Long-time lurker here, decided to make an account just to ask this question. English is not my native language so expect a few errors.

I am a 24yo dude who's always been pretty shy around girls: afraid to show my interest, afraid of saying the wrong thing and of course afraid of rejection. During my life i've never really tried to "pick-up" girls and i was mostly relying on them making the first move. It was rare but it happened just enough times to get by.

However after a 2 year period of severe depression, rarely leaving my home (except for going to the gym and barely making contact with people there) i've been more and more insecure about my ability to attract women, so i started to look into forums and communities, like this one, reading books (yes i've read models)...

At first everything seemed to make sense: i was the one at fault for not approaching and not making my intentions clear so i just needed to improve, to get confident. In the beginning I was excited and thought to myself "wow it's THAT simple?? be manly ask girls out and get pussy?". This was until the truth hit me in the face like a brick.

My depression got better and i started to go out with some old friends again. I was eager to test my newfound knowledge, i was in great physical shape (used to be reaaaally skinny, now i was muscular) and ofcourse i was also expeting to fail sometimes. I tried to be more direct, bold, cocky and YET i was still invisible to their eyes or worse: i sometimes felt like an annoyance in a sort of "i wish there was an interesting guy instead of you". So far i've never managed to get somewhere with a girl I actually chose to pursue, i might get a name or a number but they seem really unresponsive and its hard to get a conversation going and if i try a more direct approach (like "hey let's go out sometimes..") i get the stereotypical "im way too busy/not in my head/it's complicated" response.

So, seddit, what am i doing wrong?

in the phys looks department: I am no Adonis that's for sure and i will be delusional to expect girls to fall at my feets, but neither a fat basement dwellerr. I'm fit, got broad shoulders and a six pack: i've got compliments numerous times from both males and females but it doesn't seem to generate any kind of attraction whatsoever!

On the other hand i'm working hard to be more "Alpha" as some people like to put it, i'm more confident than i've ever been with girls. I've corrected a good number of bad behaviours that i used to display. Am i still making mistakes? Yes, but who doesn't? Heck i even got over my fear of rejection!

I see lots and lots of totally average dudes, with their flaws and insecurities doing so much better than me that this whole thing is getting depressing and i see no light at the end of tunnel.

I really had wished for my first post to be some nice FR, maybe inspiring some other people to got out there and take action, but i guess today is not that day..

tl;dr never been a ladies man due to shyness (supposedly), got fit and more confident still shitty results.