So I mostly lurk OOT (inb4 "this thread shows why", "go back to lurking") and I was surprised not to see a thread such as this among the plethora of subjects being discussed. If there is one, and I'm blind, please forgive me.

Now, onto the meat of the issue, most of us are at least somewhat aware that being ripped and having brad pitt's face is neither the only way nor necessary to get women "interested" (for lack of a better word). A lot of it is confidence, humor, wit, charm; in a word, confidence. But how do people who lack confidence make the best of their bad situation? What are some things people with decidedly anti-social tendencies (or just below average interaction/social skills) can do to improve their "game" as it were?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking for PUA advice, although I think there's definitely some cross-over with that kind of stuff; but I'm more interested in the non-gimmicky little things (like take a date to the park rather than to a restaurant as it gives more opportunities for subtle physical contact and less pressure to keep a conversation going while you're both locked in your seats facing each other for at least an hour - somewhat daunting for one lacking game+confidence), tips or tricks that have helped people overcome their confidence/game/shyness issues


To get a little more specific, personally one of the things I struggle with most is showing a girl I like her. As an aside, I'm prepping to go to psych uni and am in love with psychology and do a fair amount of self-analysis, but cannot for the life of me figure why I have this issue. The most plausible explanation I've come up with is that if I never take that step there's no chance of being rejected (albeit when I did do it and did get rejected it wasn't the end of the world by any means). At the same time, these sorta rejection thoughts are never actually in my conscious mind, more like when I'm with some woman, having a good conversation, laughing, etc, making (even the slightest of) moves comes so unnaturally to me, even sth like a subtle hand on the waist, or taking them by the hand. So, digression aside, I'm just awkward about engaging physical contact, I worry about being too pushy or coming on too strong and for the strangest reason, I have an issue with being too obvious, like "if I do this or that i'm making it to obvious I like her".


I realize I'm prob gonna get some tough love responses mixed in, and that's fine, but mostly I'm hoping to get a nice discussion going from which hopefully many people can learn many things.

I learned a lot of that stuff from reading the Student Life "Ask out a Girl" thread, EDF Dating/Relationship threads, and The Henry17/ArturiusX posts in the "is the PUA approach to women valid?" thread. Also start online dating(and read the online dating thread ldo) and don't be super picky on looks at first so you get experience setting up dates and making various mistakes.

thanks for that, gonna read those, the student life one is certainly interesting so far (even though i'm not a student anymore, a lot of the psychology of it is very informative).

One thing I just realized after texting a girl I really like:

I texted her some generic question about her week, she replied back and asked me how I was. So I gave a one sentence summary about my week and having a fantastic day on tuesday. So I send the msg and then I'm contemplating whether or not, if I don't get a reply within ... 15-20 mins (she replied ~instantly to the first), to re-open with "what's the present that you were most happy about receiving?" (which I think is an interesting question as well as I'm actually interested in the answer -not just her's-).

Then I realized...why am I doing this? Besides the basic concept of perhaps being pushy w/2 msgs in a row, I realized my preferred option in all other areas of life (apparently except girls, that is) is to take the route that allows me to get more information out of the other person so that I may better understand their thought process/intentions/etc. In this scenario, I would say that would involve precisely NOT sending a 2nd text(we're ignoring the pushyness factor for the sake of argument) but rather waiting to see if she replies with ~ "wow that sounds awesome, what happened on tuesday?" or replies sth else or if she replies at all.

So why am I acting differently in this situation? Is it simply emotions overruning the rational response? Is it a desire to constantly be in control? Or maybe just an unwillingness to accept defeat or even the possibility thereof?

(obv i don't expect people to answer these lol, just thinking out loud)

Your thought process is pretty terrible. I'm curious, how long have you known this girl and how do you know her? I have a feeling it's probably been a while and you likely already blew your chance with her a long time ago.

Why haven't you asked her out for a drink? This idea of trying to show her subtly that you like her is grade school behavior.

have you never had a girlfriend before?

