How to Meet a Gay Lover

The best way to meet a gay lover is often the same as meeting anyone, gay or otherwise: get out and about, socialize and have fun. The more people you meet in any setting, and the more open you are, the more likely it is you will find the gay lover of your dreams.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

1. Live your everyday life to the fullest, and remain open to meeting potential friends and potential lovers in all the right places, including the supermarket, your favorite coffee shop or the park where you walk your dog. Closing yourself off to encounters and chance meetings that begin in such normal venues can reduce your chances and limit the romance and fun in your life.
2. Find a way to flirt, if it comes naturally. You don't have to act like a tramp, but making eye contact and having fun opens a lot of doors and lets people know you are looking.
3. Check out places that may be magnets for interesting gay men, such as museums, coffee shops or the local university's film series. There's nothing wrong with scouting out the local gay bars and dance clubs, too, if you are comfortable with those scenes, but you don't have to limit yourself to a meat-market environment.
4. Talk to trusted friends about the fact that you are looking for the right person. There is a fine line between enlisting somebody's sincere help, even if this friend wants to be your "wing man," and being the object of gossip. If you maintain your dignity, you should be able to ensure that your friends treat you with dignity.
5. Take a chance on a setup or even a blind date, if you trust the friend who is arranging the meeting. Make sure you know how everything about how the "date" is being billed in advance, so that you and your date have similar expectations. If the date does not work out romantically, you may still hit it off as friends who can help each other with the romantic networking process.
6. Expand your happy hunting to include gay bars, chat rooms, dating websites or personal ad listings if you feel comfortable with such environments. Always maintain your sense of your own identity and your knowledge of what kind of person you might be looking for so that you don't get dragged down by the practices of others.

Tips & Warnings

• Don't let your desire to meet a gay lover make you careless. Take all the precautions that are important in any dating or sexual environment, including--when the time comes--practicing safe sex.