From: kevin@nuchat.sccsi.com (Kevin Brown)
Subject: Re: Being Alone?
Organization: I can't see any in the immediate vicinity...
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 17:48:09 GMT

Well, I haven't posted in a while (you can tell, right?  :-).  There's good
reason for that:  my plan worked.  I now have a girlfriend, and am *quite*
happy.  This looks to be a long-term thing, because we get along
*incredibly* well.

You gotta love it when you hit a home run the first time at bat.  :-)

Interestingly enough, I didn't meet her at any of the social group things
I went to, but rather at the gym where I work out.

Since the posting I'm responding to is from someone who obviously needs
a Plan (if not a Clue :-), I'll detail what my plan was later on, for those
of you who haven't already seen it.

In article <1992Nov15.151337.13175@bnlux1.bnl.gov> schroede@bnlux1.bnl.gov (gary l. schroeder) writes:
>In article <amymw.721677596@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu> amymw@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu (Amy Wisotsky) writes:
>
>>A new boy/girlfriend can be found when the person is ready to find
>>one.  It depends entirely on the person in question.  I know people
>>that have started relationships within the same week, and others who
>>are still hurting almost a year afterwards.  I think part of it
>>depends on the length and intensity of the relationship that ended.
>
>Well, I'm glad to hear that relationships are so easy to stumble upon at
>Brandeis, Amy.  There's a lot of people out there that are "ready to
>find one", but are still alone.  

True.  Being "ready" is necessary, but not sufficient.

What *is* sufficient?  Well, I think the basic elements needed are:

    a.  an environment in which it is acceptable to be casually social with
	others.
    b.  the existence of available people of interest within that environment.
    c.  the willingness on your part to go out there and do whatever it takes
	to get and maintain the interest of others (that you presumably find
	to be interesting).
    d.  the skill on your part to pull it off.
    e.  time.  Lots of it.

The first can be achieved any number of ways.  Most people have interests of
one kind or another, so you can join groups of people who share these
interests.  If your interests are highly dominated by people of the wrong
sex (standard example: you're a heterosexual male and you have an interest in
computers), then element (b) won't be met.  In that case, you need to
explore other activities that you may not be interested in currently (e.g.,
scuba diving, sailing, etc.).  Perhaps better is a social group, i.e. a
group of people who are there explicitly for the social benefits of coming
together as a group.

Option (c) is probably the most important bit.  If you're a male and you're
trying to attract the attention of women, then you'll need to make yourself
look as confident as possible to others (but don't overdo it).  This can best
be done by approaching women and talking to them.  Definitely hard to do,
especially if you're inexperienced.  This is where having lots of interests
helps *enormously*.  You *must* be able to communicate with the other person
on their level, because they won't initially make the effort to communicate
with you on yours (they're female, after all.  They don't *have* to make
the first effort.  You're male, so you probably do.  Social convention,
sorry).  This is something that you get better at over time (this is one of
the places where the last option, lots of time, comes in), but it's a very
slow process.  People are complex, and communicating with them is hard for
many of us.

The reason you need to make yourself look as confident as possible to others
is that women find confidence to be *very* attractive.  It's instinctive,
just like a man's attraction to a physically appealing woman is instinctive.

In any case, it'll take *a lot* of time for you to get good at these things.
I think we're talking about several years here.  Depends on how quick on
your feet you are.

The interesting thing is that all the above options are interrelated.  The
environment combined with the abundance of available women makes it easier
to practice your skills, which in turn causes them to improve faster, which
in turn gives you more confidence, which in turn makes you more appealing to
women and increases your chances of success.

>Consider the possibility that you don't
>live in a college atmosphere anymore where you're surrounded by nothing
>but people of your own age group that you're constantly interacting
>with.  That's the great thing about college, isn't it?  It's just a big
>pool of people that you can go out with on the weekend.  

This depends.  I never saw this at all when I was in college.  The
classroom isn't exactly a good environment to strike up a conversation
and ask someone out.  You've *got* to have an environment in which the
other person is likely to be comfortable with casual conversation.  I
don't think the classroom exactly qualifies.

It's a real shame that work is such a bad place to meet potential
partners (due to the political problems)...

>Well, after
>that artificial world ends, your friends might find it difficult to
>meet someone new within the week.

This depends on how aggressive they are.  If they're female, then I think
they need only be moderately aggressive in terms of approaching prospective
men and talking to them in order to find a suitable partner within the
span of a week or two.  Most males will be willing to meet them more than
halfway.

If they're male, then they need to be extremely aggressive.  They need to
do everything I mentioned above and do it with abundance.  Since this is
basically a statistical numbers game, it pays to maximize your exposure to
eligible women.

>Gary L. Schroeder  		|  
>schroede@bnlux1.bnl.gov         |        It's a pomaceous life. 
>Brookhaven National Laboratory  | 


-- 
Kevin Brown					kevin@nuchat.sccsi.com
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