Saying NO to loneliness! My Journal

[ladyforsaken]

Personally, I think 4 years age difference isn't really much.... but then again, you also wanna get to know her personality, not just determine things by age difference. I think you should try hang out with her, who knows what might come out of it? At the very least, if anything, you could end up being good friends with her. She seems rather interested by the sounds of it. Good luck!

 

[bender22]

Finally asking for those digits

Saturday

Saturday afternoon I caught up with my wingman to have a look around town. My city is really buzzing at the moment with all these festivals and there was a major car race in town as well. So with so much going on, it was a great opportunity to meet some people.

I spoke to a couple of women who were probably in their 30’s and were on some sort of walking tour. But besides that, I was having trouble finding the courage to talk to people.

After strolling around with my wingman for a long time I finally saw a girl walking by herself and decided it was time to approach. BTW my wingman (this is the guy I usually go out during the day with in my journals and often at night too) is starting to develop a lot more courage himself. When I first met him at the start of the year, I almost had to force him to go up and talk to people but now he’s feeling a lot more comfortable doing it, which is cool to see. Especially considering he used to have a lot of social anxiety most of his life.

Anyway, back to the girl I was approaching. She was a French girl who was on a working visa over here for 12 months but only in my city for 4 days. She was really nice to talk to and very pretty too. I told her I was going to a pub that night with some friends and she should come along. She was interested so I got her number and said I’ll text her that evening.

The good thing is I actually asked for the number this time. Asking for numbers has been a big weakness of mine since I’ve been doing this. There’s been a lot of times I wanted to ask for a number but didn’t have the confidence to ask and just asked for facebook instead.

That evening I messaged French girl, telling her where we were going. I wasn’t 100% sure she would come..or even respond. But she did!

I met her outside the pub and took her inside to meet my friends. Everything went pretty well, I was connecting well with French girl and my friends seemed to like her as well. After the pub, the others were going to a show. I didn’t really want to go to the show and I wanted to have some time together with French girl so I said we should go to another bar together.

So French girl and I went to to one of my favourite bars. We were getting along really well. When we got to the bar, we got a few drinks, chatted and then I lead her to the dancefloor. I should’ve tried to kiss her when we first started dancing because at that point we were connecting really well. But I was too anxious to make a move.

Maybe it was a mistake taking her to the dancefloor, I’m not very good at dancing and it’s too loud for me to talk so I sort of just stand there making awkward looking dance moves. She looked like she was starting to get bored.

I had to leave early but I thought I should at least try kissing her before I left. I tried and she turned her cheek, I tried a couple more times but it wasn’t happening. She was still smiling though and I think if I’d persisted and tried a few more times I could’ve got the kiss.

After we left the bar, I walked her back to the place she was staying. She said we should catch up again before she leaves. Before I said goodnight she gave me a look like she may have wanted me to kiss her but I guess I didn’t have to confidence to try again after getting knocked back before. I probably should have tried.

Tuesday

I was in the city Tuesday evening by myself and thought it was a good chance to talk to some girls. It’s definitely harder for me to walk up and randomly approach a girl when I don’t have a friend with me to push me along. For a long time I was walking around making excuses in my head.

There was one girl walking in front of me who I wanted to talk to but wasn’t feeling confident enough. She sat down on a bench by herself and I kept walking. Then I thought this is stupid, I need to stop making excuses so I went back and spoke to her. One of the first things she said was she was waiting for her boyfriend but I kept talking to her anyway just to get the practice. We had a decent conversation.

Later I saw another girl sitting by herself. She wasn’t the most attractive girl...she wasn’t ugly either but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to talk to her. Then I thought I don’t have to get her number, I don’t have to date her, the important thing is I push myself out of my comfort zone and get a reference experience. So I went over and spoke to her.

She was quite friendly and seemed happy to have someone to talk to. I felt really relaxed talking to this girl. Possibly because she wasn’t as attractive as most of the girls I talk to and I had a higher sense of entitlement maybe? Because I was so relaxed, I was conveying all the right attributes I need when I’m talking to girls. Before I left she actually asked me for my facebook.

Wednesday

I met up with my wingman again and we went to the city uni campus. Uni has just started and there are so many cute girls around there so it’s a bit of a goldmine right now.

My wingman saw a girl sitting by herself and said I should talk to her. I went over and talked to her but she was extremely shy. I tried hard to get her to open up but it was a big challenge to keep the conversation going with this girl. Well at least I tried.

My wingman and I were sitting together having a chat when I saw a girl walk past who I wanted to talk to. I chased after to her and complimented her on her powerful walk lol. She was amused by this and it lead to a good conversation. She was in a rush to catch a train so I had to walk with her and talk, which isn’t ideal because it’s harder to make a connection. When we got to the train station I considered asking for her number but I didn’t. I’m not sure if it was fear of rejection or that she was in a rush or I just didn’t feel much of a connection. She was a nice girl, good looking but I’m not sure if I’d ever have much chemistry with her. Perhaps that’s just an excuse?

There was another girl who my wingman told me to approach. I talked to her for a few minutes but she was meeting a friend. When the friend got there I bailed.

After all that, I decided I’d had enough and it was time to go home. As I was walking back to my car I saw a red haired girl walking in front of me. I don’t normally go for red haired girls but she looked really cute. She had a nice black dress on and I love cute girls wearing dresses during summer.

We stopped at one traffic light crossing and she looked in my direction. I wanted to talk to her but there were lots of other people around (stupid excuse!). When we got to the next traffic light crossing I spoke to her. Unlike the other girls I spoke to before, I felt a much greater connection with this girl.

She was waiting to catch a bus so before her bus arrived I asked if she was single. She said she was and feeling confident that she would give it to me I asked for her number. I’ve heard other people say that as you talk to girls more often you begin to pick up on little subtleties and get a better sense of how the girl you’re talking to is feeling. This seems to be true because even though this girl wasn’t jumping all over me or anything I could tell there was some attraction and I was confident she would give me her number. I was confident she would be single as well, just going by the way she spoke to me. Not long ago I wouldn’t have picked up on things like that.

