Shyness and relationships

Thanks. Yet, I still think most men approach most women most of the time. It's not absolute, I'll give you that.

What I meant by women need men, is that this happens subconsciously. Of course now women can take care of themselves financially and otherwise, but our brains were evolved in the era of hunters-gatherers, where males played a huge role for survival. So, it's natural for women to be attracted to those confident and risky men, because they gave them survival edge. Our world has changed, but our brains haven't. (Dry science thing)

Exactly, this is the problem. Introverts don't make themselves known. But then how embracing your shyness will help you finding someone? I've embraced my shyness long time ago, yet resulted in nothing!! Again, I think extrovert men had survival advantage in the past. I don't think people who are extroverts are better than introverts in any aspect but asserting themselves (possibly falsely), yet they are the most accepted people. So, it's all subconscious. (Again dry science stuff).

How most women you were in a relationship with approached you, and why? Answering this would've been more helpful for me than going over the assumptions and trying to refute them one by one. I need more technical advice

I appreciated your response, even though it was critical and not helpful, IMO, but I didn't expect you (or anyone) to use such words like the one I underlined above. I don't use these words in my life, and I'm not OK with someone using them in front of me, definitely not to me or my opinions. This goes as well here. I might be wrong. If so, point to me where I'm wrong, and I'll consider it, but I'm not ready to hear/read such words. Thanks

You sound very intelligent and well read but you are making a lot of generalizations and absolute statements about people and relationships on this and other threads .

It appears that a lot of your knowledge comes from books. Although you can certainly learn a lot from books, most learning about people could only come from interacting with people. Women might have a predisposition wanting confident males since hunter/ gatherer times but you got to know modern women by interacting with them to know that things changed quite a bit. It might not say that in the books but you'll find out by interacting with women in real world.

I also think that although talking to strangers in a public place could be a good first step, it's rather tough to create anything meaningful with random strangers. You might be better off by joining groups of like minded people for example if you like biking join bikers club or if you read s lot joking book club. It's easier to build something with people who share your interests.

I don't think the person who used "bs" meant to be insulting. I think he/she meant that it is untrue that women "need" this or that. Some do some don't. How do you really know what women need? Unless you surveyed 1000s of women you can't possibly say there is anything women collectively want let alone "need".

I think "Bs" isn't used as profanity here but just indicate "this is not the case"

Let us know how it goes if you join any groups based on your hobbies or interests. It could be a lot of fun and good way to meet people

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TBH I'm not sure what your issue is with that it's not a personal attack or saying that you are full of it, it's at the statement that I was referring to. My implication is that you have been mislead not calling you yourself out on anything. I'm here telling you that what your impressions of women and society is not accurate. not sure why you've picked out the one word and/or line out of a whole larger post in that I've said quite a few other things. I'll be honest, it seems to me that you're zeroing in on something and haven't really heard much of what I actually said because of it. But to each his own.

In summary let me say what I mean more to the point. Shift your thinking from believing in stereotypes related to roles in society as if they are rigid and accept who and what you are not as someone strange or eccentric in comparison to what you believe is the norm. You are perfectly normal being shy and introverted and it is not a reflection as weak or bad. My point is that you do NOT have to think your role as a mate for a woman is to be her protector, savior and all the other clichés that the world makes but find a woman that wants what and who you are right now. Trying to become or be something that you're not will only come off as someone playing a persona and it will never work. Trust me I understand your situation far better than you think but I also know there are plenty of women that would appreciate a guy like you. They likely are not as easy to find is all.

Anyway take my words for what they are worth to you.. If you get nothing from my post. leave it. Just trying to help.

Like it or not, alpha is a fact, in all of the animal world, including the human world. In some species the female is alpha, as with horses. In certain human cultures the male is alpha, but in other cultures the female is alpha. Of course if there is alpha there is beta. It is just a fact. You are the one putting a value judgement on it. I never said an alpha male was "better" than a "beta" male, but if a male is loud and even overbearing he may get more attention from the ladies. This has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not the alpha male has the ability to sustain a relationship. To say that the alpha male is good at attracting women but bad at sustaining a relationship is a value judgement I would not make. I said that alpha males are wearing because they are very energetic, and are constantly pursuing goals and they expect everyone to keep up with them. As partners they can be very exciting and inspiring.

