After several awkward situations where I’d approached a dude only to be told he was in a relationship, I decided to take my friends’ advice to “let the guys come to me.”

For weeks, my friends got asked out or went twirling onto the dance floor while I waited by our table as the designated purse watcher.

While approaching guys hadn’t worked, neither was waiting for guys to come to me. I felt stuck and frustrated.

Later, a guy friend told me, “Men don’t know when to approach women. We see one and think she’s hot. We go try to hit on her and get rejected. But there could have been 20 other hot girls wanting us to go over to them and we’d have no idea. We’re clueless.”

If a woman is introverted, wanting the guy to make the first move, or not making the first move for some other reason, guys need to pay attention to the signs women throw out.

Women are actually really obvious, but if you aren’t paying attention to their body language, you’ll miss the signs altogether.

1. She’s looking around the room.

If a woman clearly wants to be left alone, she’ll have headphones in, be staring at her phone, book, or laptop, and/or be giving her full attention to whomever she is with.

But a woman who is possibly interested in being approached will take some time to look around and assess what’s going on and who’s around her. This won’t be a quick glance or in response to some sort of commotion. This will be a full scan of the room and one she’d likely do multiple times.

2. She meets your eye and smiles.

Know what I do when I meet a guy’s eyes I’m not interested in, but can sense he’s interested in me? I immediately look down and away and avoid looking in his general direction again.

In studies, men tend to overestimate a woman’s sexual interest. They actually project their own interest onto these women: “I’m interested, so she must be interested too.” Unfortunately, these women may feel the exact opposite.

Since men might take even a brief eye glance as a sign of interest, women often do all they can to not meet the eyes of men they aren’t interested in.

If a woman, in fact, meets your eye for 2–3 seconds and smiles, that’s gold.

3. She starts preening whenever you look at her.

Women are like birds. We primp and preen when we’re interested.

As an observer and a relationship coach, I’ve seen so many examples of this behavior out in the real world. Once you’re aware of it, you can’t unsee it. I’ve even been called out for doing it myself when I saw a hot guy looking at me and my friend asked, “Why do you keep messing with your earrings?”

Here is an example of this kind of behavior:

If you look over at a woman, she meets your eye, smiles, and starts messing with her hair, clothing, jewelry, etc., there’s a great chance she’s interested in being approached by you — and you alone.

4. She says things just to you or that seem directed at you.

Let’s say that you’re intently watching a football game on the bar’s TV. You hear a woman near you say something like, “The game is on?!? Thank God. What’s the score?” It could be that she’s asking you, or she could be talking about something you’re clearly interested in to get you to pay attention to her.

She may be hoping you’ll tell her the score or that you’ll say something like, “You like football? Are you a _______ or ________ fan?”

5. She moves closer.

If a woman wants you to approach her, she may actually move herself to be nearer to you. She might hang out on your side of the bar, have her friend group switch tables, dance nearer to you or in your line of sight, or take up a spot alone so you can see she’s open to be spoken to.

I’ve personally gone so far as to drag a friend of mine to take a selfie with me in front of a sign that happened to be right next to the guy I kept sneaking glances at.

6. She sets up a situation where you might run into each other.

You go to the bar, and suddenly she’s there beside you ordering a beer too. You come out of the restroom, and she’s walking toward it. You head to the dance floor, and so does she. You’re playing pool, and she keeps passing your table.

While this may be a coincidence, pay attention if there are any other signs she’s throwing off. Is she meeting your eye and smiling too? Preening?

And the #1 sign that she doesn’t want to be approached by you…

1. She’ll put something between you and her.

If you approach a woman and she immediately crosses her arms, pulls her purse in front of herself, or walks behind a chair or table, she’s clearly not interested and attempting to put some distance between the two of you.

If you see this, take heed and excuse yourself politely.

Men, I’ve heard all of the excuses: “If women always expect me to come to them, then I’d rather be single,” “If a woman’s interested in me, she can just get off her butt and come tell me,” and “Women are just too complicated. Why even bother?”

But you know who is always giving these excuses? The same guys who hire me as their Relationship Coach to help them find love because they’re tired of being single.

Let me tell you this:

What comes easy won’t last long, and what lasts long won’t come easy.

Pay attention to the signs, and quit complaining that you have to do something a little different. Just try it. You may be surprised by the results.