Alright so the purpose of this post is to tell you a little story which hopefully contains some value and maybe get some feedback in return. Some information: In terms of looks, I feel like I've always been 'cute' or, at least, good looking enough that my looks weren't a big obstacle to overcome. But I doubt I'd thrive on Tinder or anything like that. I am not super good looking by any means. Anyway, I went to a college away from home and literally didn't meet a single person. Shy as fuck and it coincided with a breakup with the girl I had been dating all throughout high school. I had some people express interest in hanging out with me but I would never pull the trigger. I did have family in the city I went to school in so I spent a lot of time with them.

I got accepted into a doctoral program to start in fall in 2020 and, being in the Southern US lol, we've been in person-ing this shit pretty much the whole time. My biggest job as a TA is to run these things called 'tutorials' where you meet groups of 6-12 students to talk about that week's readings. They get participation marks anytime they say something that 'adds to the discussion.'When I run these things, my shyness is temporarily suspended and I just kind of act like a boss because I know all the issues, know what I'm going to say, have an idea of how I'm going to handle their responses and so on. There have been some cute girls in my regular groups but things went to a whole other level a couple of weeks ago when one of my fellow TAs said something came up and asked me if I could take over one of his tutorials. I walk in the room and I'm struck by three pretty fucking attractive girls in the group of 10.

I sit down and I introduce the topic which was the history of the drug war which happens to be my research area. I ask what they thought of the readings and they are silent which is pretty typical since most students never do the fucking readings lol. I feel the vibe is a big awkward since I'm not their regular TA and, as such, they don't really have an incentive to suck up to me or pretend all that much. Kind of like a substitute teacher sort of dynamic. I go 'Well I'm sure all of you have read every page but just in case you might have missed something since this is my area of research anyway, I'll offer a summary of the readings and my own view.'

From there, they all start talking and offering their views and this one really intense guy is super animated and ranting about all this stuff about how drugs expand consciousness and he's tried them all and I said 'I think you did the readings and maybe a little coke as well' and everyone is laughing, including the three hot girls and he's all 'You're a cool TA bro.' At the end I hand out a sheet of paper which gets passed out so they can write down their names for attendance points. The hottest of the 3 hot girls signs it last and she's taking a little long to sign it and I'm like 'This is weird' but then she hands it to me and leaves and I look at it and she drew in a heart. Now does this mean shit lol... maybe not. And it's probably not a good idea to try and pursue things with a girl when you're in a TA, even though I wasn't her regular TA. But I noticed myself being more confident after this with people in general (but especially girls) and I think the social proof element of 'This guy knows his shit' gave me a certain authority and confidence that allowed some of the more appealing elements of my personality to come out. Anyway this is getting long as shit but my suggestion would be to find situations in which you feel very comfortable and naturally dominant and maybe good things will happen, smaller at first and then larger and larger...