>>27047
Get your friends to set you up with someone. If you have limited experience with women, then it's a good option. Be honest with them about being fed up you don't have a girlfriend to share things with, going to the cinema alone is shite, etc, but don't necessarily be open about being a Virgin unless they already know.

If you do get set up with someone, when they ask you what you study and want to do be passionate about it. It's attractive, if you don't waffle off on a tangent she can't understand. Say because you've focused on your studies you haven't had much time for a GF until now, but you're hoping to meet someone nice. The nuance of flirting is hard to describe, but she might look for validation after that statement. Something like "Have you been on a lot of dates recently, then?" or similar and you should reply "Would you be jealous if I said I had?" And smile and try and maintain eye contact in a way that seems natural. Closed mouth smiling, assuming you aren't laughing, is suitable for this interaction. After this exchange, say "Ah, a couple but they never went anywhere."

Also, the match metrics on OKC are bollocks. Try messaging people who have a profile you like. Opening gambits are a hit and miss, I don't have too much experience with them having done most of my flirting face to face.

>>27048
>the match metrics on OKC are bollocks
Higher match percentages mean simply that they agree with you on more things. I haven't used OkC in a long time but when I did I found I was matching with cool progressive people and not matching with reality TV-watching dullards.

This is not to say to the OP that if you have a low percentage with someone don't go for it if you think their profile is good.

OP, you are more or less fucked. Unless you are rich or very good looking playing the Internet dating is a waste of time. Try to make a female profile on the sites and you will know why.

Your best bet would be finding an activity or hobby and meet people in that environment. Depends on your preferences it could be a church, a volunteer group, a charity and so on. You need a place where people meet in RL, since very few men can play the internet dating game. Try the Meetups in your area and find an activity you are at least marginally interested in.

In the name of Jesus, do not start approaching girls immediately. Nobody likes THAT GUY. Nobody.

>>27050

>Unless you are rich or very good looking playing the Internet dating

Don't be a knob. I'm neither rich or good looking and I've done great on tinder.

>>27048
Going for a drink with one this weekend, I'll ask and report back.

I've found that, like >>27049 says, many people below about 70% either have nothing or very little on their profile or are just not the sort of person I have anything in common with.

>>27050
I'm not a PUA and I know that just approaching girls is a good way to get slapped with an assault charge. I've tried the local photography club but it's all sneering old men from what I've found. I'll have to look into other activities.

>>27051
I think I'm probably considerably below average, hence my lack of luck. I'm not deformed or anything, just a bit of an uggo.

>>27051

>>27053

Don't spread this negative bullshit here, not on /emo/.

Look around you. Most blokes don't look like him (I certainly don't) yet manage to get fanny.

>>27054

Shagging a 43 years old obese alcoholic single mother on benefits for a bottle of Bulmers and a pack of cigs does not count as "getting fanny". At least, unless you are an unemployed obese alcoholic on benefits. All decent women have overly inflated standards due to the sexual availability caused by dating sites.

(A good day to you Sir!)

>>27055

Oh, it's you again.

>>27055

Out of interest why did you ban him? Was it the whiney post or the incel-tier picture he went with?

>>27057

Bit of both, and also telling someone they can't pull anyone unless they're an adonis. That's obviously untrue and particularly damaging in an /emo/ thread, and just obnoxious anywhere else.

I'm also 106% sure it's the same bloke who told the autistic lad he smelled like a corpse, and he got banned in that thread, so also ban evasion.

Anyway, OP, please disregard him, he's wrong, you do need to find your unique selling point, mind. Usually it's as simple as having something you can be genuinely passionate about without sounding boring. It's easier than you think once you get the hang of it.

>>27058

Amazing as it might seem to incellad, women are human beings. Some of them are obsessed with looks, status and money. Some of them are bookish types who get a wide-on for David Mitchell. Some of them smell of patchouli and go to psytrance raves and dream about living in a yurt. Some of them love trains. Some of them are lonely and desperate.

For historical and cultural reasons, men have to do the chasing, which is a bit unfortunate if you're shy and awkward. With that said, it's not rocket science and it's not an ordeal. Go to places, do things, talk to people. Some of those people will be women, some of those women might entertain the idea of going to the pub with you. In the process of going to places and doing things and talking to people, you'll make yourself more interesting and more confident, both of which are very attractive traits. I'm probably sounding like your dad, but you've got to put yourself out there. If you don't ask, you don't get.

>>27059

Also, if you're ever feeling down about yourself, just remember that a group of professional marketers thought that this was a good idea:

I'm 25 and never been in a relationship. Not really surprising considering I don't talk to anyone though. Been utterly lonely sincr the end of university.

Its shite lad, go do a phd.

>>27060
What the fuck was that?

>>27061
I'm already going back for my Master's (because I get student finance and wouldn't otherwise), but at the same time a PhD is 3 more years after that I don't want to be almost 30 when I leave uni with nothing to my name.

>>27060
The everything about the camera work makes it feel like I'm watching this from the perspective of someone tied to a chair.

>>27062

That was part of Microsoft's launch campaign for Windows 7. They encouraged people to host a launch party and gave away "party packs" with Windows 7 themed decorations.

It's like the whole campaign was planned by an alien who had never encountered a human being.

https://www.pcworld.com/article/174237/windows_7_launch_parties_fizzle.html

>>27064
Oh, shit, yeah. I remember now - they did it again for Windows 8 and gave away merch and licence keys to 'hosts'.

Dove (dived?) a bit deeper into OKCupid and one lass on there put that she didn't know how to tell the time from analogue clock. We're the same age and I distinctly remember being taught it in school, but even if you weren't they are fucking everywhere, how can you not know that?

>>27065

I remember learning it at home but not at school. I had one of them watches that spells it out for you. It came with a chart that I remember having on my wall, too. I'm sure it probably is something taught at school too, but I don't recall.

That's a very odd thing to put on your dating profile, mind, was it in response to one of those 'tell us something embarrassing about yourself' type questions?

>>27065

> one lass on there put that she didn't know how to tell the time from analogue clock. We're the same age and I distinctly remember being taught it in school, but even if you weren't they are fucking everywhere, how can you not know that?

In my experience it's a sadly widespread and global phenomenon, even for people of my age. For the "people born close to or after 2000" generation I imagine that many haven't seen an analogue clock in their lives except Big Ben and maybe at their grandma's house.

>>27067
How? I was born in 1994 and there have been analogue clocks in pretty much every aspect of my life. Every school I've been to has had one in every classroom, train stations, the town hall, doctors' office, 3 rooms in my parents' house, every lecture theatre at university, half the pubs I go in... but I digress.

I'm trying to think of the best way to ask my m9 to set me up with someone - I have a feeling that blurting it out isn't the best way. Any ideas?

>>27072

>I was born in 1994

Otherlad did say the 'those born around 2000' generation. I'm sure most of them do know how to read an analog clock, mind, and honestly the more I think about it, the more it seems like any adult that understands a digital clock could logically work out how to read one with no information other than 'this tells the time', but also I'm not THAT surprised some bint on a dating site can't.

I can't do long division or percentages, despite that being covered at school, and I'm quite sure I could relearn and retain that information now, but fuck it, I don't need to, I have the internet.

>>27072

>I'm trying to think of the best way to ask my m9 to set me up with someone - I have a feeling that blurting it out isn't the best way. Any ideas?

I mean, if you can't just straight up tell your mate to get you some clunge, what sort of world is this?!

Joking aside though, there's no point being coy with him. Steer the conversation towards women, mention you're on OKC and not having much luck, ask him if he can think of anyone suitable.

>>27061
To add, I don't even think I'd want a relationship now, they just seem unnecessarily complicated and stress inducing.

I don't do anything else with my life that said, I just go to work and then burn my time on this earth in my room, i dunno.

how do i restart life

>>27075
Start your own thread, lad. I'm sure some otherlads will be able to steer you in the right direction?

>>27073
>can't do...percentages
How do you mean "can't do"? Percentages are a valuable life skill. Long division, however, is useless in the days of computation, and even without it there are other manual methods.

>>27076
Didn't mean to hijack yours lad. Made my own threads before and honestly they just say 'go talk to people lol' more eloquently and I can't even make myself go to the gym.

>>27076

I don't know/can never remember the calculations required to find a percentage of something, i.e., I very often find myself typing things like "30 is what percentage of 670" and things like that. I know it's just dividing or timesing by a hundred or summat, but I lack the numerical logic to work it out, and for whatever reason have never memorised the method - probably because it's so easy not to.

I work with profit margins and stock percentages daily, too, but never once has there been a scenario where I've needed to work out something away from a computer. I should probably try and remember how to do it on a calculator, mind.

Divide the little number by the big number.

Hey presto.

30/670 = 0.0448, i.e. 4.48%.

>>27079

I'd be plugging that into google anyways so it's all the same to me.

>>27074
Or, if he is friendly with a mates lass ask her. Women love that shit, it appeals their innate sense for social networking.

>>27078

You divide the whole by the difference between the fraction and the whole, then multiply it by 100.

Most of the time. Sometimes that isn't appropriate. Precentages are fucking easy.

He didn't spend much time thinking before replying "I'm sorry mate, I can't think of anyone" and changing the topic of conversation.

So that's a dead end there, then. I'll have another look round Meetups.

>>27083
Don't you have any female friends? Does the mate you ask have a GF? He isn't going to go out of his way to try and set you up with someone he could potentially shag.

When it was suggested a mate set you up, the implication on my end at least was that mate would be female. Women don't trust recommendations from guys unless they're gay, either, so even if he was willing it would be hit an miss.

You need a female sponsor, lad. A mates GF or a female friend.

>>27084
Seconding this. Even a relative would do in a pinch. I have a little cousin (22, "relationship-less virgin") who recently made a point of renewing ties with me and, after a few beers one night, admitted he wanted me to be his "wing-man" or whatever. The moment he told me this I rang my sister, explained the situation tactfully, and just a few weeks later he is hooking up semi-regularly with a friend-of-a-friend of hers and posting photos of them going to museums and stuff on Facebook.

>>27084
>>27085
God, it seems like I'm, rejecting everything you lads are saying out of hand, but I'm honestly not trying to.

His lass isn't local and I would just feel really weird asking his lass, or getting him to - she barely knows me and vice versa.

My course is overwhelmingly male, and although I do know a fair few lasses from extracurricular activities, there aren't many I've become close friends with -- we're friendly enough for the few hours a week we go for a social or meeting or whatever, but to most people I might as well not exist outside of those.

>>27085
>>27084
I couldn't imagine doing this.

But that said I'm a completely friendless loner at this point. I'm the one who actually har friends once but then people say 'whatever happened to him' then go to get another drink.

>>27093
Just wait until your course finishes lad, the world gete a whole lot worse.

