Hey all, it's your random fish again. I'm here to bring you another field report. My very first warm approach, turned date, turned to my first ever rejection where I didn't get outright ghosted.

Why am I sharing this?:

There's quite a lot of people out there who thinks that once they learn game, they're probably gonna get all the girls. This isn't the case if you're just an average guy trying to stand out. I also want to use this to serve as a reminder of how easy it is for you to lose yourself when you think you've found romance. A lot of us recovering lonely people are so starved of connection that we end up over compensating. This FR serves as reflection for myself, and I hope it may be helpful to you out there. After all, I find writing about my dating life therapeutic and that's all I wanna do. But, if it happens to help some guys out there, I would be really thrilled!

The background:

I started volunteering recently as a photographer for an animal shelter to help them with adoption rates.

I went to take some photographs, then went home to change before I went to a cafe to edit my photos. As my friend owns the cafe I was working at, I decided to snap some shots for them as well.

PS: I take pretty good photos.

The setting:

The cafe I was at has a pretty friendly vibe, it's a single table and customers usually sit around so it's very easy to make friends. This girl wanted to check out alpacas at the town square later on at night and as I had my camera with me, I told her I wanna take her photos with her and the alpacas, not gonna lie, she mentioned her friends showed her a video of someone getting spat on by an alpaca and I mentioned that kinda wished that I could see that happen.

The date:

Here's the thing, not every date starts off as one. I just wanted to go and take some bomb ass photos for her. As we went and get some food at the venue, it turns out tickets to see the alpacas were sold out so we decided to go and grab a drink at a nearby bar. Before we went for drinks, she set a hard boundary with me where she mentioned, no hand holding, no kissing on the first date etc, I respected this boundary.

We drank and the conversations flowed quite naturally. As my previous drinks with my coworker turned sour real fast, I was trying to pace myself a little bit. Turns out she's a reddit user and I showed her all the posts I made here and she read all of em. I shared a little bit more about my life back then as an incel, and I apologized that I take a very statistical approach to dating. We shared a little bit about our favourite subs and I went a little bit into why I like posting field reports like these, to share my baby steps with you guys who might be going on the same journey.

We went to another bar as my friend's band was playing. She continued reading my field report in that bar and I taught her how to use my camera. I used that to establish some kino with her. We sat at to a bench nearby to sober up. Here is where she mentioned that she would like to hold hands, and as we were sitting a little bit closer, I tried going for the kiss which she rejected, however she gave me a consolatory peck on the cheeks. We were just sitting on the bench and vibing and she took whiff of my cologne and said, "Our mutual friend was right. You do smell nice."

Some stuff she mentioned that might be useful for you guys who are not getting dates/keep getting rejected:

  1. She said yes to a drink with me because she can sense I just wanted to get to know her more and it didn't feel like I have an agenda.
  2. I look great. She mentioned that girls actually care way more about physical appearance than guys do. I asked her if she would've said yes if I was my old overweight self. She said no. So, for all you overweight guys out there, go lose weight, work on yourself.
  3. I think I might have some type of halo effect going on right now. Ie: if I showed my FR to girls on a date, they might not think I'm creepy lmao.

Moving a little too fast:

The day after, we had another hangout turned mini date where we initially planned to go take some bomb ass photos on sunset after lunch. However, as we were lighting up some joints, and were up till 5 am the previous night, she said she was too exhausted after I sent her home to get changed while I grab my camera at home.

That night, she called me and told me she just saw someone posting about her ex and she mentioned that she feels like he moved on too fast. She texted me about her best friend giving her an ear full about our impulsive drinking when she was telling her about our date.

As I woke up this morning, I replied to some of her message from the night before. She was asleep and when she woke up, she texted me to mention that she isn't ready to date and she hasn't gotten over her ex.

Some of my takeaway from here:

So a lot of you might notice that this post is a lot more negative compared to my previous posts. I wanted to highlight for a lot of guys out there that dating isn't always smooth sailing. My sense of self isn't strong enough that I lost my sense of direction within 2 days of meeting this person.

My next goal in my journey to fixing my inner game, is for me to fix my sense of self. To be truly happy with myself, so the next time I feel that connection with someone, I can be ready.

I also think I might have a drinking problem when I'm out on a date so I'm gonna set a one drink limit the next time. I wasn't fully hammered but to give off an impulsive vibe when I go out with someone probably isn't a good thing.

I have been doing a lot more social things recently, it's refreshing to meet new people! I am looking forward to my next few dates.

That's all from your random fish!