How To Be More Fun & Interesting On Dates

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you. If you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you, I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence, first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Hey, welcome to today's episode of Shrink for the Shy Guy. Today we have a show focused on you being more confident on dates, dating and relationships. Now, even if you're maybe already married or in a relationship and you say, well, what's the point of listening to this episode? I would encourage you to listen to it because some of the things I'm going to share are not specific and unique to first dates or initial dates. But aren't you going to be dating your partner forever now? You might say, well, no, we're married now. We're in a relationship now, so dating is over. Well, I guess if you're referring to an extremely technical definition and making dating separate than a relationship. But what about going on dates with your partner? What about having fun, engaging, interesting connection conversations and experiences with your partner with your partner? 5 years or 10 years or 30 years? In fact, in some cases, sometimes the need for a date is even greater when you've been in a relationship for a long time, especially if you found yourself settling into some of that. You know, we talk about the logistics and the car and the kids and then watch some Netflix, then go to bed. And there's not a whole lot of hot dates. So this episode is definitely useful in any sort of romantic relationship. Speaking of romantic relationships, if you want to really increase your confidence in this area, it's one of the things we're focusing on this month in the podcast because we have an event entirely dedicated to relationship and dating confidence called Unlimited Dating and Relationship Confidence. It's going to be happening in mid November. Tickets are going on sale for the Super Early Bird and then the early bird. And to get all those details, go to my website, which is draziz.coM-R-A z I z.com make sure you sign up for that email list, which you do by just getting the ebook on that site. You can also go to shrinkforthshyguy.com and sign up there as well. And that's how you get access to all the special deals, the promos and everything. So if this is an area of your life that you, you finally want to take charge of, definitely come to that three day event. It's remote. You can do it from anywhere in the world, as in entirely online. And as long as you have an Internet connection, you can be there with us. And we're going to do three days of powerful work to really transform things for you. And one of the things we're going to be looking at is how to be more interesting and fun on dates, which is what we're going to talk about in today's episode. So why fun and interesting? Does a date have to be that way? Can't a first date be something else? Sure. You know, first date could be deep and sincere or intense or sexy or boring. You know, there's all these different things it could be. But why fun and interesting? Well, generally, let's assuming this is someone that you are first getting to know. And generally when we're going in for a first date, people, even those who crave authenticity and a real connection and honesty, if it's. Sometimes people go into that kind of experience of authenticity or honesty with a kind of an intensity which is almost heavy or unpleasant. It's like we're going to be real. And A, that is maybe a little, it's not the most fun. And B, you also haven't developed much trust yet. So why be like so deep and raw and open with someone that you just met? If anything, maybe that's a little inappropriate. And I don't mean inappropriate as you know, shame on you young lady or young man for wearing that outfit. I mean inappropriate as in not very. It hasn't been demonstrated that that's the right place to do that yet for your own well being and for theirs. Because if you're with someone and they're not very self aware or they're very critical or something, it's not the kind of person you might want to open up with. Like, why open up a ton on the first date? So generally when you're first getting to know someone, it makes it a better goal I found in dating to have it be fun and interesting. There can definitely still be some realness and authenticity there. But if you go straight for that with this level of intensity, that can be off putting or at the very least just not very fun. So how do you make your date experience more fun and interesting? First things first, and this is not a conversation Starter. This is a mindset. And as you know, confidence comes from within. Confidence is an inside job. So your mindset approaching the date determines your experience of the date. More so than what happens on the date. It's how you approach it. So what's the optimal way to approach it? To make it fun and interesting? Number one is I don't need anything from you. That's going to be the biggest obstacle to fun and being interesting is being attached to. I need something from you. What do you need? Well, the list could be endless. I need you to like me. I need you to think I'm sexy. I need you to think I'm interesting and fun. I need you to approve of me and everything that I say and do. I need you to like me more than anyone else. I need you to want to date me again. I need you to want to be in a relationship with me. The list could be endless right there, but there's some attachment, some grasping there, and with that you just want to be real with yourself. Notice the day before the date or the day of the date as you get closer to it. Take a breath, slow down. Am I wanting or not wanting? Am I needing? Does it feel like I need something right now? You might say, well, of course I need connection. Of course I want this person to like me. Like, how would I. What am I supposed to not want those things? It's like, well, of course you want connection. That's what leads you to date, right? Or go into relationships. At least one of the things that drives us there. The I don't need something from you is helping you realize that this one person isn't the source. This person isn't the source of connection. This person is not the source of love. This person is not the source of approval. They're not your source of connection