So that’s two numbers I’ve got from talking to random girls on the street during the day in less than a week. Another small breakthrough for me!

 

[bender22]

Saturday night

I got in contact with a friend of a friend of mine who is really into this pickup stuff. I hadn’t met him before but my friend had told me about him. He’s been into it for several years and even took a ‘bootcamp’ a few years ago, where so called pickup instructors spent a weekend helping him learn to attract women. We agreed to meet up Saturday night. I’ll refer to him Striped shirt because he wore a striped shirt.

Striped shirt had no hesitation when it came to approaching women. We approached at least 5 or 6 groups of girls together during the night. It was interesting to see how Striped shirt spoke to the girls. He had a much different style to me. He had no problem holding a conversation, he’s the type of guy who could probably talk to a brick wall all night.

At first I was really impressed by him but then I started to notice that even though he had no problem talking, he wasn’t building much attraction with these girls. A lot of the girls started to look bored and a little confused as he kept talking.

Not that I was doing much better. The first few interactions, I sort of just stood there and watched. It was hard to get a word in, while Striped shirt kept babbling on.

Striped shirt wanted to approach two girls standing together. They were both kinda attractive but obviously a bit older than me. They were both at least 26. But this was a better interaction for me. I was a lot more involved in the interaction and even though it may have looked like Striped shirt was dominating the conversation, I felt like I was building more attraction. I got the feeling both girls liked me more than Striped shirt.

We spoke to these girls for at least 20 minutes. It turned out one of them had a boyfriend and the other was single. When Striped shirt discovered which girl was single he focused all his attention on her and tried to get more physical with her. Clearly the single girl wasn’t too interested. When Striped shirt realised he wasn’t getting anywhere with her we said goodbye.

We went outside the bar and we were talking to one of the bouncers who Striped shirt knew. As we were talking to him, those two girls came out and one of them tapped me on the shoulder. She told me to check my facebook. They actually tracked me down on facebook and sent me a message. For some reason I didn’t get the message (it came through the next day) but the single girl pretty much offered me her number.

And this was after all Striped shirt’s efforts to seduce her. Ha! Nice little ego boost for me aha. Poor Striped shirt…

I won’t go into any of the other interactions Striped shirt and I had during the night. They were all decent interactions, but nothing interesting came from them. Except for one group of four girls who were just plain rude to us from the second we approached them.

Wednesday Afternoon

I had to go into town so I thought while I was there I should look for some girls to talk to. The previous day I’d been in town and totally wimped out of approaching any girls while I was there. I wasn’t happy about that, this journal is supposed to be about taking action! So this time I was determined to talk to at least 2 or 3 girls.

I went into the uni to have a look around and spotted one girl walking out by herself. I turned around and walked behind her like a **** creep, contemplating if I should talk to her for a while. Finally I caught up to her and started talking to her. She was in a rush to catch a train so I had to walk with her. Somewhere during our conversation she mentioned she had a boyfriend.

Even though I’m getting a lot better at holding conversations, I feel like some of the conversations I have with girls during the daytime are just too bland. Like with this girl, I just asked her about uni and what she was doing before she went to uni. There weren’t any long silences or anything, but I probably could’ve made it more interesting. This is something I should work on.

I saw another girl sitting by herself near the bus stop. I stood around hesitating for a while then finally went over, sat next to her and started talking. I had to sit between her and some other guy who would’ve heard me but I’m glad I didn’t let the fear of him judging me stop me from talking the this girl.

She responded well to me but less than a minute into our conversation, her bus arrived. Serves me right for standing around hesitating lol. As I said goodbye, she sort of paused and looked at me for a few seconds almost as if she was wondering if I might ask for her number. I thought about it but didn’t have the confidence to ask for a number after such a short interaction. Should’ve gone against my emotions and asked anyway. Worst thing that could’ve happened was a ‘no.’

After those two interactions I saw several more girls who I should’ve spoken to but I started making excuses not to again. I think I need to find more incentive to talk to more girls. This journal is supposed to be about taking action and I still don’t think I’m taking enough action. Maybe I need to set some goals.

Maybe I need to just remind myself of what I’ve learned about talking to girls from the past few months…. Girls will almost always be friendly if you start up a conversation with them, especially during the day...It’s never as awkward as I imagine it will be...I can hold a conversation now so I don’t need to worry too much about not having anything to say...some girls will respond really well even if I’m not very smooth...every interaction is a learning experience.

Take more action bender! Stay tuned guys!

 

[bender22]

Like I said in my last entry, I’m still not taking enough action. The purpose of this journal is to motivate me to take action. I firmly believe massive action = rapid results. So far I’ve been doing enough to improve and get some decent results but it’s not enough to get the results I really desire.

Instead of just talking about how I need to take more action, I’m going to take this opportunity to commit to a challenge and set some goals.

Tuesday next week I'll go into town (during the day) and these will be my goals:
-Start a conversation with 8 girls
-Talk to 14 people - can be girls or guys, can be people working in shops, could just be asking someone for the time
-Ask at least 2 girls for their number
-Approach at least one group of 2 or more girls
-No longer than 15 minutes in between interactions

These are all action based goals, so I have 100% control over whether I achieve them or not. I don’t think these goals are unrealistic, but it’s definitely enough to push me out of my comfort zone.

By posting this now it will make me more accountable. If I don’t go through with this, I’ll have to come back on here and tell everyone how I was too afraid to talk to people and I don't want to have to do that.

If anyone has any other ideas for mini challenges or goals, let me know

 

[bender22]

Why is it so hard to talk to strangers??

Well I couldn’t do it. I probably talked to almost 14 people (I lost count) but I only ended up doing 4 out of the 8 approaches. Four in one day is a decent effort I suppose but I’m disappointed I didn’t push myself to do all eight. There were countless opportunities I had to talk to cute girls where I backed out. It really is a shitty feeling letting someone walk away without talking to them because you didn’t have the courage to just say hello.

