50 First Dates - Date #16

Only three days after the previous one, I went on my sixteenth date today. Great! I'm really piling up the experience here.

I was going to be meeting up at Starbucks, at 3:00, with a girl from eHarmony. A girl from eHarmony, who had initiated communication. This would be especially interesting, since eHarmony matches are supposedly just that - matches. And because the girls on that site tend to be more serious about finding someone special, and because she'd been the initiator.

My phone rang around 2:40. I saw her name on the caller ID. We had never spoken - only sent messages. Without forethought, I answered the phone. And so it began.

We exchanged greetings, and she told me she was running late. We talked for a couple minutes, and, I was comfortable! My voice was completely in gear. I felt positive, relaxed, and confident. We hadn't yet met, but wow - I liked the way she sounded!

After a little while, she called back. She was lost, and I worked on talking her through the rest of the commute to Starbucks. I continued to be myself on the phone, sounding and feeling good. But would this continue once I actually saw her in the flesh?

Finally, she arrived. I wasn't sure what to expect - she had only a single photo online, in which she was barely smiling.. But I had decided early on to follow through and at least meet her, if for no other reason than practice.

She got out of the car. Wow. What a pretty girl! A pleasant surprise.

She hugged me, and introduced herself. The hug was something new for me - she sort of briskly rubbed my back at the same time. We were off to a good start.

I had firmly in mind one of the lessons from a few days ago, listed in the last post. I was going to stay "present" with her. No matter what, I wouldn't let myself get distracted again.

We walked into Starbucks, ordered, and talked a little while waiting. I made a tiny mistake, asking her something that was obvious, but I remembered to stay "present" and just mentally shrugged it off. I was going to move on instead of worrying about it. There was another tiny incident involving a straw (ha ha), and I once again quickly shifted my focus instead of analyzing it.

And so, I was once again sitting at a table in Starbucks, with nothing in front of me except a girl and a vanilla bean frappuccino.

I started going through the usual stuff. Conversation topics. My voice was clear, and I felt pretty good. I knew I sounded confident.

After a few minutes, I was thinking to myself: I really like this girl. Wow!

Aside from being very attractive, what was this girl like? Well, she was shy! Or so I think. From the very start, she looked down and to the side a lot. She looked down and to the side, instead of looking at me. Classic shy person behavior, even though it's one of the few problems I actually don't have (I'll look ya straight in the eye, every time!).

Maybe she liked me, and was just a bit nervous, just meeting me for the first time. After all, she had probably never met anyone from the Internet, while I'd already been on 10 other blind dates. These shindigs are becoming a part of my standard routine!

This date of mine seemed shy, but like every other person I've met on the mission, she did plenty of talking. As usual, I was rattling off questions. Oddly enough, my date didn't ask me many questions at all. Just like the other girl from eHarmony that I went out with four times. They both asked a few things, but so little that the conversation seemed like I was the interviewer and they were the interviewee. It would have helped if this girl had asked me some reciprocal (i.e., "how about you?") questions after I asked about school, work, and hobbies. I would have had something to contribute on those topics, but I couldn't figure out how to bring them up since she didn't ask.

I was pretty sure I hadn't done anything to lower her interest in me that early, so I figured that wasn't the reason she didn't inquire more about me. I have no idea, really - maybe asking questions is just natural for me, and not for some people.

We had some silences, with her acting a little nervous, looking down and to the side. Each time, I restarted the conversation after a few moments, and it wasn't bad. I'd lost track of time, but at the start of a silence following some laughter (there was plenty, by the way), I decided to end it on a high note. I walked her to her car, and used some scenery to trigger one final conversation topic from memory (pets).

I had done well the whole way through. One of the best dates ever (in terms of my success in being myself), and so far, I liked this girl a lot.

Continuing to sound like a confident, in-control guy, I told her I was glad she made it out. She said "I had a good time." And I said "See ya."

Will I soon be going on just my third second-date ever? In my experience so far, the girl usually initiates some sort of follow-up if she's still interested after the date.

Today, I received such a follow-up message in record time.

Keeping in mind that I never told this girl to let me know when she got home (although that would have been nice), check out the text message I got 40 minutes or so later:

"Ok im home. I hope you made it safe also. It was good to see you."

And so, I don't take anything for granted, but lets tentatively call it a success. I would love to see her again, and hopefully will soon. And I'm going to keep getting as much practice in as I can, everywhere I can. Hopefully I can build on this whole being-myself thing with her, and make it consistent like it's become with the one platonic friend I've made along the way here.

A few thoughts to be integrated into the Master Plan:

1. Contribute. Since this girl wasn't asking me many questions, I started to think of ways to contribute to the conversation other than asking and answering questions. The elaboration I mentioned last post is one idea. Another is to try to contribute part of your own knowledge to something your companion is saying. When they're telling you something, don't wait for them to ask a question! Just think briefly about how what they're saying relates to something you know about, and throw it out there. That's probably what people normally do - I will study this a bit.

2. Thoughts on interest. On date #15, I was completely uninterested in the girl, and did horribly. Today, I was very attracted to and interested in my date, and I did wonderfully. So scratch all of my previous ramblings about needing to not care in order to be comfortable. I just need to remember to not dwell too much or obsess over these things - a potential pitfall after meeting a new love-interest. Overdoing it can probably produce some added anxiety.

That's pretty much it, for now. A final, general observation is that things are great right now. I have other things in the works, which will hopefully translate into more good news to report. It's interesting how things were so bleak and slow just weeks ago, while now, after a few downs and some persistence, things are looking way up again. I haven't been significantly discouraged in quite a while now, and I'm starting to feel like I may actually complete this mission in 2008.

50 First Dates - Date #15

With New Years coming up, I seriously need to make a resolution for 2008: Keep the blog updated! It's been way too long. But rest assured, my mission has been continuing as promised.

It's true - working my first 9-to-5 job leaves me with less time for these things. But I've gotten fully used to it now, and I'm back to consistent dating and other activities following a 2 1/2 week lull.

And so, I went on another date last Thursday. It was my fifteenth since starting the blog. Yet another first date! The tenth different girl I've been out with.

As usual, I met my date at Starbucks. I arrived and saw several people sitting, but it looked like I had gotten there first. I started to sit down, but then one of the girls sitting nearby got up and introduced herself: I hadn't recognized her from her match.com profile.

In a way, this relationship ended at this very moment. For the first time, I was meeting up with a girl who initiated on match.com - she'd sent me the first wink and message. Browsing diligently as I do, I had seen her profile prior, but decided I wasn't interested. But when she winked at me, I figured hey - I need the practice! Fastforward a week or so later, and I was going out with a girl I had very little or no interest in. So this was different.

We got up to order, and ran into some awkwardness. The cashier took my date's order, and I tried to add mine - "and, can we have a strawberries & cream frappuccino?" She told me to hold on. What the heck? So I just gave her the size. She told me to hold on again! I was extremely annoyed - the cashier didn't recognize that my date and I were together. She rang my date's order without mine. I tried to pay for it, but my date interjected that she didn't mind paying for her own, blah blah.

As a result of this little incident, I realized something absolutely critical.

Back in front of a frappuccino and a girl, a couple of things were going on. First, I wasn't interested. Not at all. I'd expected that in this situation, I'd have no problem being relaxed and being myself. I wrote before about how I thought that "not caring" was a key to everything. But alas - I didn't care about the outcome, and yet I was doing worse than on perhaps all but one of my fifteen dates. I suffered from my infamous Voice Thing, and couldn't easily think of things to say. At some point, my date said that I was shy.

Huh? Was I going backwards? In fifteen dates, this was the first time that anyone had ever actually called me shy.

I thus determined that my "don't-care" strategy needs further examination. It may or may not help, but it's clear that it is not enough by itself.

But back to the cashier incident. While talking to my date, I really couldn't stop thinking about it. It was a major distraction, and was probably a big reason why I was doing so poorly.

The critical realization is this: It is absolutely critical to be "present" while talking to someone, or doing anything social. You can't be distracted by other thoughts. That distraction takes way too much away from you. Simple.

It wasn't even going well enough for me to get a high note to end on. For the first time in a while, I ended up letting my date end it first. I walked her to her car, and the final first-date words (I always make note of these) were: "Thanks. Talk to you soon."

The last time I heard that, I got a second date (and a third). But I feel like this girl may think it over and change her mind. If she doesn't send a follow-up (like the ones I've received after most of my successful dates), I'll never know, because there's no way I would ever ask her out again.