with feminine or masculine energy. They're not their. They're not your source for sex or for validation. There are many other sources. There are sources that are not even human. Like, you could tap into love and connection with something else, with nature, with God, with another experience. So this idea that it's all coming down to you, that's a lot of pressure. And pressure and fun are mutually exclusive. They don't really happen at the same time. So first things first. Big breath in and out. I don't need anything from you. Now how do you make that so? And you're actually feel it in your nervous system. Simply repeat it. Simply remind yourself of that. Take deeper breaths, like find the place inside you that's all tight and constricted. And for me, it really helps to remember the. The freedom that I seek, the joy that I seek, the love that I seek, the relationship that I seek. Everything that I seek is not in the things out there. It's in me and my consciousness and how I'm approaching this. So if you're all tense and constricted and I need something, oh my God, it's not going to all of a sudden become really fun and blissful on that date or after date 1 or after you have sex or after the next milestone or after whatever, because it's the same consciousness, it's the same attachment. So that's the big one. When you do that one, you're going to be a large step of the way there to being more free and at ease and being you. The second thing I'd say is to come back into yourself and connect with your values. And how you want to play, how you want to play relationships, how you want to play dating, how you want to play life, how you want to play connection. It's a game. And. And you get to choose. You get to choose every moment. You get to choose that particular day, you get to choose that day, you get to choose new. If you've been in a relationship for 20 years, you get to choose new tomorrow. How you want to show up, who you want to be, how do you want to experience this? And what is that? What are the qualities you want to have? Not, I want to get X result and Y time. This person's got to like me, and then we got to sleep together and we got to be friends and we gotta be dating and then we gotta partners, marriage, blah, blah, blah. Just like, how do I want to be? Hey, I want to be energetic, I want to be attentive, I want to be loving, I want to be playful, I want to be silly, I want to be what and pick. What are the qualities that light you up? What are the qualities that energize you? What are the qualities that are most like you elsewhere in your life? Right. So what do you tend to be like in your life? Are you a silly person? Are you a playful person? Are you a kind of more deep conversation, philosophy, politics, art, whatever it is, what lights you up? Like, okay, these are the qualities I want to bring. I want to bring intellectual stimulation or whatever it is that lights you up, and you want to bring that into the experience. And also as you're focusing on this, though, what experience do you want to create for the other person? And this is one of the Biggest secrets to getting out of social anxiety is getting out of self absorption. What are they going to think of me? Are they going to like me? Do I look good enough in these pants? What about me? And people go on a date not to have you. Use them for your own whatever. Need for something, attention. They want to connect, they want to be seen, they want to be known. They want to experience an energy transfer and exchange and have fun or feel loved. So before you meet up with this person, before you go out on a date with them, you could pause and really become open and curious, like, who is this person I'm about to meet? And I think this is so important. This is like a competitive advantage. This gives you a leading edge in the competitive world of online dating, where now everything is a swipe this way or that way. You can bring a whole person into this experience. And that is rare, you know, in, I'd say the 2010-2020 decade. What gave people a competitive advantage is if they could focus, if they could do deep work. Because the vast majority of people's capacity for focus was radically eroded by the rise of smartphones and faster handheld technology. And so people became kind of zombie like and incapable of extended periods of focus for a large, for a large chunk of people. So if you can do that, if you can sit down and work on something for four hours or have a focus to write or create, or do you have a competitive advantage. A lot of people can't do that in the 2020-2030 decade. I know we're just starting that. But my sense is that if you can bring a whole humanness to your interactions with others, you will have a competitive advantage in everything, in work, in business and sales, and then also in social life and relationship. And this kind of might sound like a no duzies, like be a whole person and connect with people and that will do wonders for your life. I mean, didn't Dale Carnegie say that in the 50s? Yeah, the 50s was a very different environment than the 2000s. I mean, look how disconnected people are, how removed people are. Look at a generation now that communicates more via screens than they do in person. And look, I'm a big fan of screens. Big fan of the Singularity predict by Ray Kurzweil, you know, coming. Is that just Kurzweil Kurtzwig Kurt something. You know, I think you predicted like 2035. That's when like humans and technology and machines merge entirely. But in any case, I use a lot of tech. I'm not saying we shouldn't use this stuff. What I'm saying is you don't want to atrophy the muscle to be, you know, a whole person with other people. So what does that mean? It's kind of a vague abstract statement. Be a whole person. Well, you know, one. And this is what we practice at our events is like, can you experience eye contact with another human? I mean, this is so basic. It's like almost like saying, you know, did you brush your teeth before the date? Did you take a shower that day? Right. Obviously those are. Those are good tips as well, but. And yet it's so obvious. And yet a lot of people have atrophied their capacity for eye contact. And that doesn't mean they're like, you know, shuffling and looking at their feet and can't even look at somebody. But it is. They can't hold a gaze, or they can, but