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More Help for Singles! Why You're still Single; and some preliminary-to-reading-it reflections on the general subject
I've said what I think about He's Just Not That Into You. I enjoyed reading it and found it amusing, but Lord knows I don't think it should be taken as a guide for women who have it halfway together and want to "find someone." If I had followed that advice, I doubt I'd ever have married. Instead, I did every single thing that the book warns against and....yeah, I had no trouble getting married, ladies. Even in middle-age.
The immense success of the book has naturally spawned other relationship guides by people who wish to question the book's main premises or to cash in on the book's success.
[1] Why You're Still Single.
A book in the first category is Why You're Still Single: Things Your Friends Would Tell You if You Promised Not to Get Mad. The book is of particular interest to me because one of the coauthors is the author of the blog Frolic and Detour, which I often read, as well as other writings listed here. Some time ago, she wrote an impassioned response to He's Just Not That Into You. You can read it here. While in some respects this seems to be a stronger reaction than a book that is classified as "Humor" at my local Books A Million really warrants, her analysis of the book's main thesis strikes me as accurate and her objections as absolutely on point.
The 'manifesto,' so-called, for Why You're Still Single is printed here. And speaking as a very ordinary someone who hasn't had much trouble finding love, I don't see very much there that anyone could argue with. In fact, if the philosophy were printed on paper I'd get out my fountain pen expressly so I could write "how true!" in the margin. I would really like to see how this philosophy translates into actual advice to the single in search of a relationship. What I mean is: I am LOOKING FORWARD to seeing this, as I shall certainly buy a copy (because in any case I want to support the work of a writer whose writing I always enjoy).
[2] But sometimes it really IS your ass.
At the end of the day, though, I am bemused by the fact that people think it's possible to write an all-purpose relationship guide that is the same for everyone. Furthermore, it's quite clear to me that most of the relationship guides reach their conclusions about what behaviors are or are not productive in a relationship without delving much into the source.
For example, the Why You're Still Single "manifesto" states:
You do not need to obsess over the size of your ass. Walking around the mall will show you that love is not a privilege of the glamorous. What you do need to do is navigate the societal brambles about women's looks and make peace with the idea of physical attraction without developing a crippling neurosis about it.
For the above sentence to be true, as in generally true, it would have to be heavily qualified. E.g., "You do not need to obsess over the size of your ass if you are the sort of woman who is attracted to men who are not bothered by the size of your ass." The second sentence is true, assuming this qualification.
And this is exactly where all relationship books go wrong: in failing to recognize---and to require readers to recognize---that in searching for a relationship, most people are looking for love among other things. To know whether it's worth your while to pursue a relationship (or to remain in one) you need to understand what other things in addition to love your potential partner is looking for. If you can't provide them, it's best to move on----not to avoid 'chasing' someone but because you are going to be wasting your time if you do.
The 'obsessing about your ass' advice is right only if the man you've decided you're in love with doesn't care about the size of your ass (and many men could not care less).
But every man everywhere has some qualities he thinks are essential to the woman he falls in love with and feels entitled to require. Contestants on dating shows use the repulsive phrase "the whole package" to express the bundled set of attributes that they would require in a mate. If the guy on whom you have set your sights has very specific criteria for the loved one's ass size, and you can't meet them, you will either have to change your ass or show him an abundance of other qualities that are at least EQUALLY HIGH on his list of criteria----that is, if you still think it's worth it.
Women get very torqued about the shallowness of men in general but women also have criteria, though many of them don't seem to know it or know what their criteria are. The fact that women deny subjecting men to the same sort of scrutiny may simply mean that their criteria aren't being consciously applied---and in some cases, this may be because their criteria make even less sense than something along the lines of 'long blond hair, great rack').
