If you’re in a relationship, how did that happen? Did you explicitly start dating or looking for a partner, or did you fall into a relationship unexpectedly?
My partners and I fell into things, without really expecting anything to happen. I’ve never consciously gone out looking for anyone, and I’ve had some conversations with friends of mine at meetup about how aces seem to be really awkward around the beginnings of relationships. This was definitely true for all of us!
The Asexual Agenda 
I’m like you, Sciatrix – I never went out looking for anyone, or even wanted to be in a relationship, and then I just somehow found myself in one. I’d actually just reached that stage as an aromantic ace where I’d become completely happy and accepting of the idea that I probably won’t have a significant-other-type relationship, at least not in the near future. And then I started to get to know someone and we hung out more and more and fell in love over Latin catch-up tutorials at uni (which we were both running). It’s not something I expected to happen or was looking for, but at the same time, I absolutely don’t regret it, because it has been wonderful.
I just wrote a long story about this for the Asexual Story Project! For me, it took the realization that I wasn’t ever going to be attracted to people before asking them out. So instead I just looked hard for people who seemed interested in me. I’m not sure if it worked, or if my success was a coincidence
My first two relationships were started by me saying, “HEY, I LIKE YOU, YOU LIKE ME, LET’S DATE?” (sometimes not exactly in those words, but you get the idea). My more recent one just sort of…happened, and then I was like, “WAIT, WHAT IS HAPPENING, WE SHOULD TALK ABOUT THIS,” and flailed a bunch, and then it happened…but with more explicit communication?
I’ve never actually gone out and looked for a generalized, non-specific relationship, though.
My relationships can also be described as “what is happening, we should talk about this” and as “flailing but with more explicit communication.” SO MUCH AWKWARD FLAILING!
I wrote about my experience in Thoughts and experiences on dating and significant others (see the last two paragraphs) for the Carnival of Aces. Summarizing, I fell in a relationship by the steps squish, friendship, bestfriendship and breakup. Though it could be described as a queerplatonic relationship, I only considered a relationship after it ended, because of the way she broke up with me. Fortunately, we are currently friends again.
I have about as much trouble with the phrase “in a relationship” as I do with the word “romantic.” (I am in SO many relationships with people, theatre productions, places, myself, etc.) I consistently focus my affection and energy into a few close relationships, but only recently have I gotten into a few situations where the phrase “in a relationship” had any sort of applicability. I do in a general sense desire close relationships and in a specific cases hope that my current closest relationships will become even closer. However, I’ve never explicitly been on the look-out for a “partner” type relationship, and the word “date” has only intersected once the other person considered us to be going out.
As for the bit about being awkward, I think my first situation had a lot less awkward at the beginning than the second, for a variety of reasons. But awkward is pretty much my natural state of being, life goes on.
I met my partner at a goth/metal club. Although I was interested in starting a romantic relationship at the time, I wasn’t out looking for someone, I was just out with a friend to have fun. We met him and his 2 friends at the club, and started hanging out as a larger group regularly. I actually initially thought I’d made a new really good friend, when limerence hit, much later than it usually does for me (think months instead of days). Apparently he felt the same way, because he asked me some weeks later if I was interested in a romantic relationship.
I once went out looking specifically for a romantic relationship, in my teens, because I felt like I should conform and all my friends were starting romantic relationships. It didn’t last long. Afterwards I decided that was the wrong way to go about it.
I’m not in a relationship right now, but the last one I was in I definitely fell into accidentally. I wasn’t looking to be with someone, because I’m really happy on my own, but then it happened anyway and I was (am) happy it did.
I fell into my current relationship unexpectedly. All of my committed relationships have been unexpected like that, and it’s a pleasant surprise for me when things turn out that way. I have never explicitly pursued a relationship.
I am in a relationship, and it… was sort of accident, sort of not? We met online (World of Warcraft, amusingly enough) and for me it was friendsquish practically at first sight.
Being in a relationship-relationship happened after we started living together, sort of? I mean, it’s been a gradual shift from strangers-when-we-met to online friends to “you are special to me and I don’t know what that means” to sharing meatspace to “you are my partner and I want to get old and crotchety alongside you, and I love you, and we’re ok with saying that to each other.”
All of this makes me feel really tremendously lucky.