Without further ado, here's a list of things I learned on this date (to be integrated into the Master Plan soon):

1. Dating is awesome experience. This one was bad in a way, but just take a look at this: In fifteen dates, I've gained all sorts of experience. I've now been out with girls who liked me, but who I wasn't interested in; girls who I was crazy about, but who weren't interested in me; a girl who didn't even remember who I was after our date, and more. I'm starting to get a really good feel for what I'd only read before. Dating is a numbers game. It's no big deal if something doesn't work. It's no big deal if a particular person isn't interested in you. Even after meeting someone you like a lot, if it doesn't work out, another person you like just as much or even more will eventually come along - even if you can't imagine that at the time. So experiencing all of this for myself has really taken the edge off, in that I'm not so anxious about the whole prospect of going on dates and seeing the results.

2. It's absolutely critical to be "present" when doing something social. In the moment, and not dwelling on something else instead of giving all of your attention to your companions and the conversation. The social activity itself can be a big source of anxiety for someone like me, and so it's easy for little mishaps to become major distractions, if you let them. The key is to simply brush off mishaps and refuse to be distracted. Bring your attention back to the task at hand, even if it requires some mental force to put off the worries.

3. Elaborate. I wrote about this some months ago. In most of my conversations, I've been doing a very, very small percentage of the talking. I figure I can shift this and do more if I can figure out how to simply elaborate on whatever I do say. A new idea I have in mind is this: One way you can elaborate on almost any topic is to give your opinion on the subject. I want to try giving my opinion following most anything that I say, and on more of the things that other people say. This will be interesting, but more on that after I have an opportunity to work with it.

4. Be open. I found myself rattling off pre-thought-out responses to some questions. I need to figure out, or perhaps "feel" out a way to give reflective, honest, open responses without needing an abnormal amount of time to think.

5. A tiny little detail I thought of after this date: Try to refer to the other person by name at some point. At a minimum, use their name when you say goodbye. This may sound kinda oddball, but I feel really good when someone new says my name. In my case, maybe it's because I've had so few peple outside of my family even know me by name. But I think it's nice, and helps build a connection between any two people.

Story Time

Well, tonight is one of those nights. One of those nights when I'm exhausted, and it's way past my bedtime, but there is just too much that has gone on with my mission for me to wait any longer before telling you about it.

Thursday night was the office holiday party. I hadn't really become comfortable with my coworkers yet, so I was a little anxious about it. It was after work, so my attendance was optional. But I didn't give myself a choice - it was a good opportunity to work on some things, so I had to go.

So I started looking forward to it. I thought it would be great if I could relax, be comfortable, and converse with my colleagues. Meet tons of new people, and even make a couple of friends.

But alas - when the time came, I squandered the opportunity.

I was a little awkward, being the new guy and not knowing many people. I did okay with that though - I followed my manager around a bit so he could introduce me. Stuff like that. Nothing to really go into here, because I just did the normal stuff that I could handle before I even started this blog.

How did I blow it, then? I was stuck inside my head all night. I became woefully distracted by my own thoughts. All kinds of worries and ruminations. This took me out of the game big time. With my focus shifted internally, I spent most of my time just standing or sitting and smiling, rather than being able to get past a surface level of involvement in conversations.

There isn't much more to say - that was the problem this time, plain and simple. The bottom line is that I need to avoid focusing on anything internal (which means not worrying, for one) when I am in these situations. I should instead be relaxed and attentive to my surroundings, allowing me to more easily converse with others. A little more on this later when I summarize it for the Master Plan entry.

And so, I was determined to never again make the mistake of getting "stuck in my head" during some social event. I found some comfort in knowing that I would have the chance to make up for it, since I would be seeing my coworkers for 40 hours a week for possibly years anyway. Going to the party was a success nonetheless (as is everything you try along the road to overcoming shyness). In particular, I at least became familiar enough with many of my coworkers to be a lot more comfortable later if I want to randomly drop by a cubicle and say, "What's up?" There is now some rapport between us.

The office party really made me feel as if I hadn't made any progress since starting this mission. That, of course, was false. I've made an enormous amount of progress - Thursday was just an off night. But I was determined to demonstrate by doing something else very soon.

So I decided to try to go for another 1-on-1 platonic over the weekend. I sent a text message to my friend from craig's list. She hadn't responded to the last e-mail I'd sent over a week ago. I decided I'd come too far with her to let her drop out. It seemed like she had become a stable friend, but I wanted to make sure.

I suggested we go to Dave & Busters (they have food, a sports bar, and tons of games), and she agreed. Great! I still have two friends.

Dave & Busters is an awesome place for a date, or for hanging out with friends, whatever. I really can't think of any place better. But at any rate, it was more of the same. I was completely myself with this friend of mine. We met first 4 months ago today, and this was our fifth outing together. Really, the first time we met was pretty good. But since then, I've been completely on target. 100% myself. When I'm with her, I'm relaxed, comfortable, confident, and every other positive adjective you can think of. There's no inhibition. I don't have to think about what to say. I don't have to think about forcing myself to say something that comes to mind. It's just natural. I teased, joked, and bragged all night long. There were only a few moments where I even became consciously aware of how uninhibited I was, since I was instead just having a good time instead of focusing on anything internally.

I will think about everything that makes me so comfortable with this one person, and integrate it into the Master Plan running entry soon. But for now, I have one more side-story.

There's a very pretty, very fun girl that I went to school with. Let's call her Kris.

The last class I had with Kris ended about 2 months before I even started this blog. Back then, though, I was super interested in Kris, and spent much of the semester thinking about asking her out or whatever. Well, needless to say, I never came close to actually doing that, in my pre-mission life. One day though, after I got this thing going, I added her as a friend on facebook. It was one of those days when I was feeling a little crazy - I thought what the hell? Maybe she was interested and I could go on a date with her. After all, I had now actually been on a few, and could handle some basics.

But facebook revealed that she now had a boyfriend.

I'm rambling. What I really want to say is that, by chance, I saw her in the mall with her new boyfriend one day over the summer. The mall isn't even near our alma mater, so it was no small coincidence.

They were walking behind me, and I looked back a few times. But I became very anxious and didn't stop to initiate, or otherwise say anything.

Now, I hardly ever run into anyone I know (since I obviously know so few people). But amazingly, I ran into this same couple once again at a fondue restaurant. They walked by me, but I this time I didn't say anything because A) I was with my family and thought that would make me even more uncomfortable and B) I thought it would be awkward since we didn't speak to each other the last time at the mall.

I was pretty mad at myself both times for not speaking to them. How could I fail so miserably? How could I fail so miserably, after running this blog for several months, and supposedly making so much progress? If only I could have one more chance..........

And, amazingly, I got that chance tonight. I was conversing with my new friend at Dave & Busters, and I saw them again. Unbelievable. There was no way I was going to take strike 3. They walked by, and I interrupted my current conversation, shouting, "Hey Kris!" She came over, and we talked. It was great! I really enjoyed it. I had suffered a panicky sort of little anxiety attack when I first saw them, but I had calmed down. I was comfortable, confident...everything I was with my friend before they came over. I shook hands with the boyfriend, and continued my cocky-and-funny routine about how great I was at the games.

I mostly just wanted to recap that story. But one tiny, yet potentially critical observation is that the presence of a friend that I'm comfortable with may have been what put me at ease talking to my old classmate/love-interest and her boyfriend. With my other, long-time friend, I've also been comfortable when meeting others with him around. Spanning out friends was always part of the plan, but I haven't really had the opportunity yet. It looks like that could work wonders.

Overall, I'm feeling more confident than ever. I know I need to do these social things for practice, but I'm really enjoying them just for the fun and companionship. I believe that this is a big part of putting me at such ease.

Things are great. Thanks to eHarmony and match.com, it looks like I will also still be able to line up plenty of dates in the coming days, for more experience and fun. And for Monday, I've arranged another second-chance opportunity with another pre-mission acquaintance. I'll tell that story a bit later.

Back In Action

I went on my fourteenth date tonight. It had been a couple weeks since the last one, so I'd felt a bit of anxiety the last couple days. Would I be rusty? After all, this was a first-date - the first one of those I'd done in over a month.

In the hours leading up to this shindig, I tried monitoring my thoughts a bit more than usual. I noticed that there was a direct relationship between my level of anxiety (the "physical" feeling of anxiety) and my thoughts. When I thought about something negative - like what it would be like to have this girl ditch me like all of the others - I felt more more anxiety. Sometimes an actual surge.

