A most highly adored book, The Mastery of Love was written by Toltecs teacher Don Miguel Ruiz in 1997. Since its genesis, it has earned numerous impressive accolades. With over 16 million copies sold worldwide, it’s been translated into an astonishing 46 languages, and it sustained a place on the New York Times Best Seller list for almost a decade.

With so many prestigious achievements, one’s mind can’t help but be gripped with curiosity. What makes this piece of work so special? What treasures must the contents of this book contain? Ultimately, the Mastery of Love is all about cultivating an authentic and loving relationship with the self. When an individual’s relationship with themselves is healthy and balanced, they’re better able to make positive changes in other areas of life.

A great takeaway from many who’ve read Mastery of Love includes the transformational overhaul of one’s automatic emotional responses. There’s much to unearth about our emotional responses, and how to go about transmuting them, from this text. The Toltecs, and Don Miguel Ruiz more specifically, gifted our world with this knowledge. Their hope being that we learn to take control of our reality and create lives we enjoy living.

Don Miguel Ruiz And The Toltecs

Creator of The Mastery of Love is Mexican author Don Miguel Ruiz. A practicing surgeon until he faced a near death experience, Ruiz shifted his life’s work towards his greater calling; becoming a Toltec spiritual teacher. The Nahuatl name “Toltec” translates to “artisans.” Scientists and artists, Toltecs have been known for thousands of years as “men and women of knowledge.”

Although Don Miguel Ruiz is one of the better-known modern Toltec teachers, their spiritual work has reverberated throughout the world since the ancient Mesoamerican people gathered near Teotihuacan to carve out and enrich their teachings. “Artists of the spirit,” Toltecs continue to thrive today as teachers of potent truth and love-based understandings.

The rudiments of their work inspired Ruiz to write The Mastery of Love, where readers learn about truth, love, and forgiveness. These three qualities allow an individual to transmute their automatic emotional responses more easily.

Truth, Forgiveness, And Unconditional Love

Fundamentally, Toltecs believe that within each human being lives a potential “master.” This master is the embodiment of which traits we practice the most in life. Either we are loving, free, giving, and authentic. Or, we train our master to be fearful, greedy, jealous, and self-rejecting. The master we practice the most reigns supreme over the direction and disposition of our lives.

To consciously choose the master that we desire to rule, we have to unlearn many things about ourselves. Aspects or statements we were raised and conditioned to believe. This includes unworthiness, fear of rejection, and the lack of self-acceptance. Put simply, we become the creators of our reality if we can uproot the unhealthy “weeds” in our minds that we’ve continuously watered.

These weeds grow when we experience injustices. Throughout childhood and adolescence, injustices from our parents, friends, and society slowly take away our ability to forgive. This lack of forgiveness strengthens our judgments of self and others, and bolsters our fearful and critical side. As we age, we also learn to seek love and validation from outside of ourselves. The Toltecs remind us that true love can only come from within. “Love creates the master,” says Ruiz.

Through a practice of harnessing unconditional love for the self and learning how to forgive others of injustices they had us endure, we’re able to see the truth of life. This truth shows us the way to the seat of our awareness.

When we are aware, we are conscious of our choices, actions, reactions, and emotions. While this is no easy feat, it is our life’s task to speak, think, and react with control and honesty. If someone/something pains us and we automatically react with hatred or volley a dose of pain right back, we lose. We sink further into fear, separation, and back into the seat of the master that we don’t want to be.

Practicing Who We Are Instead Of Who We Are Not

If we’re conscious of our emotional reactions to anything and anyone, we then have choices. Do we choose to react with rejection, fear, or hurtful words and actions? Or do we want to respond with love, forgiveness, compassion, and understanding? Life is but a continuous set of choices that we have to make. The Toltec teachings are all about practicing the act of choice. Practicing who we truly are at our core instead of who we are not.

We are beings of love. Each of us can transmute our automatic emotional responses by stepping into love and away from fear, rejection, and unworthiness. To consciously invoke this transmutation, Ruiz says we must open our emotional wounds, using truth as the scalpel. When lies told by others or lies we’ve told ourselves are discharged from our wounds, we develop greater capacity to be who we truly are.

Transmuting Your Automatic Emotional Responses

No matter how difficult a choice can be to make consciously, no matter how easy it is to collapse back into our default mode, we must learn to return to our awareness time and time again. We must learn to make all of our choices from a place of unconditional love, truth, and forgiveness.