>>27095
That's not helpful.

>>27096
What's not useful about foreknowledge?

>>27099
It's cynical shite that appeals to your confirmation bias and has no place on this board.

>>27101
Don't lie to yourself. /emo/ isn't some fucking sanctuary for delusion.

Gonna sound silly but don't hold women on a pedestal, they are as nervous as you.

>>27105
It's no place for embittered arseholes giving shit advice, either. Go be melancholy somewhere else.

>>27106
Surely we can do better than advice from the idiot characters in The 40 Year Old Virgin.

>>27106
What prompted you to say this? Not trying to be a cunt about it, but just wondered if anything I said made you think I do.

>>27134 It was just something someone said to me once and it stuck. Didn't know it was from a film.

>>27137
I'd wager most women aren't as nervous I would be, either way.

Going to try some general meetup groups in the next couple of weeks.

>>27144

Most aren't but plenty of them are.

I recently met up with a lass I'd been texting for a while and she seemed intimidatingly filthy over text, one of those highly experienced and hyper sexual types who was going to really put me through my paces. When it came down to it, though, she was too shy to make eye contact with me and wanted to snuggle up on the sofa more than anything.

Just try put yourself in their shoes. A lot of the averse reaction you get from approaching a woman in public is more of an instinctual defensiveness from years of dickheads going up to them like ERE LUV FANCY A PINT. If you start things off in a friendlier, less blatant "I aim to eventually shag you" kind of way they are much more receptive.

You're on the right track by just going to things, though. If you meet a girl over a hobby or activity you both enjoy it's pretty much the best outcome you could possibly hope for really.

The problem I have with the meeting girls over a hobby advice is that I don't really have any hobbies and don't know if the kind of girl who has hobbies would be into me. Unfortunately I feel like it's a very particular kind of person who has hobbies in 2018.

>>27155
I mean, as I am one of those particular kinds of people, I suppose it would be natural to seek those out.

This isn't for /emo/ really so I'll keep it to a minimum but I definitely think social media has skewed our perceptions of each other - there'll be plenty of people who collect football cards or restore ships in bottles whatever but would never put that on their Instagram full of pictures in clubs and on the beach.

>>27155

"Hobby" is a very broad term. You could join a running club or go to evening classes at your local college. You could join a vegetarian society or a small business networking group or Britain First. Whatever it is that you might be interested in, there's a group of people who meet up to share that interest. I don't think you'd be terribly interested in a woman who isn't interested in anything.

I'm not quite sure how you're supposed to get replies on OKC. I don't just say hey, I always reference something their profile.

Not one. Not one single reply. Maybe I am vomit-inducingly ugly.

>>27155

I don't mean to sound like a cunt but that's rather likely to be the source of your unattractiveness. You're the kind of terminally boring fucker who can't even understand other people having interesting things to do with their time because it's current year.

Get a fucking hobby, jesus. What do you actually do with your time? Do you just come home from work, eat, and fall asleep? Or, as I suspect, do you squander the time shitposting on imageboards and vegetating in front of Youtube?

Being interesting and passionate about something, anything, is such a big factor in making you attractive to women I can't emphasise it enough. Why do you think musicians and artists get so much pussy. Even trainspotters get nerdy anorak girls who are secretly fucking crazy in the sack. Get a fucking hobby.

>>27160
Please stop being so angry.

>>27161
Being angry is his hobby.

>>27160
I am a musician and a writer and am an interesting kind of person and I am not getting any lately as it happens. One of my biggest problems with the Red Pill and incel bullshit is the delusion that everyone else is having sex all the time. Even incorrigible serial shaggers have dry spells, so do girls.

>>27163

But you've had sex though? That's more than most of these lads.

OKCupid is better played as a joke.

Ask them if they've ever had their arsehole licked by a fat man in a Parka? Tell her your mate fancies her, ask her if she has a loan of a tenner for a score bag. Tell her she looks like she could use a night on the Mad Dog and your local offy sells all the flavours.

>>27163
While I'm not an "incel" (I am by the literal meaning, but we all know what it actually means now) and don't subscribe to their ideology, I've strayed closer to that path than many.

For a lot of them it's not strictly about rates of boning. It's more about the fact that while people do have dry spells, they are just that - spells - and there is an end in sight.

For a lot of these people there is no end in sight, no respite, no light at the end of the tunnel and every single fibre of your being is hardwired to want it. Parrots who are sexually frustrated pluck their feathers, this is the same thing.

Not that there aren't people who are convinced that everyone else is living in a Brave New World and everyone but them is having a bone fest every night, but I don't think many of them think that.

I am not defending the ways many of them express their frustrations or who they choose to blame, though.

>>27165
I'm sure that'll go down well?

I'm 25 and never had sex or a relationship. It's just something other people do at this point. I'm completely dispassionate about everything and have no reason to continue living other than it's just what I've always done - not that being a virgin or whatever is making me suicidal, it's just another thing that I don't do that most people do, I have no reason for existence, I just continue, endure (though that implies that there's something to endure for).

I don't know how people manage to build themselves into anything after university or what have you. It's so lonely.

Also I chime with the hobbies thing - in that nobody has them. People don't do that sort of shit, they go home, they text someone they somehow know then they eat shit food, watch netflix and fuck and so it goes on, nobody does anything, and if they do they're certainly not there to meet some spastic.

>>27168
Whom, exactly, are you calling a spastic, lad?

>>27168

This is why so many people lead unfulfilling, depressed lives. If you truly believe this I honestly don't know what to say to you.

You're literally telling me that nobody goes fishing and has a few cans at the side of the river, it's 2018 after all. Nobody joins a clan and spends excessive amounts of time on games like World of Warcraft or Destiny, that's not a thing. Nobody goes to the gym, who does that? Nobody likes to spend their time preparing new and exotic dishes they've heard about and inviting people round for dinner, that's mental. Nobody runs a Youtube channel where they catalogue old 8-track casettes, who has the time. Nobody takes up painting or learns an instrument, it's just a waste. Nobody plays football or golf or fucking boules, you're off your rocker.

I'm not telling you that hobbies are the ideal place to meet a partner. What I'm telling you is that the reason girls never reply to you on POF and you never get any matches on Tinder is because you're exactly the kind of miserable cunt they're scared of ending up trapped with. Spending the rest of their days talking about work over a pint of lager and a small white wine in the local. Watching the soaps for a bit of escapism.

You're a boring sod. People do have hobbies, you're just too desperately unimaginative to find one of your own.

>>27168
Hobbies doesn't have to mean something esoteric like enamelling pottery owls. I, for instance, am a fan of specific and quite obscure genres of music. Some people are into books, some are into keeping fit, some are into following sports. And these kinds of interests or hobbies if you like might make it more likely to meet someone who shares similar interests.

A mate of mine met his missus online after they discovered they shared a love for an obscure surrealist painter no-one's heard of.

I am literally autistic and had no non-internet friends, had no hobbies, had no redeeming features, am ugly. I managed to find girls to fuck through Tumblr. If you can pretend to be interested in social justice, you could probably fuck a fat lass through Tumblr too.

>>27160
I agree with all of that but I didn’t get this irate today. I hope I’m not getting black outs.

Going to make a brutally honest post here, lads. Others are welcome to disagree or call me out if they believe there's any misguided observations.

I've come around to the idea that finding sexual relationships is, like so many things in life, mainly about mundane logistics.

In an ideal world, things would work as one of the other lads have mentioned. You'd fill your life with meaningful activity that causes your path to cross with many like-minded individuals, and in turn you'd find someone and catch eachother's interest, followed by a fulfilling and gradual "getting to know you" montage, before getting into bed together.

This is what I strive for, too, but the world is not ideal. The way the majority of people actually have sex is the same way most things happen in life, by habit. By actually going outside and consistently doing a set of tasks each day that marginally increase the chance you'll nob someone.

Generally, this will involve actually keeping and maintaining a social circle, taking part in the lives of others, meeting friends of friends, then meeting their friends. Often it means a load of hassle and drama and drink and drugs and so on.

Now these approaches aren't mutually exclusive, but as the posts about hobbies have mentioned, a lot of people actually live rather constrained lives. What you find is that many spend their 20s playing relationship bumper cars (or in particularly toxic social groups, destruction derby), having some sex in the meantime -- some good, some bad, with a few dry spells here and there.

I think the wisest approach is to live up to the 'ideal' route with as much integrity as you can (i.e. living a full life and being open to meeting someone that way) while making measured and controllable steps to expand your social activity right now, in the present -- even in non-ideal ways. I urge caution on the second one because it's so easy to get sucked in and, if you're an ambitious person, easily bored/frustrated with personal lives or just quite private, it'll drive you crazy.

Forgive me if it sounds cynical, but it's almost like taking up a non-ideal job as a step toward your dream career. All of us have to negotiate with the present, every day.

Going out to find a partner doesn't mean club-hopping or spamming girls on OKCupid, but it may also take a long time before you ever meet someone even living a great life. My best advice is to find your own personal balance between the two.

>>27174

OOOHHHHHH!!!

OH HO HOOOO!!!

WOOOOW WHAT A HIT!

YOUR RADIATOR'S BLOWN!

YOU'VE WRECKED YOUR CAR!!!

>>27170
I am very boring and unimaginative and have no dedication to anything. This does not affect my girlfriend status however as I don't have any friends or do anything.

>>27174

That's a long way of saying its a numbers game, ladm7.

>>27178

Nah it's not just that. Playing a numbers game will "work", but treating that way breeds a self-defeating cynicism and leads to a worse dating culture for everyone.

I think what I was getting at is that a combination of creating a life you enjoy that has opportunities to meet others and practicing a bit of every day socialising probably puts you in the best position to have a good sex/love life.

There's the tl;dr.

>>27174

Excellent post - it's about building yourself up in tiny ways so that you:

a) increase your chance of coming across people with the potential to form relationships with
b) are in the best position, when 'a' has been achieved, to make a meaningful impact on potential partners each time you come across one

OP you put me in mind of me about 2 years ago, except I'd come out of the only real relationship I'd ever had in my early twenties and had previously had sex with her.

Having said that, it was looking bleak, I hopped on Tinder thinking 'ah no worries' and like you I'd had close to 0 response and worked in an all male environment with absolutely no chance there. You still seem to be in uni, which means it is now easier than it will ever be.

I had a mini panic and just decided that whatever happens I'll put myself in the best position possible for when I do come across girls. This meant increasing my social skills and the way I am as a person just in case that day come where there was a chance, no matter how small. My life is completely different now, girls actively take interest in me, I've got myself a new gf, I've the option to shag others if it comes up and am generally in a better position socially too, having gone from one distant uni friend, to rebuilding lots of friendships everywhere.