When I was in graduate school I used to count how many times the males in class spoke or were called on to speak, as opposed to the females. It turned out that on average the males spoke three times as much as the females! It was infuriating. But simply fact. I asked other females why they didn't speak out. They said they had things to say but often the men would speak first. The women were not being rewarded for being more thoughtful and reticent. I do not know where you are and what the culture is. There are some cultures where making direct eye contact is rude, such as with Native Americans. I have had Native American friends. The way to communicate with them is for both people to look towards the horizon.

If you are in a modern western culture a woman may wait for you to make eye contact with her before opening a conversation. But not always. Woman are becoming more assertive.

There may be subconscious factors at play, as well. Men of all ages have always communicated with me so I have never had a dilemma of approaching a man. It may be that my body language somehow unconsciously sends the message I am approachable. I was raised with a bunch of very extroverted brothers and so grew up very comfortable around males.

Well in every situation where this happened, it was at times when I was most active, confident in myself. Even in those times I am not one to be outgoing, but when I say active I wasn't so much hiding from the public so much, I was out and about and meeting people in a passive way. I mean going and doing activities and being just around people more than at other times. I feel very strongly that my expression of self in these times were what made women approach me, sometimes when I least expected it. I wasn't doing anything in particular with regards to women except caring for myself, enjoying my life and being content with where I was. It seems like simple thing to say but one of the most difficult things to pull off since most (at least a lot of us on this site) struggle with being content with ourselves and our lives where we are. But I think more so than the extrovert this is key for attracting females whether we get ourselves to approach them or not. For the introvert, we're not so outward speaking and vocal so being able to exude the confidence without those vehicles to do so is much harder but is possible.

think of this scenario as I try to illustrate. first imagine what many would call a "wallflower" being all shy and hiding in the corners almost seemingly afraid of the crowd. That is one type of shy person that lacks confidence and is unsure of her/himself. Then think of the quiet but solid presence in the room. The one that is not engaging everyone but is able to gain attention where people look and are curious about him/her. These are polar opposites but both introverts. One shows confidence the other does not where both are not the outgoing type.

I dunno if any of this makes sense but it's an attempt at an illustration of what I'm trying to explain. Hope it helps.

So much is subconscious. In graduate school I knew a few male professors who were introverted but who had tremendous presence. They would come into a classroom and deliver the lecture, then leave. But the way they handled themselves...yes...there would be a palpable solid presence. One professor used to sit in his car and wait for the time when class would begin. I am sorry to say this because it is so silly but all the girls would watch him through the cafeteria window. They would wonder "Why is he sitting there?" They would note he wasn't on his cell phone, or distracted. They would say, "Oh, he is thinking about the lecture and going over it in his head." This professor was a constant source of female attention, yet he did absolutely nothing overt. I became friendly with him because I was an older student and nearer to his age. I found him to be a wonderfully kind man. Simply superb. A wonderful human being. But very much a social introvert. (Married three times!)

Thanks. I agree about the books and social life. My readings though doesn't involve relationships. It just happens that I know a thing or two about evolution, and I try to find explanations about what people do based on that knowledge. It's just for my own satisfaction, because, granted, this knowledge doesn't benefit me approaching women

I'm not that disconnected from the modern world, I know how modern women live. That's why I'm here and talking about this, because I want to approach modern women. But I'm disconnected enough from them (actually from all social life), that my social skill is rotten still, which I think go deeper inside my personality. I don't like it at all, but it's there, and acts as a very thick barrier between me and others. That's why I think even meeting with people with same interests won't result in much change. I'm trying it, but it's not working so far. But I'll keep trying, because in the past I kept withdrawing, and the result was the same.

I also agree about strangers. I just want to overcome this issue and be able to speak what is in my mind, and be more spontaneous.

I really meant to say women prefer not need, or as you expressed it predisposed. I understand why it was taken negatively, especially when emphasized later by s4ndm4n2006, and made it look like as if I'm belittling women or something.

