daily exercises that help you no longer date out of need, out of frustration, or out of desperation. When it comes to love, in order to find someone to love you the way you need to be loved, you need to love yourself first. You need to take yourself out on dates. You need to do things for yourself. You need to feel amazing and wonderful and you need to strip yourself down of all your fears and become naked. You need to forget about past failures and learn from them.

But more importantly, you need to know exactly what you want going into that date, emotionally. Because when it comes down to dating, all it is is based on feelings. How did you feel at the end of a date? Most of us have never asked that question, because we always date based on wants, needs, and desires.

It’s time to change the way you date. It’s time to get naked.

They’ll walk around and go, “cracker, cracker, cracker”. Whenever they’re learning arithmetic, they’re always counting, “one, two, three, four, five”. Whenever they’re learning the ABC’s, they’re always singing the ABC’s. Kids do this throughout their entire life in order to learn so that they may act subconsciously and naturally after that.

How come, as an adult, we stop doing it that way? Even though, as an adult, we tend to act like children—we really do.  We complain like a toddler.  We basically sit there and whine.

“Ah man, I went out and approached some women today and it just didn’t work. I’m never doing this again!”

We literally act like children when it comes to dealing with our relationships, and I don’t mean that in a positive way. We act like the two-year-old toddler that we just don’t want to deal with anymore.

Life is repetition. Life is all about repetition. There are no if’s, and’s, or but’s about it. You can recreate yourself in so many different ways, but you’ll need to apply that same childlike obsession in order to do it.

I want you to check out today’s video. It’s all about how you can literally recreate yourself like artwork on a wall.

I’ve also got a new book out called Naked. It’s a passion project of mine. It’s about really recreating yourself everyday and formulating new habits, so you’re able to become 100% open, raw and vulnerable and not care about what anyone else thinks.