?Field Report? "Twenty a Day"

So I’m working through the third exercise of Hypnotica’s “Reinventing Yourself” (www.hypnotica.org) and this one is a doozie. The lesson is about “decisiveness” so the exercise is to do the “three second rule,” which is where you see a woman you want to meet and approach her within three seconds. The exercise calls for me to approach twenty women a day for a week.

Twenty…

…FUCK!

My first thought is “where the fuck am I going to find the time to meet twenty women a day?” I guess if I were *actually* single, this wouldn’t be that hard. Just go out every night to happy hours or bars/ whatever and you’re bound to find twenty women to talk to. But what if you have a full-time job? And what if your evening time is limited, because you have to go home and comfort your wife whose going through a personal crisis?

So basically I’m limited to trying to do twenty cold approaches a day in the daytime. Oh, and I have to do this while not coming off like some creepy married guy who hits on women. Ugh, talk about a baptism by fire.

Well, one good thing about this exercise is that I won’t have any more bullshit excuses when I’m done. If I can handle doing cold approaches in the daytime with essentially one hand tied behind my back, then I’ve conquered my worst approach anxiety.

Fortunately I work for a large company and I still don’t know a lot of the women there. So there’s always an opportunity or two just going about my day. That only leaves eighteen to go.
Alright, let’s suppose I can’t get to twenty a day but I’m making the effort. I’ll expand the number of days for the exercise until I hit 140.

So yesterday was my first initiation in this. (Notice I’ve been just assuming all along that I’m going to do the exercise, even though it’s scary and a complete pain in the ass. That alone is worth the price of the product!)

The first stop was the grocery store. Just try and push a cart across the store in three seconds without looking like a freak show. I dare you. So I had to modify my three-second rule to “I see the woman and decide within three seconds IF I’m going to talk with her and then commit to doing it in a way that ensures I can return to this store at some other point in time.” I was able to get *one* approach, I wussed out on an easy one and there were a couple others I just couldn’t reach, either being stuck in line or I lost them.

So grocery stores aren’t good time management for the shotgun approach (which is basically what this method is).

Okay, onto the next place, the food court near my work. Only problem, it was after lunch and most people were gone. I wimped out on at least four approaches, just flat-out didn’t do it. I had the approach in mind and just couldn’t pull the trigger. I was bummed about that.

It was terrifying thinking of approaching these women. Then again, of all the approach scenarios, these types would be the "most difficult" for me. It's good to know where I'm at as far as my anxiety, although I was seriously bummed that I'm not further along with the basics.

I managed to do a couple approaches before going back to work.

After work, I went to a happy hour. Actually I went to two. The first was Stick & Stein in E Segundo. There were like fifty dudes and two fat women. (Monday Night Football – should’ve known!) So I bailed immediately, although it seemed like a fun place if I wasn’t on a mission to approach women. Then I go to Baja Sharkeez in Manhattan Beach. Also packed, but the ratio was only 3-1 men, and a couple of the few women there were actually cute, so I hung out.

Like I said, normally, this would be fun, hanging out, watching football with friendly people. All I’m thinking, though, is “shit, how am I going to talk to eighteen women in this sausage fest?” I did approach two attractive women, then later talked with one of the attractive women’s friends who came in later. (Does that count as an approach, it’s not exactly “cold.”)

The thing is, in the effort to get numbers (numbers of approaches), I'm having to gloss over conversation. One girl at Sharkeez was really cute and fun. I would have liked to try and bring her into my circle of friends, expand my social network. No time, gotta bust through my approach anxiety!

So first day – five approaches (six if you count the friend), four wussouts. I did feel myself bust through some of the approach anxiety, which felt good, and the adrenaline rush was sweet. This is going to be fun!