Social Skydiving with Justin

30 days of engaging in genuine conversation with strangers. Dear god no. (Inspired by Brad Bollenbach)

Social Skydiving Day 50: Checking In

Am I Still Going?

Yes. Definitely. I'm not sticking to the rules strictly anymore however. Instead I am talking to any and everyone who looks interesting on any given day. Some days that results in zero conversations and others there can be several.

Have Any Friendships Formed?

Yup! I've actually made a few friends, a couple of which are involved in the final challenge that Trevor issued me and another I talk to and text fairly regularly. I have plans with all of them to hang out with also. It's crazy how you just meet people sometimes by being loud and obnoxious. I'd really like to learn to tone down my obnoxiousness however, and turn up the volume on my real personality but just with more confidence and less cockiness. I really, really don't enjoy being cocky. It isn't me. I just end up worrying that I'm going to hurt someone's feelings. I dunno. I'm still thinking it over but we'll see how it goes.

Dates/Girlfriends?

Nope. I blame this squarely on myself of course. I do absolutely horrible in this regard. Probably something that I should focus on in a future challenge. Either I maintain too large of a distance or I smother the other person. I haven't heard this from anyone but I can feel my imbalances and I feel I could do better in that regard. 

What Issues Am I Having?

Every day for the past fifty days I have had an enormous amount of stress and anxiety. This doesn't just come from talking to strangers, that's honestly not too hard if I'm interested now. The hard part is really maintaining the friendships now.

I want to get really personal and open here which is hard to do because many of my old and all of my new friends read these articles. I'm embarrassed by a lot of my quirks but this whole blog is filled to the brim with embarrassing facts that I would expect to be spurned for so why stop now? :)

My most frustrating issue is stepping up the level of intimacy without going hog wild crazy over it. Now, by intimacy I don't necessarily mean romantic. Even just between friends. I find that if I have established a friendship with someone I become afraid that they'll think I don't want to talk to them anymore and give up on me that I tell them too often and way too intensely how much I care. Like seriously, I wrote one person a couple of emails about my feelings for them. 

I think she's been really understanding of it but goddamn if it isn't the creepiest thing in the world for most people. I mean it's just way too much too soon. I get fixated and so focused in my goal of attaining a closer connection that I end up on the offensive and generate the potential to push people away.

I can't stop pressing on. Seriously. I'm addicted. Every day I am soo stressed. My English class' grade is so low, I'm sure I must be failing. I need to devote more time to school but I don't want to take time away from my social life.

I have never ever had this problem in the past and I'm trying to learn how to cope. This all goes back to that idea of me feeling like I always have to be immediately available to my friends. I just realize that I have some severe abandonment issues. No idea why, not sure that it matters either. I think that I need to let myself start letting my friends down sometimes.

As a for instance, one of my friends I text all of the time and talk to almost nightly on the phone. I love talking to her but I've been putting her ahead of school. So honestly part of that was because I was hoping something more than a friendship would spring up, but even now that I know that that probably won't happen I still am willing to do that. It isn't her fault. I know she'd tell me to get off the phone in an instant if she knew I was doing that but I haven't brought it up. I don't want it to come to that.

But it will. She doesn't let me impact her life like that. I think that she's got the right idea and that I've got to get my priorities in order.

I guess part of it is that it's just so hard for me to know when I'm being responsible and when I'm just avoiding a social interaction. Remember when I said I'm an introvert? Yeah I still am and I still have many a moment where I wish I could just say no to my friends just so I don't have to deal with social anxiety.

That brings me back to not being able to stop though. I am so afraid of falling back into the same guy I used to be that my top priority is to keep pushing myself forward. I'm afraid that if I take a shortcut that I will become a dramatically weaker person and I don't want to be. I don't want to fall back into my own introverted little world.

It's Manly to Cry

I mainly am just saying that to make myself feel better :D 

I want to let anyone else who may be trying this know that if you find yourself broken in two and a total nervous mess, you're not alone. This stuff is really really hard if you're like me or worse. 

I have once or twice needed to break down and just let it out a bit. Some awkward social situations hurt more than others so instead of trying to deny it to yourself, try to catch yourself "manning up" against your tears and invite them in. I've found that I learn the most surprising things about myself when I am going through the process of accepting myself (accepting that I want to cry is one way I've learned to accept myself).

This is another component to the stress I feel daily. I wouldn't say I feel the need to cry daily but I am definitely very tender every night before bed. Some of my friends (Like M!) like to screw with me and make me feel insecure. Other friends, who know who they are, cause me to redefine our friendship daily. It's no one's fault and it all helps me become a better person but it definitely is difficult.

There's so much to adjust to I think it'll just take me time to find my balance.

Accomplishments?

Openness. My biggest personal accomplishment is that I've been able to relate to women as a man and tell them when I think they're beautiful or attractive. I'm a goober about it I'm sure but I do it. Every time I do it, I'm left with a ball of stress in my stomach and a panic attack ready to happen but at least it gets done.

I realized this after a small cry the other day and it made me feel so much better. Have you ever listened to the song Standing Outside the Fire by Garth Brooks (beware: it is country)? Here's the thing... apparently country gets to my sentimental side. Egad! Anyway the song is about people who remain open and are willing to get hurt even when they are hurt time and time again. A life long goal of mine has been to be able to do that to some degree. While I'm not saying I'm great at it necessarily, I definitely caught myself doing it and I was elated that that just organically grew out of me. I felt extremely human and grateful for that at that point.