I’ll go through those four interactions anyway.

First girl was sitting by herself on some stairs. I hesitated for a while before going over there and talking to her. About 30 seconds into our conversation her friend she was waiting for arrived. If I hadn’t hesitated for so long I probably could’ve had a decent conversation here. Lesson is don’t think, just act.

I was standing in the food court and saw a cute girl standing behind me. I turned around and started talking to her. This was actually a pretty good interaction. I said in my last journal that I was concerned my interactions were too boring, well I made this one a lot more interesting. We were talking about bars and clubs we liked so I said one night we should catch up at one of my favourite bars. She said yeah and added me on facebook. I should’ve asked for her number instead of just settling for facebook. I’ll definitely try to pursue this one and see if I can organise to meet up one night anyway.

Third girl I literally chased after and said hello. She was walking to the train so I had to walk with her. I think that second interaction worked well because we were both standing in the same spot which makes it a lot easier to have a good conversation and built rapport. This girl was nice and our conversation went well but it was another one of those interactions where I didn’t feel much of a connection. Possibly because we were walking.

Fourth girl was walking ahead of me. I walked up next to her and asked if she was German. No. South American? Yes. Turned out she was Brazilian. Her English wasn’t great but we still spoke for about 5 minutes or so. I was very close to asking for her number but it was hard to talk to her and she said she couldn’t understand my accent very well so I didn’t bother. Another silly excuse, I should’ve asked anyway.

Goal for my next day out is to approach at least 6 girls and ask for at least one number. It’s probably better to make gradual increases in these goals. Maybe my goal for today was too ambitious. One problem is I keep looking for ‘perfect opportunities’ to talk to girls. I think a lot of guys do this. But honestly there rarely is a perfect opportunity, you just have to make the best of the opportunities that do present themselves.

 

[bender22]

Saturday Night

I went to my favourite bar with a friend and striped shirt (from a few weeks ago) on Saturday night. It was really quiet when we got there but did get busier later on.

During the night I probably approached about 6 groups of girls. Nothing very interesting to report. The first one was a group of three who were sitting down, I went over and sat with them and mostly spoke to the girl closest to me. We were talking for a while and she seemed happy I was there but I feel like I should’ve tried to spice up the interaction a bit more.

My other interactions during the night were much the same. I would talk to the girls for a while but they were pretty boring interactions. I wasn’t taking enough risks, I wasn’t having enough fun and I was overthinking everything.

I didn’t have any drinks during the night and I believe you can have fun while sober if you take the initiative. But maybe a couple of drinks could help.

Positive from the night: I took action, talked to more people than I have been on recent nights out.
Lesson: Need to have more fun with my interactions at night.

Friday afternoon

There’s a huge pub crawl on in town tonight. It was a nice day so I thought I’d go down to the uni and see if I could find some girls who would be going to the pub crawl and set up some leads. My goal was to talk to 3 girls in one hour.

I saw a girl waiting for a bus outside the uni so I went over and complimented her socks. They were pretty cool socks with big dots on them lol. She responded well and the conversation flowed nice and naturally from there. She was a pretty outgoing girl so she was easy to talk to. I had a lot of fun talking to her so when her bus got there I said we should stay in contact. She had a boyfriend but said we could still be friends so I got her facebook.

Next girl I spotted walking out of the uni. I caught up with her and started talking to her. I kept walking with her while I spoke to her but I really should have stopped her. The conversation we had was good but I feel like it would’ve been a lot better if I’d stopped her. It’s very hard to create a connection if you’re both walking and looking ahead. She was a cool, attractive girl but she seemed very focused on her studies and career. Maybe it was just me making excuses, but I got the feeling she wouldn’t be the type of girl who would just give her number out. I still should’ve asked anyway, guess I was afraid of being rejected. I asked if she was going to the pub crawl but she wasn’t.

The third girl I spoke to was waiting at a traffic light. The interaction started off really well and set the tone for the rest of the interaction. Sometimes when I talk to girls during the day, I feel like I’m just interrupting their day but this felt very natural, so did the other two interactions actually. I crossed the street with her when the light turned green but I didn't want this to become another walking interaction so I just stopped when we got over the other side of the road. She stopped too. This was another really fun, enjoyable interaction like the first one. She said she had to go and catch her bus. I wish I’d asked for her number then but I didn’t. She was real cute and fun too, probably the type of girl I could get along well with. I think I still have too much fear of rejection. I did ask if she was going to the pub crawl but she was working.

Having done my three approaches in the one hour time limit I started heading back to my car. Just before I got to my car I saw a cute girl sitting by herself on a bench. Initially I walked past her but then I thought, why not? I went back and talked to her. She was German and her English wasn’t that great. We spoke for a while, but it was kinda hard to talk to her. Again, I didn’t try asking for the number, mainly due to the language barrier.

Positives: Took action - talked to 3 girls in the hour plus one more. Usually I waste a lot more time walking around making excuses, I did a good job at minimising the time between my interactions today, which helped keep the momentum going.
Had good interactions - the interactions I had, especially with the first and third girl, were probably some of the best I’ve had since I’ve been doing this. I had fun with them, I was making the girls laugh and they felt like very natural conversations.
Lesson: Stop being a ***** and ask for numbers! There’s really nothing to lose.

Online dating

I’ve seen a lot of people talking about online dating on here so I thought I’d give it another try. I’ve tried online dating before but I never put much effort into it and nothing ever came from it.

So the other day I decided to find a better profile picture and quickly send out about 20 messages. About 70-75% of them responded with at least one message (pretty good strike rate I think?). Funnily enough, most of the girls who responded were ‘replies selectively’ girls (this is on okcupid). I messaged a few ‘replies often’ girls who didn’t reply ahah.