When I had positive thoughts, such as thinking that I really wouldn't care if that happened, I felt much less anxious. There were moments after these positive thoughts that I felt completely at ease - back to normal. But I noticed that in order to become relaxed like that, I had to start thinking positive naturally. If I merely told myself something positive, it had no effect.

In other words, I discovered that there really is something to all that talk about thinking positive. It can and does have a big impact on anxiety level. But the key is that you can't simply think positive thoughts - it has to be more than words. You have to actually believe it.... More on all of this later in the Master Plan.

What about the actual date? We met at the most beautiful, romantic location. The Starbucks inside of a Target store! (In all seriousness, this is a really nice, recently remodeled store).

This was the fourth person I met on eHarmony.com. The first was my first date ever - I made too many first-time mistakes, and killed her incredibly high pre-meeting interest level. I saw the second girl four times. The third I just saw once - had an off day that time.

And so, this was my fourteenth date, but meeting someone you've talked to on the Internet (this time, for about a month) is ALWAYS interesting. ALWAYS! It never gets old.

The date was a lot like most of the others. The good news is that I didn't suffer badly from my "Voice Thing." My voice wasn't perfect, but it was reasonable this time.

Like almost every other date, she talked a lot. I'd written down a list of backup conversation topics, but I didn't make much effort to memorize them. As usual, I had no difficulty coming up with questions (lots of questions) based on what my date was saying. I made mildly humorous comments throughout as well.

I had reviewed the at-the-moment-quite-sparse Master Plan before our date. The thing that helped me the most was remembering something I mentioned about Inhibition: when something comes to mind, say it fast. It may seem like that could set you up to say something stupid, but that'd be a lot better than being inhibited. I, in fact, did not say anything stupid though. When something somewhat silly came to mind, or when I didn't know if it was the right time to say something, or when I felt any uncertainty whatsoever.....I just let it fly. Didn't give myself a chance to debate it. This makes a BIG difference.

And so, it was fun. I force myself to do these things because I have to - it's required for my life's mission. In fact, I don't even give myself an option anymore. I won't allow myself to turn down any social opportunity that I have. It's not even a consideration anymore.

But, I realized during this date that I was having fun. Lots of fun! It was so fun to be talking with a new person. Before this blog, I hardly ever talked at length with anyone outside of my family. So this is something I'll never take for granted.

It was fun, in and of itself. I realized that I shouldn't think so much about how my dates are going and what not - I should just enjoy myself whenever I get to do this stuff. I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but it's easy to lose sight of all the important principles I discover. That's precisely the reason I'm gradually integrating everything into a one-entry Master Plan.

So how did the date go? We talked about the usual stuff - food, family, music, work. Mostly about her...she had some good stories. And she seemed to enjoy herself. There was plenty of laughter, and she was smiling most of the time. I was a little nervous, but quite possibly not even enough for her to tell.

I was aiming for 45 minutes, but kept trying to end on a high note, so the date ended up being about an hour and a half. I think it's fun to review how every first-date has ended. Is there a pattern that indicates whether or not there will be a second? Lets see....


One-and-done: "It was fun, we should do this again." (Hug)
One-and-done: "It was good meeting you, and I'll talk to you later....?" (Hug)
One-and-done: "I'll see you later...?" (Handshake-Hug)
-Successful date: "Have a safe trip home." (Hug initiated by me)
-One-and-done: "Nice meeting you. Thanks again [for the coffee]."
-Successful date: "It was nice meeting you. Talk to you soon." (she's actually still e-mailing me)
-One-and-done: "Give me a call! You have my number now." (Lingering Hug). (She accepted a second date, then cancelled it and never contacted me again)
-One-and-done: (Legendary awkward attempt at a kiss initiated by me)

Tonight: "(Hug) I'll see you...... give me a call or something!" And I said "See ya."

I like it. But I don't take these things for granted. It's hard to tell unless it goes wonderfully - which hasn't happened for me just yet. But this time I'm not going to obsess over it or anything. I like her, and yet, it really doesn't matter too much to me whether she goes out with me again.
A big help while getting all of this practice.

I'm really happy to be back in action. It's fun, and quite uplifting. I have a lot less time now that I work 9-5 M-F, but I'm still going to keep at it. If I can get this social thing down (which remains to be seen, but bear with me), then anyone can do it. No excuses.

The Master Plan (Running Entry)

In this running post, I will develop a single, unified master plan for overcoming shyness and turning around my social life. This includes both ideas that I plan to try, as well as strategies that I have found to be successful. This post will be a great work in progress - I hope to succeed in turning my life around by July 9, 2008. In the meantime, many proven methods will be added, and failed techniques will be purged. The end result should be a definitive solution for the world's silent mass of shyness sufferers. Last Update: 11/30/2007

Principles

Practice

Overcoming shyness is not something that can be done by merely studying a book, a blog, or even a thousand web sites. The single most important thing to be done is practice. Lots and lots of practice. As much as possible - this can't be stressed enough.

Persistence

Overcoming serious shyness requires extraordinary persistence. Starting out, and even later on, things will inevitably not go well in many of the social activities we try. There is no way around it - if this weren't the case, then by definition there would be no problem in the first place. It's critical to remember that it doesn't matter how things go when we're out there getting practice. Failure is the price we pay for success; every effort made in doing something social is an accomplishment - a stepping stone in the path to turning things around.

Non-Acceptance

In researching shyness online, I've come across many threads on sites like yahoo! Answers where someone asks for help in overcoming their problem, and others respond. There is almost always a response essentially telling the person that it is OK to be shy, and that they should accept being they way they are.

No one should ever accept being shy. This is serious. Living is largely about love, friendships, comradery and the like. Being shy causes us to miss out on some of the best parts of life. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Inhibition

Inhibition really is the crux of the problem here. This is part of the current, working plan:

Try to force ourselves into some uninhibited behavior. Dancing in the streets would work, but starting out, it's easier and good enough to force some comments, questions, jokes, compliments, etc. in conversation.

Sometimes things come to mind to say, but we feel too inhibited to say them. The plan is that whenever that happens, defy the inhibition and do it anyway. The idea is that by force, you have allowed yourself to indeed be yourself (saying what you're thinking), a little more than usual.

The positive responses that you get should reinforce the behavior of being yourself, allowing you to eventually do it without needing to force anything. Now, what I learned the first couple times that I tried this theory is that you don't simply have to use force: you usually have to use brute force! This is simple stuff on paper, but when I've been in social situations, I've felt too much inhibition to say even some simple things, despite my strong will.

It's really a lot like jumping out of a window blindfolded when you know there's a trampoline to catch you. It requires a leap of faith, and some intense willpower in the moment, but you can certainly do it.

So far, practicing this every chance I've had has helped - it gets easier over time. It also helps to try to speak or act soon after something comes to mind; the longer you wait, the more psychological force you need to do it.

Being Yourself

Be yourself. This simple phrase summarizes the goal of this entire blog. My life's greatest mission. We simply want to be ourselves around other people. Nothing more, nothing less.

While it will take time and many of the strategies written here to achieve this ultimate goal, there is one thing that has to be done immediately. What we can already do is not try to be anyone other than ourselves. What I mean is don't try to impress by trying to make yourself sound more interesting, or anything like that. I learned this through experience; trying to impress tripped me up horrendously when I first started my mission. Hopefully you can learn from some of my mistakes, instead of having to make them all yourself.

I also believe that when other people respond positively to you when you're not making an extra effort, or putting on any kind of show, that will also reinforce your normal, relaxed, uninhibited manner.


Reading

1. Conversationally Speaking: Tested New Ways to Increase Your Personal and Social Effectiveness. By Alan Garner.

To be continued.....I will be fleshing this post out greatly, editing it several times each week.

The Office

Today was my twelfth day on my first job. I thought it would be worth giving an overview of the social aspects now, if for no other reason than I can (hopefully) one day look back and see that I've improved greatly.

In general, the social life in the office hasn't been what I'd hoped it'd be. I spend the vast, vast, vast majority of the time just sitting alone in my cubicle. I'd always envisioned there being more interaction in software engineering - it's not an everyday thing so far. There were several days where I could literally count the words that I said from 9 to 5. Eerily reminiscent of the way things were back in school. Thankfully, though, that began to improve a bit this week.