I can't stop pressing on. Seriously. I'm addicted. My social life has been extremely active and it's been a great change of pace to actually feel like I have a life. I used the bravery I learned from this experiment to throw together a somewhat last minute week long vacation in D.C. (I appreciate my couple of friends out that way who are making a lil time to hang out with me).

Another plus, I was able to sit next to the cutest girl in my class tonight and get us both to have a pretty good time for the most part. We apparently were smiling too much since the teacher stopped class twice to ask us why were smiling so much and laughing. I think she was hoping we were just really getting what she was saying but truth be-told, at least for me, I had checked out mentally and was just enjoying a good time. Way too afraid to get to know her further at any depth. But I'll at least try once by the end of the quarter. **shrugs** I will never forgive myself if I don't. Also, when I say "try" now, I mean really try to get to know her. Yes she's attractive and that sparks an initial interest but a couple of my friends have been helping me realize how not worth my time it is just to talk to someone because they're cute (Atri and Shane thanks for the insight even if you weren't always aware you were giving it). 

Also, I'm posting this. I'm scared to a bit. Some people apparently read these (as I stated above) and I feel uncomfortable being this naked with people that I only sorta know. I'd rather I didn't my readers at all or that I am completely comfortable with them. The middle zone is the territory where they can misinterpret you and then just ditch me. Whereas I won't notice if a stranger leaves (because I never knew them) if a person who's becoming a closer friend did, it would shake me to my core.

What's Next?

My final challenge is this Sunday, which at this point should be super easy, assuming everybody shows up.

Beyond that, like everyone of my weekends are filled through October with things to do with friends. I'm proud of that. I went from 0 life to packed life just because I learned to be comfortable enough with myself to say to a stranger. I don't think it's wise to have this busy of a social life because it can get in the way of school (work hasn't really been impacted by it yet).

Beyond all of that, I want to start doing bigger things. These little things aren't enough of a high anymore. I'm not 100% sure what I'm planning yet but one thing I'd love to do is crash a wedding. Can you crash a wedding by asking the bride/groom for permission? I'd hate to spoil their special day.

I'm sleepy. Hopefully this helps someone who, like me, feels like their life has been crazy since they started trying to "get" people.

Social Skydiving Day 30: Wrapping Up the Daily Grind

So what's happening? Last day! Well, I still have my final exam but Trevor thinks it will take a couple weeks due to planning complexity (and I agree).

So let's discuss today.

Social Hub++

My biggest accomplishment today was taking the social hubbing that I did yesterday in English and enlarging it. I wanted to be talking to guys I don't usually talk to in an effort to expand the warm feelings in the class.

Today we had our mid-term. I was the first to finish so I tidied up my desk and headed outside to wait for others. Finally some guy came out that I had never talked to before. He was looking out over the handrail outside our classroom at the beautiful Washington scenery of assorted firs, and pine trees. I broke the ice by telling him how I loved Seattle for being so beautiful just about everywhere you look. I mean, we're in an "ugly" part of the city and yet we've got this awesome view. He agreed while sighing and breathing in the peaceful view. From there he asked me if I've always lived in Seattle and I returned the favor. We branched into his profession, why he's back at school, his opinion on the mid-term, etc., etc.

So I had one person connected. The classroom door opens and a woman comes out that I've talked to before so I pull her into the conversation by asking about her mid-term. Mid-term is the easy conversational catch all if you're trying to start a conversation with any classmates on mid term day. Seriously. It's a subject that just doesn't get old, but for one night only.

Then it's just more of the same. Someone comes out, stands within ear shot, I lasso them in, repeat. At one point I had gathered a group of about 8 or so people. It got to the point where there were subgroups forming and side conversations but everyone could just jump from conversation to conversation at will. It's a great feeling to get people talking like that.

Not Smooth

I also wanted to reach another milestone of trying for this one cute girl's email or number or something in my calculus class. I thought of a good idea but way too late in the class to use it. This is my last day though so I wanted to try it to just be able to say that I did my best now and so I don't just end up saying I'll do it "someday". Whatever that means.

For some background, this girl asks me for help every class period. I walk her through examples and explain the concepts, etc. So today at the end of class I asked her if I should give her my email address in case she needed anymore help. It was totally awkward and stiff and it totally didn't work. She was kind of confused and said no it was fine because she had a tutor but I think she knew what I meant though because her thank you was especially upbeat. Maybe she didn't fully realize what I was asking until she said thank you, I'm not sure. Either way at least I asked. I'm very happy about that.

Social Decorating?

One other socially directed thing I did today was to create the framework for a tea popularity contest which I named Tea Fights. Everyday I plan on going into work and pitting one tea versus another, each day pitting the champion from the previous day against that day's tea. Once I run out of flavors I plan to start moving to hot chocolate, apple cider, then eventually even move into office supplies if need be.

I had a piece of paper with Tea Fight written above it. I taped two teas to the paper and wrote versus between them. Then I created a spot under each tea where people could vote. To give a hint as to what people were supposed to do, I marked a vote under each tea just to get the ball rolling.

It worked well! People were writing funny things on the paper and voting (Pomegranate > Chamomile btw) and hopefully it helped to brighten everyone's day a little.

Wrapping Up

It's been one hell of a long journey but, at the same time, I can't believe it's already over and that I actually survived all thirty days. Some of you have asked what comes next? I've been extremely reluctant to really explore any details with any one and I still am for the most part. I will say that I will definitely continue doing this as a daily practice. Also, there will be more writing but just not as often.

