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I made the decision about a month ago to get myself out in the city more often and start doing some approaches to get over my anxiety and hopefully improve my social skills - mostly for dating but I've found it helps me with being social in general. I've wanted to write down my experiences so far and hopefully give helpful advice for anyone else new to this. I'm a 29 yo male from UK. Best locations - During the day I'd walk around the busy high streets and shopping centres. Coffee shops are really good, bookstores, clothing stores, pop culture shops (in UK we have HMV and some anime/comic book stores), the plaza, and some parks. How I'd approach - This mostly depends on what environment I'm in - e.g. in a store I would open with some sort of observation. The girl may have been flipping through a book and I'd ask her if it was any good. Or in the Hot Topic I'd ask if she liked this particular band or not. If I was approaching a girl just as we were walking down a busy street I would be more direct by saying something among the lines of "excuse, do you have a sec? I know this is kinda random, but I just saw you as I was walking, and I wanted to come say hi". Eye contact and a smile is also being used in all these scenarios. Dealing with the anxiety - The key thing I've learned so far is that getting rejected is not the end of the world. It's honestly pretty liberating when you get knocked back and realize there was nothing to worry about. You learn it doesn't faze you and that you should be proud for actually having the balls to even take a shot at all. Approach without knowing what to say - The best approaches I had were the ones were I acted first before thinking. It's better to let go and trust yourself that you can just flow into a conversation. Making observations - When asking questions like "what do you do" or "do you like x or y", I found it didn't do much just to be like "oh cool" or "oh I see". It felt more engaging to make guesses. e.g. if a girl had tattoo's and piercings I would say she seems like one of those 'ex-goths' and she'd laugh a little. Light teasing and common ground - If a girl told me something about herself I'd generally either do some playful teasing over it or find a way to relate to her in some way. e.g. a girl mentioned to me she was going to get dinner later with a friend out in a restaurant, when I asked her whether she worked or was studying she said she was a student. Since students here are on a tight budget I teased her by going "ha, as if you could afford a dinner out in the city". Or I could've said something like "oh you're eating there? I love their food! I make that stuff at home" if I chose to try and be relatable in some way. Out of the 30 or so girls I've approached I've not been able to get a number or a date yet. The only thing that's happened so far was me and one girl ended up making out while I was out in a club. My favorite approach so far was probably with this one girl I saw while walking down the busy street - her looks blew me away (an alt girl with tattoo's, dyed white hair and some piercings). Without thinking about it I had waved as we were walking past each other. I stood in front of her and while making eye contact I went "I just wanted to say, you're very pretty" and she went to me "oh thank you! so are you!". While it didn't go anywhere (she said she had to keep moving and I just thanked her and moved on), I remember the massive confidence boost I felt. When you do these approaches you'll get counter-evidence to any limiting beliefs you have about yourself. I'm on the spectrum and I've lived most of my life being super logical and flat and my social skills suffered as a result, but I'm trying to make up for that now.

"Are there any regrets I would have on my deathbed?" is one I always found effective for improving things in life. And also "how would this person or character I idolize react to this thing or situation?".

Thank you all for the help and encouragement, it means a lot. This last week has felt like a slog. My last outing at the club put a really sour taste in my mouth when one of the security decided to grill me about approaching people. I didn't bother trying to argue back and decided just to leave. Safe to say night clubs kinda suck. There was also a really easy opening opportunity for a girl in the clothing store but I just sorta froze and didn't do anything. At least not at first: I was almost about to leave when I forced myself back there to say something. I fumbled some shirts and joked to her that I couldn't re-fold them properly, she laughed and was like "oh I know, I've got a guilty conscience about that". Then for whatever reason I just froze again: I really should have pushed myself to keep the convo going further somehow, but oh well. I've felt pretty down and I've noticed it's affected my state quite a bit but I'm not going to quit. Let's stick it out to the bitter end

Not sure what led me to it but I've been asking myself lately if I'm actually cool with eating meat. I can recall a conversation I had with my dad (tl:dr he's a conspiracy nut who's emotionally charged, not a skeptic, just doesn't want people to think he's stupid so he parrots a bunch of righty nonsense to try and look intelligent). He'd happily eat chicken and fish but not cow or pig. When I asked him why, he claimed he believed chicken and fish are exclusive for human consumption and that their purpose is to "serve our hunger". Pretty classist if you ask me but I guess I'm getting sidetracked. If you asked me why I eat meat, I would only say that I think all animals have some sort of soul and emotion, so it's like... what can you do? At least until recently - I've been watching videos like the one linked above and I have to admit I didn't picture the slaughter being this fucked up. Milk and eggs apparently aren't as innocent as I thought either - calves are separated from their mothers after birth to further produce milk and they often get shackled and infected as a result, and free-range doesn't mean chickens are roaming free like I thought. Most of them are stuck in a cramped barn for most of the day. Plus the male chicks getting culled - I wasn't aware of this until today but apparently it's common knowledge. These images are definitely something I'm bearing in mind whenever I eat meat now, although I'm not sure if I can commit to going completely vegan either. I did try it one time years ago but only lasted a couple of weeks. I'd get migraines that were horrible and felt pretty low energy and lethargic 90% of the time. Although maybe I went about it the wrong way. Have any of you experienced this as well? Any of you eat some sort of plant based diet or had thoughts about doing so?