Start out with a beginner’s mind. Find moments of contemplation by way of meditation, journaling, and having conversations with those you trust. Note circumstances in the recent past where you responded from the seat of the loving master. Conversely, admit in what ways you responded with fear, pain, or anger. During this process, be sure to show yourself grace. The human experience is highly complex and perfection is impossible.

The more honest we are, the more examples we find of times we conducted ourselves the way we intended to. And the ways we did not intend to where we were not living from our heart. Over time, our patterns, automatic programming, and default responses emerge. When we reach this pattern recognition stage, we are then routed back to the conscious choices we want to make.

Before making choices, we can ask ourselves, “do I want to embolden my loving, truthful, forgiving master? Or do I want to activate the fearful, hurtful, rejecting master?” The choice is always up to us.

Toltecs firmly believe that we can be the creator of our lives. We can take the seat of the master within each of us that simply loves. To transmute your emotional responses, breathe life into the master that waits patiently for your permission to exist.

“You don’t need to justify your love, you don’t need to explain your love, you just need to practice your love. Practice creates the master.” ― Don Miguel Ruiz

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There you are, minding your own business, and some rando pays you a compliment.

Or maybe it’s someone you know.  

And whether it’s sweet, strange, or just gross, you want to know what to say that will either encourage the guy or send him packing. 

We’ve rounded up some winners, from cute replies to compliments that you like to effective responses to offer someone who sets off alarms in your head. 

 We’re covering all the bases. 

What to Say When a Guy Compliments You 

When a guy pays you a compliment, you want your reply to be just as encouraging as you mean it to be—no giving mixed signals and no wasting anyone’s time. 

You might be at a loss for what to say when a guy compliments your body. But if the interest is mutual, you can always start with a smile and a simple thank you. From there, depending on how it goes, you might even use some of the flirtier responses listed below.

On the other hand, if the guy gives you a bad feeling, it’s probably best to reply with more firmness and less encouragement—and zero ambiguity. 

If your first thought when you look at a guy is “Run!” go with it. 

How to Respond to a Compliment From a Guy 

The right way to respond depends primarily on whether you like the compliment—and whether you have any romantic interest in the guy who’s giving it. 

How you respond, then, will probably fall into one of the following categories: 

• Ignore the compliment — if it’s unwanted or crass. 
• Walk away — same as above but with body language to back it up. 
• Give him a discouraging (verbal) response — firm and a bit less than polite.
• Demure and defuse — polite but not encouraging. 
• Smile and thank him — a bit more than polite but with some reserve 
• Pay him a compliment in return — less reserved and more friendly
• Take the flirting up a notch — less reserved and more playful and encouraging

However you choose to respond, remember the following: 

• Make eye contact. Look them in the eye when you acknowledge their compliment. 
• Answer with clarity and directness. Speak loudly and clearly enough to be heard. 
• Own your attractiveness. No false humility. If you don’t feel confident, fake it. 

99 Perfect Responses When He Compliments You 

When a guy compliments you, it’s good to have some idea of how to respond. And the best response will depend on whether or not the compliment is both welcome and genuine. If it’s neither, we’ve got some ideas for that, too. 

How to Respond to Welcome Compliments (in Person)

1. Thank you. You’re very observant. 

2. It’s hard to get that kind of honesty. 

3. Getting warmer. Keep talking. 

4. Thank you. I humbly accept your compliment. 

5. Are you flirting with me?

6. Sorry, could you repeat that—extra loudly this time?

7. Thank you, I agree. But I like the way you say it. 

8. [Lifting your glass] Great minds! 

9. You’re so right! Okay, my turn.

10. I left my humility at home, so I’m just gonna say, “You’re right and keep going.”

11. Points for being right and not being gross about it. 

12. Directness, honesty, and impeccable taste. Way to stand out. 

13. True. Now tell me something my parents wouldn’t say. (This one only works when it wouldn’t sound creepy coming from your mom or dad.) 