Self-improvement. Workout, eat better, learn new things, dress well, get a great haircut, do interesting things, read interesting things. Make yourself someone women would want to date and most everything else falls into place.

nah i've actually gone out for a drink with her, talked, had fun etc, didn't lead to anything in particular, but she did seem to genuinely enjoy it, as did I physical attraction aside. However that was only late last week and i didn't wanna seem pushy. i don't know what i'm doing over the weekend either else i'd prob followed by asking her out again anyway (b/c **** it, can't worry about being pushy all the damn time) but it's possible i might have to go out of town so meh


had a 7yr LTR and a couple gfs before that. the LTR ended well, was circumstantial but in the end mutually accepted and we're still friends/love each other just not that way b/c it doesn't work for us
do you like to appear tough and condescending to perhaps bolster your ego in some sort of way, required by your disappointment with one or more areas of your life?

quid pro quo

heh this is basically word for word in the first page of henry's book and I do agree with it, I have for a while now understood that maintaining your appearance isn't vanity and it's hypocritical to want to score pretty women while you yourself are just below average-average.

I've been working out lately as well as being more on top of my haircut game and i've also lost 31 lbs in the past year, from 180 (so now i'm basically < average height and almost slim -beer belly fml- from being basically fat). It's done wonders for my confidence although it's taking time as I realize I was overweight for so long my image of myself has still not yet adjusted, i still often see myself still as the short fat guy rather than (now) > average looking slimming guy.

However, there's much more to it than that, I mean sure, I'm gonna get in shape etc but that's gonna take months. While I'm not saying omg i can't wait a few months, i've seen guys who look worse than me have decent looking girlfriends (in fairness most of my gfs have been very pretty or better and a long time ago in college when being nice and average looking while also being into alcohol/soft drugs was more than enough - and even then i was antisocial/bad/lacking confidence with women-)

I mean look, i may be coming off horribly. I'm actually a cool guy most of the time, i can talk to girls/women (i'm 26), have a decent sense of humor, probably at least a 6.5 face (aka i'm not an uggo) and get along great with the women in my group of friends, we talk a lot, laugh, generally have a great time even when it's just me & them w/o their bfs(who are also my good friends). However, I get nervous around people i don't know, don't share a history, injokes with; probably even more so with women who i find attractive and want to pursue.

I would guess my best course of action is take up some activity I enjoy where I would also meet women (but guys too, not for teh gayness obvs), to "practice" being more natural/less nervous around people I don't know (well)

This is what I was going to suggest in response to your OP.

You need to find something your are really good at and/or enjoy with a passion. If you meet women in the context of that activity, they will see you at your best - most confident/comfortable/competent.

It also reduces the intensity of "oh no, the only reason he is saying hi to me is because he is asking me out." If you are in a mutual activity, you can meet people without this pressure and then the opportunity for further development will arise from a more natural circumstance.

Women tend to sniff out desperation pretty well, so this plan reduces that. Of course, there is a further paradox that women love attention, but don't like being smothered by attention ... While feeling the need to challenge whatever activities you participate in (attention and your other friends) for attention.

That's good news. Sounds more like after a 7 year relationship that likely started when you were quite young, given you are only 26, that you are just at a loss as to how dating works as an adult.

Definitely do the reading bobo recommended and you'll get an idea as to how the dating game works. I'm sure you will be fine once you get a grasp on how it works.

Asking out that girl again is certainly not being pushy and is just normal behavior of a dude who is interested in a girl. Your thought process is a bit strange, but again I think it's more a result of not yet understanding how the dating game works as an adult.

I am quite interested in finding the "girl version" of myself. This way, I could hopefully base a relationship on honesty and avoiding a lot of the "game playing" inherent in dating that I (and presumably other "shy and gameless") find so annoying and illogical.

As for Jah Onion, it seems to me that he's doing fine.

E: it seems that people change their entire personality when they are "courting" a potential mate. I remember watching my friend of 15 years try to get with this girl. Everything about him changed, even his tone of voice. He became oh-so-interested in all the mundane details of the life of somebody he just met. It seemed so incredibly fake. It really bummed me out. He did indeed date this girl, for a few months. Is that what it takes? Tilt.

"Ohhh, you go to x school, that's interesting! Wow, do you know y student?? He goes there!"

My friend would not otherwise care in the least where this random person goes to school or who they might know. Later on I told him that it seemed to me like he adopted an entirely new personality for this one conversation, which was lame as hell, and he just said that I'm dumb and that's how dating works. Well, ok, if that's what it takes, then perhaps dating is not for me. I refuse to be that inauthentic. I still remember this scene well, even though it was like 6 years ago.

heh, nah. There are people that are infinitely "worse" than yourself, believe me on that.

You see his friend personality. This same guy almost certainly changes their entire personality when talking to their parents, their boss, a judge, a cop, a baby. Everyone has different personalities based on context. I'm guessing none of these other personality changes tilt you.