Do you see a therapist? Maybe he/she can work on social skills with you

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Actually, I appreciate any input, but you emphasized a lot about some "assumptions" and went over them one-by-one, which isn't the topic of interest, in the sense that, even if my "assumptions" were wrong, and you corrected me, it won't help me. When I'm approaching a woman, I won't think about anything but to talk to her. I don't think about why. That's it. But it was a misunderstanding, I think, as I didn't mean to say men and women are viewed as someone who protects and another who needs protection. I'm not going to tell women that I'm your protector. It's absurd. You don't know me, but I'm the first person to defend women to be independent in each opportunity I have. Some people try to keep women not empowered to keep them under their mercy. Not me. Even if I'm not close to women in general, but I have sisters.

Thanks. Your post makes sense, except it seems that you mix shyness and introversion with social anxiety. Being confident in public without talking is introversion. I'm the type of person who if goes out, I can't hide my anxiety. I just cannot. At best I'll look weird. When I walk, it's apparent that I'm anxious and self-aware, which makes me more anxious and ashamed at the same time. But, again, I don't have another choice. Will I ever overcome it? I don't know.

I'm interested though what activities in particular you were doing, and how you were behaving exactly? Like looking at people? making eye contacts? These details are helpful for me, I think.

Also, what do you mean by "be content with yourself"? I'm content with myself when I'm alone. I'm content with myself when I'm biking alone, I'm content with myself when reading a book in a coffee shop or in the park alone. When going out and be around crowds and people, I'm pushing out of my comfort zone, which makes me extremely uncomfortable, and definitely not having the best time with myself. In other words, I won't be content. So, I'm not sure how being content with myself will make my social life easier. I've been like this for many many years. I'm not complaining, just saying that what you're saying doesn't fit my situation.

Yes, I don't like it, and I think we humans don't have alpha males in the sense it's found in other animals like chimps. In his book Moral Origins: The Evolution of Virtue, Altruism, and Shame, Christopher Boehm goes to a large extent to explain how homo sapiens were egalitarian most of our time on Earth. The hierarchical structure (which isn't exactly as found in other animals, it's more political and religious) arose just 5000 years ago, when people began to live in larger societies. I think it has something to do with the appearance of religion. (I hate to talk about these things, because it doesn't help mee)

Anyway, what you're describing is fine, it's just the label that I think is misused. Again, males are different. I didn't say that confident men necessarily don't have good relationships, as it's not fair to make the same generalization about shy people. I just meant they are different. Issac Newton was introvert/shy (some says he might had ASD from his behaviors), so he was successful professionally, but socially he was a disaster. You can find an extrovert who is a disaster professionally, but socially successful. So, being confident or shy doesn't make you necessarily successful in everything in life. That's what I meant by they are different.

At the end all these are abstract stuff. Not useful.

No, I don't. But I'll put it under consideration. Thanks

At first I thought the girls were laughing at him, but then you said "This professor was a constant source of female attention, yet he did absolutely nothing overt"!! I think it depends on how he handled the lectures. Some people seem weird at distance, but not so much in close contact.

I think you misunderstood this comment. The girls were not laughing at him. They found him very charismatic, very interesting. They would not be talking about him all the time if they just thought he was a jerk. Everyone likes him. He is very popular. I was trying to make the point (reinforcing yours) that extroverted does not always means confident, nor does introverted mean a lack of confidence.

Perhaps you are overthinking all of this. You are trying to find answers on a forum when this is really something that needs to be experienced in real life. If you have social anxiety problems it may be best to see a therapist.

Your answers are often very intellectual, even bordering on arrogant. Like your response to the alpha male thing. Who gives a fig how this developed? Or if it was this way 5,000 years ago. Go out on the street and ask any woman what an alpha male is and my bet is that she will have a ready answer. It is a term used in this modern age by modern women. Do you know what they mean when they speak of an alpha male? Get curious about others.

The average woman sitting in a coffee shop on a Saturday afternoon is probably not interested in a lecture on evolution. She will be laughing at a silly and lighthearted joke some other guy is making about the weather.

