How to Overcome Approach Anxiety: Part 1

“How do I approach a group if there’s a guy in it?”

“How do I approach a group if there’s an alpha male in it?”

“How should I approach a group of girls if they’re sitting down?”

“What should I do if she or her friends notice me coming towards her?”

These are a few of the questions that came up during the Dating Mastery Class that I’m coaching for the next 8 weeks. It’s completely understandable, seeing that it’s only week two and the guys who are in this current cycle, like many of my previous students, are new to the dating scene.

While the guys in the class come from different backgrounds and have a varied amount of life experiences, one thing they all have in common is the struggle of being stuck in their dating lives. The questions I listed above aren’t meant to belittle my students or for me to vent as a coach. These questions all have similar variations and tones.

They seem like viable and productive questions for me to address, but in reality they aren’t. I always hear these types of questions in the beginning of our live classes. While I may address it with some practical and tactical advice, 9 times out of 10 it’s usually the guys’ reactive anxiety kicking in way before we even go out in the nightlife scene.

In this article, I will talk about the paralyzing fear that every person and especially men face at some point in their walk of life that’s preventing them from taking actionable risks that could result in a more vibrant dating life, higher self-confidence, a new job opportunity, and last but not least a more emotionally fulfilling and happier life.

Approach anxiety is something that everyone goes through and you’ll never completely overcome; it’ll always exist to some extent. Like the soreness you get from working out, you just learn how to deal with it better over time.

Before I get started, I want to ask you and address the giant elephant in the room… Do you really need to read this article? The problem is relatively simple, and with applied logic and good emotional management, it can be like swatting a mosquito off of your arm.

You’re already aware of your problem and already know that you’re just anxious because at the heart of it all, you’re afraid of that pretty girl saying no to you, rejecting you, and further validating that bullshit story you tell yourself everyday as to why your life is lonely, why women don’t find you attractive, and why everything in your life doesn’t seem to be working out no matter what you do.

My job as a professional coach isn’t to hold your hand and tell you life is full of sunshine and rainbows. While that can be the case at times, it’s important to understand that you need to go through the painful and unwanted things in order to achieve great things in this life.

Let go of that bullshit story and whatever happened in the past, and know that if you were capable of finding this article, capable of honestly admitting to yourself that you’re afraid of rejection, and most of all capable of admitting that you want to do something about your loneliness, then don’t just read this article and toss it away like an old newspaper. Apply it step-by-step, and eventually you won’t be worrying about how to approach that girl you like.

As I always say, dating and seduction is about solving a very specific set of problems, and one of the hurdles is solving the paralyzing anxiety that men feel when approaching women.

Approach anxiety is completely illogical and an emotional reaction meant to safeguard and protect you from a potential threat. That threat could be a physical threat or bodily harm once the fight-or-flight response kicks in. The reality of it is that in our now modern and civilized age, approach anxiety is a defense mechanism meant to safeguard you from emotional threats and social embarrassment.

Don’t worry, I’m not going to turn this into an evolutionary psychology lesson. The first key takeaway is that approach anxiety is a completely natural reaction. Everyone goes through some variation of it through their lifetime. If you’ve thought about things like giving presentations and public speaking, you’ve probably experienced it.

For example, think back to those times in grade school where you were forced to get up in front of the class and give a presentation. Everyone, or at least most people the teacher made get up in front of the class, were nervous as you probably were yourself. Often it was more nerve-wracking to wait your turn. When you finally got in front of the class and presented, everything usually ended up being okay, even if it wasn’t perfect.

Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I’m well aware of the fact that I dish out very cold, hard, yet brutally honest truths about meeting women and dating.

I’m going to debunk a few other myths and re-orient you to some new hard truths that seem counter-intuitive that you should incorporate into your new mindset.

Hard Truths About Women & Dating

Women are secretly rooting for you. They want to meet you!

One of the things that stops a guy from taking that first step towards moving things forward with a girl he likes is that he’ll make the assumption that she doesn’t want to meet him.

I will tell you one thing from doing this for the last four years of my life. While I have been rejected countless times by women, it usually wasn’t because they didn’t want to meet me or because I wasn’t attractive enough for them or something superficial of that matter.

Keep in mind that there are 4 billion people in this world. Half of them are women. There are so many different types of women out there, which means many of them will be in different head spaces, with different and unique experiences and approaches towards life.

My point is, not every single woman will reject you because of superficial things. There are a whole bunch of valid reasons, whether she’s currently in a relationship, is married, recently broke up, recently divorced, someone close to her passed away, she’s not into men, she’s not ready to meet someone new, she’s just going through a rough patch in her life, etc.