they get uncomfortable and they stop breathing and they're tense. Can you become very open and curious about who is this person before me? So when you are going to meet somebody, let's say it's a first date and all you've seen is their pictures on a phone and it's their curated pictures. It's the pictures they want people to see. Right. That's what you do. You're selling yourself online, of course. It's the marketplace. And so you look at this picture and before the, you know, about 10 minutes maybe you're sitting in your car before you're gonna go into this coffee shop to meet this person. Like, look at one of their pictures and slow down, breathe and look deeper. Look more completely. It's not like, okay, you're looking at shapes and sizes and I like this, or I don't like that, or this is hot or not or whatever. Look more fully. Who is this person? I wonder what their fears are. I wonder what their dreams are. I wonder what lingering insecurities they have. I wonder what their relationship is like with their mom or their dad. What is their favorite thing to do? That just like, boom, lights up their soul. What pain are they holding? Where would they most love to live in the world? What is the thing that could be said or done or expressed that would make them feel the most loved in the world. Can you see how when you ask those questions, you get into a different frequency, a different mindset? Your brain waves change patterns. They go from beta achieve, get outcome mode to probably a more alpha state. You're a little bit more clear, a little more focused, a little more slow in a good way. Inside and you bring that energy into the date. Notice how in this episode, as we've been talking about how to be more interesting and fun on dates, we've not at all talked about like talk about the funny stand up comedy you saw last night on the Tonight show, right? That's just act, that's just performance. We're looking at your mindset, looking at your energy. You're looking at how you see another human. Because what's going to happen out of this is you're going to come in and you're going to be this open, perceptive, connected version of you. And that version of you is fun, that version of you is playful. Because what we're doing here is we're helping you get out of mindsets and patterns and attitudes that have you approach the date as a threat, as a performance. If you're approaching a date as a threat or a performance, it's not going to be fun. And even if you make it funny and you tell an interesting story, you say something funny and the other person laughs, maybe you laugh too. There's a pressure in performance. Oh, that was good. Now I gotta do it again, right? Then you're even more nervous on the next date. Oh, how long can I keep this up? Trust me, I've been there. So this is a way to drop it all and just show up wholly fully as you. I don't need anything from you. How do I want to show up as a person? Who am I? What kind of qualities do I want to embody? What do I want this other person to feel? What do I want to bring about in them? And who is this person? What qualities do they have? What lights them up? So now you've done all that, you're doing that as you move in and you're going to go meet this person or spend some time and it's maybe not your first date, maybe it's the second date or third date. What do you do then? Well, I recommend following your fascination. This is a technique I teach in the Conversation Mastery event that we run each year. It's also in Social Mastery inside of Confidence University. And what you want to do with follow the fascination is you want to find something that the person is engaged in or interested in their life and you want to ask the questions and make the comments about it that really interest you. Because one of the pitfalls, the antithesis of fun and interesting is is you playing a role of what you think you're supposed to do to make the conversation keep going and people confuse a conversation with no breaks, that keeps going as a good conversation, that's fun and interesting and that makes the person want more. And they're two very different things. Two people can be talking non stop and look like they're engaged and interested and both be wanting to get the hell out of there. You've been in that situation. Have you ever been like, okay, I know exactly what to say to keep this conversation going. I know exactly what question to ask to make this person keep talking. But oh man, I could care less, right? And it's, you know, sometimes you're doing it because you want to be nice. Sometimes you're doing it because you just want to get through the date. Sometimes you're doing it because you say, hey, if I just keep this person talking enough and they seem engaged, then maybe they'll sleep with me, right? And trust me, that one is never. It's never. This is usually, you know, I guess a woman could be doing this with a man, but it's typically a man who's wanting to have sex will sustain a semblance of engaged conversation in order to maybe further an opportunity, another date or an experience elsewhere in which maybe this will lead to some sort of sexual, maybe not sex entirely, but something sexy. And it's very unpleasant. I've done that a couple times in my life. It's very unpleasant. At some point in my life, I was like, never. It is so not worth it. And some people might feel differently, but to me it's a suppression of annoyance and disengaged or not, you know, and trying to override. And I realize it's coming from scarcity. Why do I need something from this person? There's plenty of other people. If you just want to have sex, there's plenty of people to have sex with. That's only intensified in the last 10 years since I've been off the market and in a relationship. But, you know, if you want to have swift sex, there's a whole lot of apps that are facilitating that. That doesn't make it instant, but, you know, it sure removes a lot of the obstacles to that. And so you can have an abundance mindset if you don't necessarily connect with that person, just, okay, wrap it up and meet someone else. So what you want to do is you want to follow your fascination, which will create more engaging conversations automatically without having to force it or fake it. How do you do that? Well, let's say that you ask the person. Remember those questions I was asking