The things that helped me, starting with the easiest to fix first because you literally just have to do something (Assuming you do none of these things, but considering you are in this situation I am willing to guess you probably don't):

-Start exercising and going to the fucking gym. Pick some weights up and put them down a few times a week and do some cardio. I always thought because I was a slim guy that did a bit of running I didn't need to and I wasn't really a 'gym person'. The difference between the way people treat you when you start to look a bit more in shape is incredible, it builds your confidence and helps with the other points I'll list below. Women will find you attractive, men will respect you more and in general you'll feel and look better too, not just muscles wise, but skin, posture and other tiny plusses.

-Get a proper fucking haircut. My God, nobody ever said I had a bad haircut, in fact people would say my hair was nice and looked 'good' when I got it cut for a tenner, but when I once went and got a haircut costing a little over £20 people suddenly started to say 'wow you look great man' and 'you should have done that all along' and 'you look like a new man, an actual adult'. You don't have to get something wanky, but have a look at some hairstyles you think look good, take a picture or just do some reading online. I appreciate you're still in uni, get it cut once for every time you normally would or something if the money is a stretch.

-Say yes to every single invite you get socially (with the exception of anything that endangers you or puts you or your career or something else at risk), even if it's a pain in the arse to get to, you don't really fancy it, it's a sausage fest, you feel tired, work is busy that day. No excuses, just go. It gets you into the habit of going to things you don't want to, most of the time you won't enjoy it, once in a while you will. Most of the time you won't have any girls to speak to, once in a while one will be there and you will. This helps you build a solid network (friendship is about repeated, consistent interaction with like minded people) and also slowly builds up your social skills.

-Start inviting people out. You just said you have a few local school friends you are in contact with but then said you don't have anybody to go out with. Ask people for a pint, or if they fancy going into town, the worst that happens is they say no and you're in the exact same situation now. Most of the time they will probably say 'can't this weekend, but keep me in mind next time', it only takes one to click.

-Join some fucking societies mate, turn up at boxing society, chess society, any fucking society at your uni, pick two or three and join them and routinely go, I guarantee they'll have socials where they go out, where you can meet people and the like.

-Take care of yourself in other ways. Eat healthy, ditch the fizzy drinks or the excessive beer. Drink lots of water. Start moisturising daily. Use a face wash, exfoliate, these little things that will make a big difference to how you look over a small period of a few weeks/months.

-Get a hobby. Learn a language, do gardening for old people in the local area, cycle places, run, swim, go hill walking. Do something that when people ask what you do at the weekend you can occasionally drop in 'oh I'm out doing this' rather than 'not much', there's nothing worse than that boring line to have nothing to talk about.

-Stop focusing on getting the woman and focus on yourself. It's so cliche but it's true, I was doing all this and asked myself what the point was when it'd been over a year and no woman with a remote chance of a relationship had entered my life, then like busses, two came at once, but the difference was I was actually kind of interesting and looked reasonable rather than be in the position I was. They came out of nowhere that I could have seen either.

>>27179 has annoyingly summarised it all easily instead of my long ramble before I got to the end, but he's absolutely right.

Hope it helps somewhat OP, it might not, but eventually after seeing something similar somebody once wrote when I was in your shoes it just clicked for me and I'm sure it will for you too. It's when you focus on improving yourself the rest somehow magically follows.

Good luck mate.

>>27180
Thanks for the reply.

>the way people treat you when you start to look a bit more in shape is incredible
Can confirm, used to be a morbidly obese fatlad. Down to normal person proportions now, but still have a way to go to be fit.

>Get a proper fucking haircut.
Also agreed. I used to go to the cheapest locally but now I made a point of driving back to my uni city to get a haircut there because all the local ones at home are shite.

>Say yes to every single invite you get socially
I do that; over summer they are very few and far between.

>Start inviting people out.
I have no one to go out with because the times that the few local friends are about are very limited. Last weekend they were, and I think possibly we're having a quiet one midweek, but it's just that one singular group that I know at home. I have some general social stuff I found on Meetup in the pipeline, but I need to find out my work schedule before I can commit to going.

>Join some fucking societies mate
I'm head of a society next year, and am also in the committee for some SU stuff next year (which is full of VERY fit girls - way, Way, WAY out of my league). Problem is it's all on pause over summer; I want to sort my life out now.

>Take care of yourself in other ways.
Must admit over summer the amount of shit food I intake does go up.

>Get a hobby.
Unfortunately the hobbies (restoring old technology, photography, working on my car) aren't exactly gash central.

I would say I probably do need to up my fashion sense - I was raised a t-shirt and jeans guy, and have no idea what looks good. Before he graduated, I had a flamboyantly queer m8 who would give me some help in that department but now I'm flying blind once again.

Perhaps I do need to give up for now and just wait until I get back to uni. It'll be my last year so I do need to make it count.

>>27182

Good lad, I'm glad to hear it.

If I'm honest, you don't sound nearly as bad as you did in the first post, but there probably is still some way to go.

Glad to hear you're being proactive. Unfortunately, there is no instant quick fix to sorting out your life on a scale such as this and whilst you can start now and use it as motivation to be consistent, it's not going to change overnight, almost certainly not over one summer.

Clothing is the other one I missed out, I found the easiest thing to do was look at a film star that you get told you look like. Film stars are usually good looking people with expensive stylists, so literally just copy their clothing style provided they're not too eccentric, just copy the type of clothes that fit them. Works every time for me.

Failing that, just look at lads you think look fashionable or good out and about and pay attention to the type of things they wear, a lot of it falls down to fit. If you aren't getting t shirts that fit your body and jeans that do similar you'll struggle. A lot of it comes down to fit.

If I was bored at home in summer again between uni I know for certain I'd be going around the clothes shops having a try of something different, hitting the gym almost every day and working out a diet plan.

Your hobbies are cool mate, it doesn't matter what they are once you complete the other pieces of the puzzle. Girls will find literally any hobby interesting as long as you're interesting, provided you have some.

Don't give up now, let this be the start. Sorry I can't help more lad, I think it's just a case of getting your clothing sorted, not giving up and pushing on with what you're doing until you get to the higher levels.

I'll stop writing really long posts in your thread now and let the other lads get on with giving you advice.

>>27182
9 or 10 lasses have horrible self esteem issues, because only absolute bullet proof egos talk to them and you don't develop an ego that secure without a healthy dose of narcissism.

By and large, in my experience, If you don't immediately try and fuck them and are actually interested in them they warm to you quite quickly, assuming you're confident and don't have a glaring issue like body odour or bad breath. It is at that point that you can squeeze into their social lives, because they'll want to spend time with you if you're the kind of person who compliments them when they change their hair. Something as simple as "Is that a new Hairdo? It's nice."

Then it's just a matter of asking them to dance. "C'mon, dance with me. Neither can I, we'll be shit together." you get the night bus home with her and winch her. Then you have an excuse to ask her on a date, because you got to know her first and know what she is into. Gig, cinema, 'spoons and a fumble behind Gregg's; whatever.

Fit lasses aren't complicated, I used to get guys use the old "Why are you with this guy, when you could be with me?" and I would laugh it off, but I had to fight a few lads but to be honest that just made the lass horny. Assuming you win the fight, that's important.

>>27184
This sounds so alien to me.

I may as well be 13. It's something other people do.

>>27164

I'm the lads who suggested having a hobby is a relatively niche phenomenon. I'm by no means a virgin - I'm just frustrated by my inability to have a relationship with someone I haven't met on the internet/Tinder.

Some of you lot have responded by suggesting that everyday activities like watching TV/films, listening to music and playing video games counts as a hobby. I guess that's not exactly what I had in mind.

I suppose I should have specified hobbies tht involve meeting new people. I have plenty of interests, e.g. I play several musical instruments, but I don't see how playing them alone in my room will help me meet girls. I suppose the advice would be to go out and play music with other people, but if that was so easy I would have done that ages ago, because I'd like to join a band but can't find one of those either.

>>27168

Tending to think this lad is right.

>>27187

>I suppose I should have specified hobbies tht involve meeting new people. I have plenty of interests, e.g. I play several musical instruments, but I don't see how playing them alone in my room will help me meet girls

They don't, but either a) once you do meet a girl some other way you have something interesting to say or b) you can extend your hobby to go out and do it in public or join a group or band or something.

My hobbies are working on classic cars, reading, being a musician, writing songs and that, cycling, gym stuff, photography, cooking, hiking, building weird musical instruments, gardening, and green laning. They might not all seem like hobbies to you, and I don't particularly meet anyone directly through any of them, but any time I do meet someone I have a fucking tonne of shit to talk about. I don't even consider most of these things hobbies, they're just things I do - but listed out like that (like in a dating profile) I sound like the most interesting man on the planet. I'm not, but it doesn't hurt to have that as a first impression.

Being a musician is pretty much a cheat code for fanny, but the obvious truth is that nobody's going to know you do it unless you do it outside of your house. It's very easy to tell yourself that you're not interesting enough, or to believe that you'd be wasting your time going in to a social setting because you're not good at it, but maybe all you need is a bit of practice.

People far more boring and ugly than you are getting their knobs sucked right now as we speak, I can say that for certain.

>>27187
>I suppose the advice would be to go out and play music with other people, but if that was so easy I would have done that ages ago, because I'd like to join a band but can't find one of those either.

Please just go to an open mic night. There are literally thousands of wannabe singer-songwriters around who want to find the John to their Paul.

>>27184
>winch her
This means sex, right? Sorry I'm not familiar with that term.

>>27192

The issue here is that I have no interest in making music with the type of "here's Wonderwall" singer-songwriters who perform at open mic nights.

Where do I find people to make weird stuff with?

>>27199

How many open mic nights have you been to? I feel as though you're just looking for excuses.

>>27199

Ivor Cutler used to go down a storm at most folk clubs. There are some absolute nutters knocking about in my local folk/acoustic/open mic circuit.

I feel like this thread has gone a very long time without anyone pointing out how internet dating has gone from pathetic and embarrassing to socially accepted and completely normalised, especially among younger people, over the last five to ten years or so. I know you said in the OP that you haven't had much luck that way but it really is the norm these days, people simply don't go out to pull any more. Someone will bite eventually so long as you are worth their time.

I think that's the real issue here. You can try and maintain that it's a matter of meeting lasses, but lads have been giving you advice like getting hobbies and improving yourself because that's the real problem. You should already have bagged a Tinder date by now, and it's probably not because you're ugly. Unless you live on the surface of Mars, your local area is still going to be crawling with women, they are 50.7% of the population after all.

>>27203
>you should have already bagged a Tinder date by now

Thanks for the confidence boost, lad.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but Tinder is 90% looks, right? It's literally just a picture of you unless you look at the profile and few girls have anything there except maybe a location.

