The Nike Way

Well, I will save the "official" update with particulars for a later post. For now, it suffices to say that I have several irons in the fire, i.e., people I'm talking to electronically and may meet up with in the near future.

I've realized that I'm already perfectly comfortable online, so merely talking to these people online has very little value as far as making progress with the topic of this blog. As I've been getting closer to actually moving some of these things offline, I have noticed a couple of things that I will need to work on. First off, sometimes I get a little anxious thinking about it. Not surprising...second, I haven't really thought about chickening out on anything completely, but instead I've thought about putting things off until this or that happens, which will be a better time. Well, it didn't take much thought to realize that I have to actually keep at this, and not put anything off. There would probably always be some excuse to put things off 'til later.. I think the 17 or so years that this stuff hasn't been quite right is enough! I actually had the idea of making a huge concerted effort like this a year ago, but I ended up doing virtually nothing. And the situation is no doubt similar for everyone else.

So, how do we deal with feelings of anxiety and reluctance going forward with this stuff? Well, I would certainly appreciate any suggestions. Right now I plan to approach things the Nike Way and just do it. That is, relax to the extent possible, don't worry (there may be some anxious feelings, but we can at least disallow negative thoughts and focus our thoughts elsewhere or nowhere), and...just do it!

One thing I'm currently even less comfortable with than face-to-face conversations with new people is talking to them on the telephone. Not that I can remember even trying it :) I just assume it's even more awkward. One of the many ladies I contacted on craig's list wanted to talk to me on the phone, and at first I basically said no. I changed my mind today and decided I need to take every opportunity I can, so if that comes up again, the experience should make for a very interesting blog entry.

Now, as you have seen, a big part of my approach is going on dates. I keep thinking how interesting that is -- other material you might read, which probably doesn't work, would usually have you start with baby steps like starting by smiling at people, then saying hi, and working up from that. I think including the hardest (if not the hardest, then close) social activity from the very beginning is really going to make this approach effective. Plus, in a way I couldn't come up with anything easier to do. There are literally millions of people looking for dates online, but people just looking for friends are quite hard to come by. Anyway, enough about that for now.

In dating or any social situation, one of the hardest parts is just simply having something to talk about. Thus, in my next blog entry, I will compile an awesome list of universal conversation topics. I've tried googling this before, and never found anything great, so it should be interesting to see what I come up with for you.