I had a third date the other day. First two dates where quite nice, made a bit of physical contact like touching her arm but things never escalated. So I wanted to show more intent on the third date. We had a coffee and took a walk afterwards. At some point probably after 20 minutes of walking I wanted to grab her hand but she first thought I’m about to grab her umbrella. It was really awkward but I made a joke about it that it was the un-smoothest thing ever and we both laughed… Anyways, I took her hand and talked about something random to pretend that everything is cool but still it was an awkward situation. We walked for a bit longer and when I said goodby to her I tried to kiss her. She just offered her cheek to me so I kissed her on there and that was it. Now she messaged me that she‘s not into me.

My problem on dates is that I don’t fell comfortable to physically escalate things that lead to a kiss and more. At what point and how do you approach those things while being smooth and comfortable? I had quite a lot of dates that where nice, but not more.. Please share some advice how to get better at showing intent and escalating things.