Girl Advice From a Girl

Chapter 2

   So let's start at the very beginning of it all – friendship. Making friends starts from the toddler days of toy-sharing, and is pretty much the basis of every relationship in our lives – especially romantic ones. Like almost everything else, relationships go in stages – strangers to acquaintances, acquaintances to friends, friends to lovers – that's how it's meant to be, at least theoretically. We kinda like to skip steps nowadays, don't we? Then sometimes we want to wonder why things don't work out, when it's probably because we tend to rush them.

   Platonic relationships are at the foundation of any relationship. Without knowing it, it is here that we start narrowing down the options for prospective life partners. It is at this point that we slowly but surely begin to decide on which traits we find or don't find desirable in a partner. Where a girl decides what her ideal partner would be like and a guy begins to compile the checklist for his. At this point there's no such thing as "signs" or "signals." We just befriend people who share similar interests, and establish connections in the most rudimentary ways possible. It really is a thing of beauty. Of course, then there is that one platonic relationship that goes into uncharted territory, one that because it seems a little more special than all the rest – a little different than all the rest – is classified as a "crush." A crush is an integral part of relationship development for so many reasons. It's the first peek we have at this crazy little thing we call love, and it's borne out of things as trivial as sharing lunch, allowing someone to cut in line, and letting someone use the swings first. A crush is basically the most innocent view of romantic love, and ironically, it appears that it is this innocent, simplistic love that most people seem to search for their entire lives. But I also think a crush is designed to teach us a lesson. There are two possible outcomes: either you become companions – because words like "boyfriend," "girlfriend," "couple," and "relationship" seem like such big titles for such a considerably small commitment (heck, even commitment sounds too big); or you land in a zone.

    We all know the zones – some of us far too well. The friend zone, the best friend zone, the sibling zone – we all have to end up in one of them at some point, they're about as inevitable as crushes are. It's like the Murphy's Law of relationships – if you can end up in the friend zone, you will. Sad, but true. Zones happen for a bunch of reasons that all come back to that partner selection process. For example, a girl might have it in her mind that she's looking for a certain type of guy. Unless the guy who plans to approach her fits the bill, he has about as much chance of being her boyfriend as there is for ice-cream in a 450-degree oven. Guys do it too. Then of course there are all the excuses we use: "I'm not ready for a relationship," "I was just being nice," "I'm not looking for anything serious right now." These same people we see mere weeks later with hearts in their status messages, or canoodling with someone else. Yep, the friend zone is a fairly painful place to be.

  So how and why do we land in the friend zone? It's a simple case of a crush not returning our 'affections.' Sadly, we tend to make up in our minds that nice gestures and things of that ilk mean that there's something special going on. Needless to say, this is probably where the concept of 'signs and signals' starts. I mean, any guy that lends a girl his GameBoy Advance© equipped with full batteries and Pokémon Red must be in like with her, right? Seriously, because no guy does that – at least that's how a girl would see it. It all definitely begins with looks though. We tend to crush on the people who we (...and oftentimes everyone else) find attractive. After that, it's mostly our imaginations that fuel the fire – if he smiles at you a lot, if she's really nice to you. Unfortunately, more often than not there's nothing more there than a good friend, especially when you aren't their crush. So girls like little miss GameBoy© end up hearing stuff like "I love you like a little sister;" while guys who fall for a smile get the dreaded "you're such a good friend," or worse, "I wish more guys were like you." (Dear females, on behalf of all dudes everywhere, that's the type of thing that creates super villains).

   Friend zones are based around a truth that none of us seems willing to accept. (Thank you Hollywood chick flicks, teen dramas and romance novels). You can't force someone to like you – furthermore to love you. Funny how we seem to be able to accept that when it applies to making friends, but not when it comes to love interests. Deep down, there's always a little bit of hope that what we are feeling will be reciprocated, we can't help it. Nonetheless, it's still really not as simple as embracing the truth. There are emotions and things involved that complicate the process; because if we could just accept the truth, there'd probably be a lot of rather disinterested people in the world.

   So, remember that minute part of each of us that has now come to life? Well, it too picks up some lessons from the friend zone – and they're not necessarily all good. See, now we've created a hierarchy in which we subconsciously place all of our love interests that essentially dictates which persons we approach. The hierarchy equates the so-called "drop dead gorgeous" people who seem utterly perfect to us and for us with the unattainable top tier, who we 'don't deserve;' and the nice but noticeably less attractive people with the more accessible partners who we aren't quick to love but probably "deserve" in the lower tiers – because the crush who turned you down has now given you this idea that anyone like him/her will inevitably follow suit. Just like that, in the very first steps to love, we become more guarded, and less fearless­.