If You've Read Everything On This Site Then Start Applying The Advice

Just to get it out of the way, this article doesn't mean I'm done posting new stuff here. I just wanted to put something up that acted as a logical bookend to all the content here and addressed a certain issue. The issue doesn't only apply to this site either. It's more general and you could tack what I have to say about it onto the end of many other web pages.

Don't just read material endlessly, start improving yourself in real life

Wow?!?!? Really Chris?! Golly, I didn't know that!!! Thanks!!!!

Yeah, pretty obvious I know. Social skills are skills like any other. There's a big difference between reading about tennis, for example, and learning to play it. So assuming you actually think the ideas on here are worth using, pick anything and start changing yourself for the better. For example, you could:

Improve yourself as a person and indirectly boost your social results - an easy, lazy way to get the ball rolling:

Make over your look.
Grab some books and start filling your head with more knowledge about the world.
Learn more about all the good bars, restaurants, and concert halls in your city.
Get back into a hobby you dropped or take up a new one.
Go traveling.
Teach yourself to dance.
Learn how to participate in a fun activity that your friends enjoy doing, so you can do it with them.

Try to get better with people, but without doing anything too taxing:

Hang out with your friends more.
Try to be more proactive about having fun when you're out with other people.
Try to cut down on your weird or off-putting traits.
Try to stay out longer when you're with people.
Try to be more tolerant of little things that people do that irk you.

Make progress that'll require having some nerves and willpower at times:

Start offering more people invitations to do things with you.
Start more conversations with people.
Join a club and try to meet some new friends.

Some reasons people may put off applying what they've learned

Still, when it comes to potentially scary stuff like having to talk to new people or trying to make friends, there can be a tendency to keep reading various tips and tricks and endlessly put off actually doing anything to improve in the real world. Been there, done that. I can think of a few reasons people do this:

You don't feel you have enough information to start improving in real life yet

This is fair enough. If you honestly feel clueless then there's no harm in attaining some more basic knowledge. The problem is when guys have read more advice than they'll ever need and still feel a reluctance get out there in the real world. Maybe they think that if they pre-load themselves with enough info at the beginning that when they get out there they'll never screw up or get rejected. You can always be more prepared, right? Nah, you've still got to take your lumps learning firsthand.

In my own experience, I can read as much as I want about something ahead of time, but it'll all go out the window as soon as I do it for real. I'll still make a load of newbie mistakes when I try applying the skills I read about. Nothing ever turns out to be exactly how I imagined it when I was reading. In the heat of the moment I'll forget everything I memorized that I should do in a certain situation. I will apply some things I learned, but clumsily and at the wrong times. Things I've already read about, and should be prepared for, will catch me by surprise the first time I face them for real. Things I never read about will happen. Other people won't act the way they're supposed to, throwing my whole plan off and forcing me to ineptly improvise. And at the end of the day I'd end up re-reading everything again anyways because before I was reading up on something I was ignorant about. The writing had new meaning now that I had experienced its subject firsthand.

Another problem is that you can functionally end up forgetting like 90% of what you've read if you try to learn everything about a skill ahead of time. It feels like you'll remember at that moment, and maybe if someone reminded you you'd go, 'Oh yeah, I've read that before', but effectively the information will never cross your mind again. If you've never done something in real life, the advice has no context or previous experience to 'stick' to. You're almost trying to memorize random facts and our brains are pretty bad at retaining that kind of information. But when you've had some prior exposure to something, your mind has somewhere it can slot the advice into.

You're holding out for the magic bullet

It doesn't exist, as I like to mention all through this site. But holding out for one can be mighty tempting. What does it hurt to read a little more in hopes of finding it? You've read two dozen tips on how to have a conversation, some have sort of psyched you up temporarily, maybe there's one that will really psych you up, and it'll last forever this time. Also, social skills are relatively invisible and abstract compared to something like juggling or playing an instrument. They also seem to be influenced by other things, like your mood (e.g., if you're in a really confident mood they seem to be raised). You can end up thinking there's some way to improve your people skills all at once. Maybe you could figure out a way to be confident all the time. Maybe there's a single insight that will radically alter the way you approach conversations and make them effortless. Maybe there's an ingeniously simple trick to making everyone like you. Nope. But it is so very tempting. The alternative is years of work and having to do things that make you uncomfortable. Why not hold out hope on the off chance you'll never have to do those things?

Deep down you know what you have to do, but you don't want to admit it, so you're waiting for better advice to come along

This is kind of like searching for the magic bullet. Sometimes you read some advice, and a part of you knows that's what you have to do, but it's unpalatable in a way. Maybe following it will take too long, force you to change your habits, or put you in nervousness inducing situations. So you put it off and keep looking for something easier. Maybe you will find something more to your liking, or maybe you'll waste a few months and eventually come back to the original advice.

Another reason someone could be holding out for better advice is that they're new to a field, and are too inexperienced to recognize good recommendations when they first read them. So they naively keep reading in the hope of finding something better.

You're just not ready to make any real changes yet

This is fair enough as well. If you're not ready you're not ready. Maybe you're thinking about changing, and are fine with reading up on the topic, but you honestly don't feel like doing anything more concrete yet. That's cool, do it when you feel like it.

You think all you have to do is read about something to learn it

Some advice has an instant effect. You read a particular observation and your attitude or outlook changes right then and there. Or you learn of a mistake you were making and never do it again. You could call that real progress. For the most part, however, you can't say you've made any true improvement until you start seeing some results in the real world. Reading about something can make you think you're becoming better at it, but you really aren't because you haven't practiced it in the real world and built up your proficiency. I got into poker a while back and convinced myself I was a good poker player because I had read several books on high stakes strategy. Once I took part in some real sessions I realized how horrible I really was at the game. Going through all those books gave me a false sense of improvement. I didn't start getting better until I began playing regularly.

Even abstract skills without an obvious physical or performance component need to be honed over time. I can read advice on how to make conversation, but I'll still need to try it out several times before I get the hang of it. Similarly, some attitude changes require that you work on making them permanent. Getting rid of a bad habit or personality trait may take longer than just becoming aware of it and committing to not do it any more.

You're bored and the information is just something entertaining to read

Sometimes I'll read material on communication skills or self-improvement just because I have nothing better to do. I'll be on the internet and I've already checked all my favorite sites, so I'll go to some random personal development blog or a collection of articles and kill half an hour. Maybe I'll learn something but the objective is mostly to pass the time. This area can be fairly interesting to read about on its own, at least for me. A lot of the time I'll read up on a topic I have a handle on or don't even care about that much anymore. Still, if a good writer publishes a few new thoughts on it I'll give it a look. And if this is your motivation for reading something, no one can blame you if you don't take steps to apply it.

Once you start applying the advice, come back and review the info on this site every now and then if you want

It never hurts to refresh your memory. And like I was saying, you tend not to remember things unless they relate to your present situation, so when you're working on a new aspect of your people skills or overall improvement, and you remember an article here talks about it, you could come back and re-read it. If you've built up more life experience since you last read it then you'll probably see some advice in a new light. Some points that you glanced over before may stand out and have a new meaning for you. As you progress in your development you'll become receptive to more advanced concepts that may have gone over your head previously. That's not to say I've cleverly structured my writing to have multiple layers of meaning, and to speak to people of different skills levels in unique ways. It's just natural that people at different stages of development will take varying lessons away from any source of information.