you to reflect on earlier, before you met that person? You Might even ask the person that question. First of all, where do you work? What do you do? Where do you live? Like, oh, God, that's the job interview style date. And you don't have to do that. I'm not saying you can't ask those questions. Steer away from those questions, though, early on, if you can. And I got to the point where I would not only steer away from those questions, but if the person tried to steer it back, I would make a comment about that. So I'd ask different questions. And then let's say on a date, she would try to steer it back to, like, what do you do? And I was like, well, we could talk about that later, but I have a question for you first. And then I would go on and. I mean, I would never do this as the nice guy. Cause it's like, oh, my God, I'm not answering her question. She's gonna be upset with me or think I'm being, you know, not forthcoming. But I was very forthcoming. I would share all kinds of other things about myself. I just wanted to avoid that. And it was interesting. It did create a little bit of, like, what's going on with this guy? Why does he not want to share what he does? Or sometimes it gives some sort of flippant answer, you know, like, what do you do? Well, I am a billionaire. I have a trust fund, so I don't need to work. And I have a smile on my face. So it shows that I'm kind of being playful. Really? Oh, yeah, Yeah. I got a yacht. Wanna see it? Well, you can't see it yet, you know, so it's just being kind of absurd and saying, no, I'm not gonna answer that question. And I say, you know, but I have a question that I'm much more interested in than I wanna ask you than me telling you about what I do. I'm like, what? Okay. What lights you up more than anything else in the world? Like, when you do it, you just feel like your soul comes alive. You're on fire. What is that? That's a question I would ask someone literally on a first or a second date. And can you imagine what kind of interesting conversations that would lead to? And then, so let's say she says, oh, I love running in the woods. Okay, great. Now you can follow the fascination. How do you do that? Let's say maybe you're a runner. And then it's probably easy and natural. Maybe you're not. So what do you do? Because otherwise you can fall into, like, very standard, boring Questions? I love running in the woods. Oh, cool. Where do you like to run? How neat? Kind of. You ever run in any races? You know, I don't know. I'm not saying those are bad questions, but if you're not fascinated, then the energy is going. She might be fascinated on that topic, but if you're not, the energy is going to dwindle. It's going to feel forced. Or he. And this can go either way. This could be, you know, a man dating a woman, woman dating a man, man dating a man, woman dating a woman, transgender, whatever. This is just about human connection of all different sorts of. So I just am saying a lot of he says to she, because that was my experience in dating. So what could you do there? Well, when she says, I love running in the woods, what are the first five things that come to your mind when you hear running or woods? What comes to your mind right now? Let's do it as a little activity. For me. When. I mean, that one probably came to my mind as an example, because I love running in the woods, too. But, you know, I think of Forest park, which is right outside of Portland. I think of Altra, it's a running shoe company. Big fan of their shoes. I think of being out in the Sisters Mountains near Bend, Oregon, where I just was earlier this week, and running around there. I think of ultra marathons. I think of running at night under the moon. So those are things that come to my mind because they're coming to my mind. They're gonna be where there's more energy. Right. I'm not forcing anything. And so let's say I was dating this person in Portland. I'd say, oh, awesome. Where do you like to run? You ever run in Forest Park? Maybe she says yes, maybe she says no. Oh, cool. Where do you like to run? What trail is around here? What's the favorite trail you've ever run on? And as you do this, you can share about yourself. Like, oh, I was just running around Sisters in Bend. I absolutely love running outside. Tell me about places you've run. So you share about yourself. You ask them, and now you're off to the races and you can do this with something. I obviously share that same passion as this imaginary person, so it comes easier. But even if you don't, you can keep following your fascination to ask the questions that actually interest you. And again, this technique is a powerful conversation technique, but it's going to come out of all the stuff we've covered in this episode. So let's turn this into Action. Time for action. Action. Action. Your action step is going to be to apply what you learned in this episode on a future date. And if you're, you know, don't have a future date lined up or you're not dating right now or whatever, not to fear, don't despair. There's a way you can still do your action step, which is gonna be to bring this mindset and energy to any conversation or interaction. Because even not in a romantic setting, you might have an attachment of how you want the person to see you. You might feel like you need something from that person. So reminding yourself, I don't need anything from you, tuning into how you want to show up, who you want to be, you could do that in work, you can do that in a social interaction. You could do that going to a gathering, you could do that in a family event, whatever. So you can apply all these things outside of romantic context as well. But the key thing is going to be to apply at least one thing from this episode within the next seven days. That's your action step. Can you do it? Should you choose to accept it, this is your action step. So go ahead and look for those opportunities in your life. Apply this, because listening to it is interesting. Applying it is transformation. And that's really. That's the game we're playing, right? Fantastic. All right, thanks for being with me today and until we speak again, may have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. Talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks, and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to social confidencecenter.com it.