Just met this girl yesterday, how to proceed?

[Rollingwithlife]

bloodtippedrose: See? Every piece of advice someone gives someone else thinks it is a bad idea.

Richard-

Did you completely overlook what I posted? I specifically stated to you that just because one person has their ideas about something (whether they came to their own conclusion or have had an odd experience with the situation in question), does not mean everyone else shares those same experiences or ideas and will judge them the same way. Again, you're trying way too hard searching for excuses that you can conveniently push the blame off onto instead of blaming yourself, when the source of your problems at this point in time is your extreme negativity. I think your absolute priority right now is in just recognizing how negative you're being here and how that's affecting the reactions you're getting.

If you go back and reread these posts, you may even find that you've slowly but surely frustrated a number of us who were just trying to help you out by continuing to have such a defeatist attitude towards anything and everything, including those suggestions you cherry-picked and claim to have tried.

Edit: Another thing I want to mention is, in your current state, even if you did manage to get into a relationship and the relationship were to come to an end, I truly wonder just how you'll react to that. For your sake, I'd explore the idea of just being content with your independence first or it'll be one giant mess if and when that happens to you, especially considering it'd be your first relationship and the odds are against you in it lasting.

[smackie9]

carl1222: Ah, I see! So if you compliment you'll see what they think of you?

smackie9: Well, I agree with you, but once you say "sexy" that is no longer a non-sexual comment. What about "hey those shoes look good on you"?

MaidenMinx: I don't act this way about other people generally. I just throw all my pissed off thoughts and stuff on here.

I thought you wanted to attract.......you have to make it sexual silly. Are you not a heterosexual guy?

[richardwordoff]

Rollingwithlife: oh, yeah, I did overlook that. That makes sense that different people have different views on things like attracting women. Cherry picked and claim to have tried? I've followed every suggestion I've had the time to do. I obviously hadn't had the opportunity to try out some of the advice. A lot of the advice I've been given I was asking questions to try to understand the reasoning or clarify something I didn't understand. The therapy thing was the only thing I really didn't care for.

smackie9: Well yeah, I obviously want to attract them. Yes I am straight. I was saying non-sexual because that is what Carl suggested. When I questioned him about whether it sounded gay or not people started saying I was ignoring advice again. As far as sexual comments go, you wouldn't compliment a girl on her legs or her boobs would you? But saying a piece of clothing looks "sexy" is OK? It seems like that would just make women uncomfortable, but what do I know? So you're saying that is not the case?

[smackie9]

I'm a woman......I have had that compliment given to me and I wasn't offended in the least. I guess it depends on how comfortable you are with that person. You could go with a quieter approach and use the word nice instead. You will have to experiment and see what works for you.

[searock]

OP, you do see how every single thing that you "try" and doesn't work out you consider to be an utter failure in your life which "obviously" means that you have no chance, cause no matter what you might do nothing will ever change? Do you honestly think this is a "normal" outlook on life?

What everybody here is trying to tell you is that you have to work on yourself, before you can even think about "getting a girl". As Rollingwithwife said, in your current state, even if you did manage to start a relationship with somebody, you still would be unhappy, and the relationship itself would suffer greatly because of your obsessive-depressive tendency. Work on fixing that, you don't want therapy ok then I really can't imagine anything else that could work as good, but if you can then put that into action and stop. crying. over. yourself. Don't "try" things, DO things. How come you've got no friends, have you ever wondered about this?! You think it's normal for a guy your age not to have any friend - male or female - with whom you can share your worries and talk about your problems, as well as doing stuff together apart from casually goofing around just when you happen to be in the same room? The friend you contacted the other night didn't even reply to you. Did he even apologize after that?

Your thoughts all seem to go along the lines of, "yeah I would do this, BUT, it wouldn't work anyway. I've tried doing that, BUT, of course it couldn't have worked I should've known" etc etc... you need to stop the negativity flow, focus on that, not on your obsession (which is a way to convey and justify all the repressed anger/whatever it is you have in you and are extremely - for some absurd reason - ashamed about). Otherwise you'll just keep finding excuses for not doing stuff for the rest of your sad, unsatisfied life.

[IndiReloaded]

I need some good tunes to work to anyway:

[IndiReloaded]

Three Little Birds, of course

[IndiReloaded]

Get Up......

[Rollingwithlife]

As long as you're willing to try and keep at it, that's what I'm getting at here. I do hope you realize that this has to be a continuous learning effort to even begin to see results - can't just have a checklist where you try everything once and if things don't work out in your single attempt, it never will. And before you say it, yes, I did see that you mentioned attempting certain things for a good while now, but again, you have to be learning from your mistakes and try new approaches if you want to see any progress.

