Approach anxiety
Hello friends,
I released a new song that you can find here. Feel free to check it out.
Can you relate to the following situation?
You are in a public park right now, alone, casually walking around on a sunny day. And out of nowhere, you see her: The most attractive girl you have ever seen. She is casually smiling right now while reading a book, and you think about approaching this person: It would be sick to meet this person right now and possibly get on a date, wouldn't it? You should totally approach her and ask for her number, because you have nothing to lose.
At least that's what you're telling yourself rationally. Your heart just started going into a flight or fight mode: Holy shit, are you really going to approach her?
- What if she rejects you?
- What if it's just not the right time?
- She is reading, you definitely shouldn't approach her, right?
- What if you are awkward?
The excuses kick in. Your anxiety rises. You suddenly are scared shitless. Then, usually, self attack kicks in.
- I am not good enough for her anyway
- I would just waste her time (aka, I'm worthless)
- Would she ever date someone like me
- What if I fail?
Can you relate to this?
I'm pretty sure every dude and a lot of girls can relate to that: Wanting to approach someone and not having the balls to do it.
And maybe some alpha-gigachad-sigma god male will tell you that they have never ever in their entire life (ever btw) have felt this kind of fear. But let me tell you: This fear is 100% normal.
Sadly, most of the time, the following happens: The fear kicks in, and you don't approach her. You won't go on a date, she will never know you existed, and you are going home with a new self-attack pattern, where you will start hating yourself for not approaching her.
This is a topic that many people struggle with. I want to help you out with that. Let's get right into it.
Fear is normal
First, there is nothing to self-attack about. Social Anxiety exists, and it's absolutely normal. Don't be intimidated by the kind of trash advice you find out there about “don't be pussy” and so on. You didn't do it, alright, then do it next time. You only lose when you tell yourself you lost and give up. Go on and try again.
Secondly, just because you never succeeded until now, doesn't mean that you will never succeed. But approaching someone needs courage. So don't put all of your self-worth onto one single approach and then just start bashing yourself after it didn't work out. For real, there are so many people for you to choose from, and you didn't even get to know the person really. You never lose.
This is the most important concept, btw: By approaching other people, you never lose. You always win. You either get a number/date and take it from there, or you gained experience. On top of that, if you get rejected, you probably weren't compatible to begin with. She actually just saved you time. Either way, be proud of yourself. By approaching people, you always win.
If you get a rude response, or a weird one, or whatever special one, you get more experience and you'll be less anxious. And remember: Woman aren't necessarly used to being approached. It's special for them as well. It's an amazing process, where you will grow as a person. Don't let fear stop you.
Every experience counts and will make you a more social person until you reach the inevitable end of getting what you want. Just keep going and don't let “bad” experiences break you, because those are the best teachers.
Next step: Go out there and start step by step.
This is a full on guide I'm writing here right now.
Eating Social Anxiety for breakfast
The outcome of the following exercise doesn't matter. It's for training.
I suggest you to talk to a lot of strangers. You will start simple and make it harder and harder, until you are brave enough to talk to everyone.
First of all, just start to talk to random people and having small-talk. Ask someone for the time. Ask someone at a shop where a certain item is. Ask someone to take a picture of you. Greet random strangers (just saying hi is enough). This is Level 1.
Accept that the fear of approaching will always stay. This is another concept. The fear of approaching will never go away, but you learn to deal with it.
Embrace fear: It's the reason it feels so good when you approach someone.
After that, you will go one step further: You try to talk to the opposite sex only (if you happen to be homosexual, then the same sex). But this time, people that are working in a shop, bakery, restaurant etc. don't count anymore. Now you are only allowed to approach “non-working people”. The conversations can still be very short, but that's fine. Take it from there. This is Level 2.
All of this fear will build up more. This is why journaling and meditating are important habits: You should feel through your fear, not try to drown it. This will help you a lot.
After that, you do the same challenge again, but you have to have conversations that are longer than 2 minutes at least. This is level 3.
Always remember that you have to act instantly when your fear kicks in before an approach: This is an essential trick. Don't overthink the situation --> See a girl/guy you want to talk to, count from 3 to 1 and just go and say the first thing that comes to mind. Be honest, something like “Hey, just wanted to approach you quickly bc …” (not giving you a full example, because I don't want to make you an NPC. You got this).
Now you reached the final stage. For this, you get to approach only people you find attractive, and you HAVE to state it, obviously. Go to the girl/guy you find attractive, start a conversation, and give a compliment within 5 minutes. Make also sure to ask him/her out. This is level 4, the one that makes you socially abundant.
And with Level 4, I'm going to reveal my last tip: For the love of god, she/he can't even reject you as a person: She can only reject the first impression of you. On top of that: There are a million factors that play into a social situation: If the person is tired, has their periods, is happy, is sad, is anxious herself, has a good day, has a bad day, is reminded to her EX by you, is annoyed, feels hungry, and literally a million factors more.
Approaching people is like gambling: You have no clue what the outcome is, and you never know the odds. So you might as well just have fun with it. Nobody cares if you fail, and you will be impressed by how quickly you'll win. This is the biggest confidence boost ever, trust me. Make failure motivate you to win.
With all of that said, go eat your anxiety for breakfast, so that you can have an amazing date for dinner. I believe in you.
My challenge for you
Approach people. You have read my blog, you know the four levels, start from level one and then proceed with more. I believe in you.
Talk to 20 people per level until you are at level 4. If you feel too scared at any level, you can go back down one, but you have to do 20 conversations AGAIN on this lower level before coming up again.
Start on whatever level you feel comfortable with, and then build confidence. You got this.
My song of the week
League of Legends has for no reason the best soundtrack ever. I love it.
Further reading
If you read until this far, this one here would be motivating as hell for you.
And maybe this one as well ;)
Thank you so much for reading today's blog post. I wish you an amazing week! And good luck with this challenge, you got this!
Much Love,
Kim