Cockiness does not equal confidence

[Chaos]

I think, in the end, it all boils down to congruence. Cockiness is a really attractive trait as long as it's congruent with who you are. There is something about a person which is cocky beyond belief because he simply refuses to accept his own limits, even when everything seems against him. But it has to be real, it has to come from inside. A good example would be James Kirk in the new Star Trek movie, he's extremely cocky but he doesn't believe in "no win scenarios" so it comes out as something extremely attractive (for some women at least).

Cocky-funny on the other hand displays the opposite. I'm aware of my limitations and I'm ok with them, I don't care what you think and I'm able to make fun of myself or exaggerate so that both you and me can have a good laugh.

Whenever there's no real congruency between what the cocky part and the interior part, the illusion breaks down and little subcommunications give you away. In this specific example, I think, "I respond with some cocky bullshit basically trying to push her off but keep her interested.", she probably picked on that... the actual purpose behind the cocky behavior and obviously she disliked it because of the incongruent message, either you're sure you can get her and will then assume you'll get her, or you know you can get her but, since you're trying to push her off, you don't express it to avoid her for falling for you... because cocky people do not keep orbiters.