Review of Anna Rova’s “Claimed” Program

I am a former student of Anna Rova’s “Claimed” program. I noticed there are not many reviews online of this program from alumni (at least, reviews that are not marketing tools for the program) and so I wanted to write about my experience with this program.

This review is quite long and very honest. I have written it for myself, in that it is the review I wish I had read when I was considering signing up.

(Note that I have no business affiliation or affiliation at all with the founder of this program. I am simply writing this to share my experience of the program with anyone who is doing research and wondering if it is right for them. As this is not the usual content I create, I’ve set this page up so it’s easily found by the search engines but not by my regular blog readers.)

I signed up for the “Claimed” program a few years ago. I put the material into practice for around 6 months and I’m going to talk about what my experience was with that.

Why I signed up for the “Claimed” program

The name “Claimed” sort of grated on me when I came across this program. It was reminiscent of a piece of lost property that needed claiming, which I obviously am not.

But name of the program aside, the marketing of the program really spoke to me as a woman in her thirties who had had almost zero success attracting a committed partner. I had no problems attracting men. But the problem I had for most of my life was that they didn’t want to commit to me (I’ll go into why that was later in this article).

When deciding whether or not to sign up for the Claimed program, I watched a webinar which was very convincing in explaining the reasons why I was not attracting committed men, and I scheduled a sales call with a woman who had me do a visualisation of what it would be like to be in a relationship with a committed masculine man.

They wanted me to sign up on the spot. I told them I wanted to think about it. Anna Rova followed up with me by text message and said, if you want your committed man to show up, you need to invest in this program.

I was in my late thirties with a love life that hadn’t gone how I had wanted it to so far. I thought, what the heck – let’s give it a go and see if they have anything to teach me.

Let’s get into my review of the experience of the program — the good and the bad.

The main premise of the program is the law of polarity, which is a spiritual ideology which says that if you want to attract a masculine sort of man (which Anna Rova thinks is the only type of desirable man who will really commit to you), you will need to embrace your feminine side/your feminine energy.

The idea behind this is that masculine energy is consistent, steady, logical and purpose-driven. It’s about taking action.

The feminine energy is intuitive, nurturing, feeling, soft, open, playful and receiving. It’s about passively attracting.

And if you want to attract a masculine man, you need to “surrender”, be playful and open up.

These ideas seemed harmless enough and I was used to the idea of masculine/feminine polarity in the spiritual community. I mean, it can be helpful in the development of a new romantic relationship to let go of where it is going; to live in the moment and let it develop how it’s meant to, and not to smother the other person with the “where is this going?” talks. (more on how I went applying these ideas in my real life experience, later in this article.)

Let’s have a look at other facets of the program:

(As an aside, oddly there is little to no information about the Claimed program curriculum anywhere.)

The program teaches feminine embodiment, a dance therapy technique originated by Jenna Ward, which teaches connecting with your body and being present — basically it is emotionally regulating yourself through dance.

We all dissociate (i.e. in our heads and not in our bodies) a little at times and this technique is a great way to come back to your body and be more grounded and it can be especially helpful as a daily practice if you have a background of trauma. (I don’t use this dance therapy practice anymore but I did find it very helpful for several months after I learned it.)

The Claimed program is not the only place you can learn this dance embodiment technique — it can be learned from Jenna Ward.

It is true that embodied people (i.e. people who are present and not so much in their heads) are more attractive. However, there are many ways to be more embodied on a daily basis. Feminine embodiment is a great option. Craniosacral therapy is helpful. I do Joe Dispenza’s meditations daily for embodiment these days.

Other facets of the program include guidance on dating and embracing the feminine “pole” in terms of how you are presenting yourself to men and in dating (i.e. being more feminine in terms of how you look.)

There was also a section on setting boundaries with men.

There was material around finding your limiting beliefs in dating and overcoming them.

OK, so I applied the info to my dating life for around 6 months. What were the results?

I did become more attractive to a certain type of man. But on the other hand I didn’t really like these men I was attracting.