Mine has some hobbies and a little info, and 4 pictures - one of just me (the primary), one of me out with some friends, two of me on holiday - one with a friend, one on the top of a mountain I climbed.

Unsure what else I can do -- my OKCupid profile is full of stuff to do with hobbies, and a couple of little jokes.

>>27205

>Correct me if I'm wrong here, but Tinder is 90% looks, right?

Definitely not. Looks help, but the important things to remember are that almost everyone is 'average looking', and women do look for a bloke with more going on than a good face and some abs. Again, this will help, but the vast majority of women are on tinder because they want a long term thing, which means they want someone who isn't a depressing bore, and in reality that means even an uggo can score as long as he's got a decent profile.

Without seeing your profile (not that I'm asking to) I can't really help too much. My tinder profile pictures were a head on picture of my face on a good day, me in a suit at a wedding, me standing next to one of my female friends, and a wanky black and white photo of me looking moody. My bio was something like 'professional chef, part time musician' and that was it. I got hundreds of matches, and I'm maybe a 5 or 6/10 at best.

>>27205
Try the ostrich technique. Wear sunglasses and take the photo in black and white.

>>27206
My profile says "From <city name>, going to <university>, photographer and bassist. Have two cats and a dog."

What else do you suggest?

>>27208
I already have a like that, of me in a car no less. Added. Will report back soon.

>>27209
Don't put your city. It's completely redundant and does nothing to sell yourself. Don't focus on what university you're going to because thousands of other people are, just put the course or subject. Change the order to put put the more interesting things as a focus.

Try:
"Bassist, photographer, student in _____. Animal lover with a dog + 2 cats."

Not OP (nor anyone in this thread, as I remember) but I just canceled my tinder gold account. After just over two months my scores look a bit like this this:

Matches: ~200

Conversions to whatsapp: ~50+

People I was able to maintain a decent conversation with and build rapport: less than 10.

People who agreed to go on an actual "date" with me: Four

People who flaked at the last minute: Two (one of them twice)

People I flaked on because I saw a photo from a different angle and she was wider than a Chelsea Tractor: One

People I still might actually have a date with but it's been months and neither of us seems to have the time, energy or lack of apathy to actually arrange it: One

People who agreed to have immediate sex with me within minutes or hours of talking: Two.

People who agreed to have immediate sex with me within minutes or hours and didn't secretly have a penis: One.

Actual dates I've had: Zero

Number of people I've actually had sex with: Zero.

I'm not entirely sure why I bothered typing that all out other than to sort of get it off my chest. If it's a bother at all, just you other two complain and I'll delete this post.

>>27211

Genuine audible mirth. Keep this post up, please.

>>27211

The key numbers here are that you clicked with 10 women, made plans with 4, sacked 1 off, got fucked about by two of them and can't be arsed with the remaining one.

That's not really that shocking as statistics go.

>>27210
Done. Thanks.

>>27211
Put this onto some fancy-looking graphs and make a blog post about it and you'll rake in the ad revenue.

>>27211

Should've went with the tranny m7.

I'd try tinder but I don't have a single photo of myself engaged in normal activities with people or animals. Something tells me women aren't into creepy bedroom selfies.

Have you considered going outside? Dancing class perhaps? They’re always short on men

Sage because I only read the front page

>>27213

I think what really skewed my numbers is that I probably only initiated a conversation with about half of my matches.

Some of them would pop up "you matched with xxxx N hours ago" and I'd thinking to myself "Jesus, I did? Why?". Others I'd take a deeper look at their profile and realise that beyond saying "hello how are you today" or something equally as inane I had absolutely nothing to connect to them over being that they had no pics beyond generic selfies and no information on themselves at all; "Here I am, I am good looking" they appeared to say. Well, so are prostitutes love, and at least they have the good manners to write a bit about themselves for the escorting website.

Probably about half the conversations started were initiated by the lass (I don't mean to brag but my profile was pretty OK), and the other half were me either trying to be interesting but flirty about one of their more interesting pictures or something from their profile that I found interesting or a few canned openers that don't apply to that many people.

If I'd actually gone the whole hog and tried to open a conversation with every single match (and hey there's still time) then I might have got a much higher conversion to whatsapp rate than I actually did. Something tells me that it wouldn't have affected my "rapport built" or "tentative dates" statistics, though (although that might be my own pessimism in action).

The two people who wanted to hook up for sex immediately are what I consider to be the interesting outliers, even if only one of them actually poZessed a vagina as opposed to wanting instead to poz me.

>>27218

>Probably about half the conversations started were initiated by the lass

That's pretty fucking good going lad. There's a bit of an in-joke between my mates that if she talks to you first it's a guaranteed shag. That seems to have held true for me, and my ladm9s.

I'm not saying you're the one managing to fuck it up or anything, you seem to be pickier than myself and the dirty old men I apparently hang about with.

I know what you mean about the profiles that are just a fit bird with no information, i tend to assume they're bots or something, and if they're not the conversation from their end is 'lol wuu2 lol?' or something.

>>27219
> I know what you mean about the profiles that are just a fit bird with no information, i tend to assume they're bots or something, and if they're not the conversation from their end is 'lol wuu2 lol?' or something.

I do wonder about bots, but what's the point of a tinder bot that doesn't even send you a link to get ad revenue or hackerize your phone or whatever? A good number of 8/10 or 9/10 lasses I matched with simply didn't respond to anything from a simple "heya what's up" to a fully witty compliment on one of their pics. So yeah, definitely a bit strange.

Anyway, last night / morning of tinder gold lads. Wish me luck, because it looks like basic tinder is a nightmare (maybe it'll finally time to drop cheesy openers on all my uncontacted matches) and I'm fucked if I'm continuing to pay 14 quid a month when POF is free (afaik?).

>>27214
> Put this onto some fancy-looking graphs and make a blog post about it and you'll rake in the ad revenue.

I was thinking r/dataisdepressingbeautiful on reddit and post the screencap as one of my tinder pics. The fanny'll be absolutely frothing at the gash.

>>27223

>because it looks like basic tinder is a nightmare

What features make paying for it worthwhile? I've never looked into it.

>>27224

You get 5 super likes a day, a "Boost" once a month (whatever the fuck thati is, it never seemed to do much for me). You can skip back and change your mind if you accidentally swipe right on a munter or left on a fit lass, and you can go on swiping right all day (whereas I understand the free version only allows you so many right swipes per hour or something? I'll soon find out, I guess). Tl;dr - it wasn't really worth paying for.

>>27225
I used to hit the swipe limit when I was a sad horny student but now I actually don't have time to sit around on my phone all day I never do. Or maybe it's because I actually do discriminate in my swipes rather than swipe right on every chick like a moron.

>>27226

>rather than swipe right on every chick like a moron.

That's how I do it. You can decide if you actually fancy them after you've matched. Saves time in the long run, and avoids you being disappointed one you had your eye on didn't match. Swipe so fast their pictures don't even load.

>>27227
From what I understand, it punishes you for swiping right on everyone.

Not that I'd know, having one bot for a match, but it's just what I heard.

Listen lads. Tinder is a long game. As is POF and OKC and everything else, essentially.

As long as you've GOT SOME FUCMING HOBBIES and you're not the hunchback of Notredame you'll eventually run into a lassie who likes you back.

The hard part is when you've got over the obstacle of how to meet and seduce girls, you have to find one you genuinely actually like, rather than just put up with. That's an odyssey in its own right you mark my words.

>>27227
And end up with women quitting the service in droves because no-one they match with talks to them and gaining it a reputation for being a waste of time. Well played moron, you are actively costing yourself gash.

>>27228

Interesting, I seem to have done fine by it.

>>27230

>you are actively costing yourself gash.

Not really, I unmatch all the shit ones so they never know. I appreciate the idea that women leave in droves because I don't talk to them though, thanks mate.

>>27193
A snog, ffs.

>>27247
Apparently it's Scottish slang so how was I supposed to know.

Still no matches, but this is interesting:
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601909/how-tinder-feedback-loop-forces-men-and-women-into-extreme-strategies/

>>27249

The most effective strategy still always has been and always will be to make yourself look interesting and sociable. I'm an anti-social geek with a body mass index somewhere between holocaust victim and sparrow, and I've still managed to pull on at least half a dozen times through tinder.

If you're really struggling, get a picture with a dog, a mate's dog, any dog. They love dogs.

The next hurdle after getting matches to start with, of course, is talking them into bed, and for that all I can recommend is that you work on your sense of humour. I've always thought that if you can make a bird laugh you're as good as in her knickers already, and it certainly seems to hold true over the internet. You're going to have to steel yourself for dozens of lasses to disappoint you with shit replies or just plain ignorance, but every once in a while, there will be one you just click with. They already like the look of you and they're open to the idea of shagging, that's why they swiped, so just talk to them as if you already know them and if they "get" your patter you really can't fuck up.

Well, the end of summer is here, and still fuck all. There's a surprise.

One last year of uni, one more year of chances (limited as they may be as I'll be busy with a Master's course).

If I still can't sort it out by the end of the year, then I'm completely fucked (or not as the case may be). I don't see many options after that point.

>>27325
Have you made any progress either socially, or with pursuing fitness or hobbies?

The advice you need is probably already in this thread, it is just a case of acting on it.

>>27326
Ended up working 5-6 days a week, on my feet; not checked the scales but went down a notch on my belt, anyway.

Not sure what else I can do with my already broad range of hobbies.

Went out with mates once or twice but the work schedule meant meetups couldn't happen.

Unsure where the fitness thing comes in. I know people fatter than me, considerably so, who slay attractive women.

>>27327

>I know people fatter than me, considerably so, who slay attractive women.

They probably have the personality to compensate.

>>27047

>The only problem - where to meet women?

Back at uni, my prospects are looking bleak. Very bleak. I know a lot of women but they are all far too cool for me. They all do humanities subjects and get ketty at the weekends, but I do STEM and don't touch unidentified white powders.

Shit.

>>27504
But after uni they'll be working as baristas and you'll be making tidy cash. Plenty of time for drugs in your mid to late twenties.

>>27504
Absolutely every element of life after uni gets worse so stop worrying about it.

>>27507

M8, you just told him that it does not get any better than that, and that life will actually get worse. You just gave him another reason to suicide.

>>27506

(A good day to you Sir!)

>>27504

1) Join a society or something
2) Meet weird people that actually join societies
3) Go out with weird girls from societies
4) Relationship/sex!

It's not just 'cool girls' that want a boyfriend.

>>27509
Imagine what sort of seething incel would make a comic like this.

>>27511
hello

>>27509
I don't buy for a recond incels study hard and get stright A's.

>>27513
The comic is about a certain type of married men, not incels.

>>27514
Yeah, I guess incels use that sort of logic to just not bother and "LDAR" then. I mean, how many people does the average incel think goes to get a degree with the belief "in 10 years I'll use this degree to find a missus and finally have sex!", beause it's zero percent if there are any reading.