It’s inevitable that not everything is always going to work out and be perfect. But remember that you’ll also meet a whole lot of women who aren’t in those circumstances I just listed, and are receptive and just waiting for the right guy to enter their lives and rock their world.

Why do people go to bars other than drink with their buddies and get plastered? Why do men and women destroy themselves so much with crazy workout plans, plastic surgery, and fad diets? Why do girls spend so much time, effort, and money getting dolled up for a night out that lasts for only a few hours?

As human beings, we’re meant to meet members of the opposite sex, mate, and reproduce. How do you think your parents met and you were brought into this world? Women want to meet the right guy, and as a man you want to meet the right girl. It’s a cold hard truth that we all forget time and time again. So put yourself out there and get over your anxiety, because they really want to meet you as much as you want to meet them!

You eat, fart, and poop, right? She does too.

As men, we get so paralyzed by the beauty of the women around us. Take that halo off and take her off the pedestal, because as beautiful and as awesome as she can be, she’s just like you. She has baggage just like you, she has flaws just like you, and she’s not always on her A-Game just like you. To sum it up, she’s human, just like you.

I’d always do this exercise every time I’d see a drop dead gorgeous bombshell of a girl that would make any man question their manhood. You can do this too, it’s very simple. I’d first try to find the humor in the situation and get myself in a fun and happy mood. Then I’d logically remind myself, she eats food and poops just like me. She’s not perfect, and I’d be damned if I’ll pass up this opportunity to meet her.

What do you mean that she’s out of my league?

I guess it’s just human nature and the fact that human beings are social animals that we need to categorize ourselves into classes, tiers, and leagues based on superficial things like looks, material possessions, wealth, and status. I absolutely hate it when guys use this excuse and say a girl is out of their league.

Yes, there are women who judge based on this criteria. But at the heart of it all, if you did end up meeting a girl who judges men based on the superficial things, then you can assure yourself that she’s pretty shallow. If your self-confidence and self-worth is on point, you’ll realize and accept that she’s not worth the effort.

I will tell you one thing, next time you go out shopping at the mall, go for a walk, or even next time you go out to the bar with your buddies, take a good look at the men who are with these “unattainable” and “gorgeous” women. They are far from being on next month’s issue of Men’s Health.

I can’t fathom or tell you how many times I have seen unattractive men dating drop dead gorgeous women. Some are bald, short, fat, and let’s just say the genetic lottery was just not kind to them.

Just last Friday when I was out coaching our Dating Mastery Program students, and they were getting anxious about approaching women, I pointed out a guy at the bar who had dwarfism. He looked like Wee-Man from the TV show Jackass, and he was balding on top of that. Yet, he was approaching the hottest girls in the bar that most guys would never even attempt to talk to, and at the end of the night he ended up making out with one of them.

I called out my students and told them that they had no valid excuses. Here was a guy who had a clear physical disadvantage, going out and taking charge of his love life. Get rid of leagues in your head, the moon’s the limit.

Stop thinking about the outcome, you haven’t even talked to her yet.

I’ve seen this countless times while coaching, that men will get themselves worked up, thinking that they need to get her phone number, set up a date, make out, move her to a private location, and do a countless list of other things before even approaching her.

While those are skill sets that you’ll need to learn over time if you’re going to get better with women, please for your sake, KEEP IT SIMPLE! Say hi, introduce yourself, shake her hand, smile, ask questions that pertain to her, introduce yourself to her friends, etc. My point is that the outcome doesn’t matter and it never will.

Her job is not to validate you and determine your value as a man. This is not the Super Bowl, NBA Finals, or Nuclear Physics. Its simply walking up to a girl you’re attracted to, meeting her, and testing to see if she’s on the same page as you. Up to that point, you know nothing about her and she knows nothing about you. Her rejecting you should never be taken personally.

As I mentioned earlier in this article, YOU’RE NOT ALWAYS THE REASON! Sometimes she’ll reject you because of a whole list of other reasons not pertaining to you. So get your head out of the clouds, understand that the world is a large place, and that there are things much larger than yourself. The world doesn’t revolve around you or your feelings.

Once I reminded myself of that cold hard truth, it really set my mind and heart free from feeling any fear about taking chances and making things happen. At the end of the day, we’re all just trying to make sense of this from our professional lives, personal lives, and most of all our love lives.

In part two of this approach anxiety series, I’ll give you a few tactics and fun games you can try out and practice to overcome your approach anxiety. Knowledge is useless without practical application. These truths and tools used to cultivate your new mindset are useless until you start putting them into practice.

‘Til next time… Take care for now, we’re always here for you guys!

-Rob