How to Get a Girlfriend with Connell Barrett - Textual Healing: The New Way to Text and Get Dates—Play, Play, Play… Pull the Trigger (Part 1 of 3)

Episode Date: July 29, 2025

Do you struggle with texting women? Do you feel like you’re always one boring message away from getting ghosted? Dating coach and bestselling author Connell Barrett reveals his powerful new texting framework to make your messages magnetic: “Play, Play, Play, Pull the Trigger.” You’ll learn how to confidently flirt over text so you get a lot more dates. Plus, you’ll hear how one woman went from rejecting Connell to asking HIM out—just from a short text exchange.Episode Highlights Include:01:15: Connell Sings! (Be Very Afraid)02:35: The “Play, Play, Play, Pull the Trigger” Texting Framework Explained03:45: First She Rejected Connell, Then She Chased HIM for a Date11:19: What Most Guys Get Wrong About Texting (and How to Fix It)17:13: Yes, Good Texting is Learnable—Here’s Why21:57: Connell Walks You Through a Flirty Text Exchange that Led to a DateREADY TO ATTRACT YOUR DREAM GIRLFRIEND? BOOK A FREE STRATEGY CALL WITH CONNELL:www.DatingTransformation.comWANT A FREE COPY OF CONNELL'S NO. 1 AMAZON BESTSELLING BOOK, “DATING SUCKS BUT YOU DON'T”? EMAIL CONNELL:[e-mail]

I'm going to teach you a whole new way to think about texting. It's going to be easier. It's going to be more effective. It's going to be fun. You get to do it with authenticity. And most importantly, you get to do it in a way that women like. Welcome back to the How to Get a Girlfriend podcast. I am your host, dating coach and bestselling author, Connell Barrett.

I am here to help you flirt with confidence. get more dates and get a great girlfriend, all by being radically authentic. No pickup artist moves. This is about being authentic and the real you, because that's who women want. And think of me as your podcast dating coach. I'm your podcast wingman here to help you get a great girlfriend. And one of the things I'll bet you struggle with if you're like most men is you're not sure how to text women.

You're not sure how to be flirtatious, magnanimous. genetic by text. And if you're not sure how to text women and you're not doing it well, that leads to ghosting, leads to women going quiet where you think, a conversation, you think it's going well, you're bantering back and forth, maybe you got her number off of an app or in real life, and you're bantering back and forth or you think you are, and then she goes quiet. And that's frustrating. It costs you dates. It can cost you confidence and it can really take a toll. And today I have a solution for you. I want to help you have a little bit of, you might call it, textual healing. Like Marvin sang, I want textual healing. Textual. Ooh, baby. Makes women feel so fine.

Oh, yeah. Helps to relieve your mind. Ooh. Textual healing is something that's good for you. Okay, please don't sue me a state of Marvin Gay. And please don't take this episode down. Hope I get away with that. Anyway, I wanted to give you some textual healing. This is the first of three episodes where I'm going to take you through how to text women. This is the first of three episodes.

And today I'm going to teach you my texting framework. I'm going to teach you a whole new way to think about texting. It's going to be easier. It's going to be more effective. It's going to be fun. You get to do it with authenticity. And most importantly, you get to do it in a way that women like, that will get more women messaging you back and get more women out on dates with you.

So I'm going to teach you my framework today. And the next two episodes, I've got a lot more great practical advice for you. So here's my texting framework. It's four simple parts. Here it is. Play, play, play, play, pull the trigger. I'll say it again. Here's my four-part texting framework. Play, play, play, play, then pull the trigger. What does that mean? It means that most of your text messages should be playful, light. Give a playful compliment. Tell a playful joke. Make a playful observation. Do this and you'll get responses back because women like

to play with us and after some light playful banter then you quote unquote pull the trigger by pull the trigger i simply mean you ask her out you ask for what you want which is usually a date a video date a phone date some escalation from just messaging back and forth so that's it play play play play pull the trigger that is the philosophy it's elegantly simple and effective and you get to pour your own real authentic personality and humor and lightness into this system. So before I kind of break it down, break down how to do it, I have a quick story to share with you. I want to tell you about Annie. I want to tell you about a woman I briefly dated a few years ago. It's actually shortly before the pandemic. And this is a really good example of play, play, play, pull the trigger in