"Why do so many nice women end up with assholes?" is a question so often asked that I have to believe that there are some women who simply don't have any requirements for men to have such qualities as, say, good character or rectitude. Qualities such as "wealthy", "drives a great car," or "has two second homes" (actual quote!) obviously are more important to quite a few women than "has a steady job" or "kind and sincere"; and none of those qualities is more or less shallow than "great rack. [The disproportionately attractive young wife of one of the world's wealthy men was recently asked on some talk show or other whether she'd have married said much older billionaire if he did not have all that money. "Do you think he'd have married me if I didn't look like this?" she replied.]
So sometimes, you know, it really IS your ass. The question is whether you are going to take that as your cue to do something about it.
The truth is that your degree of hottness marries to some men and at all to others. Furthermore, physical appearance matters MORE to some men who care about appearance than to others. Before you decide that your looks are the problem, you really need to know the guy.
And if you find out that your looks ARE the problem, your Aunti Damozel would recommend that you think twice before you attempt to fix it in order to please someone else's finicking standards. Sometimes the solution is to move on. I would submit that if the problem is that the person thinks you are not quite beautiful enough you should ALWAYS move on. Why should you allow yourself to be tweaked to fit someone else's image of what you should be?
Here is something I know is not true: that all mean have the same standards of attractiveness. No doubt many or most or all men would agree about the attractiveness of certain women; and doubtless a percentage of men would only find a woman attractive if she meets certain very specific requirements, but a host of men are much more flexible in their notion of what is attractive. A very good-looking young friend of mine recently told me that intelligence and good conversation make women attractive to him when he encounters them; while not averse to dating someone very beautiful, he doesn't stick around with the ones who bore him or who aren't interested in talking to him. More men think that way than is generally recognized.
[3] Should you get a makeover?
Based on experience, I do NOT think it is possible or rational for me to reconstruct myself to meet another person's specifications. I tried that too once. The man in question started out thinking, as he put it, that I had "potential"---a bad, bad sign in a personal as opposed to a professional context---but that I just needed a bit of tweaking to be worthy of him. After the tweaking turned into an overhaul---some of it painful, expensive, and inconvenient----he realized that I just couldn't make the grade. I felt really bad about it for awhile. Then I found someone who liked me the way I looked after I'd let the haircut grow out, dispensed with the fake nails, started eating regular meals, and taken to buying cosmetics at the drugstore again).
But that's just me. Suppose I were someone else much younger; suppose the object of my affection asked only that I have more of whatever physical qualities he values than anyone else; suppose that he was my absolute specific ideal and could offer me fame and money and all that goes with it; and suppose that all that stood between me and my goal was some major reconstruction and hair extensions. Would I invest the time and money in a 'makeover'? Well, no, I wouldn't, not at this stage of my life. But you might.
But only if you are right that the problem is your looks will your makeover fix the problem. And in my opinion, a woman's appearance may be a problem, but it is almost never the only problem. I remember a very critical boyfriend who didn't like my clothes, my make-up, or my hair, all of which I changed at his behest, only to have him tell me "I really don't know if I can put up with your epilepsy." Which is when I dumped him.
[4] Coping with rejection: how I became an expert.
I don't have any statistics to prove it, but I SUSPECT that it's self-defeating to allow yourself to become besotted with someone whose idea of an ideal mate is someone else. I've had more than one such experience. At one point and for several months, I developed an extreme crush on a charming man who was still fixated on his ex-wife. He was not in love with her, exactly, but somehow he couldn't envision being with someone who didn't look like her or act like her. We didn't look alike, and I didn't WANT to look like her, since he routinely referred to her as "that fat cow." She was also pretty much of a bitch toward him; and say what you like about me, I am almost always nice to people I like. Interestingly, the guy did have room in his bundle of specs for women who didn't look like his wife, but unfortunately these women didn't look like me either (and I was plenty cute then; shut up.)
I convinced myself that if I stuck around he would eventually see my MANY WONDERFUL QUALITIES; but the fact is, he could see them perfectly well to start with; they just did NOT register with him as "wonderful." The things that I have to offer were not the things this particular guy particularly wanted. He wanted SOMETHING ELSE. And honestly, if I could have worked out what to change to be the person he was looking for, I probably would have tried.
