This isn't just about women you're interested in, how do you start a conversation with anyone? Like what exactly do you say to open a conversation with a random person sitting next to you. Do you make an observation about something? Do you try and be humorous?

Ok so I'm alright once the conversation has properly begun, there's plenty of advice on that, but I seldom know what to say to open a conversation. I always just play it safe and only talk if there's a genuine excuse to, at risk of falling flat and having them just close it off and ignore you. I'm a university student so I'm constantly in these sorts of situations where there are people you could start a conversation with, if only you knew how. I really just want to make the most of my time here, socially, build a large friend network, meet new people everyday, be constantly doing stuff.

It sounds so damn simple that I feel dumb asking it, but I see such a huge gap between those people who can just spontaneously strike up conversations with everyone they see, and myself. I'm sure part of it is just having a strong mentality and self-assurance, being prepared for the person to just be totally uninterested in talking to you and shutting it down, but there's still a skillset involved that I'm lacking. In order to develop confidence in this area I need to know techniques. I need examples I can adapt into reality, or just a book suggestion or video or something to teach me.