"I want a girlfriend/boyfriend", and other such relationship advice

[Ginger_Warrior]

Even I'd draw the line at blind dating. :P

[muggiwhplar]

Before I pitch the meet to a girl online, I ask her if she has any questions for me, so she feels like she's "screened" me. Tonight a girl asked, "if you were a tree, what would you have carved into your trunk?"

 

Dafuq?

 

I told her a huge branch and two acorns :lol:

 

 

She thought it was funny and clever. So instead of pitching the meet, I decided to ask her one more question: if you were stranded alone on a desert island... Would you drink your own pee???

 

...She never responded. >_>

 

Women. Amirite??

[Duff]

Texts between me and this girl who I liked a bit ago but who I am attempting to get over because she has a boyfriend and they're probably going to get married:

Haven't texted her in over a month, despite her last text saying we should hang out. Tired of her flirting with me and leading me on.

 

Anyway (i was a bit tipsy, which explains the random "haha"):

 

Her: Are you at [insert friend's name]'s house?

Me: Mhmm

Her: Woo! I was going to go over with [insert name of one of her housemates], but then i got too lazy

Me: it's not that far away, haha

Her: lol, i know it's super close!

 

I was just frustrated because... Why the hell would she tell me she was going to go but then she got lazy? Why would I need to know that?

 

I didn't respond after that. She hasn't texted me since. But I mean, seriously, what she did was like saying, "Hey, are you going [insert name of really exciting and fun event]?" and then, after I say yes, saying "Oh, I was totally going to go, but I'm not."

 

I just felt like writing that down somewhere. Cause I thought it was total bullshit.

 

And now -ninja vanish-

[muggiwhplar]

If you wanted her to come over, you should've just said something along the lines of, "cool, you're welcome to come join us if you want"

 

It's basically a non-needy way of inviting her over :P And then if she comes over, great. If she farts around and is indecisive or doesn't come over, then that's fine too.

 

But yeah if you're not interested for whatever reason (such as her boyfriend), then radio silence is the best course of action.

[homer205]

After having the awkward conversation where you get friend zoned, what's an appropriate amount of time to wait before resuming contact?

[muggiwhplar]

Why do you want to resume contact

[homer205]

Because we were semi friends before which I'll take over estrangement (not from a still wanting her perspective, from a friends are good to have perspective) and I'll be seeing her at group social gatherings eventually anyway.

[muggiwhplar]

If being around her despite being in the "friendzone" doesn't make you unhappy, then don't worry about when to contact and all that BS.

 

If being around her makes you unhappy, cut off ALL contact, PERMANENTLY. It sucks, but you'll be happy you did it.

 

Random thought (not particularly directed at you): by "losing" that "one girl," you "gain" the possibility of 3.5 billion women. Don't think of it as losing someone, think of it as gaining new positive experiences. :)

[Randox]

Rephrasing Muggi, after the just friends talk, you should cut off contact until you can be around her without desiring her. You need to be at a point where her presence isn't going to bother you, and having her in your life isn't going to get in the way of you moving on and eventually finding someone else. Just be very careful that you don't convince yourself you can do that, when you really just want to be around her.

[decebal]

Some people might disagree, but I don't believe that two people should stop hanging out if one truly got friend-zoned. It's only awkward if you make it awkward, and quite honestly, ignorance is awkward.

 

In other news, a Duff has been spotted for the first time in 4 months.

[Randox]

Some people might disagree, but I don't believe that two people should stop hanging out if one truly got friend-zoned. It's only awkward if you make it awkward, and quite honestly, ignorance is awkward.

 

In other news, a Duff has been spotted for the first time in 4 months.

I agree with you, at least to a point. There is nothing wrong with taking a chance, being shot down, and maintaining a friendship. If your in the position where you really want to make the move, then please take a chance or it will eat you from the inside and drive you crazy. But if you can't take no as an answer, if you can't honestly see the person as just a friend after you strike out, then you need to take a step back until you can. If you don't, and you can't at least hide your feelings, you will destroy the friendship. And you also have to be receptive to them as well. It's not just awkward for the person being shot down, it's awkward for the shooter too. If your fine and they aren't, then again, you need to take a step back until your both cool.

[TTanT]

My idea on it is:

If you're already emotionally invested before you ask them out (normally what happens if you have a crush, and wait a while before actually asking them out) it'll screw over friendship because it'll hurt you.