And it would have been futile; because---though he liked me and liked talking to me---he had already made up his mind.
Here is where He's Just Not That Into You book WOULD have helped me: the point at which he said, "I'll be honest with you; I really like you, Damozel, and if I lived nearer to you, I'd probably see you. But I just can't handle a two hour drive on the weekends."
I thought, "Hey, he said he really likes me!" and carried on trying to persuade him to come see me anyway, hoping against hope that he would have such a fantastic time (despite evidence to the contrary) that he would totally change his mind. Which didn't happen because he wasn't willing to do the driving and which wouldn't have happened even if he had been willing. He really just wasn't that into me----not because I did the running (or as Behrendt calls it, the 'chasing')--- but because he had worked out that I wasn't the one. He wasn't looking for evidence to the contrary. He had decided he needed to look elsdewhere.
Fortunately, though I tried for awhile to change his perception, I didn't give up trying to meet someone who would, you know, actually like me. In the end, I did find someone.
Mind you, to find him I had to spend time not only with Peter (the guy who wasn't interested in me) but also with a lot of other guys who were looking for someone who was not me. I also had to spend time with guys I knew from the start were not for me. It's just part of the process.
In othre words, the process took a lot of time and took a lot of work. It meant a lot of wasted evenings. But if you're starting from scratch, that's sometimes what it takes. I wanted companionship, and I was active and systematic in looking for it. In between, I dated a lot of guys I'd call 'losers' (if I really believed that the fact that a guy doesn't do it for me makes him a loser). I also dated a lot of guys who could have applied the same label to me (and probably did).
I had to put up with quite a lot of awkward hemming and hawing from men who needed to convey that it just wasn't on. A friend of mine asked me how I could stand all the rejection. Some rejections were more painful than others, of course. Rejection by that guy I had the crush on was disappointing. It was disappointing for someone I liked to decide that my "package" didn't contain anything of continuing interest to him---in fact, not enough to make him feel like making the effort to give things a chance.
On the whole, though, the worst feeling I had during this period was occasional disappointment. While I was as insecure as the next woman, I managed to force myself to be realistic. I had to be realistic about myself and what I had to offer. I knew, for example, that my degree of physical attractiveness was a point on which reasonable men could differ. Some men found me attractive; some did not. It helped (though not as much as you'd think) to remind myself that I'd been married; so at least one man had found me attractive enough. Other than that, I'd not received that much attention from men.
In other words, I alllowed myself to acknowledge that I was an acquired taste that not every guy might wish to acquire.
So it wasn't easy and it definitely wasn't fun. I remember a married friend saying to me, "I want to have YOUR life", meaning the continually meeting new men, which somehow I must have made sound exciting. I fell over laughing, because---and a lot of women who aren't good at being single can identify with this----I didn't want my life. That was sort of the point of the dating
But eventually---I reiterate---after a lot of trouble and a certain amount discomfort, I met someone. At which point things changed. Because here's the thing: if somebody is interested and sees potentail in you AND if he is looking for the same thing you are, then Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo are right: he WILL go to all sorts of trouble to make things happen.
For guys who were interested in me, a long drive was nothing. For about nine months I dated a guy who drove up every weekend from a city in the central part of the state. Don, the guy I eventually married, was also from another city. While I won't say they didn't mind driving, both of them did it on a regular basis. It was an inconvenience to them, but not a drawback.
One way that you will know the difference between someone who is seriously interested in getting closer to you is that he (or she) will be willing to take a certain amount of trouble to do it. Or even a LOT of trouble. (After Don died, when I remarried, Nick moved across the ocean to marry me.) So I agree with Behrendt and Tuccillo that guys who are part of the particular pool (however small) of guys who might be interested in a relationship WILL take trouble. I know this because the men I've been seriously involved with have taken trouble for me.
I realiize that this sounds a bit smug. I do not mean for it to. Here is my description at the time Nick married me: 43, ordinary looking, quirky, far from well off, and, as noted above, afflicted with an unfixable neurological disorder that some men found embarrassing.
