I can’t believe I am sharing this: Wessel's Generational Fumble

I fumbled. Today I sat on the train writing some notes in my notebook when a bunch of people entered the train. I was sitting on the end of the couch, writing on the little table from the chair in front of me.

Then a cute girl walked in and she chose to sit next to the most handsome young man she could find on the train… or just the first available spot, I don’t know, but she ended up sitting next to me.

At first, I didn’t even notice. I was locked in, journaling and figuring out my life (you know, the usual stuff you do on the train) and my back was kind of turned to the rest of the couch because of the horrible table placement. Then at some point I had to think and I looked up, then in the corner of my eye I saw something that might have been a baddie.

I didn’t turn to look, because she was right next to me and completely turning my body and/or head would’ve definitely been weird. Putting me in this awkward situation, kind of the same one as when you pass someone while walking just a bit faster than they are… which is absolutely horrible.

So, I decided to play it cool and do nothing. I had shit to figure out anyways. So, I continued figuring out my life and occasionally threw some quick looks to inspect the prospective baddie next to me. Eventually, when I had life figured out, I put my notebook away.

She was on her phone, and she had AirPods in. Very unreachable, so I decided it was destiny and just did some work on my phone as well. But suddenly she put her phone away. So, I finished some things and I did the same.

Then, we both just minded our own business for a bit and I had a choice to make. Normally I would look for excuses and reasons why I shouldn’t do anything, and afterwards I would come up with genius ideas of how I could’ve made it work. Things like: “I should’ve said this”, “Wouldn’t it have been funny if I did this?”, “She would’ve absolutely fallen in love with me if I did this”, etc.

And while all these ideas might have been genius afterwards, I never had anything to show for it, because I never actually did them in the moment.

So, I switched my mindset. Instead of thinking of all the excuses now and all these genius things afterwards, why wouldn’t I reverse it? Why wouldn’t I think of all the genius things now?

So, I started thinking of the ways this could work, not of all the ways it couldn’t. I didn’t think about all the ways this could be weird, I thought of all the ways this could be normal and even fun. I thought of so many things. I even laughed/smirked at some of the ideas out loud, which was probably kind of weird. The people in the train must have thought I was on drugs or something the way I was laughing at thin air. (And meanwhile I was still worried about maybe being weird, get outta here bro.)

Anyways, while I was coming up with my masterplan, I got the feeling that she was checking me out as well. Maybe I was hallucinating, maybe she was just looking at me because I was laughing at nothing, but it gave me more motivation.

What if she was into me? What if she really looked at all the people in the train and thought: “I want to sit next to that handsome guy?” What if she was waiting for me to make a move? What if she was manifesting for me to make a move? What if she thought: “I should put my phone away, so I am more approachable” and started waiting after?

That’s a lot of ifs and you may call it delusional, but what if? What if we were meant to be and I missed out on the partner of my life, because I was too scared to say hello? What was the worst thing that could happen? This is probably one of those girls you see once on the train and then never again. In the worst case we’d just part ways forever.

So, I thought out an amazing plan. I thought to myself: You know what I should say? I should say: “do I know you from somewhere” (being 100% sure I didn’t). Then she would probably say no, no clue, and I would say something like… (I feel so embarrassed saying this…)

I would say something like: “oh yeah, my bad, must’ve been in my dreams.”🤢🤮

An absolutely terrific plan I know.

So, I waited a bit, just before the station where I would need to get out. And there I went: “Sorry, do I know you from somewhere?”

She started blushing, either completely caught of guard or completely into me and said: “No, no clue, I wouldn’t know from what”.

That was my cue, so I started: “oh yeah, I thought maybe, uhm maybe from…” I just couldn’t get it over my lips. So, I tried a second time “Well, I thought, maybe from… I mean I just wanted to make sure because I sat next to you the whole time and I wasn’t sure, so I thought I will at least ask before I leave…”

I don’t know what exactly I rambled, but it definitely wasn’t according to the (very simple) script.

Well done Wessel, perfect execution…

However, we had a short conversation after that wasn’t that big of a fumble show. It was pretty good actually. And I didn’t get her number, I didn’t even get her name (honestly I didn’t even ask for it), but I broke the ice and I started the conversation. Something most people wouldn’t even have done. So I think it’s something worth celebrating.

It isn’t necessarily a great heroic story I would like to tell to my friends, but it is good enough to tell on my blog no one is reading anyways. 😝

Because it taught me about two things:

1) Think in opportunities not in limitations. Once I switched my mindset from why I shouldn’t/couldn’t do it to why I should and how I could, it opened a whole new world of opportunities that would normally only open up for me after the opportunity had passed by. Your brain’s basic response is thinking in problems and limitations, not solutions, so be aware of that.

2) Every action is worth celebrating. I was (and am) quite embarrassed about this experience, but at the same time I know it’s even worse to not try at all, because you will definitely ruin your chances then. If you don’t shoot, you won’t score. Therefore acting on it’s own is already worth celebrating, because it single handedly improved your chances at scoring (even if it’s from 0% to 1%). This is a mindset I will try to adopt in other areas of life as well.