I was attracting alpha men who were into really traditional gender roles. Of course I was applying the idea that if you want a committed male partner who presents as masculine in his appearance, you need to act super feminine. Surrender. Be passive. Let him take the lead. Be girly.

(Note that I was already a very feminine-looking woman, who was very gentle, sensitive and soft spoken.)

Putting this material into practice, I attracted the types of guy who wanted a passive, maybe somewhat childlike woman who they could control. They were “alpha males”. They were not in favour of feminism (as a movement that has given women more rights) or #MeToo. They also wanted a woman with similar views, and essentially they were seeking a skewed power dynamic in their relationship.

That was not me! I was not looking for that kind of guy. At some point I had decided I didn’t want kids. I wanted a guy who was reciprocal in his interest in me, and who was committed, but was physically masculine. But I didn’t want a manosphere bro who thought that my ultimate aim in life was to have kids and be feminine and decorative.

The program also encourages women to look into red pill ideology and evolutionary psychology ideas about the sexes.

This is where things got weird for me. When I signed up, I thought that the masculine-feminine polarity stuff was spiritual. I hadn’t realised it was actually political (when I signed up a few years ago, the marketing of the program was softer and not as anti-feminist as it is now.) It became clear that Anna Rova was selling sexism dressed up as spirituality. When I realised this, I felt like I’d been trolled.

And if I had realised the implications of this and who I was going to attract with my new ultra “feminine” persona, I would not have signed up.

On top of attracting men with traditional ideas about what they wanted, I also attracted more sexual harassment and multiple married/partnered men making passes at me. (This may have happened anyway even if I didn’t take the Claimed program). I had the distinct impression that the program altered how I was coming across to men (more open and soft?) and that had the unwanted side effect of making me more vulnerable to a particular type of bad behaviour in return, some of it quite insistent and toxic.

Now I’m going to talk about the masculine-feminine polarity idea that is so central to the Claimed program.

I want to say first of all that this idea that feminine energy is:

soft
open
emotional
receiving
nurturing, etc

…and that masculine energy is:

go-getting
purposeful
driven
conquering

…is spiritual ideology (or maybe you could call it gender ideology.)

Obviously I have a spiritual website and am open to a number of spiritual ideas. But I realised only after I signed up that I do not agree with this particular kind of spiritual gender ideology. (I put it into practice only because I had paid thousands of dollars to learn it and due to the sunk cost fallacy, was having trouble admitting that I’d wasted my money.)

Anyway, this spiritual ideology is obviously about playing a feminine role so that a particular kind of traditional, alpha male man who enjoys playing a masculine role, feels more comfortable with you as his partner.

Anna Rova in her marketing materials is misleading women by claiming that this is the only type of man who will commit to you (plenty of married men who don’t ascribe to traditional gender roles exist, and have happy marriages), and she is also misleading women by claiming this is the only “valid” form of masculinity.

We now know that this kind of gendered behaviour is more rooted in stereotype (including various ideas that men are more fit to lead than women are), than it is something rooted in material reality — the fairly recent work of neurobiologists such as Gina Rippon and psychologists such as Cordelina Fine – more on that below – shows us that there is no such thing as a ‘male’ or ‘female’ brain, even when you bring hormones into it. (This is fairly recent science so it’s not surprising that it’s not widely known.)

But if you want to label certain behaviours or traits (such as actively pursuing things or passively attracting things) as ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’, the fact is that we all have a mixture of these ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ traits within us. The Claimed program acknowledges this, but states that you should embody the feminine pole in your relationship, if you want a masculine sort of partner.

This doesn’t mean that you stop working and pursuing your purpose, but the insinuation is that you should understand that his purpose may be more important than yours. And it’s insinuated that he’s more inclined to leadership than you are, both in your relationship and in life. That’s why you should let him lead in the relationship and decide where your relationship is going.

Anna Rova walks this talk. She built her successful company but it is now headed by her husband (who she seems to like to be the leader in their lives.)