No food is good if you continuously force it down. Nobody in the right mind would eat such vast quantities of fruit/veg to the point where it overloads your kidneys (that can happen, as you said, high oxalate content is linked to kidney stones). You'd have to consume more than any sane human being would put into their body though.

You're allowed to enjoy sugar as long as it's not causing any negative long term effects for you. No more than 30g within a day is considered pretty normal. You might already be aware but fructose (the naturally occurring sugar in fruits) is healthy. You can have as much as that as you want, although our food labels here in the UK factor fructose in with refined sugar. That's why those fruit cocktail tincans will say high in sugar even though there's little to no refined sugar in them.

It might feel bothersome/unnatural only because this is ultimately a high level teaching. As much as you can raise your levels of consciousness, you're still in a human form, so it's not feasible to remain at high levels for so long. That's how a lot of people get put off from spirituality altogether because it freaks them out or makes them uncomfortable. While there's no separation between you and other from the absolute perspective, it might be best to lower your thinking to a more practical level and approach the issue more straight forward. So from what I'm understanding - if you consider yourself an empath - treat the emotions you're experiencing as more of a reaction to what other people are doing or saying rather than second guessing yourself about something within you.

Always have an open mind and remember to call out your own bullshit from time to time

Inherently there's nothing wrong with it as long as its not causing any negative effects for you.

He's a person the same as any of us on here - it's pretty common to feel frustration/anger from time to time regardless of how enlightened/developed you are.

Sorry you had to experience that but it'd good that you managed to calm down in the end. I've personally never done more than 2g dried and I found it pretty freaky at the time (not the type that you've described though) I reckon it takes a bad trip for us to realize what our limits are and respect the dosage from there - there's really no reason to do more than 1.5 - 2g dried imo

I think for most people to truly understand peace there needs to be some level of deep suffering beforehand. Would peace still be peace if there was nothing to oppose it? Of course this can be very subjective - some people suffer over money, while some have only maybe $200 in their account or perhaps nothing at all and they are some of the happiest people you can meet. Relative to the big picture, suffering has its place as it can drive people to pursue the path to enlightenment. I remember first getting into self-help because of my bad habit with alcohol which was starting to affect me mentally and it inadvertently lead me to spirituality a few years down the road.

Firstly, sorry to hear you're going through this. It's not easy when those sorts of emotions are running high, but it's always possible to return to your normal state of happiness and peace. Second, is there anything in particular you suspect might be causing these feelings to occur frequently? Is it something material you could work to change (your body/fitness, finances, security, relationships etc.)? If this is something you're feeling more existentially then I would just approach it with curiosity, but also don't take whatever you mind/ego says too seriously. Our minds can run rampant if we stay up there too long. Ironically the best cure for this is to simply sit in a quiet space and go through a meditation experience (doesn't have to be deep, 20-30 minutes is pretty good). When you merely observe what is, and accept that as whatever is the case, a sense of space from consciousness flows through you, and you will feel more at peace and happy.

I've been looking to enter a state of complete no mind like when I was a little kid - no thought, just total presence. I've been meditating consistently for 40-60 minutes. It's definitely nice although at some point throughout the day I'll have some pretty intrusive/aggressive thoughts and I'm on the border of becoming schizo again. Has anyone had a similar experience? What worked best for you?

I've recently had the notion to resume taking shrooms but only in low doses (0.4g dried is usually just enough for me). Although the last few times I've measured and been about to take them I've always had an overwhelming anxiety come over me. I've never had a bad experience before except the one time I did 2g dried. Since then I rarely ever do above 1g. Does anyone else still experience fear despite having taken them before? Would you still take a low dose in spite of being apprehensive or is it best to leave it?

As said above, go sit and rest somewhere comfortable. Sometimes entering a different room in the house can make you feel more settled as well.

Assuming you're doing cold approach correctly you're already doing all a guy can do, really. Just keep going out as often as you can to places where you can meet girls. Clubs, parties, even a shopping mall or something. Sometimes it's just your luck and when the odds are in your favor a girl can even approach without any effort on your part.