However if you're not that invested (the crush started very recently and you act quickly) then it won't really hurt and you can easily maintain friendship.

 

Hence why you should always ask a girl out if you have the urge to. Better to get it out in the open (best case: it's mutual, worst case: the friendship should be fine because you weren't invested yet and can immediately move on in your romantic scope). The whole "I don't want to ruin our friendship" is a BS excuse for being afraid.

[muggiwhplar]

Updated dating profiles again and changed how I do things a little bit.

 

Pre-update:

5% of my openers led to a scheduled date.

0.7% of my openers led to an actual date

 

Post-update:

7% of my openers lead to a scheduled date

7% of my openers lead to an actual date (!!!!)

 

Small sample size right now though, and I don't keep track of whether or not a girl's online when I message her. If she's online, the odds of her responding go way up.

[RpgGamer]

I'm not a fan of "waiting periods". How long after she breaks up with her ex until I can take a swing at her? How long must I sulk and avoid a girl that rejects me before it's not weird? How long into a relationship does sex start to be expected? When should I go in for my first kiss?

 

All of these questions will get the same ish answer from me (at least).

 

The timing will be right when it feels right.

 

And as much of a non-answer as that sounds, there really is no quantifiable way to measure intrinsic feeling and destigmatization of your social surroundings. We're not in your head, it's for you to decide when the moment is right. Just don't hesitate to pull the trigger when it is right.

 

 

That being said on a personal note, I've noticed it takes a long time for me to warm up to people. Even my best friends, generally I didn't care about them or even talk to them the first year I knew them. Perhaps a factor in why I'm so reluctant to start a relationship. The girl I was "dating" around this time last year has either blocked me from facebook or deleted hers. Not entirely sure, but I don't care much. Not the cleanest of "break-ups" but she told me she was done, I said okay we both accepted, and theoretically both moved on. I guess I'm just curious what became of her. (and no this paragraph is not some weird ploy to express I only just now gained feelings for this girl, despite how I accidentally made it sound that way lol). I guess that's another benefit to immediately cutting off contact though. There's no what if's or curiousity, it's just done. Over and simply done.

 

In other news, cute girl sits next to me in my sexuality class and my religion/psychology class. she was in my bio of cancer class last semester to learn more about her bladder cancer. Yet I've never met a happier person. Perhaps I'll talk to her more. Or perhaps I'll just let another opportunity pass me by...

[nine naked men]

For reals though 27 hours, just like the dude that got his arm caught in a rock.

[decebal]

For reals though 27 hours, just like the dude that got his arm caught in a rock.

It was actually 127 hours.

[Ginger_Warrior]

As far as timing is concerned, I think a lot of guys lack that ruthlessness; the ability to sense that there will never be a better time to ask her out than now, and so now is the time to act, not procrastinate and therefore let the golden opportunity pass by. If you take the ruthless approach and get rejected, you can still have full confidence knowing that you did the best you had to offer at the time. Cowardice, on the other hand, eats away at you because you know it's a poor choice and it's fundamentally regressive towards getting over that fear. Of course, the vast majority of girls are no better; even now the concept of a girl asking a guy out is wrongly accepted as being strange.

 

On being friends after being "friendzoned"/dumped, again I'll take a swipe at my male brethren. Girls have a much better idea of what they want and what to expect from human relationships and can more easily recognise that being in a 'relationship' with someone and being friends with someone are two entirely different things. I personally know a lot of guys who think that: female acquaintance -> friends -> girlfriend. NO. Relationships can be based on a whole range of things, sex being just one of them. It is entirely seemly for a relationship to based on sex, and yet both members of that relationship despise pretty much everything else about each other. It is also entirely seemly for a relationship to be more based on the same values that friendships are based on: trust, co-operation, mutual respect, a deep sense of caring for one another, as well as other things which define the relationship apart from being two friends. That doesn't make them the same thing, and it doesn't make a girlfriend just a female friend you also find sexually attractive.

 

Simply put, if you want there to be a friendship after attempting to pursue a relationship or having just left a relationship with that person, you need to put all of the things about that relationship away first and leave only the bits that friends think and feel about each other, because if you don't, I will bet my bacon the other person has (or else they'd still be in that relationship with you in the first place), and pretending like they might not have moved on is only going to cause you a lot of pain.

 

Of course, if you have put all those feelings behind you, then please, go for it. But not before that point.

