TL;DR: Learn to brighten up the day of the cashier at the grocery store. Whether that cashier is male or female, attractive or not.

Lately, it seems that there have been an embarrassing number of posts and comments that cannot grasp basic human interaction in this sub. And the simplest practice and test to overcome this is: can you brighten some random stranger's day with only a few seconds of interaction? Can you do this reliably?

Most people, myself included, will lean heavily on an asocial demeanor out in public; minimizing social interaction with strangers. But there is a stark difference between defaulting to this out of habit and having no real ability to "turn the charm on" to begin with. And, honestly, even with this ability in your back pocket, a failure to exercise this habit regularly may mean it withers or you miss out on opportunities that could have been available had you been charming and approachable to begin with.

I get it. I have an INTJ death glare that could wither titanium. It requires energy and can be exhausting or even feel a bit "fake" to have to turn "on" for others, but. Let me ask you... Aren't you more lively with certain friends anyways? Is it for any reason other than you just feel safer with them than random strangers? So let's flip this on its head and circle back to relationships:

Wouldn't other people be livelier if they felt safer with you?

Because "social skills" is a two-way street. It is an artform that takes a deft touch; one that takes time to develop and settle into a comfortable fingerprint of your own identity. And, my gosh, you are going to go through some trial-and-error. This is why I highly recommend practicing with everyone who has to interact with you as part of their job, not just the ones you might want to sleep with. Because if you can crack jokes with Granny at the bank-teller, and make Broseph guffaw at the DMV, the only thing holding you back with "Stacey/Steve" is to stop pedestalizing them and choking with performance anxiety; you handle them exactly the same.*

This is all training; these are skills, and thus can be learned. Your goal is to develop to where you could reasonably get a 90% success rate of making someone smile with an organic interaction; your real goal is to make someone else's day brighter and find enjoyment in doing so. (Pro-tip: set your countenance before even entering such a location. Imagine, if you must, that someone just tripped over themselves and stammered that "You're gorgeous?!" before you even set foot in an establishment. Waiting until it's your turn to interact to fire up socialize.exe is a bit... off-putting.)

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*Romantic and physical attraction is another level and a different discussion. When it comes to relationships like friendship and romantic ones, your deeper traits and interests will filter for those who better align with you. The problem for a lot of people seems to be not realizing that they're not even on the ground floor of social interaction. And your chances of making it to that next level, let alone sustaining it in a relationship, are almost non-existent when you're just boring and awkward or otherwise don't feel safe to others.

If you want that fun-loving and breezy relationship... You had better put the horse before the cart and figure out that the "fun-loving and breezy" part happens before the relationship does.

{{Alternate theory}}

People actually inherently understand this to be the case, but. It's always easier to blame things outside of yourself that you can't change, instead of doing the hard and often scary labor of doing the necessary work on yourself in order to adapt.