All of this has just made life so much more fun guys. I know so many of you read these posts and think "That's good he's doing that, maybe some day I will." I want to share one thing I learned a while ago about the word "someday". "Someday" means never. If something isn't important enough to you to pick up right this moment and do, then there's no telling when it will be important enough. I just realized actually that when I decided to do this I was thinking about that at the time and realized that I could end up never doing this if I didn't just figure out how to make it happen.

"Someday" means never. I used to think to myself, "I'm going to start as soon as life calms down." Right now, I'm going to school almost full-time (with A's), working full time (as a programmer), going through a divorce (still need to file for it dammit!), trying my best to take care of a dog, maintaining my house, etc., etc. I finally realized life will never calm down. I had to either speed up or get comfy with where I was at. After reading the 4-Hour Work Week by TIm Ferris I decided I could do so much more.

Now, because of that one night when I finally snapped and I realized I was living for "someday", here I am thirty days later and I've accomplished something big. Imagine how I'd feel if I tackled all of my "someday"'s? I started thirty days ago and I'm gonna keep going. Life fucking kicks ass.

Social Skydiving Day 29: Final Challenge Revealed

Tonight I need to talk about two things: 

  1. What happened today/how I did
  2. What my final challenge will be.
So let's get this started.

A Less Subtle Start to a Conversation

While I was waiting for the bus this morning I stood near a man who's body language was turned away from me and towards the direction he was anticipating the bus would come from. This meant I couldn't easily make eye contact with him and thus also couldn't very easily talk to him. I decided I wanted to reach a milestone and go for the conversation even though it wasn't the least bit natural. I stepped forward so that we could both see each other out of our peripheral vision. I looked over and asked him if he was on his way to work too, he said yeah. I then followed up asking for specifics on where he worked, what his company does, etc. We even continued the conversation after getting on the bus a bit but then it died.

This conversation represents a milestone of me not really having too much stress in regards to starting a more awkward conversation. I mean I did have a nervous twinge in my stomach but it wasn't bad and help me propel myself to getting this done.

Elevators Are Great for Conversations Apparently

Ran into a person from my team that I've never openly conversed with and am not comfortable with. Struck up a conversation by saying Hi and asking her what she was up to tonight (I already know she's married). She told me she has kids and I immediately just went "Ohhh" and laughed. She shot back yeah, they keep me pretty busy. We continued our conversation down the elevator, but as I've written numerous times these individual conversations are pretty easy now.

Bringing Together a Larger Group Discussion

This one isn't a group of strangers so it's not quite the same but it's still important because it showcases my new ability to host a group conversation and keep those I want to include involved in it.

While I was walking towards my class from the school parking lot, I ran into another guy who was in my class. He's one of the guys I talked to from my English class on Monday whom I didn't know. So I started up a talk with him regarding the class load, what work he's gotten done, what's his major, etc. This small talk keeps us occupied until we get to class. Once we get to class, the door is locked so we just stood outside and continued to talk. As we were talking two guys I know from my class came near us so I pulled them into the conversation asking for their opinion on whatever topic it is we were discussing. Then to make things even more interesting the most attractive woman in my class shows up and stands somewhat near us. I definitely want to draw her into the conversation but it's more of a reach since she's standing about 10-15 feet away from me.

I look over at her, call out her name and ask her if she's going through the same thing as what the other guys said. My call snapped her out of her day dreaming. "What's up?" she asked... I repeat the question, and she walks over to join in the talk. So at this point I've accumulated a group of roughly five people or so. Once the original conversation with the guy I walked to class with dies down, I brought up some of my recent social skydiving exploits since they can be fairly funny ice breakers (especially where I sang Usher alone at a karaoke bar!). It's interesting doing so much so often because I always have an entertaining story to tell now. I actually end up with too many to tell and end up having to get pretty choosey. It's an interesting change of pace to have a somewhat interesting life. I want to keep that going.

The karaoke story went over well. Everyone laughed at my foolishness. To maintain a cohesive group I make sure I'm making eye contact with everyone I perceive as being in my group though honestly most of my eye contact was with the cute one. Go ahead and tell me I'm a male chauvinist pig... sigh. **shrugs**

Finally the teacher comes and lets us all inside which disbands the group and ends the conversation.

The milestone here is really just that by some miraculous twist of fate I am somehow seen as one of the most outgoing guys in class. I'm not an overly loud, brash, asshole, but I'm confident and seem outgoing. People were shocked to hear about my need to social skydive in the past. THey said I didn't seem like I was the least bit introverted.

Of course that made me a little insecure that they were passively hinting that I had been acting like an ass lately. Just gotta shrug it off!

My Final Challenge 

As you may or may not have heard, I held a contest spanning last night through all day today until 7pm PST to see who could come up with the most difficult challenge possible. I left it up to my friends Keith and Christina (they're love birds and they both hate me).

They perused all of the entries you guys posted in the comments of the article and finally came to the same decision that I had made as well. Trevor's challenge will definitely be the most difficult. Here it is once again, in case you missed it:

"It would be helpful to make a distinction between the challenges that are essentially stunts and those that are about communication at the personal level. Some of the suggestions, while dramatic and challenging, are more free-range social engineering than social connecting. Borat/Bruno versus the actual Justin. The stunts have their own built-in personal safety: it's crazy, so it if fails, no biggy, since it's too big to be personal.

It seems to me that a challenge that is connected to the heart of your project would be smaller scale, and more directly personal, one for which you have an emotional stake in the outcome. Something 1-to-1, like dating, or in small group, like organizing an outing with people you barely know.