The difference between me and women I know who are sitting home alone is that I wasn't afraid of rejection or of boring or awful dates---or at least was no more afraid of them then never having a partner at all. I made up my mind before I started that I could cope with the fact that a lot of the men I'd be meeting would have had requirements for their own potential partners that I couldn't fulfill. But I realized also the the reverse was also true. While I certainly didn't enjoy the many, many awkward dates, they didn't kill me or anything. And in the end, persistence paid off every time.
[5] Nuh-uh at first sight: that visceral "Nope."
It helped also that I'd had my heart broken pretty thoroughly a couple of times (not counting my divorce). I was very certain that I didn't want any more of the same, and so I was willing to hold back feeling anything too powerful till I met someone who seemed as if he wanted to feel the same way about me as I wanted to feel about him. For both partners to want to feel the same is key if you don't want to risk ending up in one of those relationships that He's Just Not that Into You is talking about.
But even if someone seems disposed to fall for you, you need to consider in your turn 'the whole package.' A couple of times I made the mistake of dating someone I didn't want to admit I didn't actually want to be around just because he seemed to like me, and dating someone who liked me was easier than continuing to search for someone about whom I'd feel the same way.
Just as other people have standards that they will apply to you, you have your own standards, and your own sense of what you want out of a relationship or your life. It's important to apply them and it's important to be honest with yourself.
Revulsion at the outset is a MAJOR red flag, people. Did you know that? I'm talking about whatever you'd call the opposite of "Love at first sight." It's that feeling of "Nuh-uh" at first sight, or as soon afterward as amounts to first sight. When you feel that happen, PAY ATTENTION. That's the part of yourself that knows and can't speak sending a message to the part that's driving the car: "Don't slow donw!"
Sometimes it's completely understandable: the person reminds you of your sixth grade teacher (happened to me), smells like dirty socks (happened to me), or dresses in a way you can't for whatever reason deal with (like the really handsome and intelligent guy who showed up for a date wearing all suede including a stupid suede hat with a freaking feather). Sometimes it can be something the person totally cannot help, like his voice (I am thinking of a nice Irishman I met who sounded like the Lucky Charms Leprechaun).
And sometimes the visceral "Nope" doesn't make any sort of conscious sense.. I felt that way instantly about one of the most physically attractive men I ever dated when he knocked on my door (it was a blind date). First, he was much better looking than my particular set of specifications actually required, or than I had come to expect as my due, and getting more of one thing than you expected to find often has the effect of diminishing the importance of some of the things that aren't there. He was wealthy and had a good car (two things that were not on my list at all, but see the preceding sentence). He brought me presents and spent money on me (and I am just not the sort of woman guys spend money on). Why, then, was I SO DAMN SURE in the first five minutes I met him that I didn't want to be with him or even know him? Why didn't I at least give him a chance? He was really likable and personable and in fact I really DID like him. He was perfect. Just not for me.
That was before we really even sat down to talk. It's true that his subsequent courting behavior was a bit strange. When he brought his well-dressed handsome blond haired self into my apartment, he also brought his guitar. At intervals---say every fifteen minutes or so during one VERY long evening---he would suddenly be provoked to burst into song. He had a very nice voice---he'd spent some of his younger years performing in clubs---and it was rather flattering to be serenaded, but it also seemed very weird. I was flattered, but I didn't know how to react. Plus I didn't know what to make of the songs---whether they related to something he was feeling and wanted to share or whether the choice was arbitrary----so I never knew what to say when he was done. Mostly I settled for "Very good!" and "Wonderful!" and the like, though my tone grew increasingly faint and my cries increasingly reluctant as the night wore on.
But there again, I'd already made up my mind BEFORE the singing started. Part of my deep embarrassment (though only part) was knowing that no amount of serenading was going to have an effect on a decision I'd already made.