On Monday, one of my coworkers invited me to lunch. I was pretty anxious about it, but there was no way I could decline - I needed to do this. So he drove me and two of my female coworkers to the restaurant, about 10 minutes away. Glancing at his rearview mirror, I noticed that I was constantly smiling. I smile a lot naturally, but in an odd way, I couldn't relax my facial muscles enough to stop. Yep: I was a little nervous.

We arrived at the restaurant, and met some more coworkers - there were eight of us. Not having talked much since I started the job, I knew names, but not much else about these folks. I always find group situations to be the toughest. This was no exception.

I couldn't seem to get myself into the conversation. In fact, I really didn't even try. I wanted to, but somehow it didn't seem like there was any real opening for me. Of course, in reality, there must have been. I said so little (almost nothing) for so long that when I wanted go wash my hands, I was afraid to leave the table. I was afraid that my companions would talk about me while I was gone - about how I wasn't saying anything, or something negative.

As I ate, I was definitely a bit nervous. I felt a little shaky - yes, literally shaky, the way I described in the last post, but not as bad. I never did get into the conversation. Not one bit - my companions didn't help me out much by asking me anything.

The car ride back was better. In a smaller group, I was able to ask and answer a few questions. Inhibited, but back up to the ability level I usually have when I try going on dates.

So that sounds like it sucked. But by virtue of eating lunch with them, it forced me to become acquainted with seven new people. My thinking is that I will now be able to try chatting them up 1 on 1 later on without feeling as uncomfortable.

My best results on the job came today. We have a meeting and company lunch once a week. At the meeting, I had to give a status update in front of about 10 other people. I was anxious at first, but calmed down a bit before I had to speak. I calmed down even more once I started talking and heard my words coming out alright. I calmed down even further when my manager and coworkers reacted positively - it was like I was just a normal person.

At lunch, I sat with my manager and just one other coworker, who is even quieter than I am. I was good! Clear voice, and I thought of plenty to say. Plenty to say, because I had a lot of questions. It was the typical 1-on-1 situation where I've been able to keep the conversation going, but have been too inhibited to really completely be myself. In this case, that last part doesn't matter so much - being a little reserved is natural at work, though it was a bit more so than I would prefer.

I don't mean to bore you! Just thought this needed to be documented.

In other news......

I'm going on another first-date this Sunday. And I just got an e-mail from the girl I went out with on my last date. She initiated communication yet again, which means she's definitely still interested, despite our mediocre-at-best third date. I'm planning to not see her again, but that's definitely very encouraging!

Finally, I promise to try to start writing the "Master Plan" running entry tomorrow. I plan to do this every week, but never get around to it. No more procrastination :-)

Second Third-Date (Unlucky #13)

My situation has never been clear-cut. I've never really known what to call it: shyness, social anxiety disorder, extreme inexperience....some combination of those, and more or something else. But in the middle of my date this afternoon, I experienced a frightening reminder that whatever it is, it's more serious than I usually make it sound in the blog when I simply refer to "shyness"......

Today I went out on my thirteenth date since starting the blog in July. It was a third-date with the girl who has been pursuing me since we initially met on match.com.

I took her to lunch at Dave & Busters. Overall, it was really a lot like our second date. The great news there being that there wasn't even a hint of my infamous "Voice Thing" problem. That in and of itself is a major victory for me personally. I'm not even thinking about the horrid "voice thing" anymore; I hope to leave it behind, and carry this over to the future by just never going back.

The bad news is that I just didn't seem to have as much to say this time. I had already used most of the conversation topics from my list on the last two dates. I didn't do any preparation this time - just had a few things in mind - hoping that I would feel positive and would think of things naturally. But unfortunately, I often didn't, and there were some extended (though not necessarily awkward) silences throughout.

One "topic" that I've mentioned a half dozen times is my silly "updog joke." There's nothing special about the joke, no. The point is just that it's something entirely silly that, since I thought of it, I was always too inhibited to actually try, if it crossed my mind. On today's date, I did remember it. So the only thing left to do was to implement the Anti-Inhibition Strategy and force myself to go through with it.

And for once, I did.

We were eating lunch, and we had been talking about favorite foods. I asked her if she had ever had updog.

"What?"
"Updog. Have you ever had updog?"
"What's that?"
"Hm?"
"What's updog?"
"Nothin much. What's up with you?"

I had successfully executed the joke. She laughed a little, but just a little. It didn't seem like she thought it was very funny.

I really didn't think that I cared whether she thought it was funny or not. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I really didn't care. Consciously, there were no negative thoughts going through my mind. I wasn't (consciously) thinking "She thinks that was stupid" or anything like that.

But still, there was an awful turn of events.

A couple moments after the joke, I started to become anxious. My anxiety quickly but gradually built up, like a glass filling with water.

I was eating chicken breast. I had a fork in my right hand, and a knife in the other.

My right hand started shaking. Shaking uncontrollably - something I haven't written about in the blog yet, but that I used to experience whenever I had to do public speaking in school.

My hand was shaking so badly that I couldn't even raise my fork to eat. I tried to stop it by pressing my hand hard against the plate. This helped only a little.

I'm pretty sure that my date noticed this attack, and glanced at my hand. Wow. What must she be thinking? I continued to try to manage by instead drinking water with my left hand; removing my right hand from the table to use the napkin in my lap, out of sight; trying to wait it out. After two or three minutes (an eternity when something like this is happening), I regained control.

That was bad. I don't know if it was her reaction that triggered it, or perhaps some sort of pressure that I built up over the last couple months to try saying something silly on a date. The scary thing is that I wasn't consciously doing any negative thinking beforehand. It must have been something subconscious, seemingly outside of my control.

But I recovered, and the date proceeded as normal. We played arcade games and a couple of competitive things (typical Dave & Busters, or Chuck-E-Cheese stuff), and I was quite comfortable. I took her home after a couple hours.

I walked her up again. She again took me into her apartment without saying a word about it. The last time, I tried to kiss her before I departed, and she turned her head and hugged me.

This time, I just hugged her. I'd decided that I really wasn't interested enough in her, and probably didn't want to take it any further - so I wouldn't lead her on with a kiss. She said she would see me, probably after Thanksgiving. So it looks like *maybe* she was still interested, despite the bizarre trembling I showed in the middle of our date.

So it's yet another experience in the books. I think every single one helps. I will continue to trudge forward with my mission, doing everything I can to overcome whatever I encounter along the way. I'm determined to start taking more risks, and ramp up my efforts, so I should have lots to write about in the coming days.

If It Kills Me

Unexpectly, I'm back to talk to you again already.

I went to see 30 Days of Night with my parents tonight. I ran into a couple of acquaintances from my alma mater, from which we all graduated this year.

But they weren't just any acquaintances.

It was Jane and John.

I saw Jane for the first time in the Fall semester of 2004. She was shooting hoops on the basketball court - the opposite side of the gym from me. I was intrigued, but didn't think too much further about her until the second time I saw her.

I saw Jane again about two weeks later. I was playing some 3-on-3 basketball at school. She was in the center of the gymnasium, throwing a football back and forth with a female friend. And boy, could she throw!

I was in the middle of a game, but I couldn't stop looking over at Jane. I was more than intrigued. I couldn't even make out the details of her face, but she had this amazing bright smile. She radiated a unique, youthful, beautiful, fun type of energy - I couldn't do it justice recounting it in text.

At some point, I was totally lost looking over at her. The guy I was supposed to be guarding in the game was wide-open right underneath the basket; I was set in stone gazing over at Jane. I recovered and attempted to block the shot. But for the next play, I was back to looking over at Jane.

I'll never forget the words I said to myself after that. I said, "This is the girl I'm going to marry."

On my way back to my apartment, I saw Jane outside the gym. She was on a bike, and her friend was nearby. As I walked towards her, I thought about what I could do - smile, say hi? This was way, way before the blog, so I couldn't have even imagined starting a conversation.

It was the first time I had actually seen Jane up close. She was so sweet, so beautiful. I wasn't being poetic when I talked about her amazingly bright smile. It really was amazingly bright; it turned out to her dental braces, which I couldn't make out from across the gym.

Amazingly, she spoke to me. first. She actually thought I was someone else. When I told her that no, my name was X, not Y.... she playfully grabbed me and ran me across the grass. Boy, was she strong!