Here's a challenge:
Convince a woman that you're interested in to go on an outing with a group consisting of a few friends you'll bring, and a few friends she'll bring (but strangers to you). The challenge would be to identify a fun, non-obvious group activity and MC the whole thing, while interacting honestly and authentically, in spite of all the reasons that situation might provoke you to retreat. Take ownership of everyone having a good time. Take ownership of meeting and actually connecting with everyone she brings. Take ownership of encouraging your friends to connect to her and her friends. Now that's a graduate test in social openess and outness..."

Trevor continues in another comment,

"The scary stuff isn't parachuting out of a plane, or even being a clown in public. The scary stuff is risking social rejection or awkwardness, when you are you. No disguises, no cover story.

To make the challenge scarier, add success metrics? Possibly:
I had a personal conversation with everyone involved, AND
I made sure my date had a personal conversation with everyone, AND
Everyone met everyone, I introduced most of them to each other, and when their conversations faltered (not just mine), I took it upon myself to spark their conversations back up, AND
I never once faked anything or lied."

Once I read Trevor's idea, I pretty much knew Keith and Christina if for no other reason than that it gets directly to the heart of the matter. This really is the scariest challenge I read all day. To take a strange woman and her group of friends, who already form a pre-existing clique, and try to host an event to merge my friend base with them... geez that's no small task. My friends are all programmers... and they love what they do... and they love to talk about it. Seeing the challenge there? :D

Here's the caveat: This challenge probably can't realistically be performed in a single day (since I need to organize a group get together). So right now I am inclined to finish up my 30th day (tomorrow) and then this weekend or Monday convince a woman to work with me to organize this event. The day of the event will be the FINAL final challenge. The woman I have in my sights is in my English class and I won't be able to ask her until Monday. I'm pretty sure she isn't in to me in the same way but I really don't care. I don't see anywhere in this challenge where that's a necessity. I'll explain it to her the same way basically.

If Trevor decides that I can't wait until Monday (she's really nice so I really think I could convince her) then I can flounder around on Saturday and Sunday. If that's the case though, I very well could end up failing. This challenge the way I understand it right now isn't just about trying, it's also about succeeding, and at something I have never succeeded at in the past to boot.

What are your thoughts on this? What do you think is a fair way for me to approach this challenge?

Social Skydiving: Challenge Me, I Fail, You Get $500.

I almost forgot to give credit to Christina Moran (thanks to Keith for introducing us!) and Jeff Lenney for inspiring this post. They pointed out that there really needs to be some accomplishment that everyone can agree shows an enormous level of improvement. While I really would have been happy to just finish on a normal day they challenged me enough that I felt the need to go this route. Thanks!

I Need a Mega Challenge

My last day is coming and I need a mega-challenge to use as my final exam. I want to end this leaving no room for doubt that my life has been changed for the better and that I am a braver stronger person. So Im challenging you to come up with your own challenge for me. Give me something that while realistic is also something that would be enormously scary for you. Nothing that is designed to be destructive like swearing at my boss or violating some ones personal space by getting too "friendly".

If you leave them as comments we can all see what they are and we can prove whether or not I copped out on a good challenge.

I'm challenging you to break me.

Post your challenge in the comments and the person who comes up with the most difficult challenge (that's practical to be accomplished in a work day) will get a $100 Amazon gift card. If I fail your challenge on my 30th day you'll get a $400 gift card to Amazon.com on top of your $100 gift card.

I'm not joking. Start commenting. I'll have a panel of judges who hate me (ie. sadistic friends) choose the winner tomorrow night. The cut off to post is 7pm PST. You can enter as many times as you want. Do me a favor and spread the word... I want the hardest challenge we can come up with. 

"You Won't Pay Up"

I can't really prove I will until I do. I have the money in cash in my savings account. I will have made your payment by the end of next week. I use ING so it takes a bit to transfer. Why would I pay? Besides just because I keep my word, there's also the tremendous social pressure involved here. I have a good thing going with this blog, I don't intend to spoil that over a lousy $500. It isn't worth the embarrassment. 

"Why Would You Offer So Much Money?"

I'm really REALLY hoping it will serve as a really REALLY big incentive for me to not bitch out on your challenge. I feel fairly confident I'll hold my own but admittedly I have butterflies in my stomach. :)

Also, I pay more than that for a college class so it really isn't that much to wrap up this 30 day experiment right.

EDIT: Please don't forget to log into the comments or leave some other uniquely identifying information (like email address) so that I can get back to you if you win. That's very important. 

EDIT: I can't believe I have to type this but stripping is out. Let's stay focused here people! :D

Social Skydiving Day 28: Acting as a Hub

Wow, it's the 28th day. So close. Today I had a good mixture of some more advanced social interaction and social anxiety. My day was solid and I'm beginning to actively prep for something very big and I want your input which I'll touch on at the end of the post.

Lunch Time

I was starving at like noon on the dot so I busted out of my office and made a break for the elevator. When I got to my floor's lobby there was another guy who got there at about the same time as me. I looked at him directly and with confidence and said "Hi, how are you doing?" I knew I could say hi without concern because I was welcoming him. I wasn't looking for him to welcome me and that's a big shift from my pre-experiment days. He looks directly at me and asks how I'm doing. His body language shifts such that his feet and torso are now pointed towards me. This is totally a sign of an engaged social participant.

We start off talking about the weather. How it's been so nice lately and we have it so easy here in Seattle. I say especially compared to california (since that's where I used to live) then he perks up even more since his sister lives there (Pasadena specifically). We both agree that it is definitely way too hot there.

Just as we finish that last line, the elevator stops at like the 28th floor and is flooded with people which ends our conversation. When we get out of the elevator he wishes me a good lunch and I do the same.