Anyway, fuck off with your trying to hook me into complaining about nonsense, OPlad was trying to better himself before we started shitting up his thread.

>>27510
I am an active member of 5 societies, sitting on the committee of two of them.

>>27509
Get that shit out of here.

[x] blog

My birthday's coming up; it'll be my last one at university and so it's been really getting to me.

I know what I have it better than most, a relatively active social life, a lot of societies and extracurricular activities, a very small group of actual friends, but the fact I cannot get a relationship at all just makes me feel like a fucking pathetic failure.

I had kept myself pretty distracted for the past few weeks but I went to a house party the other day and it was everywhere I looked, everyone was talking about relationships, people were playing asinine drinking games about it. It's like having a carrot dangled just out of reach but constantly waved in your field of vision.

>>27576
After university your social life will be destroyed and you will become depressed and lonelier than ever so enjoy it while it lasts.

>>27577
That is not constructive or helpful and patently bollocks to boot.

>>27576

There are a lot of people that feel the same as you, while it might not feel like it. There are also loads of people that are in bad or dysfunctional relationships; these relationships really have a massive hangover into your adult life. My first point is that being single always beats a bad relationship.

'Cannot' shows that you believe yourself incapable:

Firstly, thinking that you can/can't get a relationship feels a bit like you're treating it like a skill. Sure, there's an element of skill, but it's not an excel formula.

Secondly, you're taking it personally as young people are wont. Step back from that, it's hard to get into a good relationship in the first place. Most of your difficulties have nothing to do with you as a person, they're more a product of your surroundings.

I found this hard to write. My intention was to say, worry about it less, take it less personally, and realise that difficulty to find a relationship is miles better than jumping into unhealthy relationships left, right, and centre.

>>27577

I'm much happier and more social than when I was studying.

As you feel how you do, you're welcome to post here and we'll offer what support we can. I understand that you mean well, but telling them that their life is going to become shit is not advice, and is a sign that you have issues.

>>27584
>Firstly, thinking that you can/can't get a relationship feels a bit like you're treating it like a skill. Sure, there's an element of skill, but it's not an excel formula.
If it's not a skill, then what is it?

>Secondly, you're taking it personally as young people are wont. Step back from that, it's hard to get into a good relationship in the first place. Most of your difficulties have nothing to do with you as a person, they're more a product of your surroundings.
It is a personal issue, no? I certainly wouldn't want to blame anyone else/society/whatever. I don't think it's true that
>Most of your difficulties have nothing to do with you as a person, they're more a product of your surroundings
as 99% of the people I know have no issue getting into relationships.

>and realise that difficulty to find a relationship is miles better than jumping into unhealthy relationships left, right, and centre.
Of course, but there's difficulty, and then there's being a nearly 24-year-old virgin. It makes me feel fundamentally broken.

>>27585
> then there's being a nearly 24-year-old virgin. It makes me feel fundamentally broken.
I'm a 26 year old virgin. I wouldn't admit that anywhere but here - bugger it.
I don't have a slightest idea what's wrong with me, if there's something wrong. I've never felt bad about it but I get that being a virgin at that age is abnormal really.

But then, I don't give much fucks about it. There were reasons for an outcome like that. The only moment it stung is when I overheard someone talking shit about me and one of the phrases was, 'Like, I don't believe he's ever been on a date'. And it hurt because I couldn't know if that was a fluke or a sharp observation.

There was a slight touch of irony though, because the person who said that had - and still has - constant problems with his spouse.

>>27586

>I don't have a slightest idea what's wrong with me, if there's something wrong.

I've had a couple of friends in similar situations, and to me it seems that this line of thinking is what really harms their efforts in the romantic world. Once they pass whatever milestone age they consider to be 'bad' to not have had a shag, they start to doubt their own worthiness, and it's a slippery slope from there.

In particular I have a friend who is my age - 29, and still hasn't been in a relationship. It's a constant thorn in his side and he's basically convinced himself it's too late for him now. It really isn't though. The thing about him, he's objectively handsome, hilarious, and very, very clever, and I've seen COUNTLESS women interested in him, but he lets himself destroy any chances through inaction, because he's scared, or thinks they'll be put off by his lack of experience. It's a real shame that he's so dug into that way of thinking, because there's so very many women who want to fuck him, but when you tell him that he waves it off or straight up doesn't believe you.

Meanwhile he's seen ugly cunts like myself do just fine with women, and probably thinks 'but why him and not me?!' despite the only thing holding him back being a self-fulfilling prophecy.

>>27587
>but he lets himself destroy any chances through inaction, because he's scared, or thinks they'll be put off by his lack of experience.

If, by some miracle, some girl made it obvious they liked me, this is what I'm terrified of. I think being a bloke it's a lot worse; you are almost universally expected to make the first move. I have literally no fucking clue how to a) tell if a girl is interested in me or b) make a move without coming off like a creep.

Not only that, but our culture is such that we're all expected to be mind readers and just "notice the signs".

Interestingly, your post is contradictory (and I don't mean it like I want to start a cunt-off, just want to point it out and discuss) to >>27584. Where >>27584 says that it's not a personal thing, you seem to think so. I'd be more inclined to agree with you, but it's interesting that people have such wildly different opinions on it.

>>27587
> but he lets himself destroy any chances through inaction, because he's scared, or thinks they'll be put off by his lack of experience
I can relate.

In my case though, besides some other factors, the main was that I've never really sought a relationship in the first place. What I can't tell is if that's driven by those prior factors or by my general indifferent attitude towards romance (I'd say that the whole dating game bores but that from someone who's never played the game that would sound contrived).

I fancied a girl once and I did actually approach her but of course I did that as a total sperg and failed. I don't regret it and I guess I was even happy that it didn't work out because the whole affair was problematic on so many levels that it'd probably turn into a one massive clusterfuck in a minute (figuratively).

>>27592

>Where >>27584 says that it's not a personal thing, you seem to think so. I'd be more inclined to agree with you, but it's interesting that people have such wildly different opinions on it.

I do agree with what that chap says about it being hard to find a decent relationship, he's not wrong at all. If you don't just want a random shag that 'might' become a real relationship, then dating can be a long and tedious process. I admit I'm quite happy to just have a one-night stand, which, I believe, is quite an easy thing to find.

I feel like I'm dangerously close to sounding like I'm talking down to you lads, which really isn't my intent. I lost my virginity quite young (15) and I think that's actually what's helped me approach women later on. I'm quite sure that first time was the confidence boost I sorely needed.

>If, by some miracle, some girl made it obvious they liked me, this is what I'm terrified of

>I have literally no fucking clue how to a) tell if a girl is interested in me or b) make a move without coming off like a creep.

This is exactly what I've seen with my friend. If you're already convinced intellectually that you don't know what you're doing and it's a scary thing to do, then of course you're going to end up knacking it up. You're definitely right about being a man too, we're expected to make the move most of the time. I'm sure the solution to most older virgin men's problems is to run into a pushy girl who essentially drags you into bed. But I suspect someone who has a lot of anxiety built up around the subject would fight pretty hard against that just out of fear of the unknown.

>Not only that, but our culture is such that we're all expected to be mind readers and just "notice the signs".

Also true, though the thing here is that you certainly do learn to notice the signs the more experience you have. Once you've been in the game for a while, a glance across a bar is often enough.

It's hard to give advice other than the tedious stock phrases like 'be confident' but it's basically true. If you think nobody will have you because you're an xy year old virgin then that's exactly how you'll come across. I don't disagree with anything the other chap said, particularly, but my approach to any problem is to look at yourself first, and be really honest about it. You can't change the dating game, societal pressures, or anything like that, but you can certainly change your thoughts and actions on the subject.

I'm well aware this is all very, very, easy for me to say, and very hard to do, but if you have anxieties over 'still' being a virgin (I guarantee no potential sexual partner cares that much. Many wouldn't even notice) then they can be overcome, but I believe a lot of them are buried under the weight you've learned to put on losing that V Card.

>>27585

>It is a personal issue, no? I certainly wouldn't want to blame anyone else/society/whatever.

My idea generally is to move away from blaming anyone (yourself included), and just understanding that being in your position does happen increasingly these days, and it's not really anyone's fault.

>Of course, but there's difficulty, and then there's being a nearly 24-year-old virgin. It makes me feel fundamentally broken.

You feel fundamentally broken and you are a 24-year-old virgin. You're not unhappy because you're a virgin. You're unhappy and a virgin. I am sure you understand me: if I gave you your dream girl right now, you'd be unhappy and a non-virgin.

I think >>27587 hits the nail on the head really. And this part from >>27595 too:

>look at yourself first, and be really honest about it. You can't change the dating game, societal pressures, or anything like that, but you can certainly change your thoughts and actions on the subject.

Your head is the only thing you can control.

I am a 31 year old virgin. Beat that.

I am acutely aware and ashamed by how pathetic it is that all I can do is make excuses, but hey, if I wasn't pathetic then I wouldn't be making this thread.

>>27609
>Also true, though the thing here is that you certainly do learn to notice the signs the more experience you have. Once you've been in the game for a while, a glance across a bar is often enough.
Which just about sums it up. I'm at the age now where most people can read the cues; we're not on MSN in year 8 going 'so hu du u lyk lol x' - I've never had a chance to learn them and so it's like starting a race a lap behind everyone else.

>It's hard to give advice other than the tedious stock phrases like 'be confident' but it's basically true.
If it only were as easy as just 'being' confident.

>>27609
>My idea generally is to move away from blaming anyone (yourself included)
>Your head is the only thing you can control.
>>look at yourself first, and be really honest about it. You can't change the dating game, societal pressures, or anything like that, but you can certainly change your thoughts and actions on the subject.

I just don't know *how* to change, though. Surely you gain confidence through success?

>>27610
I would prefer not to.

>>27614
>I've never had a chance to learn them and so it's like starting a race a lap behind everyone else.

Different poster, here. Not meaning to sound glib, but this is life. Everyone is deficient in something, we all start from way behind in some aspect. It may sting that inexperience has affected such a personal area of human interaction for you, but think of all the people whose lives are irreversibly fucked because they started a lap or two behind in some other even more critical area of life.

The most fortunate of us aren't those who grow up proficient in everything, but rather the ones who are lucky enough to have more gentle teachers.

>>27614

>I'm at the age now where most people can read the cues

An awful lot of people can't, they just kid themselves that they can, hence the epidemic of sexual harassment. The world is full of adult men who genuinely think that "nice tits" is an acceptable chat-up line or that following a stranger in the street is an acceptable seduction technique - if you don't believe me, ask any woman. You might be inexperienced, but you're not a literal monster, which puts you well ahead of a lot of people.

