FLIRTING - The Art of Approaching

OK – so I’m a woman in my late 20s and have been to my fair share of clubs and bars, whether it be for work purposes, networking or celebrating the end of a working week with friends.

What’s always intrigued me, however, is ‘the gaze’. I’m talking about ‘the gaze’ exchanged between guy and girl that do not know each other…but from the outset it seems that attraction must be the only true reason they have locked glares – right?

Although it seems obvious that they are into each other, what goes wrong when ‘the gaze’ lasts for the entire night even accompanied by a few sly smiles? But yet the lights go on at a harsh 3am, the DJ throws on something obscure and not suited to the music played all night and a flurry of what was once keen ravers huddle in a supposed cloak room queue waving their tickets; and dare I say no numbers have been exchanged – what happened?!

I started to question my own approach on things as a woman…I mean I strongly object to approaching guys myself; just through trial and error, I have learnt the hard way and realise it’s far more satisfying and self redeeming when a guy seems to put all his insecurities aside and fights for ‘his woman’ by doing the approaching, the breaking the ice, and ultimately getting the prize – my digits. But maybe this way of thinking is wrong, as I am growing tired of ‘the gaze’ affect out numbering the approaching?

I caught up with a couple of professionals in their late 20s to pick their brains.

“When the lights come on, generally you tend to beat yourself up a bit and you’ve got a decision to make” explains 28-year-old male Benefits Specialist, Ananda about the thought processes of a man when it’s taken too long to approach, “normally by now they [girls] are meeting back up with their friends and the window of opportunity has become kind of complicated…so…you’re thinking, how brave am I feeling?”

“I say just deal with it” adds 26-year-old legal PA, Gemma, “At this stage a woman’s only thinking he isn’t feeling me, or isn’t really much of a man anyway if he’s let the whole night go by…usually I just assume he never liked me in the first place”

It does sound quite harsh for a girl to seemingly be putting herself down like that and taking the ‘He’s Really Not That into you’ angle, but when the blanks aren’t filled in, us women tend to fill them in ourselves. Ananda contradicts this theory and continues, “Obviously as a guy we are conditioned to approach, but it depends on your confidence…if you didn’t get that trim from your favourite barber just before you stepped out; if you were not happy with your shirt when you stepped in; or if there was a whole gang of women and you’re thinking – ooh I like her, but there’s a whole gang of them! Then you may talk yourself out of it, but not because you like the girl any less”

There’s always this stigma attached to women taking control of situations and calling the shots; for example, for most women proposing to a spouse herself is out of the question because these women never want to gamble with the idea of coming across needy or desperate; and what used to be more common than it is now was a disdain from men for women that became the breadwinners. Are we still living in a time that follows the traditional routes of men taking the lead in all roles? "I think guys take a girl the wrong way if she approaches them. First impressions will be that she is 'on it', or desperate. If you act a bit aloof it might give a bit of intrigue and usually I like a guy to think that I'm not bothered either way", adds Selina, a 26-year-old PR Executive.

“Honestly it comes down to if you like the girl. If you like the girl, her approaching you, you approaching her, makes no difference” defends Ananda and adds some more logic behind why a guy may not approach a girl, “She could be looking back for a lot of reasons. You assume that she’s looking at you, because you’re looking directly at her, her eyes could be looking at the guy next to you, she could be thinking ‘why is that guy staring at me? He looks kinda familiar do I know him?’ It would be nice if she had some kind of sign saying ‘I’m looking at you’, but it’s a confidence thing, when you’re confident you believe she’s looking at you.”
There are endless amounts of self-help books available to both guys and girls today, but one in particular that screams ‘traditional!’ is bestseller, “The Rules” written by Fein and Schneider.

In the chapter Don’t talk to a man first (and don’t ask him to dance), the authors do some straight talking about the way things ‘should be’ in order for women to keep control of their dignity and self respect

“Not even ‘let’s have coffee’ or ‘do you come here often’…Otherwise how will you know if he spotted you first, was smitten by you and had to have you, or is just being polite?…we [The Rules] trust in the natural order of things namely, that man pursues woman. By talking to a man first we interfere with what ever was supposed to happen or not happen…Eventually he’ll talk to the girl he really wants and drop you.”

Harsh, but a straight to the point, simplistic way of looking at things. This approach will definitely cut out all those painful moments for a woman as she waits for your call or spends endless days and nights analysing the way she approached you and whether you were sincere or not, at least the above method leaves no doubt in a woman’s mind that you are genuine – right?

"I like a guy to be quite forward and have a strong personality, so if he doesn't approach me then maybe he's not confident enough for me." Explains Selina, so would the traditional methods of The Rules suit her? There is always that moment of ‘what if’ when a guy seems to just walk on past a woman that she couldn’t take her eyes off but he hasn’t, as Ananda explained earlier, got the confidence to talk to her and she can see ‘the gaze’ brewing,
"Guys usually make the first move with me but out of each relationship, I've discovered that they weren't necessarily wanting to know me for anything more then the physical.” Selina reflects, “Sometimes I wonder if I should do the cherry picking instead rather than letting them pick me and maybe I'd have more luck".
As a conclusion, it seems that most women have at some point been tempted to doing the approaching themselves purely because, like you men, women don’t want to lose out on what could be a valuable opportunity. But due to the lack of success by this method, women feel greater value when they are approached by the man himself, so the majority of the time men, please don’t hold your breath waiting for a woman to come up to you with her blackberry extended awaiting your input.

But I am left with the question if as a woman you are following The Rules method and it is still not working (please note Fein is now divorced) then maybe it’s time women started choosing what was good enough for them and not leaving it in the men’s hands. But as men were designed with a better ability to detach themselves from certain emotional characteristics, maybe it is more productive for the harmony of the planet that women continue to gaze and men practice on their lines.