Just so we're clear though, I still do stand by the idea of you seeing a therapist first. It'd definitely be the strongest starting point in just being a more confident individual, and will in turn increase your chances of meeting a girl who's interested in you. You may say that you think you hide your negativity and frustrations well from those you meet, but it usually reveals itself in the form of a vibe you get from someone, even if you're not being blatant about it. Even if you're completely against the idea of going to see a therapist right now, keep it in the back of your mind as a 'Plan B' for sure.

[IndiReloaded]

Boring. Come on someone say something new.

[Andariel]

A guy once complimented me on my shoes.. then continued to stare a little while.
Turned out he had a foot fetish.

Now I have a spidey sense for when guys are staring at my feet o_O

Ha ha!! :-)

[Andariel]

I have said it before but will say it again although I doubt it will make a difference to you as you are in such a negative and defensive state of mind:
Your problem is not that you haven't found a girlfriend. Your problem runs deeper than that. You are generally unhappy with your life and I am sure that no matter what you say to yourself this negative vibe is written all over your face whenever you approach either a girl or pretty much anyone else in order to be friends with them.

I have been approached by guys like you in the past and I can tell you from personal experience that there no bigget turn off than a guy who feels sorry for himself and whines about everyone and everything. I have never dated or tried to become friends with any of these guys and would never even consider inviting all that negativity into my life. I doubt any healthy person would.

Nobody wants to date or hang out someone who has no confidence and constantly feels sorry for themselves. All this anger you are feeling as a result of what you perceive as 'failures' surely comes across too: I am willing to bet the minute you meet a girl and you start thinking 'she's never going to be interested in me', it actually shows through your body language. Nobody finds that attitude attractive.

I have seen some rrrreally ugly guys who not only have amazing girlfriends but have a full social life. That is because they don't go around saying/ thinking 'I am ugly; my life sucks'. They have kept a positive attitude in their lives and have spent time working on inner beauty which is far more important that having a pretty face.

Even if you do manage to find a girl she will proabably leave you after a while because she won't be able to deal with all of your insecurities, negativity and repressed anger. Whenever a guy so much as looks at her, you will start feeling all insecure and you will be taking out your frustration on her until you will eventually push her away.

That is why in a previous post I mentioned that it is important to feel happy about yourself and life in general. Getting a girl won't make you happy, perhaps for a couple of weeks but then all these issues you have will start surfacing again and you will end up sabotaging the relationship.

You need to work on yourself first, change these negative patterns of thinking, try several different activities/hobbies/volunteering until you find something you like, be more sociable, give people a chance-you seem to write everybody off too quickly. Even if you don't immediately like someone you meet , you maychange your mind once you have spent more time with them and also don't forget that it is through people that you usually get to meet more people and who knows you might like one of them as a friend.

The point here is to shift your focus from the symptom of your problems (not having a girl in your life) to the root cause of your problems (negative patterns, insecurity, anger etc).

You are very negative though and I doubt this is something you will be able to do on your own , that why I suggested you see a therapist. This is not something you want to consider though, so I honestly don't know what else to say that could possibly help you or make any difference to you at this point.

[richardwordoff]

smackie9: Well, I'll do that every now and then and see what seems to "work". Let me ask though, how well did you know the guy that gave you that compliment? Do you recommend doing it to women I'm not even attracted to for practice?

searock: "you do see how every single thing that you "try" and doesn't work out you consider to be an utter failure in your life which "obviously" means that you have no chance, cause no matter what you might do nothing will ever change? Do you honestly think this is a "normal" outlook on life? " I don't know, I'm just getting really frustrated. It seems like I keep trying things and they just keep not working. An analogy if you will: Take someone who is unemployed. They turn in dozens and dozens of job applications, go to job interviews but never get a job. Eventually the experience wears them down and they don't even feel like trying anymore. The experience isn't all that uncommon.
I've been trying to make friends with people and getting a girl to notice me for years now. People that seem like they're friends I don't feel like I have enough interests in common with to hang out with them and other guys I invited to events blew me off