>I just don't know *how* to change, though. Surely you gain confidence through success?

You can also gain confidence through acceptance of failure. You can't just decide not to be scared of something, but you can gradually train yourself out of that fear by willingly exposing yourself to it. You can say to yourself "I'm going to try things, I'm going to make a tit of myself sometimes, it's going to feel bloody awful, but I'm going to keep trying regardless". The fear never disappears completely, but it does get smaller and quieter and less important. Slowly but surely, you retrain your subconscious to recognise that the pain of rejection is much more tolerable than the pain of not even trying.

>>27610
I beat that comfortably, and am now happily deflowered and living with a defacto Mrs. Life's good.

>>27619

What was your final score? Why did you fold in the end? Tell us the story of your game.

>>27628 42. She asked nicely, we were working together.
I'm not an utter freak, just never put any effort in, and had plenty of other things to be getting on with. A tendency towards hard drinking meant that, on ending up in bed with people, was never in a fit state to do anything about it.
I probably regret not saying yes earlier when friends set me up, since sex is quite fun, but other than that, nah, this is me and that's ok. I suspect that I'd have ended up married rather earlier if things had gone another way - and probably done the kids thing, so life would have turned out rather different.
For what it's worth - no particular difference before and after. Maybe a sense of relief that girl-I-like wasn't repulsed and seemed to quite enjoy it too.
I doubt this helps any - but there you go.

Well, here we go.
The odometer of life has ticked over once more. I don't feel quite as down as have been for the past few days; I can probably attribute that to alcohol.

Maybe I'll go out and try something tonight. Maybe.

Well, it's all faded into a general quarter-life crisis. I know all the oldlads will laugh and laugh and laugh, but I need to write this down somewhere because I have nobody I can talk to about this. The one 'friend' I had who told me I could talk to them just straight up blanked me last time I tried, and continued the conversation like I hadn't even said anything.

Ironically for what I'm about to say, I know I'm not a special case here and my position is not unique. but all the time when I were a wee'un I was told that I was destined for huge things and I was special and teachers had nothing but praise for my achievements.

This, obviously, hits me harder now that I have passed the threshold for 'greatness' - i.e. if I was going to be great in any field, I already would be by now. If I was going to be an important or special person, I'd be at least well on my way, but I'm not.

I have essentially nothing to show for myself, despite being at an age where my parents were both full- employed and on their second house. Granted, they both started working the day after high school finished, but still.

Yes, I'm getting a Master's degree, but I'll be graduating from it 2-3 years age-wise after most people do, but then what? I get a decently-paying job I steadily grow to hate, I come home to an empty house, and dick about on the internet until I fall asleep in my single bed. It feels like I'm doomed already. Again, I know I'm not special and this situation or set of feelings isn't unique to me; it's just that I've worked my fair share of jobs from supermarket jobs up to massive engineering companies, and I see the same stories everywhere - people in this absolutely fucking CRUSHING rut. I know they probably felt like me at one point, and that legitimately scares me that I'll be one of them in 20 years, going home to my beige house to watch whatever the equivalent of The One Show is.

Then, it's not like I can say I've eschewed personal relationships because I'm on such a busy and strong personal journey - I'm not; I've had ample time (and most likely missed opportunities) to at least form personal relationships and have personal experience in that area but I don't.

I have many friends, but practically no Friends. These are not people I often talk to outside of prescribed times (i.e. societies), and certainly not people I would ever approach with personal problems. Of the couple of people I might call Friends, when one of them was having a hard time recently I took the time out of my day to jump on a train to see them, and they couldn't even be arsed to come meet me at the train station, leaving me to go all the way to their house in an unfamiliar town. When I asked said person to come see me, I waited all day for them to say they were at the station, only to hear nothing. When I phoned them to ask them where they were, they replied "oh sorry mate I'm too stoned".

I can't see any route to romantic relationships either - despite my best efforts, there's a sea of "oh you're really [nice/funny/whatever] I don't see why you can't get a girl" or whatever, but it still never happens. I can't even say I know any girls who I'd have a chance with in a million years. Everyone I know is either not single, or far, FAR, out of my league.

I just don't even fucking know what I want any more, and everything I do feels like an obligation - even wanking (which I've had a massively reduced interest in recently, I have come to notice). I don't even have that much of a passion for uni - I'm finishing primarily because I can't afford to drop out. I can't even buy myself a Porsche or something that x-life crisis people do because I don't have any money.

>>27900

I'm an older lad and I'm not laughing at you.

I work from home so my rut is even deeper, if I don't make the effort I can stay at home for literally weeks with Sainsbury's deliveries and whatnot.

I no longer have a single friend who I could confide a damn thing in, the only two people in my life that I am 100% honest with are my psychologist and my psychiatrist (actually I'm only about 80% honest with the latter because if I have one thing in this life it's pills that knock me the fuck out as soon as it's "bed time").

You hit a bit of a chord there, lad. If I go back over my old primary school reports there are repeated references to being "the next Einstein" and in secondary school worries of me "squandering my 135 IQ", and hey, guess what? Here I am sitting in a flat on my own drinking a beer I shouldn't be drinking, trying to fix some code that an employee committed broken and doing myself no good at all.

Hell, I even did a masters at 27 (I paid fully for it, learned nothing on the course; I basically did the whole nine month academic year in an amphetamine-extended manic episode which has had no positive impact on my career at all. I've never even had interviewer ask to see my GCSE certificates (which is good because all I have is 5 Cs and a D).

I suppose what I'm trying to put across is that life terrible and beautiful, and strange and you're definitely not alone.

I also can't buy myself a Porsch because I can't even fucking drive; even a 10 year old Lotus is off the cards.

I'm dealing with all this the only way I know how; by being a total idiot. I've got a girlfriend who's almost half my age (and whose teenage sister won't stop looking at me funny, Christ), I'm going to get a tattoo I'm totally going to regret, I'm going to find out how to join a club where I can learn to fire a shotgun (or failing that a bow and arrow), and I'm going to do a few parachute jumps.

>>27900
Do you know probably why your friend cut across you? Because none of that sounds like he hasn't been there before too.

>>27903

So you own a company, you have a hot young girlfriend whose sister fancies you too, and you have manly plans involving shooting things and jumping out of planes.

Sounds pretty good to me.

>>27903
I know everyone deals with issues in their own way but it seems like despite being a bit of a mess, you do know where you are and what you want. It doesn't sound all that bad if you have women actively interested in you. Plus, learning to drive is easy if you're not totally uncoordinated, so get that one done.

>>27904
I honestly don't know. He's a bit of a strange case, sometimes he'll think he's kind of everything, other times he'll hate himself. I don't think he knows how to deal with others' feelings. For a while he was in a polyamourous relationship and despite my many protests that him talking about how much sex he was having with multiple people really didn't make me, a virgin, feel very good about myself, he continued to talk about it. I've always listened when he wanted to talk though.

>>27900
It's all fucked. Before, during, and after every single day, I can't find a reason to have suffered through that day. You wake up to emptiness, you work through emptiness, and you come home to emptiness. It would be great if you could just have one sincere conversation with someone. I don't know if it's the same for you at uni, but where I work, it's all just pleasantries and fake smiles. There are people all around the place, moving their lips and making facial expressions, but none of them ever expressing anything they really think or feel to one another. Just sociopaths everywhere, playing pretend for 8 hours a day, 40 hours a week.

And then you go home, and there's not even the sociopaths any more. Just silence and emptiness and isolation, and still no sincere human interaction. It's absolutely maddening. Everything there is to live for loses its value when you exist in a vacuum.

>>27912
I feel like there are a lot of genuine connections at uni, but I'm just not part of any of them.

>>27912
You remind me a little of the sample used in

>>27909
>For a while he was in a polyamourous relationship and despite my many protests that him talking about how much sex he was having with multiple people really didn't make me, a virgin, feel very good about myself, he continued to talk about it.

No offence, and I've followed this thread for a while and you seem like a decent guy, but I can see why someone might decide this is more bother than its worth. Friends talk to friends about their relationships and sex-lives (at least in a general sense, at least to friends of the same gender). Even if he is understanding of your issues he's not going to feel like chatting to you when he feels like having a moan about his relationship troubles which, if he goes through a lot of drama, is going to be a lot of the time. That's not a choice he has made, it's a choice you have made.

Thought I'd posted in this thread before, but probably not. I lost it last year, mid 20s, she was younger.

See how this treats you:

Make a throwaway account on reddit and find some of the places where people post nudes anonymously (r/gonewild and its offshoots). Sort posts by new and look for the ones that get minimum attention from others. Send a message or comment - a compliment, an instruction, a little tale about what you would do if you were there with them. Almost all of your messages will be ignored, but persevere. Find someone you can be flirty back and forth with. Remember that you have the following on your side: age, accent, nationality, education. Try sending a flirty voice message maybe, or read something aloud on the audio section. Maybe just post a couple of pictures of your dick. Explore some of the different communities - curvy, hairy, over-30, mild. If you like, you can keep it impersonal, or ask about their hobbies and learn more about them.

The goal is to become comfortable complimenting and being overtly sexual with another person. If you send nudes and they respond favourably, then it should also be a confidence booster for when you eventually are naked with a partner.

>>27925
I know that's the point, but it goes against every fibre of my being to send (unsolicited) sexually explicit messages to women online. I'll try, but it'll be like climbing a mountain.

>>27940
>I'll try, but it'll be like climbing a mountain.

I wouldn't tell her that!

>>27925

This is one of those times where I have to write what some lads will no doubt write off as hilariously misogynistic toxic masculinity etc etc but lads in your position need to know the truth.

You might feel like sending that sort of stuff is creepy and borderline/actual sexual harassment. But the old adage that the only difference between sexual harassment and flirting is whether you are attractive to the other person is pretty much the long and short of it. Obviously need to read the signs- Don't harass someone who's obviously not interested. But you have to make a move somehow.

Imagine if all this rape culture best a man can be lot actually got their way. Humanity would go extinct because nobody would ever initiate the process that eventually ends in reproduction. You might think you're being a respectful individual but really, the truth of the matter is that you have to gain the confidence to make a move, otherwise you will be a virgin until the day you die. I guarantee you no woman is ever going to make the first move at you, in a million years.

>>27942

>Imagine if all this rape culture best a man can be lot actually got their way. Humanity would go extinct because nobody would ever initiate the process that eventually ends in reproduction

It does seem that a lot of people think the 'Gillette' crowd think that talking to women or being sexual to a woman in any way is offensive, but I'm pretty sure they're just trying to stop getting people to stop catcalling women in the street and feeling their colleagues up.

Note well that we're currently talking about sending sexy messages to women who are literally posting their tits on porn boards on reddit. I don't think even the soyest of soyboys is trying to tell you that this is inappropriate.