I was off this forum for a little while as I was dealing with some emotional issues I was having relating to past trauma, and I was also making attempts to find my own place again and find a job that I could stick out for as long as I could. My main issue that I deal with is I have these very intense reactions towards things my parents done to me when I was much younger and coping with the aftermath of it all. I sometimes scream and become so terrified. It hasn't happened in a long time although the last time it did my neighbor called the cops on me and I had to explain to the officers that there was nobody home except me - and that I was just an aspie losing my mind over basically nothing. I read two of Eckhart Tolle's books (The Power of Now and New Heaven, New Earth) as well as a Steve Taylor book that described cases of people having profound awakenings when they experienced trauma (I can't remember the name right now). I've discovered that 90% of the issue was that I was too entrenched in my false sense of self (ego) and that I was using time to keep the illusion of past alive. I've been able to talk myself down when I experience the onset of my panic attacks - I can stay grounded in the now instead of reenacting a 'past'. I wouldn't say I feel depressed or unhappy but I'm not particularly enthusiastic in the present either. My goal is to see if I can experience pure love and joy as often as I can without exploiting alcohol and drugs like I used to (although I still micro-dose mushrooms every 2 or 3 weeks). For anyone else on here that's experienced craziness in their life and isn't sure whether they can comeback from it and truly heal - you can. It might take a lot of time, and you might not feel any ecstatic sense of joy at first. You can learn to feel peace in the now, which might not be the happy buzz you're after, but that will come on its own and it will sweep you away.

It doesn't feel like a prison when we're newborn. To be alive itself feels amazing and everything is fresh and pristine. The key, so to speak, would be to undo the years of bad programming from our parents and peers that deepened our sense of ego and return to our blissful, natural state of existence itself.

Hi there. I'm afraid I don't know what you've been through and what's lead you to wanting this, if it's any consolation there are people you may not realize need you and would be heartbroken if you were gone (you may not have met them yet). From a practical point of view I'd highly recommend you re-consider and seek help: either from friends, family or from a professional. If you're not comfortable doing so then you should at least do things to take your mind off it and see if you can get into a state of flow where there's no mind. No mind = no problem. As Leo once said in a video, if you die, you won't go anywhere. We don't wisp away - there's only this one space where anything can happen. And it won't cure our current pain either.

I used to do web programming so the transition to a designer type who's responsible for the layout and presentation of web apps was always a decent path to fallback on. I don't know what industry you're involved in but there's usually a more management side of things as you mentioned. You could look into how to secure clients or do some networking (assuming you're with a company, you'd maybe need to persuade someone within that company to transition into that kind of role if you were hired as a developer). There's always HR which - although I hate it personally - doing HR duties in a software company with a coding background would be make it so much easier for applicants putting their resume in. You'll be able to communicate with them on the same level during interviews unlike with HR who usually don't know what their meant to be looking from a developer's point of view.

This idea (or rather this truth) startled me at first but when you pin it down to what you're experiencing anyways, not much changes. You can still enjoy the physical sensation of hugging somebody. Having a good social time with friends. Although it's imagined in the absolute sense you're not gonna be fully open minded to it while you're doing your daily activity.

I've only done 1g doses but I did 2g dried which is considered to be the norm. Although for me personally it was pretty creepy and I was also physically ill with a headache and bad nausea. A friend told me she done 5g dry once and it didn't turn out well. She had to take benzos just to calm down because of how freaked out she was. Not to say there's somebody out there who maybe had the time of their lives on 5g. But if you ask me it takes an extraordinary individual to come out of that kind of trip unscathed.

Have you heard of our lord and savior Baldurs Gate 3

I always felt skeptical about whether or not I truly needed to seek professional help. I'd always have an excuse that was either I'm not THAT bad or I just don't have the money. The truth is that I consider myself to be a pretty low conscious person. Every day I have the same traumatic scenarios from childhood playing out in my mind and it leads me to having violent outburts where I scream and sometimes do something physical (punching and breaking my bathroom mirror, throwing objects, throwing punches as if the person who hurt me is standing in front of me etc.) Most recently I punched myself and left a pretty nasty bruise on my lip. I'd call that self harm and that's definitely a valid excuse to chase up a professional. A lot of the videos from Actualized have helped shift my mind about things in a super helpful way and I'm grateful for them (letting go, forgiveness, survival, awareness etc, taking mushrooms in small doses made me feel briefly happier as well). I just think there comes a time when if its not enough and problems like this persist, sometimes getting input from a professional is needed. Especially if its the only thing that I haven't tried yet. I've honestly been waking up scared to leave bed to face the day because of how frequent and aggressive these panic attacks are. It's become my default state of being. I'd rather not live life at all if its gonna be this way. I want to heal and I have a strong drive to do whatever it takes so I don't care about spending a few hundred if it means I can get to experience being seen by someone who's qualified. Even if it turns out not to be what I expected, at least I can have a direct experience of it. My main goal in life at this point is that I just want to be seen as a nice, well-rounded guy by my friends. There's no way I'm letting my experience with my shitty parents get me so down to the point where I start to infect others with my anger.