Ross Jeffries

Ross Jeffries, born Paul Jeffrey Ross on 20 September 1958 in Los Angeles into a Jewish family, is a former comedy writer and the creator of "Speed Seduction," a set of personal development writings and seminars that draw on Neuro-linguistic Programming and hypnotic techniques. Jeffries claims these methods help men understand women, particularly their motivations and psychology, in order to successfully pick up women. Ross's current version of Speed Seduction focuses on techniques of moving "energy" through the body and the practice of magick. His techniques and online persona have been the subject of some controversy.

Ross Jeffries is universally recognized for coining the term and the concept of 'Sarging'.

Speed Seduction
Jeffries is said by independent review to have started the seduction community with his online posts. He was the first of the Seduction Community to create a website and usenet newsgroup. He also published books, CDs, videos and runs seminars on dating and self-improvement for men. Speed seduction is based on adaptations made by Jeffries to techniques found in Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). The basis of the original Speed Seduction books and courses is the belief that in order for a person to interpret a story, question or any linguistic pattern they must first experience its content; for instance, asking someone “Have you ever been really attracted to someone?” will cause them to physically relive the experience of being attracted. The goal is to arouse women by guiding their emotional states by using language. This is said to put them in a connected or sexual state, similar to the experiences of women reading romance novels. Phonetic ambiguity (such as "your mind" vs "you're mine") and emotional anchoring are used. The concept is that by using "anchors" and "weasel phrases," these positive states can be associated to oneself and negative emotions can be avoided. From that point on, Jeffries says the seducer can remind a woman of these emotional states by his appearance or touch.

Jeffries' students and scrutineers have included the well-known dating coaches David DeAngelo and Neil Strauss. He was featured as a Pickup artist (PUA) in Strauss' bestselling book The Game.

Controversy
Jeffries argues his methods are completely different from the dating framework advocated by other romance gurus. However, others deny this, and it has earned him the nickname Mine99, as he says all the techniques are based on ones he developed in 1999. Jeffries considers the dating framework to be heavily promoted by the entertainment industry for commercial reasons and to be ineffective for bringing men and women closely together, either for sex or romance. Jeffries denies he is a misogynist, claiming his techniques are designed to bring pleasure to both men and women through a deeper understanding of the needs of each person.

He was also featured on the TV show Dr Phil in 2008, episode "Women Beware". His marketing was critiqued by the TV host and Ross claims to be the godfather of seduction.

In culture
According to Neil Strauss in "The Game", Ross Jeffries claims that the character Frank T.J. Mackey (played by Tom Cruise) in the film Magnolia, who gives seduction seminars, is modeled after Ross Jeffries. Cruise vehemently denies this, citing hours of character development that did not once mention Jeffries. Though, according to Neil Strauss in "The Game", the film's director did mention Jeffries as one of the influences when writing it.