I still find the attitudes of this people borderline hateful and very, very tedious, but I don't think the thrust of their mission is too far off.

>>27942
>I guarantee you no woman is ever going to make the first move at you, in a million years.
Speak for yourself.

>>27942

>I guarantee you no woman is ever going to make the first move at you, in a million years.

This simply isn't true, and marks you out as the virgin in the discussion, really.

I have a feeling your response will be "yeah well obviously dirty slags make the first move!".

>>27945
>>27946

He's overemphasing his point but there's some truth to it. It is far more common for men to make the first move, both in my experience and observation, certainly none of the couples I know got together after the woman approached him. The whole problem is that asking a girl out usually demands a level of social nuance that incels don't, or refuse to have. Yes, some girls on Tinder will (shocker) respond eagerly to a superlatively attractive man who is forthright. Largely it's a matter of knowing when and in what manner to make your intentions apparent in a way that isn't thoroughly off-putting. There's no textbook way to do this which I imagine explains the popularity of PUA 'techniques' and a longing for those wonderfully simple days when you would find yourself being presented with people's reluctant daughters for marriage merely by virtue of having a job and not being a drunk.

The girls who are outgoing enough to make the first move are unlikely to do so with someone as visibly unattractive, embittered or awkward as the common incel. Hence why they leave with the perception that romance is a game that is inherently rigged against them.

>>27947

>It is far more common for men to make the first move

Agreed, but that's a far cry from the absolute language he used. In my personal experience too, I think women are definitely starting to make the first move a lot more than they ever have before, probably just because it's so easy now with Tinder and the like. I've had a lot of girls send the first message to me on there, but if you believe the internet this is a near impossibility. I'm not even that attractive. I'm not an uggo but I'm barely average.

>>27940

It doesn't need to be overtly sexual, it can be something innocent like 'you have a really nice smile'.

>>27947

> The girls who are outgoing enough to make the first move are unlikely to do so with someone as visibly unattractive, embittered or awkward as the common incel....


I'm more interested in the process that turns someone into an "incel". I was definitely what is politely called "a late bloomer" but I feel like I can link that back to being raised by a single mother and the resulting lack of male influence in my life. That said, by the time I left home at 21 I had everything more or less figured out; yet I don't think I was ever particularly visibly unattractive or (detectably) bitter, just awkward and a bit overweight and without a single clue how to talk to the opposite sex.

At what point does frustration turn to "visible unattractiveness, bitterness, and awkwardness"? Twenty, twenty-five, thirty?

>>27950

>At what point does frustration turn to "visible unattractiveness, bitterness, and awkwardness"? Twenty, twenty-five, thirty?

Going by my friends at that age who were still virgins at the ripe old ages of 23 or even 25, I'd say that's about the age when you grow increasingly bitter as a virgin. And you then become what you project. And as one of my virgin friends confessed to me at the time, it's a feeling of running out of time more with every day that passes, all the while bemoaning the fact that you still haven't had sex. It becomes a vicious circle which then makes it all the less likely that your first time will happen anytime in the near future at all.

I was a bit of a late bloomer myself, but then again, by far not as late as some of my friends, so I can kind of relate to the issue, but again, thankfully I was not a virgin anymore at that kind of age. But what I think the problem is with many late bloomers is that they have issues like low self esteem, maybe there were strong male role models missing (certainly in my case), a lot of them tend to be of a sensitive disposition, and quite a few just. fucking. overthink. sex. It's universally a good idea to have your first time with somebody you feel emotionally connected to, to not rush into it and of course to use proper protection. But there is a good chance that your first time is going to be pretty shit as it goes, and with somebody that is horribly wrong for you even if they are your steady partner at the time and you think you are madly in love.

So in essence, don't expect your first time to be one for the history books. If at the age of 23 the opportunity finally arises to have it with somebody even halfway nice, then go for it. But if you keep losing yourself in a million and one considerations about the issue that are effectively all a load of bollocks, then you are really shooting yourself in the foot and you will become ever more bitter, and sex will become ever more unlikely for you.

Oh and also, my perception back then was that some late virgins simply have unrealistic ideas about a partner or sexual mate. Your first time very, very likely isn't going to be with a supermodel type of girl. She will probably not even look as good as the more average looking women in your porn collection. And it will be a waste of time chasing somebody like that, because as a 23-year-old virgin, you will have nothing on this whole wide Earth to offer to them. With looks like that, they very probably will have been deflowered by age 16 and will have spent the last few years riding young alpha male cock. So where do you honestly think you come in. At all.

You are all forgetting something: as you age, your dating pool becomes smaller and filthier. Nobody will have the same opportunities of a good looking, extrovert bloke in his teen years, unless obscenely rich. A 35 years old man will be literally invisible, and all half decent lady of his age are already married or in a LTR. Last time I tried a dating site the only "ladies" available were obese single mom on benefits looking for "a good man to take care of me and my little angels"

>>27950
>>27951
I've obviously been tempted by the incel path multiple times - it's easier to blame your failings on others than face them. I don't think it's as much of an age thing - it seems a lot of people in those communities are probably younger than I - 24 - so I don't think it's all about that.

I understand that my first time (should it happen) is going to be underwhelming at best, and an embarrassment at worst - that's what worries me - that anyone I happen to find will (rightly) expect me to have more experience.

I don't even know what it is for me - I had a stable family with a male role model, and my sister turned out fine. I'm probably just a bit spergic.

>>27952
There are plenty of single, attractive young women in their mid twenties that would be perfectly happy to consider a 35 year old bloke. I'm guessing it's a lot harder for women of a similar age.

>>27952

In my experience this is bullshit, as a bit of a bumbling low achieving, not particularly good looking idiot in his mid-thirties I've still managed to get my end away/have romantic loving relationships with some amazing lasses. Possibly it depends on location as I'm in a big old city so I'd imagine the options are more plentiful and varied but just wanted to add the opposite (hopefully less depressing) perspective.

Don't give up hope lads, plenty of birds in the sky and all that.

>>27955
I'd agree with this. Although a bumbling geek, I never had too much trouble finding women to sleep with me, but it was during my early thirties that things really became quite easy...

I think everyone focuses on the shagging too much - I realise that's easy for me to say, etc, but my experience is you have to be good at being some kind of friends with women before they'll sleep with you, with the attendant risk of ending up in the friend zone.

>>27952

>A 35 years old man will be literally invisible

You're so wrong. That's prime age for a bloke, particularly with younger (25) women who might be more career-minded than sprog-minded.

It never ceases to amaze that chaps like you constantly peddle this tripe despite mountains of people who seemingly break out of your prescribed parameters. And invariably when we point to an example, then oh, the woman's nose is too sharp so that's why, or he must be a billionaire.

It takes literally an hour of people watching in a moderately busy town to see that life isn't at all like you image it is. I implore you to go find that out for yourself.

>>27954

As a thirty-five year old currently boffing a twenty-three year old, I have to agree.

>>27956
I have plenty of "friends" (as described before) who are women; my issue comes from taking it further - I can't seem to read the signs, or really know what to do or say, and since so many of my friend groups are interconnected, I don't want to make it weird.

>>27959
Why don't you explain your issue to one with a sympathetic ear? She may be able to help.

>>27960

Not him, but in my experience asking women for help with the romantic side of things isn't a great idea. In fact it reminds me of a Bill Hicks routine where he said something along the lines of "Every woman says that the number one thing they want in a man is a sense of humour, and I haven't been laid in two fucking years".

>>27959

Women are extremely hypocritical and concerned only about not appearing whorish or shallow, so they will never give you an honest answer. A woman will never tell you "you are uglier than sin" or "you are way too short", even if she is 100% sure about that. Instead, she will tell you something about "sense of humour" or "there is nothing wrong with you, you will find that special someone." Never, ever listen to a woman, unless you are shagging her and you want to keep

>>27962

Stop posting shit like this in /emo/, or in fact, anywhere here. It's embarrassingly inaccurate and definitely unhelpful in the context of /emo/.

>>27945
>>27946

You misinterpreted my point, lads. I didn't say that women never make the first move, ever. I said that no woman is going to make the first move on a lad like him.

I've had a conversation about this with my very lefty feminist girlfriend and she tells me that, despite popular belief that women are just picky and arrogant about their choice in men, it's actually that they feel intimidated and society conditions women not to etc. However, when I compare what she says to what has actually happened between us personally, I find it only reinforces my belief that most women don't really know what they want. And if you play by the rules of what women do say they want, you will very rarely be successful.

I'm not endorsing all this PUA bullshit and I'm not telling you to go into a bar and embarrass yourself with a show of old-fashioned masculinity to pick up a bird. I just think that a lot of young lads out there nowadays are simply helplessly confused. They are caught between the tides of a social movement that tells them most of their base instincts are harmful and that women are to be treated like delicate porcelain dolls, and a counter-current that essentially tells them to treat women as disposable whores. Neither is the truth but a lot of young men have no way of finding that out.

>>27964
>I didn't say that women never make the first move, ever. I said that no woman is going to make the first move on a lad like him.

I take it you've never encountered a horny fat lass.

>>27965

I have one that messages me every few months on Whatsapp, she's still very coy though despite the fact she clearly wants my todger. I have a suspicion she's a mentalist, so the furthest I'll go is filthy late night sexting.

The only woman who ever has legitimately made a move at me was a mid 30s HR woman type. I was about 21 I think. She was drunk and had that really seedy wine-drinking spinster vibe about her, like the female equivalent of your dirty uncle Les. Looking back I regret not taking the opportunity, I bet she'd have pegged me rotten then sucked me dry.

>>27964

>You misinterpreted my point, lads. I didn't say that women never make the first move, ever. I said that no woman is going to make the first move on a lad like him.

I think you are getting way too worked up about that whole "first move" thing, .gs.

One of my friends is the kind of woman who is a) not the falsely coy type because it would be a kind of spiel she might get off on, and b) she was usually always the one trying to get a lad's attention when she really fancied him.

What she told me just the other week is that many guys get one thing very horribly wrong when they are out in a pub or a club. And that is that they approach a woman right out of nowhere, like a genie that appears in a puff of smoke. According to her, it's all well and good if you as the bloke have spent the best part of ten minutes ogling the object of your desire from across the room, but that does not mean you should expect to succeed at piquieing a woman's interest by sneaking up on her like a panther on its prey and then all of a sudden expect her to engage in a deliberate conversation with you, who until five seconds ago was not even aware you existed.

She said to save yourself embarrassment as a bloke (and for the girl as well, who after all then has to come up with a more or less polite way of declining your random advances), try to make eye contact from a safe distance. Smile at her, and see how she reacts. If you are not a complete Aspie, you will be able to gauge by her facial expression and her behaviour if she has a minimum amount of interest in perhaps talking to you. Do this a few times over, and if you keep getting an inviting look from her, walk over to her and start a conversation.