14. Ooh, you’re good at this. Keep going. 

15. I’m listening. This is my listening face. 

16. I bet you get tired of people telling you that you have great taste. But I’ll say it anyway. 

17. All true. So, tell me something about yourself (so I can catch up). 

18. Weirdly accurate. Have we met?

19. Right? Same page. 

20. You, sir, have a discerning eye. 

21. Well put. I like the way you use words. 

22. Nice. You’re making it hard for me to tell you to get lost. 

23. If you’re trying to tell me what I want to hear… keep talking. 

24. Really? I was debating on whether I should pair this face with these shoes. Glad you approve. 

25. Look who’s talking. Oh, and… keep talking. 

26. If you’re fishing for compliments, you’re in the right place. 

27. And here I thought the genie only granted me one of my wishes. 

28. Wow. I thought I needed coffee to wake me up, but… that did the trick. 

29. If you didn’t look the way you do, I would totally have a clever comeback for that. 

30. Nice. Now say it in a different language. (Everyone should be multilingual, if possible.)

31. I know. Points, though, for saying just enough to get me curious. 

32. Finally! Someone as socially awkward as I am. 

33. I see you went with my favorite compliment. 

34. How did you know I needed to hear that? 

35. Thanks. That’s nice to hear. 

36. [Wave and smile — politely or with more interest]

37. Awww! I didn’t hate that. 

38. That’s me—all-natural, no preservatives, and just spicy enough to keep things interesting. 

39. Did someone tell you what to say, or are you just that good?

40. Oh, stop. And by that, I mean, stop holding back. 

41. Okay, I’m gonna be honest with you. You and me… this could work. 

42. Thank you. [Introduce yourself and invite them to sit with you.]

43. Thanks. Nice to know all the effort I put into this look is paying off. 

44. I never get tired of hearing that—especially from you. [Best when used with a guy you know and trust]

45. Wow, okay. Maybe I’ll stay a little longer. 

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How to Respond to a Compliment Text (from a Guy You Know)

46. Accurate. Please continue. 

47. You know me so well. 

48. You’re making it very hard for me to be humble. 

49. It’s a good thing you’re not a perv. I’m also the tiniest bit sad about that. 

50. You have a way of getting right to the point. I admire that. 

51. You know just what to say. Never take that power for granted. 

52. I can picture your smile with this text. And now, I have to sit down. 

53. Thank you! You’ve made my day. 

54. I see your compliment and raise you a hug. 

55. What can I say? You get me. 

56. You’re a man of few words. But you sure do make them count. 

57. Ugh! I get so tired of people proving me right. But I don’t mind when it’s you. 

58. So I’ve been told (by you–many times). And I’ll never get tired of it. 

59. You’re speaking my language. When did you get so good at that?

60. You are the medicine I needed today. 

61. I couldn’t have said it better. 

62. When you’re right, you’re right. 

63. You’re the only one who knows how rough it can be to look this good. 

64. I love your honesty. 

65. You, me, coffee, when?

66. Well, this day just got better. How are you so good at that?

67. Thanks. I needed to hear that (especially from you). 

68. Get out of my head! (Actually, don’t. It’s better when you’re there.)

69. Were you just reading my mind? You know that’s not allowed. 

70. Thank you! That means a lot coming from you. 

71. I’m glad you can’t see my face when I get a text from you. It’s embarrassing. 

72. You do compliments better than anyone I know. Freak! 

73. No one should be this good at knowing what I needed to hear. 

74. And there you go again…making me wish you were here. 

75. Oh, it’s you. Good! 😉 

76. Hello, favorite person. You’re right on time. 

77. The feel-good brain chemicals are at it again. All it took was a text from you. Sorcery! 

How to Respond to a Flirty Compliment You Don’t Want

78. (Brief) unsmiling eye contact with no reply

79. Wrong tree. Bye. 

80. Hey, thanks. I’ll tell my boyfriend/husband how lucky he is when he gets back. 

81. No, thanks. [Raise hand briefly in a “Stop” gesture]

82. Noted. [Then turn or look away.]

83. You’re not wrong. But you are too late. [Show the ring finger or point to your S.O.]

84. Pointing out the obvious is not a winning strategy—at least…not for you. 

85. Oh, honey, no. Save yourself (for someone else). 

86. Gross. And no. 

87. Oof. Try again. But with someone else. 

88. Yeah, no. Goodbye. 

89. Dude, you’re ice cold. Kee-e-e-e-p walking. 

90. Keep going and keep trying. I believe in you. But, seriously, keep going. 

91. Take a number and wait in line. Or don’t. 

92. Sure, okay. Have a good one. 

93. I get why you might think I’m lonely, but I’m not. Have a nice day. 

94. Not a good time. I’m out. 

95. I’m not here for that, but thanks. 

96. [Wince as if in pain] Wow. No, thanks. 

97. Thanks for being honest about what you’re after. Not interested. 

98. Sorry, this one’s closed. Better luck with someone else. 

99. Thanks. It’s amazing what a pulse and a low-cut top can do for a gal. 

Now that you’ve read through all 99 responses to compliments from a guy, which ones stood out for you? And which do you think you’re most likely to use? 

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