Story and background: I was in a 4 year, long term relationship that failed some 4-5 months ago. We lived together for 2 of those years. I do think that experiencing a long term relationship as well as the fall of one can really help extinguish any idealistic notions one has of women. So, because of this relationship I was in, I am quite comfortable in a woman's presence. A key thing for people that may get quite nervous around women, I think, is to view them not as an objective or goal for a moment and to simply view them as a peer.

The problem, however, is that my relationship had begun in high school and the social dynamics there are quite different than just living alone as you are not consistently around the same groups of people day in and day out. Because of this, and how my passed relationship sort of just came to be, I have no idea of how to really approach women 'in the wild' or actively pursue them.

Another problem I faced is that my confidence was absolutely shattered. I felt like absolute shit, no other way to explain it. It WAS easy to be plenty confident with a nice looking lady following me around. But when that was gone and I was flying solo, my perception of myself was ultimately broken. This coupled with having no knowledge as to how one should approach women put me in a really bad, sort of cyclical negativity spot.

So, cue in /seddit, cue in getting tired of feeling sorry for myself, and cue in acknowledging and repairing my inadequacies. This is what I did, and I am in a lot better spot today.

First, I realized that at one point I had to have been a bad ass at one point to have had gotten my ex in the first place. Surely I can do it again. But my self image was just completely messed up so here is what I did. I had 3 friends that were females that I am not attracted to. I went to these 3 people and basically confided in them a bit and told them some of the issues I had and just blatantly asked them for an objective 'rating' of me. This may be frowned upon by some of you for whatever reason, but that's what I did. They all independently gave me their thoughts and some criticism which was that I was cute and definitely attractive. The criticism that overlapped between all of them though, was that I NEEDED TO SMILE. The grand consensus was that I looked quite brooding and not approachable in the pictures I had sent. My 'default face' has sort of a pissed off look to it I guess which I am now actively aware of. But all this helped me solidify that I am indeed not just generically ugly and that WHEN I DO end up facing rejection it would be either because I FUCKED UP MY GAME, or THEY HAD OTHER SHIT GOING ON, but it was most likely not due to looks. And I think this is a big deal to get out of the way. I think it is a good idea to try to get some objective feedback from some other people as to how you look, which I am 100% certain is a better opinion as to how you look than what you have about yourself. So, if you are having problems with self image - just go ask a few friends for a quick favor. Play it like this, text some female friend(s) that you can talk to on a good platonic level and say that you are going out tonight and you need a 'face check' and send her a picture. You'll for sure get some feedback.

So with the knowledge that I was a badass at one point in time and the little confidence reinforcement I got from getting some objective feedback on my looks a hell of a lot of approach anxiety went away for me.

Over the course of the next couple of weeks I still approached no one. However, I did record every time I caught a girl looking my way and I'd make sure I shot her a glance and maybe a smile back, making some good eye contact. Starting to notice more when some girls would look at me, and catching some of them looking at me upwards of 3 times really helped solidify my self image.

This brings us to current. The new rule I've made for myself is that if I catch a girl eyeing me 2+ times I am to go say something to her. And also today I made a vague challenge to myself to simply smile at and get women to smile back with no goal other than to just talk to them to get over some cold approach anxiety I have. Today I did this three times and nothing bad happened - and I am sure nothing bad really can ever happen. Today I extinguished a lot of anxiety.

I work security at a shopping strip. My social anxiety was so bad that when I have to piss I would actually go to a female clothing store that is almost exclusively worked by gay men to ask for the restroom. Today, I did not do this. Today, I went to the Learning Store, a little store that sells education materials for kids that has this cute girl in there that I swear eyes the shit out of me everytime I walk pass (hence why I go to Charming Charlies..) Anyway. I just go in there and I'm already nervous -why? I go in there and that cute girl is just eyeing the hell out of me as I approach the counter not really helping at all. I'm just going to ask to go piss for christ sake. So I just make good I contact and smile - "Is there a restroom I can use?"

"Sure, it's over here let me get the keys." Then boom. It was done. That was not fucking horrible at all. My anxiety was absolutely gone after that.

I follow her over to the staff bathroom and she goes in another room to get the keys. This takes a moment. She comes back and says 'Here you go, I took as long as I possibly could to find them.' with a grin on. It was awesome.

I was feeling comfortable now and just said 'Ah not good enough, I definitely could have held on for at least another 30 seconds.' and made my way into the bathroom to take a piss which I actually desperately needed to do.

Finish up, WASHED AND DRIED MY HANDS, and went to return the keys. I handed them to her and purposefully touched her hand a bit, said thanks with eye contact. So I leave the store and when I am out I look back just to see, and sure enough she was looking at me. So that's how I took a piss and now know the chick at the Learning Store is into me. I now have a challenge placed on myself to go for a number if I catch her walking out to her car around closing time.

Also, at another store that sells baby and toddler things like strollers and swings and such there was a girl bringing in strollers from outside the store front and bringing them inside, but struggling with the door closing on her while she was hauling the strollers in. USUALLY. I would just ignore. Today though, I saw it as an opportunity to interact and really get over this AA. So I just walked up and asked 'Hey, do you need me to hold that for you?' and pointed at the door.

Lo and fucking behold, she just smiled at me and said 'Yeah actually, that would help a ton.'

So I went over there and held the door - I noticed the back of her shirt said 2016 on it, that couldn't be right, has to be college, right? - So I asked 'Where do you go to college?"

Lo and fucking behold again, normal conversation started.

'I go to x-college, I'm in my first year.'

'Oh yeah? Have you decided on a major?'

'Not yet.'

'Ah, well you'll figure it out. I'm going for applied mathematics. etc etc etc.'

and everything went perfectly okay. When she was done she said thanks for the help, I said no problem have a good one and that was that.

So these things may seem really small and petty, but they were actually quite significant in the way of me extinguishing A LOT of approach anxiety I had. You just go up to them, and start talking to them. Who fucking knew.