What is it? How did you get in it? How to get out.
So the “friend zone” is pretty much a familiar term to most people under 50. You are interested in someone romantically but they do not reciprocate the feeling. Although you think of yourself as very compatible in that fashion they do not. They in fact see you as a peer, a companion, a friend but that’s it and to you that isn’t far enough. You’ve reached the limit that this relationship will go and even though you want it to progress farther it won’t. To you it feels as though you’ve been unfairly imprisoned.
Now before you get all excited about this being a new phenomenon be assured that the friend zone has been around since time immemorial and poets and writers have wasted reams of paper, gallons of ink, and now countless blog pages on the subject. They of course didn’t call it “the friend zone” way back when. People would call it “being lovelorn” or “unrequited love”. So don’t think it will be a weird subject for you to discuss with older people or even with your parents. They know all about it.
And lest you think that the “friend zone” only happens to glass wearing nerds or fat kids consider Gone With the Wind. Scarlett O’Hara pretty much “friend zones” Rhett Butler through a good-sized chunk of the movie (yes, I know the book is totally different) and heck, Ashley Wilkes “friend zones” Scarlett most of the time too. So pretty people can be “friend zoned” too.
Also, guys I hate to break it to you but the “friend zone” covers both genders. Men also do this to women in their lives as well. This condition crosses racial, religious, cultural, and sexual preference lines as well. The “friend zone” is ubiquitous as far as the human experience goes. However, for the ease of writing I will approach this mainly from a guy’s perspective.
What to do about it? Wait, back up and let’s see how you got in this mess in the first place. You saw “her” from across a crowded room (or website nowadays) and you were instantly smitten. I’ve found that “love at first sight” instances can more often than not lead to cases of “friend zoning”.
Reason takes a back seat to passion and you become instantly obsessed with that special someone. You’re heart beats an odd rhythm, your blood pressure varies, and you feel odd. It’s no wonder that some physicians of the middle ages considered romantic love to be some sort of mental illness (although this may be apocryphal I’ve heard it quoted various times). The other person on the other hand doesn’t notice a thing. You will probably highlight this moment in your life, to them it’s a Thursday and they had chicken salad for lunch.
Next you go about doing various things to catch her eye. Eventually she acknowledges your presence and you think that you’ve made a breakthrough. You get to talking and as far as you’re concerned things are going quite well. It’s then that things take a turn. Your increased attention doesn’t seem to be reciprocated as much as you expected. She in fact had lots of other guys in her life and things aren’t progressing the way that you thought that they would.
So at this point a normal guy would take a gamble and approach her to see if she wanted to go out on a date or if she felt the same way about you and if not then that’s where the story should end but instead you stay silent.
So why do you stay silent? I mean if this person means that much to you, as you claim that they do, why don’t you say anything? My conclusion is fear of being publicly embarrassed (or at least what you perceive as public). No, seriously. People have done various things to avoid embarrassment. They have avoided reporting crimes, betrayed their country, even committed suicide rather than face embarrassment. So it stands to reason that they would rather keep quiet than to feel embarrassed in case that their suit is rejected. I will touch upon this aspect a little more further down.
So you stay silent and sulk and alternate between feelings of deep passion and resentful anger. Toxic. This affects your concentration at work, your digestion will be off, you will be miserable and exhausted from shifting emotions all the time. Not a nice place to be.
Eventually though something happens. Some other suitor will come along and speak up and sweep her off her feet and definitively close off all your avenues of opportunities. You will feel quietly miserable and mope. Perhaps someone else may catch your eye and prove that your obsession was merely puppy love and you will probably start the cycle all over again.
So you say that neither of those outcomes appeals to you. How then do you get out of the “friend zone”?
I’ve read various magazine articles and watched several YouTube videos on the subject. They mainly deal with ideas such as to become more aloof and less attentive to the person that you want to woo in order to elicit a reaction, or to mirror their actions, or to dress more provocatively or other somewhat childish ploys.
Less popular and touched upon is the idea of self-improvement to change yourself into what they like. Self improvement is fine for its own sake but if you use it for this sort of thing then it’s really just another ploy.
As I said above you could just speak up and get it over with but again there’s that public embarrassment thing to consider. Here I would like to address the person on the other end of the equation. If someone comes to you and professes their feelings and you reject them please do not go around gossiping about it.
Firstly it’s not nice, secondly it’s a private matter between two people and thirdly you don’t know what will happen. Most of the time the other person will go off with crushed feelings and slowly get over it but some reactions can get extreme and range from suicide to violently lashing out. Making a rejection a public affair will make an extreme reaction that much more likely. So unless you feel that your life or their life is in danger, keep it to yourself.
Getting back to getting out of the friend zone, you can try all sorts of tricks to get out of it. Ultimately though you need to realize that the “friend zone” has no geographic boundaries. The “friend zone” is not even an idea shared between you and her. It only exists inside your own mind. You chose to enter it and you are your own jailer and can choose to release yourself whenever you want.
To see the prison that you’ve made for yourself is to leave it.
Recent Comments