The Friendzone

The friendzone is a place you chose to be.

Harsh? Maybe. But I’ve been in it more times than I’d like to admit, and every time I can trace it back to something I did, or didn’t do.

You’ve got feelings for her. She’s got a buddy. You want more and you settle for less, because less feels safer than asking.

F*ck that.

There are two ways out, and they are the only two.

• You change what you’re doing, early enough for it to matter.

• You ask, hear the answer, and leave.

Everything else is waiting. And waiting is how you got here.

There was one girl I thought I had a real connection with. We hung out all the time. We texted constantly. When she needed someone, I was there, every time, no questions.

So I tried to take it further.

“You’re such a good friend.”

Kick in the gut. I’d spent months building the case for a relationship and she’d spent the same months filing me under mates.

It felt like sh*t. It also taught me the only lesson in this post that matters: if you want something more, you have to act like it from the start. Not after six months of being her unpaid therapist.

Marshall Fine called the friendzone a penalty box. The place you get sent when you aren’t unobtainable enough. Not because you’re ugly. Because you’re always there.

I think that’s the whole thing in one line.

Robert Cialdini put the mechanism in Influence back in 1984 and called it scarcity. The harder something is to get, the more we want it. People queue for the restaurant with no tables and ignore the one with the waiter stood outside.

You, at her beck and call, are the waiter stood outside.

So pull back. Not all the way to the other end, where she can’t reach you and stops trying. Just far enough that your time is something she has to ask for.

Don’t drop everything when she calls. Have a life she isn’t in the middle of. I wrote about the version of me who couldn’t do that in Neediness, and it cost me more than one good girl.

Every time I ended up in the box, it was one of five things. Usually three of them at once.

She doesn’t know

You’ve never said. You act like a friend, so she treats you like one. This isn’t her being cruel, it’s her reading the only signal you’ve sent.

Mark Manson’s Models is the one book I’d point you at here, and its point is simple: say what you want. It’s risky. It’s a lot less risky than another year of this.

You’re always available

Covered above. The penalty box has a door, and you’re the one who keeps walking back in.

You need her approval

Checking everything you say against how she’ll take it. Agreeing when you don’t. Never once disagreeing with her, because disagreeing feels like a risk to the friendship.

It’s a turn-off. I don’t need a study to tell you that, and I don’t have one, so I won’t pretend. Think about who you were attracted to and whether any of them were asking your permission.

You’ve become one of the girls

The gossip. The oversharing. Hearing about the lad she’s seeing and offering advice on him. You’re not a man she might sleep with. You’re a safe place to talk about the men she might.

There’s no tension

Friendship and attraction aren’t the same thing, and one doesn’t grow into the other on its own. If you’ve never flirted, never teased her, never held eye contact a beat too long, never touched her arm, there is nothing for her to feel.

I covered the touch side in Touch. Small, comfortable, and respectful. A hand on the arm, not a grab.

If you’re not sure whether you’re in the box, you’re in the box. But here’s the checklist I wish someone had handed me.

• She tells you about other men she fancies.

• She’s tried to set you up with her mate.

• She calls you “bro”, or worse, “like a brother”.

• Every hangout is a group hangout. Never just the two of you.

• You flirt and it bounces off. No reaction either way.

• No touch. Not a hug that lasts, not a hand, nothing.

• She isn’t jealous. You mention a date and she’s pleased for you.

• You’re not in her future plans, and she’s never asked about yours.

One of these, fine. Four of these and you’re her confidant, not her lover.

And there’s a sixth reason, which is the one nobody wants to hear.

Sometimes it isn’t about being too nice or too available. You’re just not a match, beyond friendship, and she worked it out before you did. Don’t take it personally. It isn’t a verdict on you. It’s a verdict on the pair of you.

Already stuck? There are three moves, and they go in order.

Stop being the nice guy. Not rude, just not endlessly available. You are a backup plan at the moment, not a priority, and nobody falls for a backup plan.

Create distance. Step back. See other people, actually see them, not as a tactic. Give her space to notice you’re not there and work out what that means to her.

Then have the conversation. Be direct. Tell her what you want and ask what she wants. If she’s not into it, walk away.

Maybe later means never.

I know that line hurts. I’ve had it said to me and I spent months reading it as a maybe. It isn’t. It’s a no from someone who likes you too much to say it plainly. I wrote about that fog in Ambiguity.

Prevention beats cure, and it’s a lot less painful.

Be clear early. Hiding your feelings behind friendship rarely works and never works well.

Ask her on an actual date. Say the word. Hanging out is for friends, and if you let it be hanging out, that’s what you’ll be.

Flirt. Tease her. Hold eye contact, then break it first sometimes. Keep a bit of yourself back, so there’s something left for her to be curious about. Don’t text her every dull thing that happens in your day.

And look for mutual interest. If she isn’t showing any, stop chasing. Attraction has a shelf life, and the longer you wait, the more of it you’ve spent being her friend.

Stop doing the same thing and expecting her to change her mind.

If you want out, change what you’re doing. Be clear, be a bit less available, and make the move.

And if it doesn’t work, respect yourself enough to leave. That’s the bit I kept getting wrong.