My System for Not Feeling Approach Anxiety!

[AspiringStoic]

After almost a year of approaching, I really feel I have come up with a system where I trick my brain and almost completely surpass feeling any anxiety to approach girls. Bold claim I know. .

But this is not about how I have grown to not care and how I have become a stone cold pimp. Its a system that I have come up with after a lot of trial and error because I had debilitating resistance and anxiety.

Its a long post because I want to flesh out all my thoughts and how I came to my system. So read with an open mind, field test it and read it again before you make a decision on whether it could help you.

When does Approach Anxiety (AA) Arise?

Before I got into cold approach, I walked the same streets and saw the same beautiful women all around me but I never felt any approach anxiety. Whenever I saw a beautiful woman, I would steal glances at her, enjoy looking at her visually, even fantasize about her but I felt ZERO ANXIETY!

But once I started cold approach even mildly cute girls started giving me anxiety. Why?

The big difference is that before, I had no intention of approaching these girls. I had made no decision to approach any girl so I never felt any anxiety. So now that we know this, we can isolate what actually causes AA.

Approach Anxiety arises when 2 factors are present:

1. You have an intention to approach or have made a decision to approach a particular girl or girls in general....


2. And you have NOT YET approached or opened.

So any time you make a decision or have an intention to approach and have not done it yet, you feel this anxiety. Its a future projection but most importantly, it is only felt if you have made a decision to approach.

The entirety of last year, everyday I had the intention of approaching girls. Therefore until I did it, EVERY DAY I felt this anxiety and discomfort in anticipation of approaching from when I woke up until the point in the day when I would go out and approach. After I did my approaches for the day, the discomfort would disappear because I no longer had the intention of approaching.

Then on the very next day from the time I woke up, the discomfort and anxiety was back because I now had the renewed intention of approaching again and had not yet done it.

This was a really tiring cycle to endure every single day. I needed to constantly read, watch pick up content everyday to motivate myself and force myself to overcome this resistance and approach.

After reading some books on habits and momentum and one guide on AA (which I will list below) I took a closer look at this process.

There had been two instances in the year when a girl had come and stood in my vicinity at a bus stop when I was not looking to approach. But the opportunity seemed great, she was right next to me and the SAME BRAIN THAT USED TO PUT UP A TON OF RESISTANCE USUALLY, HAD ON THOSE TWO OCCASIONS URGED ME TO OPEN! And I had. I thought this was very strange.


Upon closer inspection I realized what was different on those two occasions. And it was this:

The time gap between when I DECIDED to open and when I did open was almost zero! As a result in the lead up to opening these girls I had almost zero anxiety.

Now you might say this is just the good old 3 second rule. But there is a difference! When trying to follow the three second rule, I still had made the decision to generally open girls and I would see the girl, make the decision to open and THEN force myself to walk over to her and open and therefore I still felt a lot of anxiety.

So I broke the process of approaching down further and asked myself these questions:

- Do I have anxiety to go out of my house and take a walk everyday? No.

- When I am out on the walk, do I feel anxious to just walk next to and past a pretty girl who is walking or just stand next to and within earshot of a pretty girl who is stationary? Nope.. Not really.

- Do I feel anxious to open and talk to the pretty girl after getting close to her?? YES! YES! YES!

Now that I had isolated the genesis of my resistance and anxiety, I decided to eliminate it and decided to do all the things right up to the last step before when my anxiety would start.

So my goal was not to approach girls anymore. I started to play a game. The game went like this:

- Go out everyday

- Find attractive girls you would approach

- If they are walking, just catch up to them as you would do if you were appproaching, but walk past them instead. No need to open.

-If they were stationary, get next to them, close enough to be within earshot. Stay there for 5 seconds and then walk away. No need to open.

Suddenly, all my anxiety and discomfort that I felt from the time I woke up disappeared! Because I no longer had the intention of approaching girls.


Instead I looked forward to playing this game. But then something amazing started to happen.

Everytime I was out playing this game, if I went out and took a walk for an hour and got next to 6-8 girls, once I was right there next to them my brain started saying, you are already here, she is right here, next to you, just say something!

I had not FORCED myself at all. I had not made any decision, I had not used any WILLPOWER to overcome any RESISTANCE.

I had just gone out and placed myself near girls WITH NO PRIOR INTENTION OF OPENING THEM!

And yet the same brain that used to come up with reasons to not open was now urging me to open.

I want to emphasize this point. It is not that the anxiety went away indefinitely.

When I was at home, if I thought of approaching girls, I felt resistance and anxiety.

If I came out and decided to open girls, I felt AA.

Even when I first saw the girl and thought of opening, I felt AA.

It was only after I just got close to her and was within her earshot, it was then that the resistance would melt away and my brain would urge me to open!

And again, if I opened and had a coversation with that girl, it was not that the anxiety disappeared indefinitely. It was the same process again with the next girl.

It did not even happen with every girl. My results started to look like this:

Went out for an hour and found 6-8 girls that I got next to.

Ended up opening 4-5 of them.

Of 4-5 of them, 2-3 were full fledged direct approaches.

Also it was not linear progression throughout the session. Sometimes, the very first girl I got close to, using this method, I would end up opening directly, then the next 2 I did not open at all, then I opened the next one with something indirect and then the last 2 were direct again etc.

So here I was without having any pre-set inention of opening and just by playing this game, I used to end up doing 2-3 direct cold approaches everyday.

But the best part was I felt no anxiety or discomfort throughout the day or even during the session.

