Paul Brian
I’m a nice guy at heart, and most of my life that led to people stepping on me and leaving me behind.
But in the past few years I turned a corner and tried something new: I became an alpha male.
This isn’t just a hollow label, it’s real and it’s powerful.
Becoming alpha has worked wonders in every area of my life, and I’ve decided to share the formula with you.
Here’s how to do it…
How to be an alpha male when deep down you’re a nice guy: a 13-step guide
1) Stop apologizing so much
From a young age I grew up apologizing a lot even when I hadn’t done anything wrong!
Maybe it’s due to being Canadian, but I think it was also a mindset that I should minimize my place in the world, not rock the boat and make sure everybody else was happy and approved of me.
A weak mindset, in other words.
I also noticed that I’d use weakening qualifier words in many sentences all the time, words like:
“Maybe…”
“I think…”
“I guess…”
“Sort of…”
These words were almost always unnecessary, and I realized I was using them to subtly sabotage what I said to others.
So I stopped doing it.
The results were almost immediate. People listened up more when I spoke and respected me more. I was able to be nice in a way that was empowering instead of in a way that was purely submissive.
2) Get much more self-motivated
If you want to be an alpha male when deep down you’re a nice guy, start putting action ahead of talk.
Put real effort ahead of intention.
Get active, motivated and stick to your plan. Make a schedule and follow it. Make penalties for yourself when you fail.
Not only should you stop being a flop to others, you need to stop being quite so nice to yourself.
There’s plenty of time for excuses and throwing a pity party later.
For now, focus on results and action.
Stop looking for validation or to fit the role that others have picked out for you.
Start looking out for yourself.
In simple terms: stop being so damn nice to everyone and trusting people so easily or expecting them to help you out.
It’s not going to get you anywhere in life.
And far too many will take advantage of it and see it as weakness, even if it’s not.
3) Embrace this one key brutal truth
There’s one harsh truth that you have to accept and fully embrace if you want to truly be an alpha male.
This is that brutal truth, and it’s something many people spend their entire life avoiding:
Nobody is coming to save you.
This relates to all the other points in this article, because they’re all connected.
Being an alpha male ultimately means owning your life, including your own mistakes.
It also means you fully acknowledge that many of life’s tragedies, disappointments and let-downs are out of your control.
You step up and own that. You stop looking around for anyone to save you or “fix” things for you.
You truly shift your mindset so that you’re not even subconsciously glancing around for a savior to come.
You focus on what is in your own control.
Even if you’re very religious or spiritual, you also accept that change in life will have to start with you.
4) Develop your deltoids
Your deltoids are basically your shoulder muscles, and I refer to that specifically for a reason.
Physically, you want to develop your deltoids and every other muscle on your body.
Become mentally and physically strong. Run, jog, jump, lift, push and pull.
Work out until you’re drowning in a pool of your own sweat.
I’m not saying you should literally collapse on the floor out of exhaustion and overextending yourself.
But you should be putting in a full effort and getting in a real workout at least every other day.
This not only pays enormous physical benefits, it will also bring you a lot greater mental clarity and motivation.
5) Recognize some conflict is inevitable
An alpha male understands that not all conflict is “bad.”
Trying to get everyone to like you and never upset anyone is a surefire recipe for failure in life.
It will also make you miserable.
If you wait for others to give you the greenlight for everything you do in life, love and your career, you’ll be a puppet and remain unfulfilled your whole life.
Now and then by chance and choice, people are going to clash with you and try to stop you from your goals and living by your values.
When this happens, you don’t always have the option to run away from a conflict.
You may need to stand right in their face and say you disagree and bear the pain and discomfort of knowing they dislike and disagree with you.
Do you want to be on your deathbed remembering how at least most people approved of everything you did and believed?
Or would you rather lie there knowing you stuck to your guns no matter what and lived your own life.
So: some people think you’re a loser, wrong or off track in your life.
So what?
6) Throw out the victim mindset
I’m going to say something controversial here, but I don’t care.
Taking a pointer from the last item, I’m just going to come right out and say it regardless of whether this pisses people off:
Many of us live in a modern society which encourages a victim mentality.
It’s making us weaker, stupider and more miserable.
What do I mean, exactly?
The list of examples is endless, and victim identity has become a form of score-keeping in many cases.
But more than that, we are seeing media, popular culture, politicians on all sides and philosophies that encourage rage at being a victim.
“I’m a victim, therefore I deserve XY and Z” has become the rallying cry of a spoiled and misled generation.
We’re all victims of various things, most of all to time which is slowly killing all of us!
The more we focus on being victimized for our identity, life situation or fate, the more we give up our personal power and plead with some system, government, person or supernatural force to fix it.
They won’t. We have to do this ourselves, and step one of becoming an alpha male is facing that nobody is coming to save you, like I mentioned earlier.
This means the victim mentality has got to go.
7) Delve into your discomfort zone
Instinctively, most of us seek out pleasure and avoid pain.
That’s healthy and normal on some level, of course.
It’s closely linked to evolutionary traits that helped our ancestors survive harsh climates and life-or-death situations.
The problem is this:
In a modern world where many of the daily threats to our life have been removed, our comfort zone can actually be a dangerous place. Think about someone who eats what they want, sleeps with whoever they want on a daily basis, rarely exercises and watches whatever the mainstream media lobs at them.
They are in serious danger of:
- Obesity, heart disease, diabetes and lethargy
- Sexually transmitted diseases, unplanned pregnancy and emotional exhaustion
- Stupidity, boredom, apathy, nihilism and despair.