If you want a little history about me:
When I was in middle school I desperately tried to fit in with the "cool" crowd. Started playing sports and trying to be good at them, wearing all the douchebag expensive clothes, etc. I was also insecure about my height because everyone else was (and still is) a head taller than me. Almost everyone still still disliked me.
In high school I was a wrestler for the first year I was there. I did a few things with guys on the team and thought that being a good wrestler would make people respect me. Not true. To my surprise, nobody outside of our immediate group gave two shits about it. After realizing this, getting tired of not being able to eat or drink half the time and having three hour practices every day I said "screw it" and quit. After that I really didn't have any group that I fit into and got really into video games and computer related stuff.
When I was a sophomore in high school I started to really take religion (Christianity) seriously. I tried to get respect and attention from other people by being a nice guy to everyone. This did not work either. I was involved pretty heavily in the youth organization at my church but none of the so called friends I made there ever ended up hanging out with me. I quit going to football games and "normal" social activities at this point because I never really liked them to begin with.
My junior and senior year I got really tired of trying to impress or garner respect from people (especially the "popular" people) and just said "screw it" and went about my own way. I played video games, did the church youth thing, etc. I hung out with one of the college youth mentors quite a bit then as we were workout partners but he has moved away now.
In college so far I've mostly stayed to myself. I'd play video games or watch movies on the weekends, go to class, etc. Actually, I had a job a couple years ago where I was around a lot of people all the time and really enjoyed it but I got fired. I hung out with a few people from there a couple times but that was it. I still play softball with about half the guys (well not now due to injury, but whatever)

But anyway, I HAVE tried things. Er, well I'll say DONE things since you said trying isn't enough.
- I tried going out to the bar and actually got a little bit of attention from a cute girl (she didn't want to play pool at first but near the end of the game she got up and said she wanted me to try and I told her a couple things about how to do it) but the whole experience was soured by the belligerent drunk guy bitching at me about how I played pool. Also, I was talking to her a little after that and in mid conversation she just follows her friend and her friend's boyfriend and walks off without any of them saying anything to me (I had been playing pool with the other two). I thought she was warming up to me but then when she walked off to the bar I was confused. I never said this couldn't have worked or that I knew this would fail. I'd say for the most part it was enjoyable.
- I texted a guy from my softball team about going to play with me and he didn't respond. I have never done anything bad to him and he acts fine at softball games. Maybe he finds me annoying or something, I don't know. And hell no, he did not apologize. I sent him a text this morning asking him if he got the message and he hasn't responded yet.

"How come you've got no friends, have you ever wondered about this?!" Um, well, yes I have. No I realize it isn't normal and without jumping to conclusions it seems like you're rubbing that in. I guess when I get feeling down this is one of the things that bothers me. The guy I hung out with a fair amount (watched movies, etc.) that I used to work with moved away but I still talk to him on FB and text. A few months ago I went out of town to visit him. The guy I've been friends with since elementary school doesn't live here anymore but I go a few times a year to go hang out with him. He came over once a week during high school. My other friend from high school that lived in my house with me for a couple years doesn't hang out with me anymore (heck when he was living there he never really hung out with me, just went to other people's houses to drink and party; I didn't do those things) but in high school he came over every couple weekends and had gaming sessions with me. When I was in high school a college mentor of the youth group was my workout partner and we were pretty good friends but he has moved somewhere else now too.

Andariel: "I am willing to bet the minute you meet a girl and you start thinking 'she's never going to be interested in me'" I actually never think that when I meet women. I've approached, talked to and sometimes asked out women who plenty of guys would not even try with because they would assume they were taken or were to attractive to want anything to do with them. When I talk to them I disregard any of the insecurities I have. I don't mention my height or any of the other things that irritate me.

I'm angry, insecure and negative because I feel like people in general have been undependable towards me and although I've tried many, many times to have a girlfriend (or even get a date) or even just make friends. If I'm doing something else (video game, school work, etc.) I'm usually OK, but once I get bored I think about how I've go no friends to do things with. It is especially bad now that two activities I really enjoyed (weight lifting and softball) I can't do for months because of an injury. Also, walking around campus seeing all these other people happy with women reminds me about my own lack of success. I don't think I would even care as much if I had had a girlfriend recently, but I've just got this big mental hurdle about being old enough to be out of college and never having had a girlfriend. It just absolutely kills my self esteem and idea of self worth.

I am not angry, insecure, negative about things for no reason. If I had so called "friends" that didn't blow me off and at least a girlfriend every now and then I couldn't think of any other reason for me to be upset.

I just don't understand what talking to a therapist about this would do. Yeah, I suppose I may be giving off a negative vibe to some people but I've never noticed someone who I've just met seem to pick up on it. A therapist can't make me have other activities I enjoy and can't make other people quit treating me poorly/blowing me off...

[carl1222]

If you can't see the connection between your negative attitude and lack of success with women, you are beyond all hope. You need to lose the attitude BEFORE you can expect good things to happen ... just what a good therapist would help you work through.

You turn women off with your bitterness and insecurity.

This just makes you more bitter and insecure.

So you try again and fail for the same reason.

Making you even more cynical and negative

And so on, and so on.

Cassius:

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves ..."

Julius Caesar (I, ii, 140-141)

Six pages of advice and you haven't learned a thing!

The bad news (and the GOOD news) is that YOU are the problem.

Carl.

[Andariel]

Ditto...I don't have anything else to add.Well said,Carl.