This is the first field report I've written for anyone other than myself to read. It is my hope that I can contribute to the growth of other sedditors as well as receive feedback, all while documenting my progress for others to see. My knowledge of pickup strategies and terminologies is probably medium-low, but I have done my best here to explain my tactics.

I recently made a decision to better my life in many areas. As part of that quest, last week, I went back to school at age 25. Another major point of improvement is my social and sex lives, so I knew that the first day of orientation would be an invaluable training day in the social arts. It's also worth mentioning that the school I'm attending is very largely female, with a huge percentage of them being the "general" type of girl I usually go after.

So I challenged myself to be as outgoing and charismatic as I could, and to talk to people all day. I pointedly went into the day with no other expectations. I understand that these are baby steps, but I'm not embarrassed by that. I've been significantly more hermitish over the last few months than I normally am, and I don't feel very "polished" right now in my social skills.

I walked into school chatting up an old lady who works there. She was friendly and willing to show me where I needed to go, and I really just wanted to walk in with someone. I didn't feel confident enough to flirt with her, but there were plenty of smiles and laughs, and it was a very positive energy interaction. We ended up entering the main building with a group of about six people, which was important to me. When I'm in a large gathering place, I don't feel very comfortable alone. I feel like I'm being judged for being a loser without any friends. So I counter this by surrounding myself with people! It makes me feel better, and it provides social proof, which in turn makes me feel better, which makes me perform better, and so on.

The first thing I notice about the room is that it is FULL of hot girls. There are tables lining one side of the room with benches on either side of them, and almost all the girls are sitting on the "wall" side of the table (a sign of nervousness?). I remember a move from The Game where you pivot yourself to leaning on the bar/wall, so that people have to surround you. I didn't see an opportunity to do that here, unforunately.

Any creative ideas for this situation to make it seem less like you're "leaning in"?

So I sat down on the "room" side of the first table, said "Hello hello," smiled big, looked both girls in the eye, and turned around to remove my jacket. I do this almost every time I sit down at a set, for a multitude of reasons. One, turning my back on them after I've already said hello to them is a nice push-pull. Two, it gives me a chance to stretch my arms out wide and take a big deep breath, which always calms me down. Additionally, it gives my blush (every fucking time) an extra second to subside.

I turned back around, sat down, and extended my hand with a smile. "I'm IGetsBuckets, what's your name?" I confidently shook their hands, and lo! They were nice to me! Shocking, I know, but sometimes we get so wrapped up in our own shit that we can't possibly think anyone would respond to us in a pleasant way.

I tried to keep the small talk going. I don't have enough recollection of this conversation to give you guys exact lines, but we mostly talked about the school we were all about to start. I straddled the bench and gave a friendly smile and said "Good morning," to everyone who walked by. I know it may be kind of cheesy, but I was really enjoying letting everyone see me chatting up (now three) girls. I felt like the fucking man. I haven't been laid in almost a year, but in that moment I felt confident and suave.

At one point, while sitting with the girls, there was an awkward silence. Girl One has been giving me some sly looks, and we have a lot in common. I've been making the most eye contact with her intentionally. During the awkward silence, Girl One says, "I think he's a little stressed out." Not really sure what that was about. I didn't look at the other girls to see their reactions, but instead just said something deflective and tried to shake it off.

I convinced the group to move to the auditorium (where all the new students were headed eventually anyway). I've seen some of Tyler from RSD's videos on Youtube, and this seemed to parallel what he teaches about "leading" the group around. Accurate or not?

The auditorium was pretty empty when we walked in. Girl One took the aisle seat of the third row. I put my stuff down in the seat next to her, then sit in the third seat (with a seat separating us). I know, weak move. I'm honestly incredibly embarrassed just writing it here. But I'm doing it both to provide an accurate model for feedback, and to hopefully allow others to be more honest with themselves.

So at this point, I realize I've fucked up. In retrospect, this is where I started to lose my cool. I'm also not in a position to move closer to her. I spent about 30 agonizing minutes sitting a seat away from this girl and not being able to do anything about it. I made a decision to spin the experience in a positive light. My first freeze-up. This is good. I can recognize it now and move past it.

I tried to spend the rest of the day working on maintaining eye contact & confident posture, and talking to as many people as I could. We were busy for the rest of the day, and not much else exciting happened. I just tried to do the best job I could at making my personality stand out from the others.

Another big takeaway from today is the power of initiating a conversation with Girl B while you are standing with Girl A. It doesn't seem to need to be anything special, the act just shows that you're confident enough in your surroundings to do it. I feel like it creates an element of jealousy with Girl A, while sort of showing off your status to Girl B.

All feedback greatly appreciated! More to come soon!