As you can see, I'm still working on some first week goals if for no other reason than fun. He was from my company and that goal (which was originally thought of by Matt Valerio) was about getting to know more people in my company as a means to make my environment more friendly.

Also, the weather comes up way too god damn much. I am so tired of talking about the weather and all of this other small talk. Meh. But I guess that comes with the territory and it gives me a great reason to find the other persons hot button concerns ASAP. Oh we haven't discussed those yet have we? Suffice it to say that everyone has certain topics that get them all fired up. Ideally, I should be looking for those as I'm making small talk so that the conversation will ignite in a ball of fire. I'll keep that in mind this week and see if I can make any progress on that front.

In Calculus

I came into class with two people already seated so I took my seat as far away from them as possible. I like this method also because it gives the incoming people an opportunity to decide where to sit and I was hoping one of the women I like would sit next to me. After I've taken my seat I decide to start bridging the room a bit. I ask the guys I didn't sit near some questions regarding the last class that I skipped most of. The questions were pretty dumb but I just wanted to make a point of interacting with them and establish my presence in the room. I haven't worked for this long to go unnoticed. A part of the point of this is to be able to make myself be known at will in a positive way.

A couple minutes after that exchange the cute girl I was waiting for comes in the room. I make eye contact and we both smile and she sits next to me. By the way it definitely isn't like that with her but I still enjoy sitting next to an attractive woman. 

So I ask her a question about whether or not she got her Homework done, she did but she had some questions so I start working to answer them a bit. Another guy sits in front of us and I draw him into the conversation by asking him if he finished his homework, he responds (I don't know what he said I honestly didn't care) and I go back to helping the girl next to me. I still leave a portion of my focus on the guy in front of me, looking at him every now and them to keep him included. He starts helpig the girl a bit and talks with her. By now another guy had taken the seat directly to the left of me. I draw him in with the same asinine question. He's like nah I haven't started it and I tell him I haven't either. I kind of laugh a bit then I go back to talking with and helping the girl to my right. The guy to my left is now listening in. This whole time I'm trying to juggle my body language between the three people and we've got a pretty good little conversation running. I make a checkmark in my mind and call it a success. I keep talking when necessary and enjoy my class time.

Misc Thoughts Throughout the Day

Yesterday I was pretty positive about being declined by the woman from the Blue Moon. Today I had a little negative sulking happening the first half of my day. I just gave it time and tried to relax and it basically resolved itself. Additionally, I had a bad case of stomach pains and anxiety that I think is being caused regularly by just being outside of my comfort zone.

This led me to think, "When will living outside of my comfort zone begin to feel comfortable?" Once I asked myself that self-contradicting question I realized I answered my own question as I asked it.

Some friends postulated that maybe my goal should be more around stretching outside of my comfort zone for a boxed amount of time and thenrelaxing for another boxed time range. I think they might be right but I like to continue with techniques until the fail me. In this way I can find the boundaires for myself and make fewer assumptions and thus hopefully have fewer contradictions in my behavioral philosophy. 

Day 27: She Turned Me Down for a Date and I Feel Awesome!

Wow, so this is going to be a super embarrassing post and that's exactly why it'll kick ass. This is the best night ever for me to blog about. I had that one night where I had a huge success and that was good but a good life isn't about how well you can handle success. The only way I'm going to have something real to show for this 30 day experiment is if I improve how I handle failure. Allow me to say, that I take epic failure like a fucking champ.

Remember a while back when I said I had my first "rejection"? Well I totally just topped that in the most extreme way I ever have.  I got my first REAL rejection today! It's the best thing in the world. I'll talk about why but first the good news! 

Talking to the Guys

I was in English class tonight and I realized I hadn't talked to anyone yet for my daily goal. I looked around the class and, like I've said in a previous post, I've talked to just about everyone so I wasn't sure what to do. There were two guys though that I hadn't talked to yet. I set that goal in the back of my head and waited for an interesting opportunity.

During our one and only break, I struck up a conversation with one of them regarding a topic we were discussing in class. As we walked down the hall, away from the vending machines, we were nearing the other guy I hadn't had a chance to talk to yet. Once we neared him (he was standing just outside the class room door) I worked to include him in our conversation by asking him what he thought (or something like that).

After being so introverted for so long, it's funny to see how easy it is to get a small group conversation going. We stood outside class talking for a few minutes and then finally we went inside and stopped talking.

Total Utter Rejection

Next up I finally decided I felt like myself and the woman I met at the bar were comfy enough to go out. So I asked her out. For the first texts she was cool. We were setting up the "date" and and then we got to setting up the time and she was like "This isn't a date is it?" 

One can imagine how my stomach must have dropped to the floor, my eyes widened, and my hopes shattered. One could imagine, but they'd be wrong! Maybe it's because I haven't been focusing on her exclusively (unlike my usual tactic) and maybe it's also because I'm just happy I still get to know her. She is seriously hilarious and a pretty nice person, even though she won't admit it about herself.

Oddly enough, I just started laughing to myself. I always expected that that kind of rejection would sting like a bitch. I just took it in stride though. I mean ego got shaved back a bit admittedly, but not bushwhacked. I'm extremely positive about it.  

I guess part of it is that I don't really feel like that changes much. I don't hit on women to get in their pants, I go for women that I think are smart, strong, and full of banter and confidence. Those are qualities I want in my friends too. So failure in going on a date is equivalent to success in getting a friend plus since I was totally up front with my expectations we both know exactly where we stand. Because she was so honest, things can move forward on renegotiated terms with neither of us left feeling bitter and pissy. I can put all of those thoughts aside and focus on just having a good time with a cool person. 

