[Coach]

^^ I'm definitely feeling what's being mentioned in that article, not as a workplace thing, but just overall. I've talked to quite a few female friends about it. Trying to navigate the nuance has been messing with my head to the point that I'm way overthinking everything and it just becomes a deeper and deeper hold of self-doubt and second guessing.

"Oh hey, this girls really cute. Okay don't say anything weird. Why would you say something weird? Do you usually say weird things? Are some girls walking away from conversations with you thinking you're a creep? Oh yeah, there's a girl in front of me. Okay don't look anywhere but her eyeballs. If you glance away she'll think you're not paying attention, or worse that you're looking at another person. If you glance down she'll think you're looking at her chest, even though you just like the color of her sweater. Oh #### now you looked. And now she thinks your creepily scanning her body. Are you creepily scanning her body? Annnnd she's gone because you haven't said anything in 40 seconds."

All of these things equal not really being able to pay attention to the actual person and deal with them naturally. Let my eyes move as they would normally, say the things I would normally say, etc... It's like someone put a new filter in your head and your not sure what should be getting through anymore. I consider myself someone who was and is very respectful of women. Has that made me immune from saying something stupid once in a while? Definitely not. But the thought that I might be getting perceived that way (true or not) is enough to make me avoid approaching with women, and particularly avoid approaching those I don't already know.

My whole thought process now is to avoid ANY sort of first move. Women I know think that's ridiculous but what else is there to do? If the first move is going to be considered creepy AT BEST even some of the time, then why would I be doing that? I tell them they're going to have be the ones who assert themselves more as men become more and more reserved out of fear of coming across inappropriate. I'm not saying these are bad things, just shifts we have to adjust to and that does include women.

EDIT* Not to get too personal/graphic, but it boils over into sex to IMO. In my personal experience, the majority of women like at least a little bit of "domination" (for lack of a better term). Words like "harder" and "pound" are regularly used. Some spanking is usually present. Even most popular sexual positions kind revolve around one person dominating the other (usually the male). So even stuff like that is throwing me for a loop. It starts to seep into my head that the whole act of sex is "bad" or that I'm somehow "doing this too them" instead of us having mutual relations. Do I ask permission before giving a small spank? Can heterosexual women in here honestly say they would find it sexy if a man kept asking permission to do things to them in the bedroom?