I was hoping to find some girls going to the pub crawl, but no luck in that department. A few girls stopped responding after one or two messages and a few I’m still talking to. I exchanged quite à few messages with one girl last night and floated the idea of a date. Sounds like she’s definitely interested.

My observations from online dating:
-You need a really good opening message to set you apart from the masses of other guys messaging these girls every week.
- You need to put some thought and effort into your messages. Most of the messages I sent that didn’t receive replies, were pretty boring. The ones I put a bit more thought into, generally got responses,
-You need to be able to convey that you’re a normal, well adjusted guy
-A lot of girls just wont reply, it probably doesn’t matter how good looking or funny you are..I’m sure there’s no guy that gets responses from every girl he messages. So you can’t take it personally.
-I definitely don’t recommend online dating as a substitute for going out and actually talking to girls. A lot of guys seem to do this because messaging girls online is easy and within their comfort zone. But you’re never going to build up your social skills and confidence through online dating.

 

[Batman55]

My inner cynic or inner realist (whichever, depending on how you see it) says you must be a pretty darn good looking guy to get that response rate! You lucky bloke. It's well established that one's picture(s) are the most important factor in receiving a response online.

(It's also true that women look at more than just the pictures, though, and a man's written profile is far more important than a woman's, in terms of the scrutiny it gets... but I've said enough )

 

[bender22]

Pub Crawl Fun

With three big universities nearby, there’s a lot of pub crawls throughout the year in this city. But the one last night is the mother of all pub crawls. I’ve heard it’s the biggest in the country. Once every year, thousands of uni students (including lots of attractive girls) make their way out into town to have a good time, meet people, enjoy the good drink specials and get a little drunk. What’s not to like?

We had to line up for about 20 minutes at the first place we went to but I was chatting to some other guys in the line. Everyone will talk to anyone on this pub crawl. Inside, I saw two girls together who looked amazing. It turned out my friend knew one of them so we went over and spoke to them. They were from Brazil. There was a band playing so it was too loud to talk to them much but we danced with them for a while. I kept going back to them throughout the night, to dance with them.

I talked to quite a few other guys and girls at that pub. None of my interactions lasted that long and didn’t really lead to anything interesting but I was still having a good time.

We decided to go to another place. Before leaving we said goodbye to the Brazilian girls. One of them added me on facebook.

The next place we went to was full of pub crawlers. While we were lining up we spoke to a group of girls in front of us. One of them I was getting flirty with and I could sense she was interested. Later when we got inside I saw her again at the bar. We chatted for a bit then while I was talking to my friend, she tapped me on the shoulder and said they were going over to the dancefloor. This was basically an invitation to join them. I thought I’d run to the toilet first and then find them on the dancefloor after. I had to wait for ages to get into the toilet and by the time I got to the dancefloor I couldn’t find that girl. I was rather bummed about that because she was pretty cute and all the signs were good.

I saw one girl who was dancing by herself so I went over and started dancing with her. We chatted for a while then I lead her over to another part of the dancefloor. We started getting really close and physical. All the signs were good so I didn’t hesitate for too long before kissing her. I spent about half an hour with her just dancing and making out. It was fun but I didn’t think it was going to lead to anything more. Her friend came over and spoke to her so I took the chance to bail. I could’ve stayed with her longer but I wanted to find some more girls to talk to.

There was a girl standing by herself in a quieter area of the bar playing with her phone. I went over and told her she could stop texting me. The great thing about a line like that is if delivered correctly, it sets a fun tone for the interaction right from the start. We hit it off pretty well. There was something about this girl that I found really sexy. She wasn’t the best looking girl in the club or anything but the more time I spent with her, the more attractive I found her.

I lead her around the club, we danced and got a drink together. I challenged her to a thumb war. This is something I do with girls sometimes to make the interaction more fun and it gives you a reason to hold hands with her. Even something simple like that can create more sexual tension. I know we were both having fun and I was sure she liked me but I wasn’t getting the same signs I got from the girl before and that made me hesitant to really escalate. Which is stupid because I should be able to take full responsibility for pushing things forward instead of relying on the girl to do part of the work.

Eventually I said I should find my friend but said we should meet up later on and I got her number. Later after I’d finally found my friend, I texted that girl to find out where she was. She replied but she’d already left :/

Would’ve been nice to see her again before I left but besides that it was a great night. I talked to lots of girls and guys, made out with one girl, got a number and had a lot of fun.

Positives: Took action, built momentum throughout the night, had fun
Lesson: I was thinking about my more successful night interactions recently and I realised there was one thing they all had in common. It was just me and the girl. I either approached the girl while she was by herself or I was able to get the girl away from her friends. I’ve heard before about how important it is to isolate the girl at bars and clubs but I think I’d forgotten just how crucial it is. No girl wants to look ‘slutty’ in front of her friends but if it’s just you and her, she’s probably not going to be so concerned about being judged by her friends.

@Batman, yes I've been told I'm a decent looking guy and yes that would probably help me get responses on dating websites where looks are a lot more important than in reality but I'm definitely no Ryan Gosling or anything lol.

 

[ardour]

I’ve heard before about how important it is to isolate the girl at bars and clubs but I think I’d forgotten just how crucial it is. [/font]

okay you may want to rephrase that - "wait until she's by herself etc."

 

[bender22]

Exciting week

Well this has been a great week so far. I’ve had three dates and got a new job which involves talking to a lot of people so that should help me build up my social skills too. Until this year, I hadn’t even been on a date since the start of 2012 (pretty pathetic huh?) so three dates in one week is exciting progress.

I’d been talking a lot with one of those girls I found on a dating website and we decided to get lunch together on Monday. The date went pretty well, she’s a nice girl. She’s not super attractive or anything but she’s cute and she actually looks better in person than she did in her profile pic. I feel like all the practice I’ve been getting talking to girls (especially during the daytime) helped me a lot. I wasn’t feeling nervous at all and there weren’t any long awkward silences. We kissed at the end of the date.