Last year, when I tried doing Chase's 4 approaches/day challenge, I could not sustain it for 30 days and I had so much anxiety. Now, I know that if I follow this system and play this game, I inevitably end up approaching.

Its a question of ratios. If I get next to 10 girls, I end up opening 5-6.

If I get next to 6-8, I end up opening 2-4 girls.

This has been a massive massive breakthrough for me.

I know it sounds very counter intuitive but I would be happy to answer any questions or clarify misunderstandings that anyone has.

But lastly!

Disclaimer: This is not the just go out and "naturally" let it happen system. Its going out intentionally, finding attractive girls, walking up to them and then and ONLY then making the decision to open or not kind of naturally without forcing it.

Its about making the brain that works against us, work for us and get on our team.

 

[Stark]

I think this is pure genius.

You're getting into a FLOW state by playing a game that's way easier with the skillsets you possess.

Once you're within earshot, it's just 'one small will' required to talk to her.

Rather than exhausting your willpower reserves thinking of approaching girls from the get go.

I realized that I do this a lot in crowded transit venues without thinking.

Need to make it more like a game as you said it in the post.

Sounds exciting!

 

[AspiringStoic]

Once you're within earshot, it's just 'one small will' required to talk to her.

Rather than exhausting your willpower reserves thinking of approaching girls from the get go.

Yesss!! Spot on. You got it. This is the whole point.

I got it from reading a book on Momentum. He was talking about a goal of "just walking into the gym everyday" and then he was free to walk out if he wanted. But just walking in would lead to short term momentum being activated and then it would be harder to just walk out and not exercise than to just do some exercise.

This is exactly what I am trying to replicate in terms of approaching.

 

[gameboy]

I've been doing this from time to time when I saw a hot girl I wanted to approach, but had too much AA. I told myself "I'll just walk over and then see what happens." Then once I was there it was much easier to approach.

But I never did this systematically. Today after reading your strategy I gave it a try. It worked like a charm! Opened 4 girls this way, and without stressing out much. And I even did it in a shorter time frame than usual. Pretty cool!

 

[AspiringStoic]

I've been doing this from time to time when I saw a hot girl I wanted to approach, but had too much AA. I told myself "I'll just walk over and then see what happens." Then once I was there it was much easier to approach.

But I never did this systematically. Today after reading your strategy I gave it a try. It worked like a charm! Opened 4 girls this way, and without stressing out much. And I even did it in a shorter time frame than usual. Pretty cool!

So glad it helped. Till now its worked for me like a charm. Been field testing it from around mid December. I have never been more consistent with approaching and never been able to approach with this little anxiety.

Hope you use it consistently for a few weeks and see if it helps you as much as well.

 

[gameboy]

Hope you use it consistently for a few weeks and see if it helps you as much as well.

That's the plan. Will let you know!

 

[Skater]

You're an inspiration bro, thank you.

Have you run into trouble with your brain outsmarting itself (lol) and realizing it's all a cover for approaching anyway? In other words, do you find it necessary to keep continuously re-brainwashing yourself into convenient delusion?

After reading some books on habits and momentum and one guide on AA (which I will list below)

Which books and guide are these?

 

[AspiringStoic]

You're an inspiration bro, thank you.

Haha. You are kind. Thanks a lot.

Have you run into trouble with your brain outsmarting itself (lol) and realizing it's all a cover for approaching anyway? In other words, do you find it necessary to keep continuously re-brainwashing yourself into convenient delusion?

Yes. This is an issue. If at any point, I feel any "tension" about going out, I know that I am secretly entertaining goals of doing more than just going out and getting next to girls.

I use that as a cue to again make it clear to my brain that I " don't HAVE to open" and then the tension goes away. And then when I am already there, almost 99percent of the time I open.

In fact to convince my brain that it was not "just a trick" I actually went out and forced myself to not open and just get close to the girls for a couple of days.

 

[AspiringStoic]

Which books and guide are these?

Oops forgot about this. Thanks for reminding me! Here you go:

Mini Habits- Stephen Guise
Momentum- Stephen Guise
She is 6 Steps Away- Eric Disco

 

[Aussiedude]

One question, when you're reteaching your brain that you aren't approaching. So when you go up to the girl as if you were to approch but then don't.

This is working well, except if let's say I walk past the girl, so she's walking in the opposite direction of me. Do you think I should turn around and kinda catch up like I would approach? Because if she's standing still, or already walking in front of me. Makes total sense, but when they walk past me sometimes I feel a bit idk random turning around to catch up like I were to approach.

The thing is I find this method is working best when I do not skip any good looking chick. Not necesarily approaching as you said, but getting into talking distance of them. Like you would do when approaching.

If that makes sense? Or do you not give a fuck lmao and just turn around.

 

[AspiringStoic]

do you not give a fuck lmao and just turn around

Yup. This. I turn around catch up to her and walk past her. Actually this is an important thing that I figured out while doing this exercise.

I used to be walking down the street, see a girl walk by me in the opposite direction and then my mind would say, she is too hot, too tall, not hot etc and I would not turn around and go approach her. And I chalked this down as Approach Anxiety.

But... Here is the catch. When I started doing this, I did not even have to open and I still felt resistance to the idea of turning around and catching up to her! Then it got me thinking, how can you have approach anxiety when you are not even looking to approach!??

Now I realize that this resistance to turning around and catching up to her is the result of a general "spotlight effect". We think that everyone is paying minute attention to everything we do. Its absolutely not true.

So now when this happens, I just look around as if I just realized I am heading the wrong way, and then I turn around and catch up to her and either open or just walk past her.