Jesus, I'm just thinking about how I would have viewed this post if I had read it a few years ago. I sound so full of shit and like I'm just rationalizing my disappointment. I mean, I admit I'm disappointed, I told her that as well and that that's just a compliment to her. I think I've been talking about flirting and talking to someone as being a compliment for a while but I never had a chance to really prove that that was how I felt. This proves it and totally makes my night.

I won't mention this woman's name, but let's let this be the last we mention this most awkward of nights and just get back to the laughs again. I'm looking forward to hanging out.

Sacrificing Popularity to Get a Woman's Attention

On Sunday night on HackerNews there was a post from a woman who was so depressed she was differentiating formulas to keep her mind off of a failed relationship. Ok. You catch that? Differentiating equations as a mode of diversion? First off, any woman who knows what a derivative is, you've got my attention. Second, if you do them for *fun*, I've gotta admit I'm getting a lil flustered. So I did what any self respecting social skydiver would do, I totally jumped all over that opportunity. 

I called dibs on her rebound in a reply to her comment and also let her know that what I really meant was that a woman that's into that kind of stuff is so hard to find and that her ex would be feeling his loss in no time. I won't post the exact quote nor the usernames of either of us to try to ensure some sense of anonymity. If you know any of the details please keep them to yourself and out of the comments. :)

There's only one person I'm fixed on embarrassing here and that's me.

The HackerNews community smote my karma. I actually lost almost 20 karma points trying to get her attention. There were a lot of negative remarks to my trying and some of them had some decent points. I'm sure I looked like an ass. I've written about that before though too. The general strategy for dealing with feeling like I look like an ass? Who gives a shit? If I have good intentions and I'm not always being disruptive, being an ass every so often is completely ok. 

So you're probably like yeah you looked like an ass and she ignored you. Pfft! Think again! We've been talking back and forth via email now. I looked like an ass, put myself out there, and, at the very least, found someone new to talk to. Once again, even if she's only interested in being friends, it's one more friend I would not have had if not for being semi-ballsy and putting myself out there, prone to failure.

I wrote an article a while ago where I said that every single time I've failed it's led me to be an even happier person. I also said "Winners are Made of Fail..." One commenter (on MetaFilter I think) actually called me out on that and asked how I would know what a winner would feel like since I fail so much. I think after these incidents I can answer that challenge. 

I know that I am a winner because the only real goal in life is to die happy. If I would have died any time in the past month I would have accomplished that goal. You can dress it up any way you want to, maybe you want to say you should leave the world in a better state than when you entered it. I look at the people I am apparently helping with these narcissistic ramblings and think yeah! That's done.

I look back at how I felt about starting this blog; about how scared I was to put myself out there and now I see how much taking that risk has given me and the people around me. 

My point in telling this to you is to reemphasize how important it is to take "risks". If you take them in a smart way they aren't really risky, they're more investments in your life and hedges against an empty boring existence. 

This is relevant only because myself and this other girl actually seem to have a fairly good dialog going. I think the story of how I threw caution to the wind is also important as I've never done anything like this before I don't think. I'm not god's gift to women (as story number two indicates), lest you think I'm bragging. What I'm really saying is that there is a world of opportunity all around us and we only have to reach out and grab it and yet so many of us don't. I know I never used to. As I've said in the past, being not unhappy does not make someone happy. Likewise, avoiding a life's opportunities in a bid to mitigate failure does not relegate you to a life of success, just a life absent of failure. However, living a life where you take every opportunity you can, you will definitely fail, but you will also definitely succeed and success is the only way to have a truly happy life.

Ok, it's way too late for me to be up still and I still need to reply to my math buddy. Hopefully this post makes some sense, I look forward to tomorrow! See ya!

Social Skydiving Day 27: Doing Over Tomorrow... Nothing to See Here

All I did today was just try and recuperate from getting in so late last night. I did stumble out to the grocery store but I couldn't even think straight. I haven't had a day of no social interaction since I started this, so maybe I just needed a little break. Anyway, I'll resume tomorrow and have something real to post rather than just rambling on about nothing (more so than usual). And yes tomorrow will count as Day 27.

Apologies for the cop out! :)

Social Skydiving Day 26: Karaoking It Solo

Social Skydiving is Life Skydiving

One of the most important things I've learned from social skydiving is to be more willing to do things that scare me. For me, this whole thing isn't just about learning to talk to people anymore, it's really grown into learning to enjoy life and having a good time.

Likewise, I'm on this kick right now where I'm trying to do things in my life that I would normally avoid because I am irrationally afraid of them. You know, things like sky diving, bungee jumping, and going to a karaoke bar alone. That last one is literally more scary than the other two as far as I'm concerned which made it a perfect thing to do on a Saturday night.

 

The whole time before going I had horrible anxiety. I was sweaty, my stomach was in knots, and I was trying to find some excuse to not go... I'm getting so much worse at finding good reasons to not do stuff. **sigh** I made myself take a few deep breaths and then I took my dog out for a quick walk to clear my head. While I was out, I gave myself a good talking to and decided that the worse thing that would happen is that I would be embarrassed and alone. That made me realize that really the only thing that could really happen is I could end up getting emotionally stronger. Also, I don't care how dumb someone looked doing their crappy rendition of Burn by Usher, if they were there by themselves I'd give them mad props just for showing up. In other words, in my mind, it would have been an accomplishment just to fail.

If you look at it that way I totally accomplished something.

