I can genuinely recommend you to read 'the game'. Don't get deterred by what people might tell you about it, especially people who have not ready it.
It was eye opening to me that it's in your complete control to show people (not only girls, really anybody) your uniqueness, and that you can literally meet dozens of people every week and must not rely on office environment or random coincidence.
"The Game" is only useful in making one realize that attracting women is a learnable skill. I was a big fan for a time but now realize much of what it recommends is like snake oil. I recommend going through David Deangelo's later material (2009+) and also Michael The Wizard. Deangelo's early work made it into "The Game" but even he realized with years of experience that there is a better way (Of course he made tens of millions from selling courses on material he now admits was wrong!)
Also, unfortunately a lot of PUA stuff seems to revolve around convincing men that there is an objective standard of beauty in women that all other men are chasing too, and structuring their interaction with women in ways that stop their personal judgement from diverging from that consensus.
Any specific recommendations for DeAngelo's later stuff?
I too was big into that whole PUA/game thing in a former life (more theory than practice though) and came to much the same realizations about it, particularly after listening to many of Barry Kirkey's radio shows (the very early ones) where he gave you the non-exaggerated, non-glorified view of what it was like to live in that house.
FWIW I also have a similar problem to the OP. Other things in life I'm sorting out right now but taking up classes again and going to meetups are on my radar for the near future.
> I too was big into that whole PUA/game thing in a former
> life (more theory than practice though)
I spent a few years working in that industry.
If you want to bring more women in your life, the most important thing is: "find and talk to lots of them". Everything else is window dressing, which is why the whole "theory more than practice" thing is such a dead end.
Honestly, I'd recommend one of the big commercial workshops. The attendees skew 90% towards people who want to find a life partner, a coach will be able to point out any weird habits you have that are holding you back, and it'll normalize (through a lot of practice) the idea of starting friendly and normal conversations with women in your day-to-day life. The course material tend towards 40% self-improvement, 40% "how to sell", and 20% how to make small talk. Most of them also offer pretty robust money-back guarantees. Hard to over-estimate the benefit of a workshop over reading some ebook.
So true about practice over theory but the reality is you need to change yourself and become a different person in order to have success with women, if you are currently unsuccessful. To do something you have never done, you must become someone you've never been. And you are not going to change in 3 days!
I have attended some of those bootcamps and the reality is that most of the instructors are not that successful with women themselves. They have spent lots of time perfecting the approach and interactions at bars and are great at this, but outside of it have nothing else. I think they have paid too high a price. They have no careers, and must earn a living by teaching other men how to pick up women. Fundamentally this makes you a very unattractive man. You may seduce hot chicks from bars but you will never attract or keep a quality woman. By day three she will realize what a shell of a man you are and take off! If you are in your twenties, I would strongly advise you against going this path. Work on improving yourself, becoming more interesting, advancing your career, making more friends while simultaneously learning pick up skills. It is not easy but ultimately leads to the most fulfilling life.
I recommend Man Transformation. I also recommend the book The New Psycho-Cybernetics by Maxwell Maltz (updated edition by Dan Kennedy). You can listen to the entire book on YouTube or download it and listen to it while driving. I recommend listening to it at least 3 times a month apart. I also recommend doing the following:
1. The theater of mind exercises where you visualize yourself as successful with women. You must make your visualization script really vivid for it to have any effect. And you must not lose focus while visualizing. This is actually quite hard and the reason why most people get no value out of it.
2. The mental rehearsal exercises before you go out and talk to women. You must design your life such that you are constantly interacting with women. The easiest way to do this is to sign up for dance lessons. Salsa is my preferred one. Other ideas: Hang out at coffee shops, in busy areas (malls, near college campuses etc)
email me at honeydoilookfat [at] gmail [dot] com and I'll send you more tips. For all intents and purposes I have solved the women problem although it took me six years. Now I am working on the wealth problem!
pua is usefull only when you want to get sex, but honestly considering the time you have to put into mastering pua, you can safely get a second job and pay for hookers, at least it'd be less random.
Also the book was utter garbage i've read around 30% of it and fell asleep.
It was eye opening to me that it's in your complete control to show people (not only girls, really anybody) your uniqueness, and that you can literally meet dozens of people every week and must not rely on office environment or random coincidence.