I’ve also been texting the girl from my last journal whose number I got on the pub crawl. So we agreed to get a coffee together at uni on Tuesday. This date also went well. It started off a bit slow, at first I didn’t know what to talk about with her but but before long we were both having a lot of fun talking to each other.

This date really highlighted just how much I’ve improved at talking to girls since I started this. I remember when I was younger, if I ever got a date I always wanted to go somewhere like the movies where I wouldn’t have to talk to the girl much. I used to be so afraid of running out of things to say. Now it feels pretty easy.

Later we planned to get a drink Thursday night and watch this TV show we both like together. I said I’d come to her apartment to pick her up. When I got there, we decided to go straight inside and watch TV. After watching our TV show and some playful banter, I started making out with her. I got her onto her bed and things got pretty intimate but she didn’t want to have sex. She said we didn’t know each other well enough. I’m pretty certain if I was more experienced with this, I could’ve made it happen. I tried but I didn’t have the confidence to keep trying after I got a bit of resistance. Nevertheless, it was still a lot of fun.

The dating website girl and I have planned to meet up again Sunday night and it sounds like she wants to do pretty much everything besides sex. She says she’s only had sex with one guy before.

What I’ve done well with both of these girls is establish a sexual frame from early on. In the old days I usually never had the confidence to even bring up anything sexual related with a girl. Just to show how far I’ve come let me share a couple of stories from when I was younger.

When I was 17, I started seeing this girl. It was the first time in my life I’d ever dated. We had a lot in common, we got along really well and I liked her a lot. From the time we first met, it probably took me over a month to ask her out, then another 3-4 weeks after that to kiss her and the whole time we were seeing each other all I ever did was kiss her. Even though she clearly liked me, I never had the confidence to even touch her most of the time. I was always afraid that if I tried anything she would feel uncomfortable or I’d be rejected.

While I was at uni I met one girl and we went on one date (it only took me about 3 weeks to ask this one out lol!). After that first date I kept asking for a second date but she’d always make up some excuse. We had classes together at uni and we’d text each other a lot but we would never do anything together. For about 4 months this went on…. We only saw each other at uni and in those 4 months I never even kissed her.

So for me to meet a girl, go on a date with her a few days later then almost have sex a few days later is huge progress! I’m sure there’s a lot of people who wouldn’t think that’s a big deal but considering how I used to be it’s pretty big for me. There’s no doubt at all it can be attributed to all the confidence I’ve gained from these past few months.

Today I had to go into the city to meet up with someone. I got there a bit early so I went over to the uni campus to look for some cute girls to talk to. For a while I was thinking things are going well with the other two girls, do I really need to go out and find more girls? But if I want to truly improve this area of my life then I can't start getting complacent. I saw one girl sitting by herself. I sat down near her and saw her looking in my direction a few times so I went over and spoke to her. I didn’t have long to talk to her (only about 3 minutes or so) because she had a lecture to get to.

She seemed like the type of girl I’d like to hang out with so I thought I’d take a chance and ask if she was single. She was. I asked for her number but she only wanted to give me her facebook. Fair enough, we hadn’t spoken for long...I’m just pleased I had the balls to ask for her number after such a short interaction.

So things are looking up! I also had two job interviews during the week (including the one I got). In the past, job interviews would terrify me. I would be so nervous. In both these interviews I felt very confident. I was offered the job pretty much on the spot in the second interview. So the confidence you get from talking to lots of random people also carries over to other areas of your life as well.

 

[bender22]

In terms of taking action I’ve been pretty darn slack over the past week. I was at a shopping mall one day during the week and wanted to talk to some girls but barely saw anyone in the right demographic and didn’t end up talking to anyone. Then last night I was out with some friends and I should have taken the opportunity to talk to some girls then but I had other things on my mind and I was making excuses in my head.

Besides that, I’ve seen the dating site girl three times since my last journal. We’ve been getting along really well. On Thursday night I sealed the deal with her Last night I went out to a pub nearby to get dinner with a couple of friends and after I was going to head into town to find some cute girls to talk to. Dating site girl messaged me asking if I wanted to meet up in town.

So I had a choice between meeting new girls or possible sex. Considering how long I’d gone before without it, I chose sex. We had a good time but afterwards I was a little disappointed with myself for not choosing the former option. I’m still not satisfied with this area of my life and I’ve still got a lot of improvement to go so I shouldn’t be getting complacent….especially on a Saturday night! The weather is looking good this coming week so I’ll definitely be setting aside a day or two to go out and get back into action taking mode.

I’ve still been talking to the other girl from my last journal but she’s gone a bit quiet on me the past few days. Not sure if I’ll see her again. Not that I’m too bothered. For the first time in my life, I feel confident there will be other girls soon enough so if things don’t work out with one girl it’s no big deal.

One thing I would say about all this is that it can really play on your emotions. Over the last 4 months or however long it’s been now, there have been times when I’ve felt amazing. When you get a really attractive girl’s number, when you meet someone great, when you’re talking to someone and you realise how much your social skills have improved... you feel on top of the world.

But when things don’t go your way, when girls don’t reply to your messages, when you can’t bring yourself to approach that cute girl you just saw, it can really hurt inside. There has definitely been a lot of highs and lows along this journey so far. However, it’s those lows that really help you develop as a person..as long as you don’t let them get to you and you can take away lessons from them. I think I’ve coped with the lows pretty well, there hasn’t been anything I’ve dwelled on for too long. Although there have been times when I’ve felt like honeysuckle, I’m definitely more a lot more content with my life now than I was at the beginning of this journey.

 

[bender22]

The biggest barrier between me and the results I want is still my inconsistency in taking action. The past three weeks, I’ve gained some valuable experience in dating and I’m sure that will serve me well in the future but I haven’t been pushing myself to get outside my comfort zone anywhere near as much as I should. The other problem is I feel like I haven’t been playing to win recently, I’ve been playing not to lose. I just did four approaches this week and I was playing them all very safely. I have to play to win.

