Hi seddit, this is going to be a semi-long one so thanks in advance for anyone who reads and/or has input.

A bit of background: I'm a 20 year old male who has been reading and attempting to absorb as much information from seddit as possible. I have gone through a good amount of the stickies/guides etc but honestly it's fairly overwhelming.

History wise, I have never been with a girl. I really never knew what I was doing and of course suffered from 'AA'. Recently I've gotten over a bad case of what you guys like to refer to as 'one-itis' where I crashed and burned after telling the girl how I felt.

Whenever I interact with a girl I am really attracted to I mostly go into stupid dumb mode and lose my nerve. (Exception with one-itis girl above).

I have been working hard to improve myself. I am probably a 6-6.5/10, average enough. I am overweight (need to lose say 65~ more pounds to be at ideal weight) but have been working hard the past few months to lose weight and get into shape and am progressing well on that front. I have also been dressing much better and taking care of myself a lot more grooming wise etc.

I will be 21 before the end of the year and my goal is to improve and become the person I know I can be before then.

Other positive steps I've taken is talking to a lot more people, making conversation with strangers whenever possible, smiling and being more outwardly friendly. Something worth noting, whenever I have to do anything professional (e.g. meeting new clients, giving presentations etc) I am so full of confidence and have absolutely no problem doing a really fantastic job of it, but when I am in a social interaction when someone I'm attracted to I will nearly shutdown (see above).

I am at a point now where I feel I can take things a step further in terms of improvement but I feel really overwhelmed by everything and am not sure what to do. Any input or advice anyone would have would be helpful, the more basic the better.

To expand on the point about improving myself physically: I am a very funny and intelligent person. I can be a big presence in the room when I am in my zone and a little self-esteem behind me. I have varied and interesting hobbies/interests and am in an interesting/lucrative career path (still in college fyi).

On the more specific end I wanted your opinion on a recent encounter with someone I'm attracted to. Let's call her A. A works at a new local store. I first met A when buying weekly shopping, she was pleasant and told the person in front to have a nice weekend. When it was my turn she made very small chat when scanning my items and told me to have a nice weekend too. Skip forward: the next few times I'm shopping at said store when I see A I do my best to make eye contact and smile, which she returns (note: the first couple of times I was extremely nervous and avoided eye contact). I progress to saying 'hello how are you' and smiling when I pass by her doing the shopping (baby steps I guess!). Skip forward again I am queuing to pay for goods and she walks over to me and told me she can help me with them (store was closing) so we go over to her lane and she helps me scan the items through, while doing she makes conversation and starts to slag me over my items etc (joked about me being a big baby for having chocolate milk or something). I shutdown a bit (see above) but still managed to pull off an ok conversation but didn't really drop any hints that I like her. So that's where I am now basically, I know it sounds awful but it's the closest thing to a positive encounter in a long while so your opinion would be appreciated.

So.. that's basically it. Thanks seddit!