Brain differences aside, what about women and their hormones making them ‘irrational’, ’emotional’ and ‘inconsistent’? (The Claimed program talks about the feminine being like a constantly changing wave that crashes against the ‘masculine’ rock, which holds steady and holds space for the feminine.) Surely we need men to hold space for us because we’re hormonal and emotional? The Claimed program advocates menstrual leave, even just a day of taking time off and taking care of yourself during your period. The program also advocates tracking your menstrual cycle so you can see why your mood and energy levels change from one week to the next. This was not the first time I had come across this idea, having read ‘Red Moon — understanding and using the creative, sexual and spiritual gifts of the menstrual cycle’ by Miranda Gray.

I liked this idea of tracking the cycle to see how it is affecting me from one day or one week to the next and I did it for years. Years ago, I downloaded an app which predicted what my energy levels would be like on each day, how I would sleep, feel about sex and my partner, and more.

But here’s the thing about these hormonal predictions that I have noticed (and other experts on women’s health, such as Alissa Vitti talk about):

When you take excellent care of your health, you are much less affected by your hormones.

In the last couple of years I’ve completely cut out sugar, caffeine and alcohol. I am eating real food every day (no ultra processed crap). I am meditating and exercising daily. Now I don’t notice fluctuations in my hormones. I hardly know when my period is coming and I don’t get PMS. I don’t feel a big difference in energy levels from one week to the next.

Being hindered and very impacted by female hormones is an effect of how your health is doing and how you’re treating your body — not an inherent result of being female.

Let’s have a look at another aspect of the program:

A positive part of the program is also about becoming aware of your limiting beliefs about men, dating and relationships. I became aware of a couple of my limiting beliefs though the Claimed program, which was helpful. But although I worked for months on that process of releasing limiting beliefs that the course teaches, I didn’t find the process to release those beliefs for good to actually work, mainly because my subconscious mind wasn’t convinced. And some of the evolutionary psychology taught in the program (e.g. men are most interested in young, fertile, beautiful women) gave me a new limiting belief: “As a woman in my late 30s, I’m too old to find a man!”

There are positives to the Claimed program, too. I enjoyed the embodiment practices, as mentioned. There is also what I consider sensible dating advice to avoid “putting all your eggs into one basket” (which you can also find in other books about dating.) But you can find all of these benefits for a vastly lower price tag elsewhere.

Ultimately, the Claimed program was not the solution for me. I uncovered the real reason behind not being able to attract a committed man. It had nothing to do with embodying the feminine pole by being surrendered and playful.

It was about my low self-worth at the time.

The low self-worth meant I was behaving in certain ways which were repelling potential partners and also choosing people who weren’t good for me. It took me a couple of years to fix this. The Claimed program was not able to help me with it. Any amount of embodying the “feminine” pole was missing the point.

My recommendation for anyone considering this program is to be sure that you align with the “Red Pill for women” ideology before you jump in. Anna Rova is peddling regressive attitudes about women’s and men’s “inherent” capabilities and desires, which are centuries old, and she is repackaging them as spirituality. If you visit red pill forums on Reddit you’ll find some of the same material for free that is in this program.

If you are attracted to the ideas presented in the Claimed program’s marketing, know that you can learn them elsewhere for a vastly lower price tag. Here are some resources that you can use instead:

(I don’t all of endorse the books above but I mention them mostly because if you use them and study the ideas in them, you could potentially save yourself thousands of dollars. I do recommend Jenna Ward’s program because I think her dance modality is great.)

Even if you wholeheartedly agree with Anna Rova’s ideas and philosophies, I think the Claimed program is hugely overpriced for what it is. It’s several videos and worksheets with a few guided meditations. It’s not surprising that she doesn’t reveal the curriculum or length of the program.

The program does come with group coaching which at the time I signed up appeared to be offered indefinitely, but if you avail yourself of the coaching, you also need to ask yourself if you’re comfortable sharing your potentially private information with a large group of women, most or all of whom are strangers. I felt a bit exposed talking about my personal life in front of strangers.

You also need to question what qualifies the coach to be coaching and what kind of value they have to offer. Anna Rova is someone who has done a 6-12 month dance therapy certification, ostensibly read a few books on dating (probably the ones I link to above based on the advice she gives) and has found a husband. Her program is relatively new so she doesn’t have decades of experience in coaching women nor as a young woman does she have bags of life wisdom to offer. As a dating coach, her answer to every problem seemed to revolve around masculine/feminine polarity and well-known dating hacks.