action. I want to share with you how just by texting her this way, I went from getting blown off and told, not interested, to making sparks happen and all of a sudden we're dating and having an amazing time. So here's the quick story of Annie. She and I had been messaging for a few weeks off and on. We had matched on a dating app called The League. And I've been trying for a first date with Annie. Annie, by the way, is a kind, beautiful private equity real estate agent. And we just couldn't get our schedules aligned. And one day, this is early in January of this year, of the year I'm talking about, 2020, early in January, because I'd sent her a happy New Year message. I remember that. And then one day, she sends me a polite blowoff message. And instead

of just going away with my tail between my legs, I instead decided to use my play, play, play, pull the trigger philosophy. And just a few messages later, she'd gone from rejecting me to setting up a date with me. So here's how I did it. Here's pretty much exactly what she and I wrote. So we have a couple of messages back and forth trying to figure out a date for us for trying to figure out our first date. Then Annie writes me, quote, hey, sorry, I won't be able to meet you. I'm talking to somebody else about a first date, but I wish you the best of luck. I'm sure you'll find somebody. wonderful on the league. I write back, hey, no worries, Annie. Glad to hear you made a love connection, but I'll have to return the engagement ring I bought you. A little smiley face and

an engagement ring emoji. Annie writes back, L-O-L. Sorry, I'm just an honest person, but hey, perhaps it'll be a terrible date. So she's starting to open the door right there. Next, I write, I have an idea. How about I come on that first date with you? And you can give the guy you like most a rose, just like on The Bacheloret. Annie writes back, L.O.L. That would be different for sure. You know, it's too bad that you and I never connected. I just don't like dating more than one guy. Me. No worries. I only spent $7 on your ring, so it's okay. It's a fake diamond. It's a diamondoid. She writes back, perfect. I'm clumsy, and I probably would fall and lose the ring. I write back, few. Then I jop, then I dodged a bullet. I mean, you're adorable and you seem

really cool, but if you dropped the very symbol of our eternal love down the gutter, that would hurt. Annie writes back, L-M-A-O, laughing my ass off. I can't help it. I'm clumsy. I write back, Oh, that is so you. It's why I proposed. Annie writes, Ha, ha, ha, you're cute. Maybe I should meet you. I write back,

LOL, thanks. You're super cute, too. I'm just trying to keep up with your cuteness. You have a great sense of humor, and don't worry, I never propose until date number two. Now, at this point, I am getting ready to, quote,

pull the trigger and ask her out, because she's clearly really liking this light, playful vibe that I've created, this fun little role play. I'm doing a role play here. That's what makes it playful in this example. A fun little role play where I'm pretending that Annie and I are already engaged,

even though we haven't met yet. Annie writes back, so I'm getting ready to pull the trigger, actually. Then Annie writes back, ha, ha, ha, we should, you know, we should meet up, exclamation point, heart eye emojis. I'm a call you in a min. She writes I, MMA. I'm a call you in a min. And in like a couple minutes later, my phone rings.

I remember it vividly. It was a Sunday afternoon in early January of that year. And all of a sudden, my phone rings. By the way, this entire text exchange happened in the course of a brief short afternoon back and forth. My phone rings. It's Annie, obviously. We talked for like a half hour.

We had a great conversation. And then we had an amazing date two or three nights later that ended with Annie spending the night. So think about this. I went from her giving me a blow-off text to having her call me, her quote, chase me, and then all of a sudden we're lining up a date for a couple nights later. And on that date, she spends the night. And all I did was I kept it playful. All I did was I followed this philosophy of play, play, play, and then pulled the trigger. Notice what I didn't do. I didn't logically try to convince her to meet with me. I would not have worked. I had said, oh, I don't know, come on, why don't you give me a chance? That guy is probably not right for you. You know, you can't really logically talk somebody into doing something and dating very effectively because this is not an analytical, logical space. This is about heart and emotions. Instead, I kept it playful. Also, notice I didn't just give up. A lot of men

would have just taken no for an answer. But I didn't take no for an answer, but I didn't. I didn't I didn't not take no in a disrespectful, toxic way. I just cracked jokes and kept it light and playful. So I guess the technique I used in addition to play, play, play, pull the trigger is essentially I was speaking to her fun, light, emotional side of her mind, not trying to logically convince her to date me. But nor did I give up either. So that's an example of play, play, play, pull the trigger in action.

although actually she was the one who pulled the trigger by calling me. But then when we were on the phone, I was the one who asked her out. So I did pull the trigger. You struggle with dating, right? Sure, you have a good job and cool friends, but you just aren't sure how to flirt. The apps don't work for you. And sometimes women put you in the friend zone. It's frustrating.