A lot of women still simply like it when a guy makes the first move, and that's a hoop you are just going to have to jump through with most women, and you either accept it or you don't. But you can make it a whole lot easier on yourself and increase your chances considerably if you try to work out from a distance if she would be interested in talking to you. It will also help you quickly separate the ones that aren't interested from the ones that are worth pursuing that evening. Without having to waste five or ten minutes talking to someone who would really be more comfortable if you left her alone.

>>27967

>She said to save yourself embarrassment as a bloke (and for the girl as well, who after all then has to come up with a more or less polite way of declining your random advances), try to make eye contact from a safe distance. Smile at her, and see how she reacts. If you are not a complete Aspie, you will be able to gauge by her facial expression and her behaviour if she has a minimum amount of interest in perhaps talking to you. Do this a few times over, and if you keep getting an inviting look from her, walk over to her and start a conversation.

Fuck, I honestly never realised that some blokes would miss this part out. Whenever I say 'talk to women in pubs' on here, this is what I mean, doing the eyes and all that first. I feel proper daft that I've never considered that could sound like me saying 'just pick a random woman and wander up to her'. There's a whole dance you do before that.

>>27968

>Fuck, I honestly never realised that some blokes would miss this part out. Whenever I say 'talk to women in pubs' on here, this is what I mean, doing the eyes and all that first. I feel proper daft that I've never considered that could sound like me saying 'just pick a random woman and wander up to her'. There's a whole dance you do before that.


Exactly. And I was told this by - shocker - a woman. Who has probably seen more than her fair share of random chat up attempts out of nowhere like that. Maybe there is still a remote chance that a girl will be interested even if you come at her like that. But your odds really aren't good, and you are still going to have to overcome the obstacle you have laid for yourself that you, like so many other guys that night, have just assumed she would be open for that kind of thing without gauging her interest first. As you said, all that is part of a whole dance.

On the other hand, if somebody keeps smiling back at you from across the room, that dramatically increases your chances by a few orders of magnitude. You can then of course still cock it up if you turn out to have poor conversation skills, but your first foot in the door is indisputably those returned smiles from across the room.

Do not assume that just because you want to talk to somebody, that means she must want to talk to you as well. See the whole thing not (solely) from your perspective, but think what you could really do to make yourself appear attractive, and as somebody that a woman might want to have a casual conversation with that night at that pub.

>>27969
>Do not assume that just because you want to talk to somebody, that means she must want to talk to you as well. See the whole thing not (solely) from your perspective, but think what you could really do to make yourself appear attractive, and as somebody that a woman might want to have a casual conversation with that night at that pub.

It is genuinely quite worrying and depressing that this needs to be explained to any man at all, let alone what appears to be the majority of them.

>>27963

I am trying to blackpill that guy, since it is clear that he's quite oblivious. I wasted a lot of time trying to court femoids, to treat them well and to be worthy of trust. Nothing worked. I managed to get some success when I started looking at femoids as filthy pieces of meat looking for a fit body to be fucked from, or for a meal ticket from them and their fatherless kids. As soon as I realised this, I was happy. No more looking for "pure love", no more obsession over sex or relationships, no more feminine bullshit.

The only honest women in UK are those listed in www.adultwork.co.uk

(A good day to you Sir!)

>>27971

>>27971

Lad, get some therapy. This is clearly not a healthy way to think.

>>27969

On a similar note, it's really helpful to just get used to talking to strangers in any context. There's a world of difference between approaching a woman and just exchanging a few pleasantries. You can't fake the latter - women can smell from a mile off if the only reason you're talking to them is because you want to get into their pants. Getting into the habit of making small talk with total strangers is immensely useful if you're struggling to meet women.

>>27970

They don't teach social skills in school, but they probably should. These days, a lot of people just miss out on key formative experiences in their youth. Maybe their dad isn't about and they don't have a male role model, maybe they get bullied in school and don't have many mates, maybe they suffer from mental health problems in their teens and can't or don't want to talk to people. Because there's such a strong stigma, it becomes a really difficult rut to get out of.

When I was a lad, adult illiteracy and innumeracy was still a big problem. A lot of people fell behind in school, they were too embarrassed to mention it, nobody identified them as struggling and they just stopped learning. At least in the working-class bits of the north that I grew up in, it wasn't remotely unusual to encounter middle-aged men who couldn't read a road sign or count out £3.71 in change. They'd never admit it of course, but there were a million little signs.

Today it's almost inconceivable that someone could make it all the way through school without learning to read, but we have a similar sort of problem with social skills. People are just slipping through the net, nobody is identifying the issue and there's nothing being offered as a fix. In my day, a lot of kids grew up in a home with two illiterate parents and no books; these days, a lot of kids grow up with a single mum who won't let them play out in the street. There are no Key Stage milestones for social skills and you can't go to an evening class to learn how to make appropriate eye contact.

I don't know what the answer is, but it's clear that there are a huge number of young and young-ish people who are really struggling with the basics of social interaction and are in desperate need of compassionate support. I suppose it ties into the "how to be a man" discussion that we had recently.

>>27970

Much as I usually dislike the whole "women don't owe you shit" argument about male entitlement (because it disingenuously tends to assume female entitlement, all the while rejecting male entitlement, as if one is better than the other), it's a very logical conclusion that is often missed.

It may well be that you are completely smitten with somebody at the mere sight of them and it just never crosses your mind that that woman may not want to talk to you even for one second, or maybe you are just looking to get a shag that night with a minimum amount of effort, so you chat up ten girls in the hope that one of them is swayed and you don't go home on your own.

But if your game is to get somebody's attention and if you want to meet somebody who really takes an interest in you, then somebody who just won't respond positively to your looks from a distance surely isn't going to be won over by you instead just sneaking up on her out of nowhere.

I don't think it's a male entitlement thing. At all. I just think that a lot of men are genuinely clueless about the way a woman decides who she wants to talk to, and take a closer look at on a night out. So again, see it from the perspective of what you can do to appear attractive to a woman in that way.

>>27974

>I don't think it's a male entitlement thing. At all. I just think that a lot of men are genuinely clueless about the way a woman decides who she wants to talk to,

It could be argued that if these men started thinking about women as if they're human beings with thoughts and motivations of their own, beyond feeling compelled to shag any bloke who cracks the code, then the accusations of male entitlement would decrease significantly.

I'm not even saying I agree with what I've just wrote, but there's definitely men out there who seem to think of women as something other than just another person.

It's hard for me to get my head around entirely as I'm quite social and have always had both male and female friends, so the mystery of the woman was dispelled pretty early on for me.

Watch one take a shit, that's my advice. That'll really knock em off the pedestal.

>>27974

>So again, see it from the perspective of what you can do to appear attractive to a woman in that way.

Equally, just recognise that a large proportion of women won't find you attractive and that's fine. Contrary to what the incel lunatics would have you believe, attractiveness is highly personal and subjective; just see the "guilty woulds" thread in /x/ as an example. To a great extent, it's just a numbers game of mutual attraction. You can stack the odds significantly in your favour by a) sorting out the most blatantly offputting aspects of your personality and appearance, b) playing to your strengths and c) just meeting a lot of people.

>>27976

Very much what this chap says. I fear the lads who have a strop and tell us NOBODY thinks they're attractive are either setting their sights ludicrously high, think that they deserve to be attractive because of their ego, or both. It's all just low confidence narcissism.

>>27975

>I'm not even saying I agree with what I've just wrote, but there's definitely men out there who seem to think of women as something other than just another person.


I wasn't trying to insinuate that blokes like that don't exist. Sadly, they do, and I have known a few myself. My point is that a lot of men who struggle to speak to and get to know women don't do so because they think of women as lowly sperm receptacles. All the majority of them want is indeed a caring fellow human being by their side who will be their romantic partner. Which you will have to agree is a consideration that is far removed from seeing somebody just as a place to put your spunk that night. But a lot of men, despite more noble intentions, just don't know how to talk to women, and how to initiate contact with somebody you are interested in.

Personally, I struggle as well. And I think I've got a bit of mild selective autism mutism with women. In my everyday life, friends and coworkers have called me a "master of small talk", they have said I have the small talk skills of a little old lady. And business partners have commented to my boss that I was "such a well behaved and interesting young man". But when it comes to women, I can't small talk to them for toffee.

Nevertheless, it's a hurdle you are going to have to overcome.

>>27976

>Equally, just recognise that a large proportion of women won't find you attractive and that's fine.

True. Fear of rejection can be a pretty shit thing to struggle with, but it is just the way normal life works. There is no point crying into your pillow at night because you applied for 20 job ads and got rejected all 20 times. After a bit of a weep, to which you will be entitled, you will just tell yourself to get your shit together and start sending out yet more resumes.

And it's the same with women. Twenty women will think you're a complete git, but then there comes number 21 who is completely smitten with you.

>Contrary to what the incel lunatics would have you believe, attractiveness is highly personal and subjective;

Incels have so many things wrong on so many levels. But the most fundamentally damning thing where they go wrong is not accepting responsibility for your own actions. Even the term "involuntary celibate" is a load of tosh. If your state of unfuckedness really isn't voluntary, then how come you make no effort of changing it that goes beyond blaming others for your predicament.

Well this has turned into a bit of a bin fire.

In response to the "eyes across the room" thing, to me it seems like something that only happens in TV and film. I've never locked eyes with anyone across any room, ever. It's something so far removed from my frame of reference I wouldn't even know how to deal with it if it did happen.

>>27960
I don't really have anyone I feel close enough to to talk about something so personal. Like yeah, they are friends, I'll chat shit while having a pint, get invited to social events and stuff, but the vast majority of people I almost feel like it's a "professional" friendship.

>>27980

It's not "locking" eyes it's making and breaking flirtatious eye contact.

>>27981

Right. If your idea of eye contact is a "lock", which will no doubt make a woman more uncomfortable than it will spark her interest in you, then no wonder it has never happened to you.

Getting in tune with women' s ever so subtle nonverbal cues admittedly takes practice. But once you get the hang of what to really look for in the way a woman acts, it's really easy to spot.

>>27981
>>27982
It seems like you interpreted what I was saying as me staring women down. I just meant like, eye contact. Though I'm not sure how one can look at something 'flirtatiously'.

>>27983

It's the fine line between gawking at a lass on the one hand, and giving her a wink like, "Hey there... you seem nice... you want some of this? Yes? no? maybe?". And then looking away again and seeing if she makes eye contact again.

And I guess the key is also to not appear needy or desperate. You ideally project that you have noticed that person across the room. But that apart from that, nothing has to, but anything can happen.

I guess it's really an exuding confidence kind of thing which I am trying to explain here in a bit of a circumlocutory way.