We talked very briefly. My standard conversation - what's your major, what year are you? That was about it. She was smiling the whole time - beautiful, amazing girl. It was my junior year in college, and I'd probably only had a couple of actual significant conversations with females up to that point. So naturally I couldn't, or didn't keep it going, and said see ya later.

That was it. Afterwards, I thought about Jane constantly. I couldn't exaggerate this if I wanted to. She was the most beautiful, amazing girl I'd ever seen! The sweetest, greatest girl I could imagine! I literally could not stop thinking about her.

I saw Jane around campus a few more times that semester. She always greeted me with an enthusiastic "Hey, how are you?" or something similar. My feelings weren't fading a bit.

After the winter break, I finally found myself heading in the same direction as Jane. We were going into the library, and she was carrying a huge bookbag. I asked her how her winter break was. We exchanged a couple of sentences, and then she said she was heading to her locker to put away her books; her back was killing her!

I answered with one of my standard "Oh yeah?" remarks - I still find myself saying that a lot, when nothing else to say comes to mind.

I always took the stairs, never elevators. In an amazing feat of ineptitude, I kept walking toward the stairs, and she split and headed to the elevator. I didn't even say goodbye!

Now, of course it's obvious now what I should have done. I should have offered to carry her bookbag up; I should have asked her what floor her locker was on; I should have continued to make conversation for a few minutes while we were together, and then gotten her campus phone extension number, and gone from there. Simple stuff.

But this was a time when I had never, at age 21, been out on a single date. When I had scarcely even had a conversation with a girl outside of my family.

That was pretty much it. I saw Jane a few weeks later - the day she'd gotten her braces off. She was happy, but didn't seem so interested in me anymore. She was dating someone else.

I saw that someone else the day of the Super Bowl. They were walking together. It was John. Yes, the same John that I saw with her tonight at the mall.

John is similar to me. Eerily similar. He plays the same sport, he had the closest major to mine, and he even looked similar to me.

And so, Jane has been with John ever since. He was the very first guy she went out with after meeting me. After meeting me, who she seemed quite interested in. Me, who thought she was the most amazing girl in the entire world.

And so tonight, I asked Jane and John what they'd been up to. They apparently live together now; they're probably engaged or married.

Wow. I felt so anxious talking to them, I started to lose control of my body - I was glad we ended the brief conversation before my infamous twitch returned in full blast.

Jane, the only girl who I ever seriously told myself I was going to marry (practically love before first sight), ends up marrying the very first guy she goes out with during the time I'm too anxious and inexperienced to even have a full conversation with her? It's painful, my friends. It was painful every time I saw them on campus, but I was doing well until I saw them again tonight. It took me a while (months, or a year?) to become seriously interested in other girls again - but eventualy "out of sight, out of mind" kicked in.

I felt down after speaking to Jane and John tonight. Jane still seemed every bit as beautiful and amazing as I thought she was. She hadn't "shrunk" on me at all.

So I got to thinking. In my google research, I very often come across sites like yahoo! answers, where people ask questions about how to overcome shyness, and ordinary people answer. More often than not, there's at least one answer telling the shyness sufferer they should accept the fact that they're shy - it's okay to be shy - stuff like that.

My long story about me, Jane, and John shows that those answers are absolute gibberish. No one should ever accept being shy, or anything like that. This is serious. Living is largely about love, friendships, comradery and the like. Being shy causes us to miss out on some of the best parts of life. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Now, this may not be what some people want to hear, but I believe it is an absolute fact. I can't know for certain that it would have worked out with me and Jane had things been different. Of course not. But through age 24, it is clear that shyness has been a pervasive force in my life, and it's caused me to miss out on way too much already.

So I am not going to accept being shy. Never. Ever. I am going to fight. I've decided that tonight, I will do whatever it takes. If it kills me, I'm going to beat this. There's no hyperbole here - I mean this literally.

Yes, literally. So tonight I figured that if I'm willing to face death to overcome shyness, certainly I should be able to take any risk. If I'm willing to take risks (it's easy to say and hard to do, but believe me, I am going to do it, and prove it in this blog), a whole new world of possibilities opens up. I started thinking about getting started immediately - probably implementing something like the one approach per day program, with that being just for starters. I originally planned to work on this stuff every single day, but lately I've done nothing at all on most days. That has to change.

So it turns out that the girl from my second second-date is in hot pursuit. She called me today, and I declined a group date to a movie. She then sent me a phone text message later, asking me if I wanted to grab lunch tomorrow.

I'm currently not very interested in her - probably the main reason for my success with her to this point - but I need to go out with her again for the practice. I don't mean to lead her on, so if I don't feel more interested tomorrow, I won't try to kiss her or anything like that.

So this is it. This can't be like any of the other times I've preached in the blog, and then just went on about half-assing the mission. It really is a mission. I'm going to turn my life around, or die trying.

Status Report

So I've been busy. So busy, in fact, that it's been way too long since I've had time to write an update. At least we got a couple of good comments in the meantime. Now I will backtrack to last Friday, and bring you up to speed on everything that's been going on.

Stable Friend

Last Friday was great. I hung out again my newest friend (I only have two total), who I met from craigslist way back on August 9. It was actually only the fourth time we had met up. The first time we talked at Starbucks; the second time we went bowling; the third time we saw a movie.

This time, we went to a play. An interesting, interactive sort of play. The premise was that we and the rest of the audience were audience members of a taping of a show like America's Most Wanted. The cast was to re-enact a murder of a young girl. But during the show, the blanks in the gun would be replaced with real bullets, thus creating a real murder in front of us. We were to be involved in the investigation and figure out who dun it.

Not to get off-topic. The point is that it was an interactive thing. The cast members came around in character and chatted, argued, and did all kinds of stuff with us. I talked to a couple of them, and I was completely relaxed and comfortable. There was a stuck-up, arrogant, 17-year-old character who everyone hated; I made friends with her :)

As for the interaction with my friend - it was perfect. I was completely at ease the whole time. I was the best possible version of myself - relaxed, comfortable, confident. I didn't have any difficulty thinking of things to say. I kidded around, made jokes, teased, nudged my friend. I laughed outloud with no self-consciousness or reservation. I could have spoken out in front of the whole audience (about 30 people) if I'd wanted, and I would have been fine.

Amazing, huh? I'd go into more detail about what I talked about, but it really doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is that I was able to be myself! Which is all I've ever wanted on this mission.

So there are two things worth doing here. First, I should point out that this friendship has started to really stabilize. This time, our activity was her idea. And she paid. Sample line of dialogue from her, when I was driving her to her car and neither of us knew exactly where to go: "Don't worry, we'll find it buddy." The point being that it seems like there is no longer any issue of whether everyone's intentions are strictly platonic. We've been e-mailing each other since then, and everything is good! She is my second stable friend who I can be myself with.

And so, the second thing worth doing is trying to figure out what it is about my interaction with her that is different, and has made me so comfortable. What aspects of my experience with her can I apply to, well, every other person, so that I can be myself with them too?

The first thing that comes to mind is the whole Don't Care mindset that I plan to discuss at length when I start the Master Plan running entry. In short, I just had no concern about what anyone thought of me. It sounds simple, but if that holds up as a strategy, the trick will be that you have to actually not care; I had tried saying that to myself before, but just thinking it didn't help much. ("Don't care" is a bit of a misnomer. Of course you care; but it seems like you need to not care in the same way that you don't care when talking to your best friend or a close family member. Maybe I'll clean up the diction in the master plan.)

The next thing that comes to mind is the gem quote I mentioned before: "According to the experts, if you feel positive, feelings of fear will not interfere with your ability to think of something to say." This time, I made no effort beforehand to prepare or even review lists of conversation topics. And yet I had more than enough to say. It looks like I will have to work more with that feeling-positive theory. Relying too long on a list of topics for things to talk about inevitably leads to disaster. I figured this out after doing it for a fourth meeting with another person. You can only list and remember so much.

I'll add more here later as I think about it, because I just remembered there's another important topic I need to discuss.

New Job

On Monday, I started my first job. I'd had this great vision that the new job would be a huge springboard for my mission. I was hoping it would get me over the hump by providing me with 8 hours a day of (unavoidable) social interaction.

Well, my first week on the job didn't turn out to be what I hoped, as far as the social stuff goes. I was a bit tense. In fact, I don't think I was any better than I had been back in college. Sure, I wasn't anxious, and could have some basic short conversations and interactions. I don't want to get into it, because it's really not good. I'm way past the point where being able to say "Have a good weekend" is any sort of victory.

