Some time ago, I wrote a post on this sub in which I expressed my intention to begin an exercise in which I went out and approached women each weekend until I had approached 100, and asked whether it would be acceptable for me to post nightly accounts of such ventures on this sub in order to keep motivated (SelectSelect75 (u/SelectSelect75) - Reddit). All of the commenters expressed that this would be acceptable, so until someone else tells me otherwise, I will continue doing this. The following post comprises account #8.

Context and goals:

I did not attend a Meetup tonight, but rather a speed dating event, organized by the company of that dating coach I’ve mentioned in several previous posts (Dating Coach | Core Confidence Coaching | Australia). I’ve been to several speed dating sessions before, and got no results thereat, but that was before I knew much of the theory that I know now, and I figure I need to start pursuing more avenues than merely cold-approaching women at bars once a week. Nevertheless, in lieu of any advice to the contrary, I decided to treat the dates as essentially a series of pre-arranged cold approaches. I decided that I would not count the dates as part of my approach and conversation tallies, given that they had been prearranged and the women were obliged to engage in them, but that I would count any phone numbers/phone number rejections.

The session took place at an underground 1930s Shanghai-themed bar I’d been to before. It was aimed at ages 29 to 39. There were 18 women. The way it worked was that each woman was assigned a number and a fixed spot to sit, and each man had to start talking to a woman, talk to her for five minutes, and then move on to the next woman in sequence upon the ringing of a buzzer, with the process to repeat until each man was back to the woman he’d started on.

Just to let you know, I will be going to a regular Meetup tonight as well, so this will be the first time thus far I’ve gone out two nights in a row, and you can expect another report tomorrow.

Account:

At the start, as it happened, I met the dating coach I’ve been talking about, who turned out to be one of the organizers. I didn’t actually talk to him beyond a: “Hey, we spoke on the phone about a week ago”, though. I was in no mood to go through an inane retinue of: “wHaT dO yOu Do?” “wHeRe ArE yOu FrOm?” 20 times in a row in two hours. So I decided that I would initiate each conversation with a prohibition against such topics, before testing out some left-of-field conversation starters (i.e… “2 truths and a lie, go.”, “If you were the opposite sex for a day, what would you do?”, “Describe your dream house to me.”, etc.). This appeared to be the sentiment of the organizers, too, given that they handed participants cards with recommended conversation starters written on them before we started.

All of the women proceeded to seem receptive to such conversation starters, and I had some amiable, even fun, conversations with them. However, I didn’t really feel as if I particularly clicked with any of them; wasn’t particularly attracted to any of them and didn’t feel as if any of them were particularly attracted to me. Also, a few of the women, I gotta say, seemed kind of… odd. I’m 90% sure that one of them was trans or enby – she (he? they?) asked for my pronouns (no, really) and then ended the conversation when I (politely, I want to stress) refused to tell her. Not one but two of the others claimed to be able to “talk to spirits” (again; no, really), and one of them claimed to have sustained an injury from one. I asked about 10 of them for their number (obviously not including the aforementioned ones), but only one of them gave it to me. She was actually the last woman I spoke to, and again, I didn’t feel as if I particularly clicked with her, but on a whim, I decided to ask for it at the very end, and as it happens, she gave it to me. Given that I’d now spoken to literally every woman there, I couldn’t think of what else to do except go home.

Reflection:

Last week, I reflected on how my conversations with women had been dragging on too long up to that point and how I needed to try and build rapport, cut to the chase and ask for a number faster. Tonight was a prime opportunity to practice this, given that one was literally limited by force to five minutes, although it turns out I get as few numbers from five-minute conversations as I get conversations from cold approaches. Again, I am uncertain as to what I ought to be doing in light of this.

All of the women seemed receptive to the left-of-field conversation starters, in much the same way as they seem receptive to the “three clues, three guesses as to what my job is” game, so I’ll try them again as I’ll try that again. If nothing else, they certainly make the conversations themselves more fun and less of a repetitive chore.

Should I bother texting the one woman? If so, when should I do so and what should I say? A funny meme pertaining to something we spoke about?

Tally:

Primary goal: 100 approaches.

Secondary goal: 1 date.

Tertiary goal: 100 immediate rejections.

Approaches: 35.

Immediate rejections: 13.

Conversations: 18.

Phone number rejections: 14.

Phone numbers: 2.

Dates: 0.

Sex: 1.

Relationships: 0.

Breakups: 0.