I got confused

[Azk]

Hi,

before starting, few words about myself : I am an introvert and shy guy.
I am about 30, living in Austria for my work but only speak a little austrian (I am dutch), which does not ease communication, and make me even more shy and introvert.

Now the story :
There is this pretty woman at my work that I don't know and that I meet almost everyday during breaks.
Over three months I have really believed she was sending me a lot of signs of interest, like very long eyes contact, big smiles...
I was even thinking that sometime she was chasing me.
On my side I was sending mixed signals, sometime aloof sometime I was replying to her eye contacts.
I was aloof, or "too hard to get", not because I was playing a game but just because I was shy and I was afraid to misinterpret her signs.
But I never made a move to talk to her untill one day she stopped, got cold, and even looked at me in a nasty way.
I was really starting to like her a lot and her sudden coldness forced me to go and talk to her:


I went to her and introduced myself (my heart was beating at 100 km/h, and maybe she saw it)
Me : "Hey, I am XY "
Her: "Hey I am XX, nice to meet you."
Me : "Nice to meet you too. I wanted to let you know for a long time, that I find you very pretty."
Her: "Thank you!" (with a big smile)
Me : "Maybe we could have a coffee together?"
(then she simply replied)
Her: "No" (while laughing)
(then I feel like an idiot and say)
Me : "sorry if I have been embarrasing..."
(and I started to leave, then she kind of stopped me and asked me what I am doing in the company)
(I replied and asked her the same. Then she answered and asked)
Her: "How long are you going to work here?"
Then the conversation went into that direction, she asked me where I am from, and if I will search for a job in netherland.
(I was already more relax as I thought it was already over. But in an other hand she was smiling, and looking me straight in the eyes)
The conversation last about 5 min.

But I told the story to a friend and he told me that it was quite positive.
Although kind, her simple "no" + "laugh" to my invitation is still resounding in my head, and I am not the kind of guy who like to insist.
I myself hate when girls insist with me, because it is simply embarrassing.

Now I am still confused about her behaviour. I am still pretty sure she kind of flirted with me.
Reading a lot of materials recently on this website, I have several interpretations:

1) I am crazy and I am not able to interpret correctly the nonverbal signs a woman send.
2) I have been too aloof and too long to react to her call and she entered into an "auto-rejection", and my move was too late
3) She is a tease, and have fun with me.

What do you think?
How should I react? I would guess, if there is something, it is her turn to do a move now.
If it is an auto rejection case, is there any chance to recover the situation?

Thanks, and cheers

 

[HellAtlantic]

You probably missed your opportunity some time ago and she is indeed in auto rejection. If she wanted to have coffee with you she would've said yes. There'd be no need to say no and think you would persist. That sort of stuff is saved for LMR, but not a coffee date. Your best bet would be a social gathering with other coworkers after work and then try then (out of view of your other coworkers or when everyone leaves). Let her see you interacting with other female coworkers and being flirty with other girls. Maybe when you talk to her at the gathering you can say "yeah I always thought you were cute but your personality seemed too serious or rigid I guess and I wasn't sure we'd get along cuz serious ppl are so boring to me (or make up some other reason) and now that you're out I can see you're pretty cool and fun, I should've introduced myself sooner haha." And let her react to that: "I'm totally not boring" (her qualifying yourself to you). Then you can respond "oh yeah, so what do you do for fun?" with a smirk and lead the convo with sexual undertones. Girls like it when guys have standards and types, it shows you just won't go for any chick who likes you and you have abundance to be selective. But I think that's your best bet. Start trying to organize an outing and take it from there. I'm sure there's other ways but I excel at nite game so my preference is to lead things to my domain (bars). If nothing else just move on and use this as a learning experience as to not take so long to introduce yourself and approach. You'll move faster next time. Good luck.

 

[Drck]

Hi Azk,

There is a good article on the main GC site called Attraction has Expiration Date, definitely go through it.

Basically you took 3 months to talk to her while she was showing you signs of attraction, that's probably beyond the expiration date.

There are different ways how girls can like you, the general consensus here is that girls want a lover - a guy who is moving fast, who enables her to sleep with him perhaps on first date and so forth. Girls can also like guys in another way, as friends, nice guy, provider,... Girls don't sleep with every guy they like, they can like all the guys in that particular group but might sleep only with one or two of them. In other words, the closer to lover you are the higher chances you have...

It's obviously a long way to become a lover for most guys, it probably takes years of practice rather than months, so don't worry, you didn't miss anything.

"But I never made a move to talk to her untill one day she stopped, got cold, and even looked at me in a nasty way"
>>>> See, here she probably thinks that you are teasing her, you keep giving her good looks here and there, then you ignore her by playing cold, but overall you don't do anything.

A lover would go after her much faster. It is also possible that she fell into auto-rejection, she just got tired of a guy who doesn't do anything, but worst case scenario is that she could have been thinking that you are a creep. I know that's not the case, but think about it, there is a guy who is showing her an interest for months, who is giving her looks but doesn't really do anything. She just doesn't know who is he, what is he thinking.... She's got to put her shields up, as she simply doesn't know nothing about this guy...

Anyway, she figured out that you are shy much faster than you think. I wouldn't be surprised if she knew within the first minute of seeing you, girls are simply very good at reading body language. So she knows that you like her because you finally approached you, but she is no longer attracted to you as a potential lover. She is nice to you as she knows that you are shy, thus she smiles. She simply doesn't want to hurt you. She may even flirt with you to boost your confidence. At the same time she says No, which might be confusing at first.

When a girl says No to most guys or "I have a BF", they give up, they walk away. Which was also your case, so again, she simply didn't want to hurt you thus she started talking to you to make you feel little bit better. When a girl says No to a lover, he gets excited because he sees a challenge. She knows right away that he is not hurt by rejection, she knows right away that he's got experience with girls - thus she might give him a second chance...

"I was even thinking that sometime she was chasing me"
>>>> I don't think she was chasing you. She was giving you the opportunity to open up, talk to her. When a girl is after you like that you want to act, you don't want to play too aloof...

 

[Sophisticated Gent]

Azk,

Drck did a good job of covering the points. I want to add for future reference that you asked to quickly to have coffee. You needed to build some investment from her. That is why we talk about deep diving and chase framing. Just some flirting is not enough for her to give you a yes. Read some of the articles in here on these subjects.

I do agree that you have been auto rejected because of the time frame. Work does have an extended time frame than other situations but not that long. Every time you saw her looking at you she was making an invitation. If you don't approach each time she feels a little rejected. All of these little rejections add up and she then decides you are not worth effort. Once that happens you're done.

Also read articles on approach anxiety. These will help with your shyness.

BDSC

 

[Azk]

Hi guys!

Thanks a lot for your comments. At least I have learned something and hopefully I will not make the same mistake again...