Dating site girl has been talking a lot about how she wants a relationship, she obviously wants something more than what we have right now. Wednesday night we caught up to get a drink at a bar in town. She had to go early so we didn’t have enough time to go anywhere else. Without the possibility of sex, I think it just put my mind at ease and helped me relax a lot more. I felt so comfortable talking to her and that allowed to present all the qualities I should always convey when I talk to girls. I think a problem I have and most other guys have when talking to girls is getting too attached to the outcome. If you’re too attached to the outcome, it’s difficult to relax and express yourself in an attractive way. Again, I think this is another reason to take more action. I’m confident that the more often I talk to girls, the more I’ll become detached from the outcome I’ll become.

In a way it would be nice to be in a relationship, but I feel it would be the easy way out. I still have a lot of progress to make and I’m only just starting to get the success I want. A relationship would just compromise my progress and get in the way of my goals right now. So I spoke to her yesterday and explained that I don’t want a relationship at this point. She was obviously a little upset but she was okay with it. This is something I’ve never had to do before and it wasn’t easy for me. I think the fact that a girl would get this attached to me and want a relationship after such a short time is a testament to how far I’ve come since I started this. There’s no way I could’ve built that kind of attraction so quickly 6 months ago.

Things I need to work on:
-More daytime interactions...it’s uni mid semester break right now but in one week uni goes back and I’ll make sure I get down there and start doing more approaches. I think the uni campus in town is the ideal spot for me to meet girls during the day because there are so many attractive 18-24 year olds around.
-More night time interactions...I need another big night out soon. Hopefully next Saturday night. The last big night out I had was the pub crawl night.
-Play to win, don’t play not to lose….take more risks.
-Detach myself from the outcome when I talk to girls, adopt more of a ‘nothing to lose’ mindset.
-Seek out more opportunities to improve my social skills besides approaching girls.
-Aim higher….Right now I think my expectations are too low. There’s a well known quote that says ‘aim for the moon, even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.’ It’s time to start aiming for the moon.
-Experiment with different things when I talk to girls….such as body language, voice tonality, teasing, humour, talking about my passions, being very direct etc.. See what works and what doesn’t work.

 

[bender22]

Taking action again feels good

Yesterday was the best day I’ve had for a while in terms of taking action. I was at the gym in the morning, warming up on one of the bikes. This cute girl who I’ve seen at the gym a few times before came over and got on the bike next to me. Normally I don’t talk to girls at the gym unless I know them. For various reasons...I’m usually focused on my workout, I know some people don’t like to be interrupted during their workout, I’m often sweaty and smelly...the girl could be too. But I was picking up on some signs that this girl wanted me to talk to her so while she was right next to me, I had to take the opportunity.

She was really nice when I spoke to her. It probably wasn’t my best conversational work, I may have been a little nervous but we still had a good chat. I’m sure I’ll see her at the gym again soon, so I didn’t ask for her number or anything on this occasion. I figure if I talk to her again the next few times I see her, it will build a stronger connection, stronger familiarity and she will feel more comfortable if I ask for her number. Let’s call this a work in progress.

In the afternoon I went into town to find some more ladies. I ended up approaching three girls...not as many as I should be but it’s still an improvement on the past few weeks. When I first got there, I saw a performer in the mall with a crowd of people watching. There was one attractive girl standing by herself watching. I walked up near her and it would have been so easy to just say ‘hey what do you think of this guy’ or ‘hey, can you do that?’ But then doubts crept into my mind, I stalled for a while then the performer stopped his routine and the girl left. It’s so frustrating that I’m still allowing these doubts and excuses in my mind to hold me back.

The first girl I talked to, I just wanted to get into talking mode and loosen up a bit. I had no intentions of asking for her number or anything, I just wanted to get started. I approached her, walked with her and talked for a few minutes then said goodbye.

The next girl I talked to was super cute. She looked like she was an exotic mix of indian and something else. Not the type of girl I normally go for, but I found this one extremely attractive. I used my ‘stop texting me, I’m already here’ line...she liked it (as always lol). We stopped and chatted for a few minutes. To guys who are learning how to do this….I cannot emphasise enough just how much easier it is to talk to a girl who isn’t moving. Yes, talking to a girl while you’re both walking is a lot better than not talking to any girls but if you want to create a connection, you have to both be standing in the same spot, looking at each other. Anyway, my conversation with this girl was going well but she said she had to go and meet a friend (this wasn’t just an excuse to get away from me lol, I saw her with her friend later). On reflection, I should’ve tried to convince her to stay and chat for just two more minutes and then asked for her number (taking risks..playing to win).

The third girl I spoke to responded really well to whatever I said to her at first. I can’t even remember what I said. But she was in a rush to get somewhere so I didn’t pursue it any further.

In the evening I was meeting up with the girl I’ve been seeing to get a drink. She was catching the bus in so I said I’d meet her at the bus station. When I got there she texted me to say she would be another 5-10 minutes. While I was waiting I saw an incredibly attractive girl sitting by herself outside the station. Even though I was supposed to be on a date, this opportunity was too good to miss, I still had 5 minutes or so to kill anyway. I sat next to the girl and talked to her. It turned out she was a model. My conversation skills were really sharp and I didn’t allow myself to get intimidated by her looks as a lot of guys would. She was asking me a lot of questions as if she was genuinely interested in me. At one point it seemed like she was even trying to qualify herself to me. After talking to her for almost 10 minutes I saw my girl standing about 80 meters up the street waiting. I was tempted to go for this girl’s number but if my girl had seen me and realised what I was doing, I would’ve looked like a serious *******. I didn’t ask for her number but I was regretting that later. It’s not everyday you have the chance to get a sexy 19 year old model’s number. And she was showing signs that she was interested, I feel like there’s a good chance she would’ve given me her number. Oh well, at least time I had a more genuine reason not to ask for the number. And on the positive side, I had a solid interaction with a model and built some attraction quickly...so it’s a good reference experience.