40 Ounces to Fail

I ended up at Ozzie's in Seattle. Not a bad bar, hella busy and overwhelming though. The place is divided into like 3 or 4 different "rooms" and each one has a vastly different vibe to it. When I first walked in the door I was in the middle of the restaurant section. People were sitting, drinking, talking, eating and just plain having a relaxing good time. As I walked through the dimly lit, darkly colored eating area I noticed the karaoke room to my left. The opening from the restaurant to the karaoke room was huge so it really felt more like a section than a room in and of itself.

There were probably five or six televisions with the words to the current song printed boldly across them and some drunk frat boy was in the middle of the room doing his best to molest it (the song, not a TV).

Ahead of me and to the left was a staircase that led to a dimly lit bar area... I still don't really understand the function of this spot. I think it's just there so the self-important people have a place where they can go to be goofy drunks but try to feel exclusive about it. Everyone who was up there was looking svelte and like they were having fun so mission accomplished on that front.

Directly ahead of me was a corridor with a bar flanking both sides of it with probably five or six active bartenders. If one could brave this gauntlet of booze they'd find a dive bar's equivalent of a game room complete with the creepy fluorescent lights positioned over the three pool tables that spilled out onto the dart boards and gaming area.

I stopped in the corridor to pick up a beer. Know how you can tell you're in a bad bar? They don't have any porters on tap (read: any serious beers). So yeah, I had to settle for a Guinness which honestly just bitched out when compared to other beers. It was watery and devoid of any real flavor though it still got me tipsy so I guess I can't really talk... but still.

Now that I had my beer in hand I headed towards the karaoke "room" (for lack of a better term). The place was packed; not a seat available in the house. I managed to find one however. There was some guy who was wasted, like to the point of looking depressed. I saw that he had one of the song catalogs at his table so I walked over and asked him if I could check it out.

The song catalogs are *HUGE* in case you've never seen them. So imagine a note book the size of two hardcover unabridged english dictionaries laying on a circular table only a couple feet in diameter meant to accommodate the drinks of about four people. By opening this massive tome of glee I easily overtook half of the table.

I stared at the seemingly endless selections of songs for a while trying to find something to sing. I say seemingly endless because the song that I had already picked out in my mind to sing ("Most Beautiful Girl in the Room" by Flight of the Conchords) was no where to be found. They must have had a couple of whole pages of Garth Brooks songs though, oh and Hanson... Oh yeah! and  I think he was too drunk to care though. A little bit later one of the bouncers said that he needed to settle his tab before he could get more drinks. The patron never came back.

I finally chose to do Burn by Usher. Hehe... Yeah we'll get to that. 

Eventually, a group of three people came up to my table to read the song catalog. I tried to start up some conversation ala my freshly learned social skills but it just wasn't happening. They were friendly and would talk back but after saying a couple of things their body language would turn the other direction and since it was so loud they couldn't hear a word I was saying anymore. I was happy that I tried, but it sucked to be an hour or so into this whole thing and still be sitting by myself.

Voice Like a Crow

Finally I got called up to do my song. First of all, I need to say this it was so bad. Like, I'm not even being humble as though I were on key and just went flat a few times. No I mean I was so bad I don't even know how bad I was. I've done karaoke once in the past (with friends of course) in a smaller more enclosed bar. That place wasn't too bad because I could hear the music and hear myself. At Ozzie's though I swear I could barely hear the music and I couldn't hear my own voice over the PA system to save my life. That means I had (and still have) no idea how loud I was or how bad I was. I do know that the look on my face was a wide-eyed expression of terror. One guy came up kinda dancing near where I was singing and tried to root me on a bit but he's not Jesus, and no miracle was performed this night. Before you think I'm just trying to make excuses for myself I'm not saying I would normally sound great, but just that there's no way I should be sounding THAT terrible. 

Part of my problem is that I didn't want to do the karaoke drunk. I wanted to be sober because I was there to learn from my thought processes and not cover them up. First and foremost was personal growth not looking good and not even honestly having a good time. Coincidentally, I didn't really have a good time. I finished my drink and then left the bar to walk off the stupor provided by my crappy beer. Ironically I had a more fun time walking around the streets of Seattle then I did inside the bar.

There and Back Again

Here's my approximate route. I started at point A and worked through the others sequentially:

Right around waypoint B I think some of the booze began to wear off, because I began to question the intelligence of walking around completely desolate portions of Seattle in the middle of the night. At which point I figured I should probably stay a lil closer to the pulse and head back into the general vicinity of my car (waypoint E).

 

Somewhere between waypoint B and C I saw this woman standing in front of this awesome old time car. I should've snapped a picture but I didn't think of it because.. Have you been paying attention so far? I just came from a bar and was in the process of walking the streets of Seattle alone for the past 30 minutes. I obviously was not thinking straight. So anyway I ran across the street and asked her if she was a driver (she was dressed in a full tuxedo). She said that she was and that she was waiting for a bride and groom and I was like oh awesome! I think she saw I was a little too excited to be sober judging by the wide-eyed smile on her face as she agreed.

 

After that I decided I wasn't getting sober quickly enough so I stopped at a convenience store to pick up some Pringles. That helped a fair bit actually. I could see the Space Needle above the surrounding buildings and set my sights on it and decided to see if there was anything interesting happening there.

 

When I got to the Space Needle (waypoint C) I ran across a couple drunk army guys who needed directions to Club Fusion. They said they wanted to get some "trim" and by golly I support my troops! I was a little nervous about helping these guys out but one was from North Dakota and the other was a fellow Californian so what could go wrong? Am I right? That's not foreshadowing... they turned out to be cool.

 

While we were trying to figure out the directions on my phone though these two shady mexican guys came up to us and asked for loose change. I put my iPhone away. Only one of them spoke english (in front of us at least) and it's always comforting to have two guys you don't trust speaking a different language in front of you. 