Instead, I urge you to seek out your discomfort zone. This is where you push yourself to work out, exercise more patience in selecting romantic and sexual partners and take the time to consume books, films and programs that are actually meaningful to you.
As the Promescent Team writes:
“Becoming alpha means major life change for most guys – after all, our brains are conditioned to seek comfort and the well-tread road.”
8) Become comfortable with women
Alpha males operate from a place of confidence and strength.
They’re never reckless or idiotic about new challenges, but at the same time, they are not the kind to over-analyze or spend too much time in their head.
The alpha will always prize real world experience and results over mental masturbation.
That’s the number one reason they succeed, and that includes their success with women.
Alpha males aren’t all handsome, charming, funny or smart. If you’re any of those things, consider it an added bonus.
Instead, alpha males care more about reality than fantasy.
They ask out women they like, do their best to look good for them and try to find a partner, but they never stake their hopes or happiness on that.
They appreciate a woman for who she is and her beauty, but never let physical attraction kill their rational mind and make them act like an idiot or shell out money recklessly.
In short, alpha males are comfortable with women.
9) But stop idealizing them!
Alpha males are comfortable talking to women, take rejection on the chin and do their best to go out with women they want and turn down those they don’t want.
But they also don’t make the mistake of idealizing women as some inherently perfect species who deserve all their time and attention.
This relative indifference is what makes alpha males so attractive to women.
Alpha males aren’t playing hard to get, they actually are.
They see women strutting their stuff and they just…don’t really care.
As Shania Twain said in a much different context, “that don’t impress me much.”
Alphas avoid wasting their time, energy or emotions on people who don’t have time for them and they don’t let highly attractive and popular women scare them.
An alpha knows his own worth, and he never begs or worships at the pedestal of a beautiful woman just due to her appearance.
10) Learn when to bow out
If you’re looking at how to be an alpha male when deep down you’re a nice guy, you also need to learn when to bow out.
A true alpha doesn’t start fights, but he finishes them.
Part of not starting fights is knowing when to bow out.
But here’s the difference between a typical “nice guy” and an alpha on this:
*A nice guy will bow out of almost everything, refusing to assert himself when somebody else comes along and tries to dominate. They will almost always cede ground to self-proclaimed experts, peer pressure or conformity to whatever seems popular.
*An alpha will only bow out of situations and interactions that he knows he isn’t qualified in. He’ll never give up ground just because somebody is being a bully or exerting pressure.
11) Being a real alpha male vs. the media stereotype
As I alluded to earlier, there are a lot of incorrect ideas about what being an alpha male means.
Being an alpha male does not mean being an aggressive d*ck.
Any pickup artists or internet sales pitch that tells you this is full of crap.
A true alpha doesn’t have an interest in swaggering around and dominating others or telling them how great they are.
That’s actually the behavior of a fairly insecure and unattractive man-child.
A true alpha isn’t interested in spouting off, having a perfect Instagram account with shirtless pics or liking all the “cool” latest music and styles.
A true alpha marches to his own drum and draws other to his orbit through his own unapologetic, confident and purpose-driven life.
A true alpha is a trend-setter, not a trend-follower.
The quiet guy sitting in the corner of your university library may be the biggest alpha male you’ve ever imagined in the right context or an emergency situation…
While the gym bro puffing his chest and fist bumping his “bros” might be the weakest insecure beta male you can imagine underneath the bravado.
It’s all about what’s under the surface.
12) Find the balance between toxic and tame
The idea that being an alpha male means being toxic and stereotypically pushy and aggressive is incorrect.
At the same time, an alpha male is certainly not some tame and docile guy.
He gets out there and gets the job done, and he goes the extra mile in tense situations and crises to save others and be somebody people can rely on.
The point is that an alpha male is not necessarily the showy person who only thinks of themselves or tries to impress others.
This sort of stereotypical alpha type is actually much more likely to let others down and come to be resented by his peers.
A perfect example of this is in the military context.
Many people have a false idea of what makes a good soldier due to Hollywood portrayals of soldiering. They believe that a Rambo or Steven Seagal-style badass is the one who saves the day and racks up the medals.
The truth is closer to the opposite. The best soldiers and the heroes we look to on Memorial Day are the ones who sacrifice for the team, who put communication ahead of bravado and who care more about the mission than themselves or their image.
Recently I’ve been watching the British show SAS: Who Dares Wins.
In it, a group of ex-special forces soldiers put civilians through the paces to see if they can pass some of the basics that they first went through to join the special forces.
As the instructors say, it’s often the stereotypical swaggering alphas who are the first to fail, because they think they can go it alone and overestimate their own abilities.
The instructors are tough as nails, but they don’t care about showing off or point-scoring like fake alphas. Instead, like true alphas, they care about their mission which in this case, is to test participants to their absolute limit.
13) Stop reading this article
I’m joking. Please read to the end.
But in general, stop reading about how to be an alpha male and start being one.
Alpha males are thinkers in the sense that they value their own insights and observations.
But they never indulge in mental masturbation or daydreaming just for fun. They focus on the real life in front of them and the tools they have to change it.
Start adopting the same mindset.
You’ll thank me later.
Switching to the alpha side (SAS)
Here’s the truth:
If you accept that nobody is coming to save you…
And you accept that you have the power to reach a much greater potential…
You are already half-way to becoming an alpha male.
No matter how “nice” you are and how many times you’ve been stepped on, the formula to switch to your alpha side is simple.
Get clear on what it will involve in your life.
Then do it. Even if it takes the rest of your life.