The first problem was that I ended up just sitting alone at my desk for long hours each day. There wasn't nearly as much "required" social interaction as I'd expected. There was a company lunch on Thursday, though. This is alarming: I sat at a table with a group of new coworkers, and I didn't say anything the first several minutes. Now you all know I have been practicing conversations and 1-on-1 interactions since July. So what was going on? I was drawing a blank; nothing fitting seemed to come to mind.

I had become a bit of a hermit at my desk for three days prior, and group situations are the hardest for me anyway. Perhaps all of this led to me not feeling so positive, so I didn't have the ease described in the quote above.

But eventually, someone asked me which company I had come from, so that gave me something to say. And then I thought of obvious questions - duh. How long had they been working here....did they live nearby? When did they give out those company t-shirts? I eventually got into a prolonged 1-on-1 conversation, where I saw plenty of opportunities for follow-up questions.

Whew, so I hadn't gone backwards too much with my social skills.

But it isn't enough. I have to really take advantage of this job thing - my mission is more important to me than even the money they're paying me (!). I have access to about 35 people for 8 hours a day, five days a week. I'm going to have to figure out how to utilize this for much more social experience. I don't have many ideas yet; I suppose I could try to muster the courage to randomly chat up coworkers at their cubicles. I hope I can find one person to sort of target to become friends with, but somehow, I don't see any good matches yet. Who knows - I'll work on it, and it should make for some better blog entries later. I'm really motivated to work something out, becuse I feel there is some danger of creating a reputation around the office for being shy - and I definitely don't want that. It makes things worse - harder to break out of. Most shy people who read this blog went through that themselves in grade school, so I won't even start on it.

New Efforts

So, working 8 hours a day (instead of 0) leaves me with less time for all the online dating that I'd been doing up to this point. I've decided to take a break from match.com, but I'm still responding to the (very rare few) eHarmony matches that I'm interested in.

To avoid getting offtrack at all, I also decided to try something new. I actually posted my own entry in the craig's list strictly platonic men-for-women section. Picture and all, yes sirree. It'll be interesting to see how many responses I get, and what they're like - I really have no idea what to expect.

I also made a sloppy attempt at setting up a third-date for tomorrow- more on that if it actually happens.

"Tell me about yourself"

Well, things are going pretty well. Instead of the usual stuff - reporting on my experiences and coming up with new general strategies - I thought I would write a quick post on a specific, more advanced topic.

Back on date #10, my companion asked me to tell her more about myself. I really couldn't think of anything to say, and she didn't have any specific questions. At the time, I sort of placed blame on her for not having anything specific. But now I've realized that I should have had an answer to the general question.

I really can't tell stories at all. That's one of the more advanced things that hinders me a bit socially, but so far, the issue has been dwarfed by more basic problems (like figuring out how I can be myself).

So responding to the request "Tell me more about yourself" is a good place for me to start learning how to tell stories. I read this article that gives some suggestions. The general idea is to phrase the answer in such a way that makes it interesting to the other person, by telling a story. The author also suggests that it takes practice (no surprise there) to be able to give a good answer.

So I've decided that the next time someone asks this question (it's inevitable), I will have a decent response. I won't try to recite something verbatim - I want it to sound natural - but I have something like this in mind.

"So, tell me about yourself."

"Well, I grew up in Brookline. I went to school outside of Boston for 6 years, studying computer science. That really took up a lot of my time - I didn't do much of anything outside of my school work. So when I finally finished, I started making up for lost time by taking up new hobbies, trying everything I could. Now I'm balancing them out with my career as a software engineer."

So that's my first shot at a general answer geared toward a new acquaintance. I tried to do what the article said, pulling my background together in a way that creates a single, memorable picture of myself. I'll probably practice it aloud (although I hate doing that) a few times, and I'll let you know how it goes the next time someone asks me to tell them about myself.

Second Second-Date Update

Ahh. Women are tough to understand. Here's an update on the last post. I don't know why she didn't kiss me, but it looks like she realized she'd better make her interest clear after turning her head. The bottom line: Don't-Care Strategy Success.

Hey [Me],

Thanks for lunch yesterday. It was good to see you again.

How was the game?

While I'm here, let me share more good news. My new friend is starting to look stable: I just got an e-mail from her, asking what my weekend is looking like. It also looks like I'm going to start a new job at the end of the week. The job is part of my personal master plan to give me a huge push in terms of getting more social experience (I'm 24, and it's my first job). But I'll dedicate an entire post to that soon.

Second Second-Date

Today I went on my second second-date ever. This one was important, because it was the first chance for me to test out a theory that I believe is going to be a huge part of the Final Solution. And it worked.

I will go over this concept in much more detail tomorrow in the running Final Solution entry. For now, let me give you a brief overview:

I kept trying to figure out what the difference was between social situations in which I was comfortable, and social situations in which I was anxious or (especially) tense. I couldn't pinpoint a clear difference. It just seemed to be something intangible. Something intangible, causing the Voice Thing, causing me to have difficulty in thinking of things to say, and causing me to not be myself.

So what examples did I have? I started with experiences that I gained since starting the mission. First, there were the dates. I'd been pretty far off in most of those. And then, there was the new female friend that I made. I'd been pretty much myself with her, every time. What was the difference?

It seems obvious. I simply cared less about how anything went in the strictly platonic relationship with the girl who's become my friend. But no, it's not that simple. If it were, then I'd have all sorts of friends - not just 2. But one important factor seems to be that to be myself, I need to not care about how things go. Not just say that I don't care. I need to really not care. That's the tough part. Conversationally Speaking talks about something related in Chapter 12.
It's important, but I will discuss it soon in the Master Plan running entry.

For now, let me recap my latest date, as is tradition.

The most important thing to point out here is that I was testing my theory about not caring. I wasn't very interested in this girl. She'd been largely the pursuer, or else I may not have even gone out with her again. I really didn't care how this went. I kept myself busy with other things prior to our second-date today. Kept myself busy with other things, instead of doing lots of planning of conversation topics. Instead of thinking about what it was going to be like. Instead of worrying that it might not go well. Instead of thinking about it much at all, really.

And so, if my theory were correct, I should have been more comfortable this time. A heck of a lot more comfortable than on date #11, where I thought the girl was amazing. No, it wouldn't be perfect, because there's a lot more to this stuff than just not caring. But it should have gone better.

In my August 20 entry, I wrote this quote from a site on shyness:

The secret to knowing what to say is learning what to feel. According to the experts, if you feel positive, feelings of fear will not interfere with your ability to think of something to say.

At the time, I had tied that information into my own plan to try to lose my sense of self-awareness, instead of actively trying to think of things to say. When I tried it out on date #3, the result as an absolute catastrophe. After that, I completely abandoned that line of thinking, in favor of a new strategy. Now, it made sense again, and I knew a date on which I had no worry (conscious or otherwise) would be a chance to support this little gem of knowledge (I wish I knew what "experts" actually suggested this - if anyone can find this out, it could help us a lot).

So without further ado, this is how the didn't-care second-date went:

I picked her up at her apartment so that we could have lunch together. I had little to no anxiety when I called her, or when she came down. Contrast this to date #11 (a really-care-a-lot date), when for the first time, I was especially anxious just waiting for my date to make her appearance.

I started out with some general questions - what have you been up to? I was able to ask follow-up questions based on her answers. I'm always pretty good at that. But when she asked some questions of her own, I was better this time. I was relaxed, and able to answer without the usual stumbling.

We went for waffle sandwiches. I had a couple new conversation topics in mind - just because they had occurred to me as passing thoughts earlier - but I wasn't focusing on reciting them. Shopping, Black Friday, Music. I had some things to say of my own about most of the things (not the usual case!). I added information, and did so pretty smoothly. I did about 40% of the talking, instead of the usual 20% or less. There were some brief silences, but I didn't feel uncomfortable about them. It was pretty easy to think of new topics. At some point I even said something totally silly without having to force myself to do so. In other words, I was pretty much myself.

The only time I started to feel a little anxiety was when my mind wandered to thoughts of a possible end-of-the-date kiss, and a possible rejection. I only allowed those thoughts for a moment, and the anxiety lessened when I brought my attention back to the current situation.

When we got back to her place, I told her I'd walk her up real quick. I then got a little sloppy. That is to say, I forgot a few things. Not because I was anxious...just because I was a little distracted with the current conversation and thinking of the ending. (If you're wondering, I forgot to open the car door for her, and didn't think to sneak some chapstick during a perfect opportunity).