You are so invested in being right. This is probably a characteristic that is an obstacle. Maybe you are actually secretly judging women. You spoke of one girl you didn't talk to who was sitting at a table with you as being overweight. What did that have to do with anything? Were you saying that because she was overweight as opposed to a hot model type you should have been able to talk to her? Like because she was fat she should be happy if a guy spoke to her? Wow.

There is disconnect and distancing. I think you need therapy to find out why that is.

All these different responses may only serve to confuse you.

Love isn't an equation to be solved.

If love hasn't yet arrived, spend time working on yourself, your career, and other things that matter. Maybe get out and volunteer. Show up at an environmental clean-up day or something, instead of sitting home alone playing videos and reading. See a therapist to help you overcome social anxiety. You are kind of stuck in a place of bleak self-absorption. You need to break out of your shell and become curious about others.

You are starting to act a little mean towards the people who are leaving comments. Please don't respond to my comment. I am going off Psych Central for a break. I advise you to do the same.

Best of luck to you.

It is obvious everyone who replied on this thread has your best interest in mind and wishes you success.

I totally agree with previous poster.

You keep arguing about how things are in the society and you appear to want to be right yet since you spend so little time with people, you cannot possibly know everything. I think therapy is something you would benefit from. And not only working on social skills but trying to dig deeper. Is shyness an issue or there is more to it?

Also you are the one asking questions and want help yet you argue with everyone who responds. We are all educated here and all read books. I see no point coming on here lecturing people about books I read, let alone quote from those books . There are forums that are for political debate and science debates etc I thought you wanted to improve your social skills but it appears like you are too focused on being right and showing your knowledge of books and science. All good but is that why you are here? To argue? Or to get better?

You either want to get to know people or you don't. Yeah what's with overweight girl comment? How is that important. And how do you even know "women are harsh on themselves when it comes to beauty"? You don't know enough women to make such assumptions. Heck this girl maybe is as successful and accomplished as they come. She is also very possibly already taken.

I have a feeling problem isn't shyness per se. Please seek therapy


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OK, I see. Thank you. You made my point very clear; I'm not social and cannot talk about the things normal people talk about and be spontaneous and easy going. No wonder why I prefer to be alone, because I simply cannot connect with people at any level. Probably you're right for me to leave all these books and forums, and focus more on real life and see a therapist. Probably that's what I'm going to do, or just accept myself and be alone all my life. Anyway, I appreciate your time and effort in replying all.

Probably this will be perceived as another post for me to be right, but about the overweight girl, I didn't mean what you tried to put in my mouth, because I felt as nervous as with any other girl I try to approach, and didn't talk to her at the end. For this one specifically, she just happened to be around me at the time, it's not like I was seeking easy-to-talk-to girls. I didn't say anywhere to my knowledge that overweight girls are easy to talk to. On the contrary, I said she was beautiful. I wish people try to put things in contexts (read the previous post, and why I wrote this part) instead of throwing conclusions arbitrarily. I wonder why now after all these posts!! People in the beginning try to be nice and helpful until you say something they dislike for some reason, then they begin to dig in your past to throw something in your face and distort your name and make you feel bad. This makes others to join the unreasonable firing for some reason, it's like going with the crowd. Not just that, people will play your admission of lack of interactions with women's card against any statement you make, as if you aren't a human and have no general understanding of the opposite sex, whatsoever. I have a mother and two sisters, and I know what beauty means to them. There is no reason to think women aren't the same in their core. But of course if I try to clarify myself or respond to something I don't agree with, then I'm arguing. People want you to listen to them, and to submit to the social consensus regardless, like girls think there is an alpha male, and what that entails of conclusions. But that's OK. This thread taught me a lesson, at least.

There is a reason to believe that women aren't all the same in their core. The reason is simply experience with women. If you knew more women, you'd know they are not all the same in their core. Same as men: they aren't all the same. They are all different. Etc I know many people in different continents. People have similar values but everybody is different. Generalizations are just never a good thing

I think the issue with overweight girl is why even mention it? Like if I saw some person somewhere it wouldn't occur to me even describe him/her in regards to their weight. How does it define anyone?