After which he decided, for reasons best known to himself, that he wanted a relationship. He called me. He sent me roses. ( Here's how revolted I was: I left them on the floor for my flower-loving cats to eat. When he sent some to me at work, I let them sit there unwatered till they dried out.) I like getting flowers; I just didn't want any flowers that came from him. It didn't matter that I liked him and rather admired him for overcoming some really serious challenges. I just didn't like being around him.
After repeated conversations during which I repeated the words, "There's no point," we did meet one more time. . He showed up unexpectedly one evening a few days later (again with the guitar). I got through the evening only by getting drunk (bad idea, people). Though I thought I ended it definitively that evening, within a couple of days he was calling me again, begging me to 'give it a chance.' When he wouldn't stop calling, I asked a male friend around to answer the phone. After that, he went away.
Note that there was nothing at all about this guy to make me decide in the first five minutes "Nuh-uh". I would have LIKED to like him, which may be the reason that the visceral NOPE was so insistent and so powerful. I don't know what would have happened if I had ignored it, but judging by the speed with which he decided to have an attachment, it would have been an exceedingly 'addictive' sort of relationship once it got going and probably very difficult to escape. Perhaps I flatter myself. Whether I did or I didn't, it didn't matter. he was great, but not for me. I tried to remember this encounter during subsequent periods when I was dating.
Besides the ones I've described, there were plenty of OTHER dud encounters---blind dates, personal ad dates, whatever--- with men I thought were horrible (and who no doubt felt the same about me). Those were always extremely awkward. I got through them by staying detached and reminding myself that I didn't have anything invested in the relationship.
"I'm amazed that you never got killed or raped," said one of my friends recently, when we were reminiscing. Well, that is always a risk if a woman takes responsibility for her relationships. I was extremely careful, though. One specification in my bundle was that the man needed to give me very specific and verifiable personal information and that we needed to speak on the phone EXTENSIVELY and several times before arranging a meeting. I also made sure that my friends had all the information about the man in question that I had and knew exactly what our plans were for the evening. This was in pre-cell phone days, but somebody ALWAYS called me at home a couple of times to check up on me the first time I invited the guy home. (I made sure the guys knew this, too).
[6] Learning to tolerate risk.
The point is, one element of finding love is taking risks. The element of risk can't be eliminated, though some aspects can be mitigated by detachment and honesty. You have to be clear with yourself in advance about your own expectations and you have to be prepared to find out that other people have criteria that you can't meet or don't want to meet or don't feel you should have to meet.
Obviously, I couldn't agree LESS with Greg Behrendt that being what I'll call 'proactive' in looking for a relationship is off-putting to guys as in ALL GUYS. It may indeed be off-putting to Greg Behrendt or to some guys (e.g., who would all be guys who wouldn't care much for me anyway).
But I happen to believe that no matter what you do, the sort of person who is right for you will NEVER be put off by it. A guy who is repelled by being 'chased'---I use the word because it's used in He's Just Not that Into You--- is not a guy I want to be with because a guy who was disposed to be interested in me would by definition be a guy who wouldn't care who did the running. A guy who cares about that sort of thing is not going to get on well with me.
ANYWAY. I am looking forward to this book. Will it have anything new to add to the general understanding of the Sweet Mystery of Love? Will it propose any new techniques for dealing with love's big letdowns?
Now on your local bookstore's shelves: Why You're Still Single. Watch this space for a review.
RELATED POSTINGS
It’s Just Not that Simple (review of He’s Just Not that Into You).
Toxic Love 101 and Sonnet 36: The Love that Dares You to Speak its Name.
Advice for Brides Planning Big Weddings: Don’t.
Love in Midlife: How to Fail at Finding it
Key West Wedding Celebration
Forget the Wedding Planner---Damozel’s Hints for a Unique and Truly Memorable Wedding.
Toxic Love 101---The Perils of Present-Giving
More Help for Singles Who Don’t Want to Be: Why You’re Still Single and Some Reflections Prior to Reading It.
The “Princess Bride” Fallacy and an Eminently Practical Approach to Wedding Etiquette
Look, Look! A good relationship book! Why You’re Still Single by Evan Katz and Linda Holmes [book review; relationships]
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