Hey, I struggled with dating too. As an introvert and a total nerd, I didn't just live in the friend zone. I owned real estate there, but I escaped using the dating philosophy of radical authenticity, which I've used to help thousands of men in 17 countries find love. It's what I wrote about in my best-selling book, Dating Sucks But You Don't, and Radical Authenticity is why psychology today called me the best dating coach in America. And now I want to personally help you attract your dream girlfriend. So go to datingtransformation.com and book a free call with me. On our call, I'll tell you how my one-on-one coaching will help you find your dream girlfriend, and you'll be

doing it by flirting with confidence and authenticity. No creepy pickup tricks needed. So go to datingtransformation.com, book a free call today, and let my personalized coaching help you get a great girlfriend. That's essentially what play, play, play, pull the trigger can look like in one example. Now, that's just one example. It can look different. But let me pull back and explain why this one.

works. Okay? What is flirting? What is the simplest part of dating, this thing called flirting? Well, Webster's defines flirting as, quote, playing at love. In the courtship phase of dating, that's what most of your text messages should be, playful, right? So, for example, don't write, you know, we want to avoid logic and information and instead lean into light, playful good emotions, right? So you don't write, oh, I see you play piano. Cool. How long have you been playing? That's a logical question.

What you could write is something like, oh, I see you play piano. Very cool. What song would you play to wow the judges on America's Got Talent? Notice the difference there? The first text asks an informational question, while the second text, the second question has an emotional what if embedded into it, a sense of play, a fun sense of, ooh, what would I play on America's Got Talent? So think about it this way. Playfulness signals ease, confidence, zero desperation. Also being playful shows that you don't take yourself too seriously. And that meeting you might be fun. women hate hate hate boring dates and a nice light playful vibe tells her okay he may or may not be

mr right but he won't be mr boring i'll go on a date with him and that's going to get you a lot more dates so when it comes to applying this philosophy ask yourself okay based on where i am with this woman terms of knowing her, how long we've been messaging, where we, how we connected. Ask yourself this question, how can I make this message fun? How can I make it fun? And there's different ways to be playful and make messages fun. You could share a playful compliment. Something like, oh, you run marathons? That's so impressive. Should I start training now? Or can I just drive alongside you with snacks and encouragement, right? You could make a playful observation. You know, let's say you, I don't know, let's say you match with a school teacher. I've matched

with a lot of school teachers. I guess I have a type. You could make a playful observation and say, takes the fact that she's a school teacher and maybe one piece of information you have about her and make a fun light observation, such as, so you're a teacher and you're a horror movie fan? Let me guess. You read Stephen King novels to your students to terrify them and keep them up all night, right? That's playful, right? It's a nice, light, playful, very gentle tease. Also, it's more silly. It's not even a tease. It's just a silly, fun idea. Or you could do one of my favorite things to do, which is you can give her a playful quiz. Hey, pop quiz, pizza lover. Thin crust or deep dish, careful. There's only one right answer. Winky face. Notice how light and playful that is

instead of saying, what is your favorite kind of pizza? You're putting some emotional stakes in a light playful context with your pizza question. But more importantly, you're taking the very conversation and pouring it into the container, so called, of a quiz. And quizzes are a fun go-to, for playfulness that I really like a lot. People just like quizzes, right? Both men and women. But I think especially women. There's a reason why every woman's magazine,

at least back when magazines were a thing, every woman's magazine was this quiz, that quiz. Is he cheating on you? Who's the right man for you? BuzzFeed is just all quizzes, right? People love quizzes. So that's a fun, quick training wheels way to start practicing being more playful.

And so, yeah, so basically you keep things playful, aim to exchange. Let's say you match with a woman or you get her number in some way. Let's say it's from a, let's say you match on a dating app, right? Aim to exchange, once you get her number off the dating app, aim to exchange a total of five to ten playful text messages with her and then ask her out. Then you pull the trigger. and when it's time to pull the trigger you still can keep things playful right um you don't have to ask her out in a logical boring way you could still ask her out with a light a sense of nice like

light playfulness right um so when you ask a woman out you can still keep it playful but the bottom line is that fourth part is pull the trigger ask her out because women don't want to be a pen pal Even if you're being fun and playful and she's enjoying it, which she will, she'll still want you to move things forward. So four parts. Pull, pull, pull. I'm sorry, play, play, play, pull the trigger. And switching analogies here for a second, I'm a big movie fan. So I like to think of texting women as a trailer.

