Lets face it. 99% of approaches are awkward. A stranger on the street stopping a woman who seems to be in a rush to tell her shes pretty and trying to get her to talk. Or even worse, at store or the train. That would make for a very awkward rejection. You are kinvading their peronal space. Not to mention your mom told you its rude to bother strangers.

Not following social norms is awkward for most. Its also very uncomfortable. This is why so many guys have approach anxiety. If you have AA, you must understand this, because in order to fix anything you must first recognize the problem. If you are going out and not approaching you must recognize that you are not approaching because you are waiting for that "perfect set". That set that is not awkward to approach.

Once you recognize that every approach will be awkward your perspective can change. When your perspective changes your goal changes too. If you have aa, when you go out your goal should not be to get a number close or make x number of approaches. You goal should be to recognize the approach as awkward and take the action. Tell yourself "Im going to take this awkward action". But dont postpone the action. Telling yourself that you are going to do this while youre still sitting at home will not work. You have to recognize it and take action the present moment, not worrying about whether you will do it later. So a better statement is, while in the field tell yourself "im just going to take this awkward action now". Dont worry about later, takke the action just this one time right now. Then when you see another set tell yourself the same thing again.

It doesnt matter if she stayed or not. The only thing that matters is that you took action despite it being awkward and this action has made you more comfortable with awkardness. It has made you comfortable with approaching.