[obfuscator]

127 hours is the perfect amount of time to have your arm stuck in a rock, that's for sure.

[RpgGamer]

I saw an old high school friend at a diner last weekend, hadn't seen him in about a year, but he's still crazy as hell. I walk up to talk to him, he smiles, gives me a hug and what not then shoves me aside gently and points to a girl and says "dayum that's a fine ass". She immediately spun around and he gave her the biggest smile ever and she sat back down with her friends to which my friend said "ahhhh she didn't give me nothing". I thought it was hilarious, but it dawned on me that this encounter was essentially the ideal of what we talk about here. He was quick, he was efficient, and he got his desires across in a simple sentence with less approach anxiety than a magnet. It was hilarious. And awesome. Alpha as [bleep].

[Randox]

@Ginger Warrior

 

Agree with most of that, though relationships can grow out of friendship, called a storgic relationship (from the word storge, which refers to love from familiarity and similarity. The relationship puts the emphasis on friendship above everything else, including the sexual component, and the relationship is borne of a bond of understanding rather than physical attraction. It is one end of the extreme spectrum of balance between emotional and physical, placing the entire emphasis on an emotional bond.

 

The best example I can think of off hand are in home caregivers, where it's not entirely uncommon for hired caregivers to develop feelings for the people they take care of. This would generally be a storgic relationship.

 

The problem most people would encounter is the lack of passion, which really comes more from a sexual attraction and focus, and this can lead to boredom.

 

 

On the far end opposite storge, you have relationships that revolve entirely around a sexual component (such as trophy wives), where the focus is (almost) entirely on a physical bond with little to no emotional bond.

 

I figure the norm is some balance between the two extremes, so you need more than friendship, you need a physical bond as well, so you shouldn't expect a romance to develop as an extension of friendship, because there is no expectation that you fill the other criteria needed for a relationship of that sort.

 

EDIT: actually, the good people at wikipedia have a list of 6 styles. You don't neccesarily have to agree with the classifications, but it seems like a reasonable classification of how people love to me. Eros would be what I was talking about as 'normal':

• Eros – a passionate physical and emotional love based on aesthetic enjoyment; stereotype of romantic love
  
• Ludus – a love that is played as a game or sport; conquest; may have multiple partners at once
  
• Storge – an affectionate love that slowly develops from friendship, based on similarity (kindred to Philia)
  
• Pragma – love that is driven by the head, not the heart; undemonstrative
  
• Mania – obsessive love; experience great emotional highs and lows; very possessive and often jealous lovers
  
• Agape – selfless altruistic love
  

Pragma was the one that really jumped out at me (as in pragmatic love). Not the one for me, but an interesting concept. And as clairifcation, you could also add Philia to the list itself, which would also be considered "true friendship". A friendship so deep that it is itself love. If that makes sense to anyone else.

[Ginger_Warrior]

I think so, but wouldn't that be more Platonic? Love which is inherently non-sexual? (although sex does happen between people who are 'just friends' too, it's generally accepted as a no-go area)

[Randox]

I think so, but wouldn't that be more Platonic? Love which is inherently non-sexual? (although sex does happen between people who are 'just friends' too, it's generally accepted as a no-go area)

A storgic relationship is sexual, it's just...imagine being such goof friends with someone, who is likely very similar to you, that you want to spend the rest of your life with them; because your such good friends. It goes beyond friendship, but it is each others company, conversation, and time together that drive the relationship, not physical pleasures. Those are just a bonus on the side. Wikipedia has a decent explanation and it's not the one that list links too, it's the one that list is from, found here, though be warned, it almost sounds like a fortune cookie. It's still a decent overview of the what the six categories sort of stand for.

[Ginger_Warrior]

EDIT: Oh, nevermind. Confused myself thinking philia and storge were two different things. Didn't read the bracket in the bullet point list. >_<

[obfuscator]

I don't think there's such a think as a completely non-sexual male-female interaction (assuming both parties are straight and not related).

[Randox]

Yes and no. As best as I can tell, Storge when used to refer to a sexual relationship puts the specific emphasis on homogamy, or similarity. Philia puts the specific emphasis on familiarity. But yes, for all intents and purposes Philia is a storgic relationship.

 

And obfuscator, I would agree with that. We are wired to evaluate peoples physical status sure, but it doesn't have to be the cause behind entering a relationship, even under totally voluntary circumstances.