It's like a coming attraction trailer. And the first date is to feature film. Now, if the coming attractions are flat, in other words, boring text messages, she's not going to want to see the movie. She's not going to want to go to the movie and you'll get ghosted often. But when your texts are fun, light, playful, she's going to want to have a front seat at the movie of the first date with you. Now, you might be thinking, oh, but I'm not naturally playful. I'm a logical guy. I beg to differ. I coach so many men who are logically minded in most of their life. I've coached so many software engineers.

engineers, engineer, engineers, doctors, accountants, tech coders, don't sweat it. Most men, including me, are naturally inherently logical and analytical. You can learn and awaken a playfulness. It's in there. I promise you it's in there. So if you're thinking, Connell, I'm not playful. I beg to differ. You were a kid once. You played games you teased your buddies you have an inner child who is still in there you can tap into that and an important thing i want to mention is that the idea of play play play play pull the trigger notice i'm not saying witty witty witty witty ask her out i'm saying play play play i'm not saying it has to be amazing content you're not a content creator you don't have to have some high

level of amazing, funny, witty lines. If you do, it can be a nice bonus every so often, but you don't need to be the wittiest, most charismatically clever guy in the world. If anything, too much of that can come off as laying it on too thick, not relatable to women. All you need to do is keep it light and playful by asking questions about light topics. by instead of asking her how old is your dog send her a picture or a video of your dog if you have a pet doing something adorable funny silly you're playing with her you're giving her something playful and enjoyable to think about to play with um so yeah play play play play play play play pull the trigger it keeps things light and fun, and then that's what gets her to want to meet you because

she's thinking, wow, if he's light and fun here by text, then our date will probably be a good time. And that's all it takes to have a woman go on a date with you, is she's enjoying your texting vibe back and forth. But just make sure you're doing all of this in an authentic way. You want to make sure that you're being light and playful in a way that's authentic, congruent to you. That's who the right woman is going to fall for. The real you, the best core you. I want to read you one more exchange I had with a different woman. Also from a dating app, and her name is Susie. I'm just going to read this right off my phone right now. I want to show you one of the simple ways I like to be playful with a woman. A couple things you can do here, and you can borrow my techniques.

don't copy my style if it doesn't seem like you. I don't want you to sound like me. And I sure as hell don't want you to sound like chat GPT. Do not offload your playfulness to chat GPT. Chat GPT is terrible at humor and play. It is so mediocre at this. So I'd rather you do your best solo here than don't use chat as your ghost writer. It is not good at this. Yet. Maybe it will be one day. But anyway, okay. This is a woman named Susie. Susie is a lovely woman. I met on a different dating app called, what dating app was this? Oh, Susie's from Hinge. And Susie is lovely. She's smart. She's intelligent. She's a registered nurse. Big heart, warm for what it's worth. also gorgeous, more curves than Route 66.

She is an absolute quality, wonderful dating option. I never met her. This is just a text exchange I had, and I really liked our interaction. Anyway, so Susie's profile mentions that she's a nurse. She also mentions that she calls herself the, quote, real-life Wonder Woman on her hinge. I liked that. So when you're looking at a woman's profile, you can look at little specific things she says about herself and ask yourself, how can I play with this?

How can I be playful with this topic or detail about her or something she's into? Anyway, so Susie and I match on Hinge and we swap a couple of messages. And I said, oh, so you're the real life Wonder Woman, are you? And then I said, well, what are your superpowers? I'm curious. Are they super speed? Super strength? Now we're talking about her through the lens of her being a superhero. See how that's playful and light rather than how long have you been a registered nurse? Where do you work? Notice I'm keeping things light by talking about the what if idea of her having actual superpowers. And she writes, yes, I'm the real deal wonder woman, laughing emoji. I'm a mom, a nurse, a woman's advocate, much more I can share later. Great.

Okay. So she's really opening up a little bit. And I wrote back, by the way, I interrupted my playfulness. I wouldn't say I interrupted it. But notice that you're about to notice that not every message I send a woman is funny or hilariously playful. we just want to keep things light. That's all I mean by playful. Light.