Edit: Just another side note, I know I've said it before but I need to start using eye contact to my advantage more often. It can be so powerful. Just then I was at the grocery store and saw this cute girl, looked at her and held eye contact with her for 4 or 5 seconds until she looked away. I saw her a few minutes later and she looked at me then when I was lining up at the checkout she was in front on me and kept looking back at me. If she hadn't been with her mum I would've spoken to her. I think holding eye contact is probably the easiest way to create a connection with someone. Must start using it more often.

 

[Batman55]

In the evening I was meeting up with the girl I’ve been seeing to get a drink. She was catching the bus in so I said I’d meet her at the bus station.

Nice to have another journal entry, bender. Keep up the good work.

I want to ask about this girl though... I believe you said you didn't want a relationship at this time, right? Are you just going to be friends or..?

 

[bender22]

In the evening I was meeting up with the girl I’ve been seeing to get a drink. She was catching the bus in so I said I’d meet her at the bus station.

Nice to have another journal entry, bender. Keep up the good work.

I want to ask about this girl though... I believe you said you didn't want a relationship at this time, right? Are you just going to be friends or..?

Thanks Batman. Yeah I don't want a relationship right now because I think it would be a distraction from my goals. The arrangement I have with this girl is just casual at the moment.

My long awaited return to the night scene
I was going to out alone last night but when I got there I ran into a couple of guys I know. One of them (Matt), I’ve talked about in my journal before and he’s very good at attracting women. He was with a few of his friends who were there to pick up girls too, so I joined up with them.

I ended up talking to a lot of girls during the night. Matt and I did a couple of interactions together, it’s great to see how he goes about it. The biggest difference I notice in his interactions is how he tries to have a lot of fun with them. He’s also very good at creating a fun vibe for other people, which helped me during the night. But it made me realise I need to learn to have a lot more fun with my interactions, especially at night.

All my interactions during the night went well I guess, the girls seemed to like me. The venue we went to is a great socialising venue but most people are in big groups with their friends and it’s difficult to separate them. Unfortunately I don’t handle big groups so well, I much prefer one on one interactions. Maybe I get a little intimidated in big groups. So it was difficult for me to really capitalise on my interactions.

I had one pretty good interaction with a cute blonde girl I saw sitting by herself. She responded well and the interaction got off to a great start. But then her friends joined her and I was dealing with another big group situation. I think I probably could’ve got her number, I just needed to separate her from her friends for a while but I didn’t do that.

Results wise it wasn’t the best night but I still had a lot of fun and learnt a few things from the other guys. This was the first big night out I’d had for several weeks too so I think I was a little rusty.

Uni goes back this week so hopefully I’ll be hitting it hard during the day!

 

[bender22]

How do you talk to shy girls??

I dropped by the uni campus Monday afternoon to look for some people to talk to. I had a pretty good interaction with a cute blonde girl who I saw sitting by herself. I seem to have a thing for blonde girls right now aha, I’ve always gone for brunettes in the past. When I first spoke to her, I was really nervous. Normally when I approach girls now, I have no nerves at all. There were several other people nearby who could probably hear me so that may have made me more nervous. But my nerves quickly disappeared when we started talking. When she said she had to go to her lecture, I wanted to ask for her number but a small part of me was worried she would say no, so I didn’t ask. I have to get over this fear of asking for numbers...it’s pathetic! Especially when the interaction goes well like this one did, I should ask for the number everytime. She even thanked me for coming over and talking to her and said she enjoyed talking to me, yet I still didn’t ask for her number….#idiot #growsomeballs #needmoreconfidence

I spoke to another girl who was walking by herself to the train station. I walked with her for a while, because she had to get to her train. Our conversation went alright but it was kinda boring, the girl was a little shy.

Last night I went to a running club in town. Before it started, I saw a girl waiting at the bus stop. I spoke to her until her bus arrived, which was only a few minutes. She seemed really shocked that I’d just randomly approached her ahah and she didn’t have a lot to say. I didn’t get the impression she was annoyed or anything, she just didn’t seem to know how to handle the situation.

When I got to the running club I saw a blonde girl standing by herself (continuing the blonde trend lol). I asked her if she’d been to the running club before and she hadn’t. I talked to her for a while before the run started. When I finished the run I waited around for a while so I could talk to her again but she was taking a long time so I left. Maybe she got lost lol. If I go back next week, I could probably keep working on this one.

Today I had to go into town to meet up with someone and I had just enough time to talk to one girl. She was sitting by herself so I sat next to her and said hi. Since I’ve been doing this, I don’t think I’ve come across anyone shyer than this girl. I could barely get a word out of her. I’m getting a lot better at holding conversations now, but it was almost impossible with this girl. I’m sure more experienced guys would know how to get someone like this to open up more but I couldn’t do it. So I bailed after a few minutes.

To further challenge myself and help accelerate my progress I’m going to make sure every time I go out day or night with the intention of meeting girls, I will practice a new skill. What follows is a list of things I want to practice over the next few weeks. Each day or night I will choose just one to work on in my interactions.

-Hold strong eye contact throughout conversation - I’m already doing this pretty well but sometimes I’ll forget, so I should still practice it.
-Build compliance - this could include telling the girl to come meet my friends, come outside with me, get a drink with me etc..
-Separate girl from friends - an important skill I need to learn when meeting girls at night, sort of follows on from building compliance.
-Stop girls who are walking - as I’ve said, you can’t build a connection with a girl while you’re both walking so I need to be able to stop girls who are walking if I want to talk to them.
-Be physical from early in the interaction - this just applies to night interactions. If you can be physical right from the start of the interaction (even just touching her arm or holding her hand) it sets a better frame for the rest of the interaction. Usually I leave it until far too late to get physical with the girls I meet at night.
-Ask for phone numbers - this has been one of my biggest weaknesses since starting this. So many missed opportunities. Must work on this.
-Create future projections - I occasionally do this...something like ‘me and you are going to go on a holiday to Mexico and we will buy cool sombrero hats’ it just makes the conversation a lot more fun and interesting. I need to get into the habit of doing this more often so I can avoid the trap of getting caught up in boring interview style interactions.

