Found the following on a reddit post about breaking the friendzone:
For the social scripts: it’s a dance of signalling interest and reading the other person’s signals. Importantly, there’s a general acceptance that if you signal interest in romance/sex in clear but deniable ways, then as long as you don’t suffer from already being labeled as creepy, people generally won’t call you out on it. (So “would you like to have sex?” can get you in trouble; “would you like to see my room” will get you in less trouble; “would you like to have dinner at my place” still less trouble). The fact that from a Bayesian perspective you’re sending a lot of information is irrelevant; what’s important is that you don’t say it explicitly out loud.
The rest of the signalling game mostly revolves around personal space. Most people keep a fairly large personal bubble. By the time you’re having sex with someone, you tend to have basically no bubble between you and them. The seduction/hookup interaction is driven by a gradual erosion of the bubble. You signal interest by standing a bit too close, paying a bit too much attention, and touching people.
Start all this gradually. One way to be “creepy” is to collapse the other person’s bubble too fast. So start by standing a couple inches too close, or by touching the person on the forearm. Forearm touches are safe. The important thing is to read the other person’s body language. People who are comfortable with you will
(1) not move away
(2) orient their torsos towards you
(3) make eye contact, sometimes break it by looking down
(4) not fold their arms or cross their legs.
People who are uncomfortable will move away, turn their torsos away, avoid eye contact by looking up or to the side, and hunch their limbs in like they’re trying to protect their head and abdomen from an attack. Obviously these are ends of a spectrum, and there’s some fine judgment in the middle which is hard to explain, but these are the signs to look for.
Probably the most reliable basic one is (2); it’s really, really hard to keep your torso oriented towards someone you don’t like. Next time you’re talking to someone moderately annoying, try to face them full on. See how psychologically difficult it is. The same is true in reverse. If you ever wind up talking to someone who’s turned away and talking to you over their shoulder, they’re really trying to leave and you should let them.
So: give a light touch, then see how they respond. If they respond with comfort signals, you can escalate a bit more. If they respond with discomfort signals, slow down or abort. And you can just keep gradually escalating (this list is off the top of my head, no guarantee it’s precisely accurate, and adjust to taste, but it’s in roughly the right order I think):
(1) brief forearm touch
(2) brief shoulder or outer thigh touch
(3) more sustained contact on arm or leg
(4) holding hand
(5) cuddling, arm around shoulders (I find it helpful to give a quick side hug in response to something they say, see if they try to move back out or if they want to stay in my arm)
(6) full-body cuddling, touching abdomen
(7) touching back of the head, touching face, kissing
(8) touching breasts if they have them. Around this point you should probably try to find a private location.
Quick edit: this doesn’t touch on how to be attractive. Just tools for figuring out whether someone right now is attracted to you right now, and what they’re interested in doing about it. The most important part is the “watching for whether they send interest signals or avoidance signals”.
THOUGHTS?
For the social scripts: it’s a dance of signalling interest and reading the other person’s signals. Importantly, there’s a general acceptance that if you signal interest in romance/sex in clear but deniable ways, then as long as you don’t suffer from already being labeled as creepy, people generally won’t call you out on it. (So “would you like to have sex?” can get you in trouble; “would you like to see my room” will get you in less trouble; “would you like to have dinner at my place” still less trouble). The fact that from a Bayesian perspective you’re sending a lot of information is irrelevant; what’s important is that you don’t say it explicitly out loud.
The rest of the signalling game mostly revolves around personal space. Most people keep a fairly large personal bubble. By the time you’re having sex with someone, you tend to have basically no bubble between you and them. The seduction/hookup interaction is driven by a gradual erosion of the bubble. You signal interest by standing a bit too close, paying a bit too much attention, and touching people.
Start all this gradually. One way to be “creepy” is to collapse the other person’s bubble too fast. So start by standing a couple inches too close, or by touching the person on the forearm. Forearm touches are safe. The important thing is to read the other person’s body language. People who are comfortable with you will
(1) not move away
(2) orient their torsos towards you
(3) make eye contact, sometimes break it by looking down
(4) not fold their arms or cross their legs.
People who are uncomfortable will move away, turn their torsos away, avoid eye contact by looking up or to the side, and hunch their limbs in like they’re trying to protect their head and abdomen from an attack. Obviously these are ends of a spectrum, and there’s some fine judgment in the middle which is hard to explain, but these are the signs to look for.
Probably the most reliable basic one is (2); it’s really, really hard to keep your torso oriented towards someone you don’t like. Next time you’re talking to someone moderately annoying, try to face them full on. See how psychologically difficult it is. The same is true in reverse. If you ever wind up talking to someone who’s turned away and talking to you over their shoulder, they’re really trying to leave and you should let them.
So: give a light touch, then see how they respond. If they respond with comfort signals, you can escalate a bit more. If they respond with discomfort signals, slow down or abort. And you can just keep gradually escalating (this list is off the top of my head, no guarantee it’s precisely accurate, and adjust to taste, but it’s in roughly the right order I think):
(1) brief forearm touch
(2) brief shoulder or outer thigh touch
(3) more sustained contact on arm or leg
(4) holding hand
(5) cuddling, arm around shoulders (I find it helpful to give a quick side hug in response to something they say, see if they try to move back out or if they want to stay in my arm)
(6) full-body cuddling, touching abdomen
(7) touching back of the head, touching face, kissing
(8) touching breasts if they have them. Around this point you should probably try to find a private location.
Quick edit: this doesn’t touch on how to be attractive. Just tools for figuring out whether someone right now is attracted to you right now, and what they’re interested in doing about it. The most important part is the “watching for whether they send interest signals or avoidance signals”.
THOUGHTS?
