Hey guys,
I'm hoping to get some of your opinions on what lately seems to be my sticking point. I have no trouble with the early (starting covnersations) and final (once I've kissed her and onwards) stages of romantic encounters, but I often find myself stuck in the intermediate stages, for instance where I've seen her once or twice and, if things are to go anywhere, it'd be time to make a move, for instance from a date out to going to either my/her place.
Sometimes I feel like I'm no longer escalating even when I already have the girl at my house for dinner and she's then in my bedroom. For instance, she's on the chair and I'm on the bed, there's good raport and a 'pleasant' conversation, but I just don't know how to make the conversation 'slow down' and become sexual without bringing sexual topics out of the blue. In other words, to get from A to Z you need to go A-B-C-.. , but I often don't know what those intermediary steps should be to go from a 'normal' conversation to the kind of interaction where you're already looking into each other's eyes from close distance (as I said, I'm fine from there onwards
).
I thought maybe if things don't progress naturally, or I feel I'm not proactive enough with her, maybe it just means I don't like her (or she doesn't like me) enough - but last night when this happened to me, I dont think this was the case. It's more like she was waiting for me to exploit a transition point in order to move to the next level, which I never did.
Occasionally (when there's enough 'chemistry', I guess), I don't even have time to think what's going on and I'm already in bed with her. Unfortunately, this only happened a handful of times in my lifetime, whereas most of the time I have a conscious 'agenda' of advancing/escalating things one step at a time. The typical male problem, I guess, being too analytical and procedural, but I don't think this is bad, as long as you just have an outline in your mind and just improvise along it. I think my sticking point is worsened by the fact that i) being overly intellectual is second-nature to my profession (science/academia); and ii) girls who'd escalate by themselves and 'grab you by the hand' are not really my type - I very much like the leading/escalating role, it's just that I only feel confortable making my intent with her crystal-clear if and only if I feel tons of attraction in the air, in which case, as I said, things take care of themselves anyway.
Some techniques I use to escalate:
- I like to build anticipation in her mind about kissing/making love, for instance by innocently&curiously asking her how good a kisser she is, or asking her to tell/show me what turns her on and taking it from there.
- slowing down the pace of the conversation and maintaning good eye contact, just to make the rapport more sensual/personal
- making the conversation more about her/me/her&me if it tends to become too impersonal/factual
- "probe" her interest by doing things like touching the ends of her hair or speaking to her from closer than normal - and observing whether she's fine with the escalation or pulls away
- misinterpret stuff she says as being sexual / her hitting on me
You may say I already know what to do, but the problem is that I don't often enough feel that the vibe of the interaction is appropriate for that (again, it's about how to *get* to a place where it *is* appropriate, even expected, to be doing things like that). But even when having good 'strategies' like that in mind, sometimes I just find myself stagnating, and of course after enough stagnation it just feels awkward to try anything anymore and the date ends disappointingly for both of us.
Sorry for the long post. If anyone feels they can contribute some helpful remarks, I'd appreciate it!
CHAT