 

Since I had some spare change left over from my Pringles purchase. I gave it to the two hoodlums and they went on their way. It was basically just a bribe so they wouldn't hurt me. Pretty soon afterwards I finished giving the army dudes their directions and after a manly handshake and fist pounding we all went about our merry way.

 

The problem with the direction I was heading in though was that I had to walk past the creepy mexican guys again. I caught up to them since I apparently walk way too fast, and we all said hi. Then the one that spoke english asked me where I was heading to and I told him I was off to my car. He repeated it back to me to clarify and I confirmed what I said and told him I'd already done my partying for the night. His friend said something in spanish and responded and I was totally just done with this. I didn't know why the hell he asked me but I knew I didn't fucking like that he did. As I continued to walk past them I was much more thankful for being a fast walker. I wanted to put as much distance between us as possible. When I finally made it to a more well lit and populated area I started feeling better.

 

I had finally gotten rid of my dizzyness and most of my buzz after eating about 3/4 of my full can of Pringles. I had probably been walking around for about two hours by the time I finally reached my car.

In Conclusion..?

I'm not sure. It was a good night, but only in how bad it was. I broke some new ground for myself and made my weekend interesting. If this is the what my average Saturday night becomes, then there are some good times ahead of me still.

Social Skydiving Day 25: Good Morning Criticism!

Back to Being a Breeze Again

I know this is common knowledge now but I always forget it. Whenever I'm feeling overwhelmed, stressed, and just generally tweaked out, a little sleep and exercise go a long way to curing what ills me. Although, sleep didn't really happen... I only got about 6 or 7 hours of it. I did, however, run/walk for 30-40 minutes in the morning. That was a great way to start the day. By the time I got onto the bus my day felt like it was already in mid-swing.

Likewise, my attitude was completely different from yesterday's. Today, I felt chipper, energetic, and ready to take on the world. I got to the bus stop and just felt like... like I can carry this damn bus. *rawr*

So anyway, I'm still holding true to my talk to any and everyone who interests me thing. It's working pretty well. The only times I don't ask are when I think my question might make the other person uncomfortable. For example, there was a woman on the bus with what appeared to be a mountain hiking backpack (due to its size) and a musical instrument case. I play guitar so I was a bit interested in what she played but I wasn't sure if it was a musical instrument case and I didn't want her to have to talk about being homeless... Maybe I just should have asked anyway, I'm not sure. That's why I didn't, or at least how I rationalized why I didn't.

My successful talk of the day was with a guy in the elevator. The short of it is we talked, shared a laugh, went about our separate ways. The longer version is this:

First some background. The building I work in is 40 floors high and I work on the 38th floor. Now the elevators for my floor run from the 25th floor to the 40th floor which means anytime I want to go down there is a fairly good chance someone will call the elevator before I make it past number 25.

Well today, I had thought I was in the clear. The elevator was practically free falling I was going down so fast. 28, 27, 26, 25... 25... shit. I was in a hurry to get home since I was on my way to see Harry Potter. You know, important stuff. So this guy gets on at the 25th floor and I decide what the hell. I'm not sure if my honest though joking thoughts regarding his untimely entry will go over well, but I gotta try it out.

I tell him, "Must suck to be on the 25th floor huh? Always being the one who keeps people from getting to the bottom floor as quickly as possible." He laughs and agrees but he brought up a good point. He says that it works well for him since he always has an uninterrupted ride. We were both chuckling and so we chatted for a second or so more and then when we got to the bottom floor we said our goodbyes and made haste to our chosen mode of transportation.

On Not Being Likeable

The good news: I found a link from MetaFilter to my site thanks to @BitterOldPunk on Twitter! (http://www.metafilter.com/83360/Social-Skydiving)

The bad news: Lots of criticism.

I'm not going to defend myself against any of the criticism. Although it bruises my ego a bit, my large ego could stand a lil thrashing from time to time. Also (and this is why I want to talk about this), it is a pointless game to try to and get everyone to approve of me.

I talked a little about why having so many other people reading gives me more challenges to overcome and this is what I was referring to. I was afraid that people would respond negatively to my opening up so publicly. 

This same theme is one that has been running through every one of the days I've written about. Before I posted that rant yesterday regarding feeling negative and stressed I had a small battle with myself to not edit it. Finally, I just decided to let whatever may happen, happen. It's not my goal with this blog to make friends. I've been genuinely surprised that anyone would see me as the least bit likable in this whole thing. It's a total indulgence to just sit and write about myself and how I'm feeling. That on top of my pre-existing arrogance that I battle with daily PLUS my attempt to be positive and confident which can also easily sound like even more arrogance... yeah. I'm really surprised I haven't heard more comments of this kind.

At first it's hard when I read stuff like this because I think how I want to explain myself better. I feel as though that's a pretty big trap though. I've found that if I just accept that not everyone in the world will like me then I can say something like: My personality will tend to polarize potential friends. Those who are most unlike me will spurn me and those that are most like me will become my friends. It's like an organic self-selecting friendship network.

Who approves of me is not important. What is important is that I continue to honestly and sincerely keep working on myself. If I do that, then eventually, those complaints based on reality (I can't forget that many aren't) will be taken care of by the natural progression of my personal growth.

So that's my random thought on the matter. It's actually a really good thing, that gives me a balanced perspective on myself and keeps my Godzilla-sized ego in check. Thanks everyone for all of the comments. Whether they're positive or not, they all really do help to throw my actions into sharp relief against my intentions.