Yep this is it, when you feel that impulse to run you just take one more breath and stay a few seconds longer and say one more thing. Over time you recondition yourself out of believing that the sky is going to fall down when your anxiety comes up.
@empath your response of ejecting is a conditioned response. Some part of you has been trained to run away from difficult social situations, and to experience tension as a completely negative thing. You have to rewrite that part of yourself. I know, I used to have very bad 'social anxiety' - I use inverted commas because in fact it's a total illusion.
You rewrite it by getting close to the tension and staying there a little bit longer each time, experiencing its presence and letting it exist there with you. After a while you realize it is a neutral entity, and can even be used effectively - it's very hard for things to get sexual without it.
There's a big difference between tension, awkwardness, and hesitation, which is very common for girls to feel, especially around attractive guys, and actual negative tension where they just want to leave. As long as you simply hold your ground while remaining chill, calm, and not being pushy - and don't forget to
smile - she will either push through and stay with you or eventually come up with some excuse to leave while moving away, and then you simply let her go.