Three seconds. That's how long it took. Your shoes. Your posture. The way you held your drink. Whether you looked at the floor or looked at her.
She already filed you away. Interesting. Boring. Safe. Bold. Before you even opened your mouth.
Everything you say after that is just her confirming what she already decided.
So stop rehearsing lines. Fix the first three seconds. Stand tall. Look up. Smile like you mean it. Walk like you belong wherever you're standing.
The words come later. The impression comes first.
Next Monday you'll feel more confident. After the gym you'll feel more confident. After one more drink you'll feel more confident. After you get a better haircut, a better jacket, a better job.
You've been "getting ready" for two years.
She's standing ten feet away right now. She'll be gone in four minutes. No amount of preparation will manufacture the courage that only comes from moving your feet.
Walk over. Stumble through the first sentence. Let it be clumsy. Let it be imperfect. You will feel more alive in those ten seconds than you have all month.
Alright here goes then.Well, this Forum isn’t the Amazing Kreskin. If you need help, facts matter for background …
Attraction runs on a clock.
She flirted for weeks. Touched your arm. Found reasons to be alone with you. And you were careful. Respectful. Waiting for the right moment.
The moment had a shelf life. It expired around month two, and by the time you asked her out, she'd quietly filed you under "little brother."
One of the hardest lessons inside the 22 Rules: women rarely wait. Interest either grows or it decays, and nothing decays it faster than a man who never moves.
Make the move while she's still inventing reasons to be near you.
Take responsibility for it. A man creates his own life, positive and negative. Take responsibility for how you’ve allowed your life to go, then start working the problem. Drop the emotion, and think through it. I can’t tell you what to do or what to think. You’ve got to discover that for yourself, but the best thing you can do right now is start with the little things. Small wins, like completing some small constructive, positive task. Something to get the ball rolling, to start building momentum in the opposite direction of where you’re going now.Alright here goes then.
I feel like I don't know myself. I'm not pursuing my true interests. I've got bull**** issues at school, which I should have graduated already.
I don't really know who to turn to. I've been having panic attacks even. I may be having a slight one right now. Soon as I get a setback my natural reaction is to get drunk and waste cash.
My health is going to ****. I don't have the energy to do the sports I want to do. There are a million more problems actually but they are too personal and involve finances and family...
Also I received a blow to the forehead last year in a fight, just about when I suppose I started to lose control of my life. Don't know if the shock to the frontal lobe (my skull had a few fractures in the front, the nose bones were shattered basically), has changed my behavior. I basically feel more lazy in general and unwilling to do intensive work or anything that may exhaust me. Perhaps because of this I have been slacking on school and now I've got a problem and my teacher doesn't want to grade my internship report because it was past the due date.
I wrote a long ass list of problems for them to consider, but left out the fact that I had a huge blow to the skull. I don't want to come across as though I'm somehow dumber now and might be unable to get the degree. I don't think that is the case. Though I feel like I am becoming dumber because I'm not stimulating my brain and learning new things.
So besides that me and my family are running out of cash, I need to get the degree. I'm experiencing too many setbacks.
We've put my childhood home up for sale and there are no buyers for it because it's in a foreign country. Ever since I left that home at the age of 11 I've meant to go back but now that seems to be unattainable. My life is basically falling apart. If we don't get a buyer we might have to sell the one I'm living in. In which case I would be 30, trying to get my bachelor's degree, and would have to go to renting a room again like most other students (which by this point should have gotten a Master's).
So I am rethinking everything. What shall I do? At this point I couldn't simply study something else. I'm so over life at the moment that I have no clue what to do. I'm not working enough hours and I don't know if I could get a job where I could really use my brain. All I know how to do is study random stuff and analyse things. I'm educated but not in a field that interests me. I have no clue what to do and no direction in life whatsoever.
Would be nice to get some kind of helpful advice or support or something. I have the idea my life is at a crossroads between success and failure. And failure seems a bit more likely in the immediate future...