Ok I'm going to throw my 2 cents in, but from a stand-up comedy slant. Hope you all get it.
Everytime I approach I have varying levels of anxiety, caused by various factors; previous set success, number in set, sobriety, hotness of HB etc. What I find interesting about the latter (hotness of HB) is that as that increases my AA goes down. This is similar to stand up comedy. Everytime I go up on stage, I get that 'butterflies' feeling, even though I've done successful gigs in front of 300 person crowds - I still get it. What's counter-intuitive is that I don't get it as bad when I've got a big audience, whereas a 20 person audience can sometimes make me feel sick to my stomach. This is mainly due to the fact that if only 40% of the audience laugh at your jokes, it's more noticable in a smaller crowd.
Think about it like this. You walk up to a HB10/500 person crowd with confidence oozing from every pore. They are going to assume you are confident in a situation with a HB10/ 500 person crowd. They're going to assume that this is everyday stuff for you, and that's just because of your confidence. I never met a guy who got AA from talking to a HB5 who he wasn't particularly attracted to in the first place. Firstly, you're not losing much if you f-up. Secondly, the HB5s are easier to talk to because they've developed a personality rather than relied on their beauty throughout their schoollife and worklife. Third, you'll realise that she's not used to being hit on so will be more receptive to you talking to her. So HB5s are easier to approach than HB10, right? Nope. Partly due to the aforementioned confidence, and point 2 I made about personality development.
Now let me take a second and explain why. HB10s don't tend to have as deeply ingrained, complex personalities, and as such they are very succeptable to gaming because they'll enjoy themselves talking to someone who's genuinely interesting, and isn't vulnerable to her beauty/bitch shield etc
If we go back to the stand-up comedy metaphor, note that I always get nervous. It's what seperates me from the crowd. That emotional state puts me one step ahead of them. From the audience to comedian, afc to pua. It seperates those gamed from those who game. Learning this stuff doesn't just give you material, it changes your way of thinking, your perception and your way of reacting. That is what seperates you from your previous AFC self. The material is the tools, but you can't build a house without knowing how to use them.
I did a "solid post" on Confidence and AA a while back, here's the link
confidence-and-pma-vt73244.html
Any questions, let me know guys!