If you want to find a relationship, there are 3 things you need to stop doing.
Today, I stopped to get something to eat. And I noticed that the server, the person behind the counter, was very attractive.
She was a blond-haired, blue-eyed, smiling, wonderful-looking person who seemed like she would be a delight to go on a date with.
But I didn’t flirt with her.
And I didn’t ask her out—even though I should have.
And I’m going to tell you why.
There were three reasons, three things that kept me from asking this young lady for her number.
And to be honest, they were rookie mistakes. As a confident alpha male, none of these things should have been allowed to bother me.
But I’m human, and I’m as imperfect as anyone else—and we all face challenges sometimes.
And in this post, I’m going to tell you how to navigate all three of these challenges, and eliminate them—helping you to free yourself to interact with potential partners the way you actually want to.
So let’s dig in.
1. I Wasn’t Dressed Very Well, And Didn’t Look Very Good. In Other Words, I Lacked Confidence
I had just pulled an all nighter.
Working on my computer, I was wearing some pretty mundane khaki shorts and a T shirt.
I didn’t feel like I looked terrible, but I didn’t feel like I looked especially good.
Needless to say. If I wanted to find a relationship, this would be a hindrance to me.
Now, if there’s anything that will keep us from hitting on someone we think is attractive, a lack of self-confidence will do it.
You have to be confident in yourself.
If you don’t feel good about yourself, the odds of you walking up to someone and engaging with them, hitting on them, or even asking them for their number is going to be very small.
And there’s a good reason for that. We want to feel good about ourselves.
In all honesty, to a point, we need to feel good about ourselves to really engage with people. Otherwise, we’re not going to be doing it effectively.
So what could I have done to prevent this?
Well, I could make sure that every time I go out and leave my house to go potentially socialize with anyone, I’m wearing clothes that make me feel good.
You need to have a sense of style. And for me, this means constantly striving to improve on my fashion choices.
I should have done my hair, brushed my beard, took a shower, put on clothes that I liked, and made sure that I looked presentable.
This would have helped me to sidestep the whole ‘confidence’ issue, because I would have put in the work.
And work, my friends, is what helps us to overcome our lack of confidence.
That’s really the basic premise. And then, of course, you can go outward from that, and you can zoom out to the bigger premise, which is the long-term.
In other words, you want to be working out, you want to be spending time on your body itself every day, and you want to be eating good food and maintaining a proper diet.
You do these things so that you can keep your body feeling good and looking good, so that you can stay healthy and stay attractive.
So you have the short term things, like making sure you’re dressed for the day and that you’re ready to go out there and crush it.
And then you also have the medium-to-long term, which is that you want to be investing in a healthy lifestyle and a healthy body.
And my example on this particular day is particularly bad. Not only was I at a restaurant, ordering food, and failed to dress good enough to feel like I could approach this lady.
But also, I was literally at a fast food restaurant ordering food that’s not really healthy anyway.
So there you go. This was a double-whammy.
Learn from my mistake.
Don’t do what I did.
That entire morning was pretty much a zero all the way around.
Ideally, what I would do is this:
- I would eat healthy food before I go out
- And then, if I wanted to swing by there and grab some kind of healthy snack, that’s great
- Then, I could have looked my best. I could have hit her up, maybe asked her for her number, etc.
2. I Was Tired, And My Energy Levels Were Low
The second thing that kept me from talking to this lady when I went through the line at the fast-food restaurant was my energy level.
I was tired.
I had been up all night.
I wasn’t particularly prepared for the day, right?
I was kind of dragging.
I was rolling through there on the way to the laundromat, grabbing a snack to eat while I was letting my laundry dry.
Had I been well-rested, and had I been feeling good and feeling full of energy, that might have changed my outlook.
If you want to find a relationship, you need to give yourself the best chances of success.
And this goes back to habits. My habits are pretty good. But as I go through the week, I tend to slip up. And the night before, which was a Friday night, I had stayed up all night long catching up on a project that I was running late on.
So on one hand, I felt good about it, because I got a lot of work done. I tend to prioritize work over most other things (which isn’t a bad habit, actually. Not keeping a regular bedtime, on the other hand, is a bad habit.)
This resulted in me not being ready to be able to take advantage of what could have been a fun opportunity in my day and life, to talk to this woman.
So that’s a downside.
3. I Didn’t Think She Would Say Yes. I Wasn’t Confident In Myself, And In The Process Of Attraction
This was partly a confidence issue, partly a fear of rejection issue, and partly an I just don’t GAF issue brought on by sleep deprivation.
But if you want to find a relationship, this is something you need to be aware of. Negative cycles happen. And they’re NOT good for your dating life.
And in my particular case, it also had to do with my clothing/style/grooming choices and my energy levels.
But both of them contributed to this third reason. This third reason, when you get right down to it, was that I simply didn’t believe that any good thing was going to happen.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the negative cycle starts.
If you don’t believe good things are going to happen, you will not give them the chance to happen.
Then, they won’t happen.
Then, you’ll believe that you were right. Then, you’ll begin a negative spiral that causes you to continue to believe that nothing good will happen.
This is called a ‘self-fulfilling prophecy.’
And negative self-fulfilling prophecies like this are a huge source of unhappiness for many people.
And when it comes to dating, many people allow these types of feelings and predictions to ruin their day, and destroy their chances.
They feed their fear of rejection with their own self-fulfilling prophecy.
And it becomes a cycle.
Now for me, this isn’t an actual cycle, because I become aware of it pretty quickly.
I walked away from the restaurant, and I wasn’t even out the door before I was thinking to myself, “why didn’t I talk to her? Why didn’t I ask for her number? Why didn’t I ask her out? What kept me from engaging with her in an authentic and genuine way?”
And I figured out that the three reasons listed above were the answers.
How Am I Fixing It? If You Want To Find A Relationship, You Need To Be Willing To Fix Your Problems
This is a really good question!
Making mistakes is part of the game.
But learning from them is where we find true gold.
The lessons are the most important part of the process.
This morning, I logged onto Amazon and placed a few orders for some clothing accessories that I really need to level-up my appearance.
My plan is to start dressing better.
I am also re-committing to my sleep schedule habits, trying to make sure that I am awake and invigorated every day, to live my best life and not suffer from a lack of sleep anymore.
I want to live life to the fullest. And to do that, I need to be self-aware enough to see the areas that I could improve on.
Self Awareness Is The Key To Avoiding A Negative Spiral – But You Need To Cultivate It
I was self-aware enough that I could see it. And now, I can see improvements that I could make in my life the next time, which will give me a better outcome… or at least a better chance at a favorable outcome.
The moral of the story, ladies and gentlemen, is this:
- If you prepare every day, to perform at your best…
- Set yourself proper goals…
- Show up for yourself in your show short, medium, and long term goals…
- And have hope that good things will happen to you when you act in a positive, proactive way on your goals…
Then you begin a positive cycle of good things happening. And then your self-fulfilling prophecies become positive instead of negative.
And that’s the whole game. That’s how it starts. That’s how you change your life for the better. That’s how you find a relationship that fulfills you and makes you happy.
Go with grace my friends, and never give up your power.
This is Joshua Sigafus, signing off.