She took me in the apartment unit (a first!) and gave me a little tour, bedroom included. She asked if I wanted to sit down, and I did. She then kept talking away. Interestingly enough, she was asking the questions the way I usually am. Asking me about things she knew I was interested in (sports). We were sitting on her sofa together, and I was thinking about how to end the date. Hmm. I was going to try to kiss her - on a second date, that goes without saying. But I decided to wait until I stood up, instead of trying it on the sofa (although that would make for a good place for my first makeout!).

She stood up with me, and opened the door. I put my right hand somewhere in the vicinity of her waist, and started the motion to kiss her. This time, it felt pretty natural.

But wait! The kiss never actually happened. In an instant, she turned her head! She turned her cheek toward me, in a somewhat subtle way, and turned it into a hug. I was pretty surprised. There was no indication that she'd lost interest in me...so what was the deal?

I wondered very briefly whether she just thought I was trying to hug her. But no, it was subtle, but obvious - she turned her head away from my lips as they moved towards her.

I thought it was odd. But I didn't care. Nope, no negative feelings this time. No obsessing over it for the next 3 days (I'm still anxious about the date #11 girl, who I plan to call tomorrow night, in spite of the extraordinarily awkward ending. Presumably the anxiety wouldn't have gotten so difficult to deal with if I hadn't obsessed over it and placed so much importance on it to begin with).

So this girl and I are done, unless she initiates contact (and then, maybe still). But the moral of the story is that when I didn't care what happened, I was a lot less anxious (before, during, and after), and a lot more like myself. Now, just how it is that you can actually not care, at least in the way that it will reduce anxiety and tension, is an issue that I will have to work with and discuss at length. It's just one piece of the puzzle, but it's an important one.

Figuring Things Out

Last night, I decided to take a look back on some of the old entries. When I started out with the first few 1-on-1 interactions, I wrote posts that listed everything that went well, and everything that needed improvement. The early entries were also filled with all sorts of specific strategies for dealing with pretty much every problem that I could encounter on my quest.

Skimming over those entries last night, it didn't take me long to realize that I had allowed history to repeat itself too many times. All the way up through my eleventh date, I repeated many of the same mistakes over and over again. Simply put, I should have reviewed my own writings.

I became somewhat perturbed last night, realizing that I haven't been making as much progress as I could have, if I'd just kept in mind all of the important things I learned from previous experiences as I proceeded.

(I'm rambling, but stick with me - this is important)

I've had a lot of things in mind lately about what to do - what to try - that would be different, and that might work here. I decided to revisit a book that I keep under my bed, called Conversationally Speaking. I've mentioned this book before, but I said that it only contains very basic info on conversation skills. Well, it turns out that I hadn't read the entire book. There's a chapter near the end entitled "Reucing Anxiety in Social Situations." To make a long story short, Garner's advice here validated a number of theories that I've had in mind lately, but that haven't yet made it to the blog (because I wanted to try them out first).

So this is the plan. I am going to do something different with the blog. I'm going to create a second running entry, in which I will write a single, integrated master plan containing every single useful point that I've come up with. I will still be in the process of trying out some of these things. That's okay - I will remove and add information as I go along. I'll also explain the important points from that chapter in Conversationally Speaking, but that book is going to be required reading for us all anyway. This way, I can review a single entry (instead of skimming 50!) before every practice session, ensuring that I make progress instead of just repeating the same past mistakes.

The end result (8 months, or hopefully a lot sooner) will be a single, clear solution for overcoming the shyness problem, or whatever it is from which I've been suffering.

The master plan entry is going to take a lot of work, but look for the beginnings of it late Monday night.

O-o-h Child

So, in the Lab Notes, I talked about an amazing girl who I'd been chatting with on match.com. I said I'd never been out with a girl as attractive as she. In my mind, there was an issue of whether this would result in me being even more uncomfortable on any date with her. In this post, I will take you through our offline "relationship" (I know, I know) from beginning to a probable end.

It progressed, and I soon had her telephone number, and a request to call her to finalize a date for tonight. I cut short my Meetup.com event so I could head to my car and dial that number.

I tried my new strategy of not "building up" to making the call. I just dialed and pressed Send. She answered, and the reception was awful. I was totally off - I suffered from The Voice Thing and general awkardness (forgot to tell her who was calling, and forgot to check to see if it was a good time to talk - she was on the other line!). She said she'd call me back in about 10 minutes, and in the meantime, I'd decided to try to relax and take my time when I talked to her again.

I was less awkward when we got on the phone again, but my voice was still out of whack. What! That's going to need some work in the Lab Notes. But at any rate, I offered my usual Starbucks date. She said we needed to go somewhere that had more than coffee. Indian or Ethiopian food. Cool...this girl knew what she wanted. None of my other 10 (!) dates had ever been unsatisfied with my original suggestion. I told her we'd go with Ethiopian, and we talked later that night to set everything up. I improved a little on our third call - it was easy to talk to her - but was still a little awkward.

Tonight was the night. We met up at an Ethiopian restaurant.
This time, I wasn't going to make the same mistakes I did with date #1 (another first-date dinner date). I was determined to open the restaurant door, pull out her chair (no such chair existed at the Ethiopian place however), and most importantly, walk her to her car (the fun part! read on).

And so, I won't go into much detail, because this date was just like most of the others. I suffered from The Voice Thing. I was a little awkward, but had no difficulty keeping the conversation flowing. Before the date, I had been determined to go for everything. I was going to use my silly conversation topics, but I somehow failed with the Inhibition post plan. I'd even planned to open by asking, "So is this the first time you've gone out with a celebrity?"

It was a little different from just being inhibited from doing what I wanted. Thinking logically, it just never felt like the right time in our converstion for some of the silly things. It didn't seem like they would fit! I'm not sure if this is my inhibition, or if that's reality. Will work through it later in Lab Notes.

So this is interesting. This girl was amazing. I could say that she's the most beautiful girl I have ever laid eyes on, and actually believe it. And she had a personality to match! The sweetest girl I could imagine. About 10 minutes into the date, I thought to myself: I'm going to marry this girl if I can. If there is some sort of divine intervention that will allow that to happen, I might be open to taking it.

Since this shockingly beautiful girl was so sweet and so unintimidating, I was also thinking how I couldn't imagine this being another one-and-done. I was a little awkward and all, but she smiled and laughed the whole way through, and there was no indication of her having lost interest in me.

Hmmm.

I didn't much like the Ethiopian food. I didn't eat much, and she said that I was going to be starving later, and that she would pay, since I hardly ate anything. I told her no! But she said yes.

I told her no again! She said yes.

The bill came out. I reached for it, but she snatched it. She did so rather quickly. I wasn't fooling around - I really wanted to pay. She put her credit card in the container, and placed it on the table.

I went for it. I was going to take her card out and replace it with mine, but I didn't wait long enough after she had put it on the table. Her reflexes were pretty quick, and she grabbed up the little leather folder. I grabbed at it in her hand, but she was serious. There was no way I could get it out of her hands without using my masculine strength to physically overwhelm her and pull it away! I decided that probably wouldn't be good, so I gave in. She put the bill over on her side, out of my reach.

Hmm. I have no idea what this means. The other 10 dates scarcely even offered to pay. I could pick it apart - was it because she was still interested, because she wasn't interested, or was she just that amazing of a girl? She works for a nonprofit and doesn't have cable television, so she's not exactly made of money.

Now it gets interesting.

Modulo my Voice Thing and a little awkwardness, the date had been pretty good. I didn't use many of the fun conversation topics I was so determined to try (used lottery, but not updog, popped collars, supernatural, etc.), but there was never any difficulty keeping the conversation flowing. Awkward silences? Nah, I've hardly seen any of those on the Mission.

We chatted for a while after the bill was paid, until she finally asked if I was ready to go (I would have preferred to end it myself, but didn't quite get to that point).

She popped a stick of gum. She didn't offer me any - rather, she just gave me a piece ("Take this"). Hmm. So of course I thought, OK, I've seen this before - giving gum is a likely indicator that a girl suspects there might be a kiss soon.

