Travis Tackles Relationships VI

I'm torn about something. You see, in terms of relationships, I've long be a huge believer that "they either like you, or they don't". Meaning, if they're into you, it's pretty hard for you to screw it up. They might play a little hard to get, maybe make you jump through a few hoops, but really, your margin for error is pretty wide. You can say the wrong thing - even do the wrong thing - but you'll still be hard pressed to change a girl that is into you, into one that is not. In fact, based on some of the horror stories that I've heard of first or second dates - where I couldn't believe that afterwards the girl was even still talking to the guy, let alone that she was actually still smitten with him - I've almost come to believe that if a girl likes you, you'd almost have to be actively trying to turn her off in order to actually do so.

On the other end of the spectrum, if she's doesn't like you, no matter how much time and energy and effort you put into it, you're just not going to win a girl over. Not truly. You might get a date or two, maybe even get to see her naked, but in the end, she hasn't really been 'won over' so much as she simply 'gave in'. And this is hard for most guys to accept. Society has sort of built us these weird expectations - almost a sense of entitlement - where a guy believes that if you work hard enough at something, you deserve it. If you put your time in - if you try really hard - eventually a girl will have to like you. It's only fair, right? But that's just not true. If she's not into you, she's not into you. Fair or not, there just isn't a whole lot that can be done to change that.

Look, you can tell when someone likes you. If you can't, you're just not paying attention. The problem is, a lot of guys mistake getting no signals at all for her not having made her mind up yet. When in reality, no signals almost always means no interest. Sure, some girls make it clear right away that they have no interest (this is when most insecure guys start tossing around the term 'bitch') but most girls just give you nothing at all. It's their way of being polite. Us dudes have pretty fragile egos, and at the end of the day, if every girl we met let us know right away that they weren't interested, we'd all be on prozac by the age of fifteen. By the time we were forty, we wouldn't even be able to leave the house. Every one of us would just be a weeping mess, huddled in the basement, paralyzed by the realization of just how many women have absolutely no interest in us on a day-to-day basis. Ignorance is bliss. But ignorance also breeds naivety, and that's why so many guys mistake a girl that gives them no signals as an invitation to try and win her over.

I don't have much of an ego, and as such, I've never really been one to bother when a girl has shown no interest. It has always just seemed like a fruitless endeavour to me. I mean, what's going to happen? I'll show you that I'm not such a bad dude, that I can crack a few jokes, get a few laughs, treat you with respect and pick up the cheque at the end of a meal? None of that really changes the fact that you're not into me. Sure, you want those qualities in a guy - every girl does - but those qualities alone can't make up for an inherent lack of interest. And a girl fooled into trying to think otherwise is just settling at best. And I don't want to be 'settled for'.

The philosophy is simple: why would I want to be with someone that doesn't really want to be with me? I'm sure I could wear down a girl over time. I'm sure I could convince one that I'm worthy of a date or two. Heck, I could even guilt someone into thinking they're shallow for not being willing to date a guy like me, when they claim to only want a nice guy at the end of the day. All of these strategies have worked for countless guys on countless girls for countless years. Yet I just can't get past the whole 'a girl shouldn't need to be convinced/tricked/guilted/worn down' philosophy. Sure, it's resulted in a lot less dating for me than most other guys. And, yes, I'm very aware of that. I'm also aware that if I'd just relax my stance on it a bit, I'd have a lot more success. Especially in the short term. But that's just not me. Sure. it's lead to some pretty lonely nights over the years, but at the end of the day, I've made my decision, and I accept the consequences.

Why then, am I so torn? What could have possibly changed to make me question the philosophy that I have lived by for pretty much my entire life?

Well, the exception to the rule, of course.

Over the past couple of years, I have seen enough cases of girls who initially had no interest in a guy, be worn down and eventually won over, to the point where I'll be attending the wedding of one this summer, and have had to watch another try and heal her broken heart after the relationship fell apart. Maybe I'm wrong - maybe I misread the path it took to get there - but in both cases I was given the distinct impression that neither girl was that into the guy to begin with. And seeing as how both relationships saw the girls both fall legitimately in love, maybe my whole philosophy is completely misguided.

Can a woman be won over? Or were these just a few of the rare cases in which the guy had so many good qualities, but they were hidden far enough beneath the surface, that it was less a 'wearing down' and more of a 'once you got to know me…' situation.

I don't know. I'd like to think that I would be a prime candidate to win a girl over with the whole 'once you got to know me…' thing. But obviously that can never happen if I shut down at the first sign that there's no interest. That said, there's been ladies that have 'got to know me' over the years, that have still never wavered in their complete lack of romantic interest. In a lot of cases, that's been just fine, and even preferable (see: the last few posts on 'Guy/Girl Friendships'). But I'll admit, sometimes I think to myself "man, this girl knows me, and has still never shown any sign of interest…" And while that's a good thing - I mean, I wouldn't want them to be interested, seeing as how in most cases I'm not interested back, and would hate to deal with the fallout and awkwardness that such feelings on their part would create - by the same token, it doesn't exactly have me brimming with confidence when dealing with ladies that I am interested in either.

In fact, sheepishly, I will admit, my ego sometimes gets a little bruised by it. I mean, I'd like to think that I'm a good dude. So, if any woman can be worn down, shouldn't I have inadvertently done so by now to a few of my female friends? Again, I'm glad I haven't, but still, seeing as how it's never happened, I sometimes wonder if maybe I'm not such a good dude after all. I mean, I know I'm not great. But I've always assumed that I was at least a little bit good.

But maybe everyone assumes that - even the complete assholes. They might be completely wrong, but I'm sure on some level they must think they're decent people, right? Even if they know that they're a dick some of the time, they wouldn't be able to live with themselves unless they thought the good outweighed the bad. So, maybe I'm not as good a dude as I like to think I am. Maybe I'm just another asshole whose ego is so big that he assumes that he's a good guy.

Or maybe, in the end, it's just as simple as: they're either into you, or they're not.