I think you can learn to connect with others if you make an effort and go out there and open your mind to other people and other opportunities. Again you either want to improve or you don't. In a long run it doesn't even matter what we think of this or that. Just get out there

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Are you telling me that women don't care about their beauty and keep judging themselves about it? I hear this everywhere. There was a YouTube video that showed women describe themselves less favorably than someone else describing them. But you try to make me appear wrong, look naive, and that I'm over generalizing, as if I'm not aware of anything in this world.

To put it in context for you, BreakForTheLight said earlier that men don't approach women unless they are supermodels, as a response to my comment that shy women are different than shy men, because they are the ones usually being approached. That's why I mentioned the overweight aspect to emphasize that it's not true men seek supermodels. Also, "women harsh on themselves when it comes to beauty" comes within the same context. Men care about women's look but not that much, at least for me. That's all what I was trying to say, otherwise, I wouldn't have mentioned the story in the first place.

I wish it is as easy as you make it sound. I want to connect with people (not women specifically) more than anything else in my life right now, yet I fall short every time, and crawl back to my shell.

Anyway, thanks.

I'd like to give some input if that's alright.

First off Wandering, I can empathize with your situation. I'm a 23 yr old introverted male that has never been in a relationship. So I'd like to express that you are not alone in your situation and wish you the best.

Normally I tend to avoid picking "sides" but towards the end of the posts... it does rather seem like Wandering is getting ganged up on to an extent. Not to say there wasn't some truth to what was said, I won't deny that.

To bring up an example, the overweight girl argument. While morally speaking, yes it really shouldn't matter what you look like. But I feel there has been some unfairness. It's been argued that "alpha males get more attention" or "that girls try to use looks as a strength because they know that's what men look for".
Let me ask you a question then with your logic. Who would an alpha male typically pick? The one who may be overweight or one who isn't? Odds are... the one who isn't. So if a guy has trouble speaking to girls that he finds attractive or that make him nervous... Why so judgmental if it may be easier to speak with some one who doesn't make them feel that was as much cause maybe subconsciously he thinks that maybe talking to some one who hasn't been as well received/sought after so they might be more accepting?

I'm not saying that's always the case, like I said I'm just trying to follow the thinking behind these posts.

I'd also like to point out the stereotypical belief about men being sensitive. Even today boys and men are still under scrutiny on how "tough" we are supposed to be. This is also an evolutionary trait and sadly it's still in the dark ages if you want to compare say the modern woman no longer needs to follow the "hunter/gather" stigma...at least in my opinion.
I'll say it, I'm an immensely sensitive person and Ive put up with a lot of **** in my life. I basically grew up believing that I was unloved as a person. Which I know isn't true... I know I have family and friends that do. Yet because I've never experienced physical affection, intimacy, or being in love with some one and getting those feelings reciprocated... I still FEEL that way. But because we as men get so absurdly judged for it, I've had to put up this stupid shell of pride saying Im perfectly fine. When on the inside I'm in such pain that frankly... there are just no words to describe it. You are screaming but you have no voice.
And sadly, if it wasn't for my pride as "The Surviving Lone Wolf, showing to the world that I've been through hell and still keep going"... Well to be blunt: Pride is the only thing keeping me going and without it I would probably be dead right now.

I apologize for rambling, but the point I'm trying to make is not all guys can just brush off the rejections we get. It starts happening long enough to where we begin to feel anger and resentment. We want to keep trying.. but we slowly hold back more and more because we don't want to get hurt.
So basically, it's not always just "being nervous or shy", it's our subconscious mind restraining us so we don't get hurt and feel more pain that we could already be in.


So Wandering, I really hope you find that some one. Believe in yourself and believe in the fact that no one is fated to be alone. That's what I tell myself anyways lol

Exactly. Thanks

Thanks. Hope the same for you. No one should be alone. It's the worst situation one can find himself/herself in. This isn't the life any human being would want. Even though you're younger than me, and you've friends, which is a positive thing.

Good Luck!