 

[Batman55]

This may sound like an unusual pointer, but I'll add it anyway. I find that caffeine helps me with social interactions in general. It keeps me sharp between the ears (important for me, since my default state is slow and foggy) and improves confidence. These are temporary and slight effects, of course, but at times I've found that caffeine is so effective, I don't go without it when I really need to socialize. I imagine it could help with approaching girls as well. The only times I've come close to trying it, I was under the influence of coffee. Give it a try if you haven't, it's just another tool in the kit.

 

[ardour]

This may sound like an unusual pointer, but I'll add it anyway. I find that caffeine helps me with social interactions in general. It keeps me sharp between the ears (important for me, since my default state is slow and foggy) and improves confidence. These are temporary and slight effects, of course, but at times I've found that caffeine is so effective, I don't go without it when I really need to socialize. I imagine it could help with approaching girls as well. The only times I've come close to trying it, I was under the influence of coffee. Give it a try if you haven't, it's just another tool in the kit.

Increasing confidence is one the noted benefits of caffeine, but overdo it and it just makes you anxious. I find alcohol is better. It won't improve your conversation skills but it will make you feel as if you were saying something intelligent, and that's half the battle won.

 

[bender22]

Yeah perhaps I would have more success if I was under the influence of caffeine, I've never really tried it (I rarely drink tea or coffee). The main reason I usually go out sober at night (well besides saving money and health reasons) is because I don't want to become reliant on alcohol. I wouldn't want to have to rely on caffeine either. I'd rather be able to generate my confidence internally rather than externally.

But maybe at some point I might experiment with caffeine and alcohol for a couple of weeks just to see if it makes a big difference. I have had some good nights in the past when I've been under the influence of alcohol, it definitely helps you loosen up and reduces any anxiety. But then I've also had some good nights completely sober.

This may sound like an unusual pointer, but I'll add it anyway. I find that caffeine helps me with social interactions in general. It keeps me sharp between the ears (important for me, since my default state is slow and foggy) and improves confidence. These are temporary and slight effects, of course, but at times I've found that caffeine is so effective, I don't go without it when I really need to socialize. I imagine it could help with approaching girls as well. The only times I've come close to trying it, I was under the influence of coffee. Give it a try if you haven't, it's just another tool in the kit.

I went out Saturday night with some wingmen. I started off doing a few approaches with one of the other guys. They went okay but I wasn’t really switched on yet. We went to another venue and after wondering around like a lost soul for a while, I finally did an approach by myself. It went pretty well, I was feeling a lot more confident this time and the girl responded well.

But then I got distracted by a guy I know who came over to speak to me and she got distracted by her friends. Before I knew it she was taking off with her friends. I should’ve told her to stop and keep chatting to me first.

I spoke to a few other girls but they were only short interactions that didn’t go far. I’m struggling with meeting girls at night lately. Probably because I haven’t had many nights out recently. I’m just hesitating too much, then when I do approach I’m very unsure of myself. I feel like I’ve definitely taken a step backwards in the last month.

The past week I’ve been really busy working on other stuff so I didn’t get any chances to go out and meet girls during the day. I did however get another chance to talk to that girl I met at the gym a few weeks ago. I like her, she’s my type of girl and I can see some signs that she’s attracted to me too. Not really sure about how I should proceed with this one though. At what point should I try asking for her number?

There’s also another girl I see at the gym usually once a week. I remember when I first saw her at the gym I’d look over in her direction but she’d never glance away from her workout. So I started using my eye contact powers on her to see if I could get her attention. Sure enough, she finally started noticing me (eye contact is so powerful). Then last week we were training at the same time and I caught her looking in my direction on a number of occasions and we made some good eye contact several times. So I’m pretty certain I’m on her radar now and there might be some attraction there. All I need now is a good opportunity to approach her. The only problem is most times I see her, she’s having a personal training session with her friend. Not exactly an ideal time to be approaching her.

I’ve given myself a challenge for the next 18 days. 30 approaches (by myself, not with wingmen) in 18 days. That’s roughly 11 approaches per week. That’s more than I have been doing so it will push me a little further outside my comfort zone but it’s definitely not an unrealistic target.

 

[Batman55]

Yeah perhaps I would have more success if I was under the influence of caffeine, I've never really tried it (I rarely drink tea or coffee). The main reason I usually go out sober at night (well besides saving money and health reasons) is because I don't want to become reliant on alcohol. I wouldn't want to have to rely on caffeine either. I'd rather be able to generate my confidence internally rather than externally.

But maybe at some point I might experiment with caffeine and alcohol for a couple of weeks just to see if it makes a big difference. I have had some good nights in the past when I've been under the influence of alcohol, it definitely helps you loosen up and reduces any anxiety. But then I've also had some good nights completely sober.

External influence is relative. I would say about 5% or more college students would not even be in higher education if they didn't take medication for their ADD.. is it then "unnatural" for them to be in college given that their work is assisted by stimulant drugs?

For me the answer is no because society has such a high premium on quality, whatever it takes to get you there--within reason--is now taken for granted.

In terms of caffeine, you've got everything to gain and nothing to lose, especially seeing as you're not an addictive-type personality. The worst I've ever gotten was a headache for a couple days, when getting off it. I'm telling you right now dude, it helps with socializing, no two ways about it.

You do what it takes to reach your goal... if you're trying to be a body-builder, for example, you're gonna be taking protein shakes and creatine otherwise you'll be left behind. You can see where I'm going with this... it's just society and what it expects. Enhancement is encouraged and generally expected, at this point.