It's not fake at all. This sentiment is very very common in guys who lack success with women. It holds them back in a huge way.

Yeah, but in your first 4 examples, that person is an authority figure in some way. You're generally just trying to avoid trouble. The fifth is barely even human, biologically (brain chemistry, overall development) speaking, so whatever.

I don't think, as a heterosexual male, that I should act differently around a 25 year old woman in a social setting than a 25 year old man in the same setting. I am not the kind of person that is interested in the life details of someone I don't know. This shouldn't have to change because they have a vagina.

I don't know ... the above whining aside, I know your overall point is correct, in that we have "different personalities based on context". It's trivially true, I suppose. Bums me out. I just wanna be me, as trite as that sounds.

there's nothing wrong with recognizing the fact that in many scenarios you do act different around a woman than a man because you want to have sex with the woman. it's a totally normal thing and to think that you HAVE to turn into something that you dont like just because youre attracted to a woman is a very poor way of thinking about things. it seems like you think that you have to change into a totally different person around a girl youre attracted to, which isnt the case at all, your personality can still be the same and you can "still be you", but you dont have to feel uncomfortable about the fact that youre physically attracted to some people and not physically attracted to others.

You should learn some magic tricks

well, I've been "being myself" for 28 years and I've still not even been on a date, so I think I actually do need to be someone else

I have a small sample on which to base this, but it seems like my friends all just act differently around their girlfriends or girls they're interested in. I guess they retain the same baseline personality, but they're definitely different. It's as if they are putting on a show.

Or maybe they are just showing another side of their personality as the situation dictates? You can't ever be 100% who you are. Ever think how strange it would be if your friends brought out their romantic sides around you? It just wouldn't work in the context of friendship. The situation we're in dictates which parts of who we are that we choose to reveal.

Thanks for the nice words and advice guys.
this makes sooooo much sense and is definitely one of the things i'm self-conscious about.

As for TypicalBro, you sound a lot like me when I was younger, very radical, very black or white, you need to be more flexible in your views. Dontdoitpls makes a great point as do the other guys.

Yeah, DDIP's post seems especially insightful. It must just be me. My buddy certainly thought I was an idiot when I told him all this.

do you act slightly differently when youre around various social circles? i know i act a little different if im around X group of friends vs. Y group of friends, but i dont think of one as better or lesser than the other.

and of course it seems like youre putting on a show when you date someone. thats 100% inevitable and not a bad thing. when you first start dating someone you want to show off the best qualities about yourself, what's wrong with that? i want a girl i date to want to show off her best qualities to me when we start going out. it shows that youre actually interested in that person.

Jah Onion - you should just be putting yourself in more social scenarios that require you to talk to strangers. bar trivia night, a softball league, etc, stuff that just gets you talking to people.

movieman,

For context, TypicalBro doesn't like to be around people and doesn't shower, and wants to find a girl he doesn't have to shower around. I don't think it's obvious to him that you change behavior around people, he just wants to be him.

I recently touched on this in one of the other dating threads, but if you're interested in social psych, look into Mead's ideas on identity or search for the posts. The basis of it is that we all have multiple selves, play different roles in different contexts and it's all perfectly normal. I studied this extensively in school and ever since have always found advice like "be yourself," "keep it real," etc to be misleading and rather dumb.

I used to think insanely similar to you. Women rave on all the time about wanting equality, being treated the same as a man, etc. Yes, women should be treated equally, but they are also different and should be treated as such.

When you have the boys around for beers and football for example, the conversation is not going to go the same as if there were women there. If it did, most women probably would be bored, and quite likely offended at the general conversation. The same as if you are with your friends, you don't act the same as if you're with your grandparents.

Sales taught me a lot about picking up girls. Firstly, they make a decision quite quickly about whether they want to talk to you - so appearance is quite important. You don't need to be hot, per se, but a good haircut, nice clothes, and good cologne is essential.

Next, you need to essentially mirror your customer (or girl). Find out their interests, find common ground, be fun, always be smiling & happy and be casual (this may take time if you're a noob, and that's ok)

In the end, it does suck you have to play these stupid games. They're illogical, ******ed, and kindness and intelligence should trump just about anything imo. But girls are girls. They enjoy the chase more than the catch. It's why they can go out, have 10 guys coming onto them and still choose to go home alone.

Focus on the chase more than the end game, because even though you want that so bad, you've got to play it her way, because that's the society we live in. For example, if you're playing poker you don't usually turn your hand over before the flop or you'll get no money in the pot.