Also know that if you have an insecure attachment style, a background of trauma or a difficult childhood that impacts on your love life, the claims that this program makes (in terms of feminine polarity being your salvation), are heady and tempting but it’s unlikely that the Claimed program is the answer. Anna Rova shares a bit about her own background with adversity but the program is not trauma informed, in the least. If you have a similar background, I recommend you seek out a healing modality that can help you. Take that money you’re considering spending on this program and put it to much better use. Go to therapy or do EMDR to uncover the limiting beliefs behind past traumas. I had to go on an intense healing journey to change my beliefs, but everyone’s path is different so I’m not going to share the healing modalities that worked for me. (I’m aware that people reading this may not share my spiritual beliefs.) However, I believe you are more likely to find a happy, healthy relationship if you focus on loving yourself and building self-esteem. Potential partners reflect your own sense of worthiness and self-love back to you.

Ultimately, you want to attract a partner who loves you for you. Not someone who will only stay with you as long as you’re in your “feminine” persona. This course may take you down the road of turning yourself into a more feminine and “acceptable” persona to be loved and I don’t see how that will lead to a successful relationship long term. The world teaches us women that we are not enough, and this message comes at us from multiple angles from girlhood onwards, eroding self-esteem and having us believe that in order to be loved, we have to be better or we have to be different somehow. In my experience, the Claimed Program is just one more variation on that toxic theme.

If you do decide to dip your toe in and schedule a sales call, be aware that the marketing and selling of the program is incredibly aggressive and oriented towards you making a quick decision that you may later regret but cannot reverse. I felt the whole sales process was quite dodgy. The call is designed to give you no time (and as little information as possible) to reflect on whether the program might be right for you – instead they do a guided visualisation to have you feel what it would be like to be taken care of by a masculine, committed man. They are purposely putting potential clients into an altered “feeling” state where they are disconnected from their logical, decision-making brain and then asking them to sign up on the spot with next to no information about what they are getting into. I can see how that would work.

As mentioned, there is no information given about what the program contains, which should be a red flag for any potential client. My experience was that they don’t care if the program is right for you or not – they present the program as the solution for every woman (which it isn’t) and it’s clear they just want the sale. They want you to put the payment through while they’re talking with you and there is no cooling off period. If you’re in a low space and feeling hopeless about your love life, you could be persuaded into parting with a lot of cash because they are so utterly convinced (and convincing) that this is the answer for you. But once you get on the other side you might find, as I did, that the course is not at all the magic bullet it is marketed as.

I feel it would be more ethical to actually present information about what the program contains rather than putting people into an altered state where they feel connected to their desire but giving them no info on the actual program and what it is – that way, people can decide for themselves whether it is right for them.

What about all those testimonials online?

There are marketing testimonials and interviews online with women who say that they used the program to find a partner, and maybe some of them led to long-lasting relationships, but during my time in the Facebook group and talking privately with other students, some of those women later shared that they had broken up with their new partners. I also wonder about the quality of the men students are attracting through applying the teachings of this program.

Many studies show that men who enjoy traditional gender roles do not make the best partners. (This mirrors my experience that the man you will attract through applying the Claimed program may not make a good partner long term.) Here is an excerpt from an article “Is Feminism Killing Romance?”

“…More broadly, one study showed that men who said they were in relationships with feminist women reported greater relationship stability and sexual satisfaction. The authors of this study concluded that, far from disrupting heterosexual relationships, greater gender equality in a relationship was healthy – for both women and men. Other research has also suggested that men who eschew traditional cultural scripts of romance tend to have more satisfying and committed relationships.

There’s also a darker side to traditional relationships. The dominant role for men in relationships is problematic for wider society because it can socialise men into a culture of violence. Research consistently shows that men who more strongly endorse traditional gender roles, including in relationships, are more likely to report a history of sexually coercive behaviours, are more likely to blame the victims of rape and are more accepting of intimate partner violence.”

I wish you all the best in your dating adventures.