What I didn't tell you is that before the date, I weighed the question of whether or not I should try to kiss her at the end of the date. My general policy was to never even think about it on a Starbucks date, but to always go for it on a dinner date (I thought the mint and chapstick from date #1 were an indicator that the girl wanted to kiss me). I wasn't entirely sure if going for the kiss was the right thing to do this time, because it would be the first time we'd seen each other, and we'd only spoken on the phone for a total of 10-15 minutes. But I decided that if it went prettty well, I would just go for it. What was there to lose?

And so, the chapstick came out. I decided then and there: chapstick and gum, I'm definitely going for it.

I don't think I really blew anything between the very end of our date and the time the chapstick/gum made their appearance.

I told her I'd walk her to her car. She said oh, she had been planning to walk me to my car. Huh? I said no, that was okay. She asked where I'd parked, and a weird sign and alley setup confused me slightly so that I wasn't 100% sure. (I'd looked like a fool not knowing where I parked in date #1, where the chapstick/gum had also come out). She asked if I was going to be able to find my car - something like that. Alertly trying to avoid the same blunder as before, I confidently told her yes, sure, trust me, I have good sense of direction, no problem. Ha.

So this was it. We'd arrived at her car. I was going for that kiss...

She hugged me. Then she started to say something again about me finding my car. I thought she was finished her sentence, so I put my hand on her cheek. Then, damn it, she started talking again - she apparently wasn't finished.

Yep. She was talking, but my hand was already on her right cheek. It was weird, but I'll reserve the word awkward for the next moment of this little fiasco.

In an instant, I thought it would be even weirder to retract my hand without doing anything. So I kept it there a moment, sort of interrupting her speech, waiting for her to end the sentence. I then moved slightly toward her for the kiss.

"Oh nooo. Never kiss on the first date."

Ha! I'd anticipated this earlier as a possible reaction.

What on Earth was I to do? I was finally experiencing one of the things - "first kiss rejection," lets call it - that most guys encounter way before age 24.

I just laughed, and sort of brushed my hand on her jacket at the same time. She said have a safe drive home, or something like that. At this point, I had decided that our relationship was completely over. Dead at age 94 (minutes!). R.I.P.

I said "Alright. See ya," turned, and walked away. I grinned, and I bore it.

My attitude was great about this at first. I was thinking how funny it was, and how good it was (in a way) to finally be getting my first experience with that inevitable little situation. I'd been convinced by internet love experts to always go for the kiss on the first date (but 45-minute Starbucks dates seemed to me an obvious exception). I figured it just meant she wasn't interested - I had nothing to lose anyway. Plus...isn't it amazing that I am at the point where I even have the guts to attempt that?

Keeping with the actual order of events, I grinned and bore it all the way home. I felt a tiny bit down about it, and felt like giving up the romantic attempts on my mission and just focusing on the platonic stuff. The thought was...I was never going to find another girl this amazing, and these things are failing too darn often. The only good news there is that it means I'm officially "over" that girl I went out with four times (Sunken Ship) and was so crazy about.

Driving home, I heard the song O-o-h Child, by The 5 Stairsteps. It goes something like this:

Ooh-oo child, things are gonna get easier

Ooh-oo child, things'll get brighter

Some day, yeah

We'll put it together and we'll get it all done

You just wait and see how things are gonna be

I concluded that this song should be the official anthem of The Mission. It's going to take a lot of time, and a lot of heartache, but someday, things are gonna be good.

All the way home, I was convinced that I had done the right thing by going for the kiss. My logic? At worst, it shows confidence and a little aggression. Positive male qualities, right? Well, I wasn't sure at all. So I googled it up a bit.

One site said not to go for the kiss on the first date if it's the first time you're meeting the girl (e.g., online dating). I got very depressed after reading this, thinking how stupid I had been to not realize this, and how I may have blown what would have been a second-date with such an amazing girl (I'll try not to sing her praises anymore than that, since I don't think I'll ever see her again!).

But I did some more googling. I'd met this girl on match.com, and I came across this page on match.com that took a survey of 500 online daters, and asked what kind of "action" they expected on a first date:

• Peck on the cheek — 16%

• Peck on the lips — 22%

• Open mouth kiss — 25%

• Nibble on the neck — 6%

• Wake up kiss ... the next morning — 25%

Okay. So it looks like at least 72% of online daters expect some sort of kiss on the lips (mine would have been minimal) on the first date.

According to this information, what I did was -perfectly- reasonable. I didn't go through with it smoothly, but it looks like she would have reacted the same way regardless.

So hmmm. Since it then didn't seem quite so egregious, I started thinking that I'd cut this girl (and myself) some slack. Maybe she was still actually somewhat interested (for some reason) and really just has that rule. Which is not unreasonable.

I doubt it, though. But since after 10 minutes I decided I would marry this girl if I could (perhaps a bit of hyperbole there, but still....), I'm thinking I ought to at least give it a shot.The only real reason I ever give up on these things is because I'm terrified of what Friends Speeches will do to my ego.

I'm secretly hoping that she will send me a follow-up e-mail like my previous successes. But I doubt it. Duh! I'll give that a snowball's chance in hell. I plan to call her (or e-mail her, if I chicken out) and ask her out again in 5-9 days. The odds are stacked heavily against me. Yikes. But there's never anything to lose, and everything to gain.

And so ends the month of October - the fourth month on the mission. I've now been on 11 dates, plus 4 platonic meetings, for a total of 15 1-on-1 activities, plus a few other things. I've come a long way since July, when I was just trying to figure out how I was going to force myself to even try meeting someone from the Internet (for starters). But there's still an incredible amount to figure out, and an incredibly long way to go. The goal is to document in this blog the solution to overcoming shyness (or whatever I'm suffering from) in a mere 8 more months. It's going to be tough, but I do have some new ideas.

(for the guys)

P.S. The girl was so awesome! At some point I told her that her myspace song was one of my favorites that'd been stuck in my head recently. No One by Alicia Keys. She was raving about how much she loves Alicia Keys, and how that's the only girl she'd go bi for. What! Haha...unfathomably awesome. She and Alicia Keys are both at about 10/10 on the beauty scale. No exaggeration...she ("She") actually looks similar.I promise not to sing this girl's praises anymore...I just wanted to share that with my male readers =)

What do you folks think...would my Mission make for a pretty decent reality television series?

Lemonade

Alright. So my would-be second-date with the girl from eHarmony was cancelled on Monday, with a mere 7 hours of notice. A little discouraging? Not really...I was tired, and going out with her mostly out of obligation to my mission (and, of course, because I thought we had some potential).

But I had another date scheduled for the next day. A date with a girl that I mentioned in the Lab Notes, who was incredibly attractive. More on that soon, but the point is that I wanted to "practice" some before meeting the awesome girl the next day.

So I was determined to do something on my mission on Monday. Luckily, I had an opportunity: one of my Meetup.com groups (rock climbing) had a meetup scheduled for the same night. It was their first meetup. I met several people, but most of those were nothing to report here, as it was just more of the "acquaintance making" that I was already able to handle before starting this blog.

But I do have good news. And no: it's not that I saved a load of money on my car insurace by switching to Geico!

There was one other male who showed up at the Meetup. He, like me, was new to rock climbing. He was VERY talkative. As talkative as anyone! Just like with all of my 1-on-1 meetups, this fact helped me immensely. I made just the slightest effort, and soon got into a conversation with him. I asked him about where to buy the gear for climbing, and this led to him telling me some stories about his marine days, and off onto all other kinds of topics. What we each did for a living, his kids (he's a half generation older than me, but somehow this is still working), his lady problems, all kinds of stuff. He talked so much that I actually had to cut it short so that I could get away to make a phone call to set up a date for the next day (that's going to be a good post....above this one!).

The last time I went to one of these things, I didn't actually report back to you in the blog. I had claimed in an entry that my goal was to leave with the phone number of one new person. I didn't - not even close. But this time, I was not going to fail you.

I asked if his e-mail was on the Meetup.com group page. He said yeah, and to send him an e-mail and he'd give me his phone number. Wow! A first for me. Making a friend...and a male one, and that. He talked a bit more (very talkative - should help), and when I finally cut out, he said he was definitely looking forward to getting that e-mail from me.

Yeah! So the moral of the story is this: find a hobby that requires a partner, and find a meetup group on the Internet! This could work - I'm hoping we can meet up to partner for rock climbing, which, by the way, is very fun! And hopefully if I go to the same place regularly, I'll make another friend or two, and can expand outwards. More on that later, but the concept is a simple one. So it looks like I turned lemons into lemonade (my broken date into a new friend!)

Next post....