Keep things light. And so I respond to that with sincerity, authenticity. Oh, wow, you're a mom, a nurse, a woman's advocate. Those are three of the best things a woman can be. Totally being really sincere with her, showing some heart, not just jokes and lightness. My family is filled with nurses, I write to Susie. My niece Aaron, my Aunt Colleen, my sister. Yeah, basically, I'm giving her genuine validation.

I love nurses. My mom was a nurse. There are nurses all over my family. I just think it's beautiful. Anyway, that's right. You can be nice. You can be nice and sweet. Women like it.

It's not bad. It's quite good. Okay. Then I write, I would love to see how good you are. Oh, wait, no. Oh, she writes back, one of my superpowers is I can smell bullshit. mile away, LOL. So I really, so I'm like, okay. And then I write, I would love to see how good you are at smelling bullshit. Then I say this. Here's where I throw in a quiz. Okay, I'm going to

see how good Susie's BS detector is. Ready for a test? Question mark. And I put a little pencil and like nerd emoji, like a school, nerdy school, a kid. She writes back, let's go. Let's go. exclamation point. Here are two truths and a lie. So basically I'm just teeing up a quick little game of two truce and a lie. That's simple. I'm sure you know about two truce and a lie. It's on pretty much every dating app. Anyway, I write, okay, two truths and a lie. Which of these is bullshit, Wonder Woman? So now I'm giving her a nickname. That's a way to be flirtatious and playful. Give a woman a light, cute little nickname, something that comes out of the organic interaction. That's flirty and playful. It's both. I mean, playful is flirty, but it's extra flirtatious

because we only give people nicknames if we have a rapport with them. And that's a flirtatious thing to do. I write, okay, two truths and a lie. Number one, I appeared on a reality TV baking show. Number two, my dad was the mayor of my hometown. Number three, I played golf with a U.S. president. of those are truths. One is a lie. And she wrote, oh, wait, sorry. Actually, two are lies. Only one is a truth. I had that backwards. So it's one truth, two lies. And she wrote back that she guesses wrong. She guesses wrong. She guesses that number one and two are true and three is the lie. So she thinks she, so the truth is I have played golf with the U.S. president. She thinks that's the lie. And she writes back, okay, I think three is the lie. You have not

played golf with a U.S. president. And I write back, oh, sorry, but your BS detector is malfunctioning. Number three is the truth. And then, so I tease her a little bit for that, right? she's like oh my god no way that's amazing which president now the truth is the president i played golf with is our current president and i didn't want to get into a conversation about our current president because that can get a little bit tense with certain people which i understand so i actually deflected a little bit uh she writes which president and i write back um oh which president fDR yeah i'm a little bit older than you smiling emoji. And she laughs at that. Well, it could have been the bushes. And then our exchange

goes on a little bit longer. And then I ask her out. And she agrees to a date. And so I wanted to share that example with you because that's an example of keeping things light, but very genuine. Like the way I was just texting her, that's pretty much how I talk, how I would talk to a woman on a date. It's pretty much how I talk when I'm in a light, fun, playful mode with people, but especially if I was with a woman I was interested in. And so that's a good way. A good thing you can do when you're messaging with a woman is you can come up with a fun little test or quiz. You know, maybe she says she, I don't know, loves, she's a foodie. And you can give her her a quick little food quiz maybe about yourself it could be like okay here are three foods

guess which one i am allergic to any kind of quiz is a fun playful way to interact with a woman now you don't need to do it with every woman and don't do it more than once but it's a fun go-to for some nice light playfulness now you might be asking oh my gosh okay well i can't give every woman 10 quizzes, what else can I do to be light and playful? Well, actually, in the next episode of this series, in part two of this three-part series about texting, textual healing, I'm going to give you what I call the 10 texting commandments. The 10 texting commandments are basically the core practical how-to. Of all the dues, a couple don'ts, but mostly the dues of texting women, that is going to show you how to be playful and also show you how to pull the trigger.

And when you ask her out, have yourself a really good chance of her saying yes. So stick around to the next episode and we're going to have more textual healing coming up in part two in a couple episodes. And thank you so much for listening. And don't forget, your dream girlfriend, she is out there. there. She's going to love you, but she's going to have to meet the real authentic you. So I'll let Marvin play us out. Until next time. See you next time. Get up, get up, get up, get up.

All right, see you next time.