The Friendzone: Why does it exist?
Lets dive into this teenage dilemma together.
Introduction
We all know the common tale.
A guy likes a girl. They start out as friends.
They start becoming closer. They become best friends.
The guy tells the girl how he truly feels. The girl does not reciprocate.
The guy fades away and the friendship is broken.
This has been a recurring theme around me and in movies I’ve watched ever since I was little. What is this phenomenon and why does it happen?
Confidence
In the past few decades, young men have become less and less confident in themselves (I will leave the reason for a future article). This has made it less likely for a guy to be direct to a girl about his feelings.
The guy wants to play it safe. He wants to plan everything out and to make sure everything goes perfectly between them.
However, it rarely works out, does it? Why is that?
Before I start getting accused of generalizing too much, I want to clarify that I am taking the typical American teen movie characters. Girl likes bad guys and view nice guys as platonic squids; let's dive into this.
Bad guys are usually over-confident even though they don’t have much to be confident about.
Meanwhile, nice guys are shy and are too afraid of offending or upsetting the girl. They want to avoid conflict as much as possible and prefer to play it safe.
It’s not really whether you are a nice guy or a bad guy. It’s whether you’re confident or not.
Girls fall to the facade of confidence bad guys give off. These relationships never last, because the girl eventually realizes it was all talk.
Meanwhile, the nice guy that has a lot to be confident about never shows it. He keeps it hidden because he doesn’t want to copy the “bad guy”. However, it is not copying!
People like confidence whether it’s a guy or a girl. What we need to avoid is over-confidence and arrogance. We need to be humble yet confident in what we offer.
So, next time you as a nice guy like a girl, make a move! Don’t wait until all the stars align or the girl will assume you’re not interested and consider your feelings platonic. (To clarify, by make a move I mean to ask her out on a date, not a sexual move)
As for the case when a girl truly is not interested. That’s fine! It happens. You tried and failed; it happens every day! One day, you’ll meet a girl that reciprocates these feelings and the value you bring to the table.
The most important thing is to work on yourself and become a person you are happy to be.
Important Distinction
Let me make one last distinction. Being happy with the person you are is not the same as being a person you are happy to be.
Assholes and criminals might be happy with the person they are no matter how twisted it is. This is not what we want.
If you are unhappy with the person you are, work towards improving yourself until you’re content. You will gain confidence.
If you don’t like yourself, how can you expect people to like you?
So, why does the friendzone exist?
To teach people that fall into it to become confident and to grow capable of handling rejection with a smile on their faces. Being rejected doesn’t mean something is wrong with you (being accepted doesn’t mean there’s nothing wrong either).
Thank you for reading this article. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to edit it perfectly due to not having my laptop with me. If you’d like to read more thoughts like this, feel free to follow me!
