meeji Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 I see people complaining about being in the friend zone like its the end of the world. I personally prefer to be friends first before I even think aout dating a guy. I like to feel comfortable interacting with him without feeling the pressure over making the right moves or saying the right thing, impressions, signals ect. If I can be friends with a guy and we have things in common, I feel like I am getting to know him for who he is and not as the guy that is trying to impress me. Whe people date you really play up your positive attributes and sometimes that means hiding the negatve ones until they come to the surface later. Am I the only one that thinks like this? Curious 5
soccerrprp Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 Being friend-zoned when you have a romantic interest is quite different for most. You don't want someone to think of you as a PLATONIC friend when you are interested in romance. Being friend-zoned is being regarded in a platonic manner, not romantic. Of course you'd like to create a relationship where you are both comfortable and open. This is preferable in a romantic relationship as well, but if you have no romantic interest, then you weren't FRIEND-ZONED. Anyone else? 1
carhill Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 TBH, it's not terribly 'bad', from a man's perspective, as long as the woman acts in a loving and caring fashion as one would expect from a true friend. In my life experience, and I had a lot of it with this dynamic, such was rarely the case. Rather, it was more a facilitating of letting another love one, with just enough positive reinforcement to train the behavior. Kind of like training a dog with food, except the food was the lure of sex and companionship. 1
Treasa Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 I've found that in martial arts it's very easy to make friends of the opposite sex. I would say that 90% of my friends are martial artists. And because it's a very traditional style, the thought of any of us hooking up is revolting and shaming, because we think of each other as family, sparring partners, etc. I'm the only female who does weapons training. Hence, I'm the go-to person for all the big, bad-ass varying-degree black belts when they're having trouble with women and need advice. 1
runningfar Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 My relationships have all evolved from platonic friendship. I wouldn't be interested in dating a guy who wouldn't want to be my friend. I am approached for dating alone but pfft you don't really know someone that way I have decided. And that means real friends. Not constantly making moves and upping the sexual ante when I am not up for it. That would put a guy into I will never give a chance no matter how single and wanting to date I am. 3
Barnacle-Bob Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 People who complain about being FZ'd are not seeing the big picture and don't seem to grasp networking. The thing about girls is that a lot of their friends are girls, too. 1
soccerrprp Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 My relationships have all evolved from platonic friendship. I wouldn't be interested in dating a guy who wouldn't want to be my friend. I am approached for dating alone but pfft you don't really know someone that way I have decided. And that means real friends. Not constantly making moves and upping the sexual ante when I am not up for it. That would put a guy into I will never give a chance no matter how single and wanting to date I am. This is good. You are female, of course, but how old are you? And how many relationships have evolved from such friendships? Now that some of them are exes, are you STILL friends? And who initiated the interest? Sorry for the insane number of questions, but curious.
todreaminblue Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 I agree, being friends first allows a no pressure situation where you can relax .......and not feel under scrutiny.....and it also gives a guy time to go ...this girl is whacked...so glad we are just friends......crap i almost went out with her..she makes an awesome friend though...glad she is in my corner....shes nuts.....win win situation...and if it progresses......it changes to i know what i am in for but i have to try anyway.....grey hairs begin to form..yaaaaaay go the FRIENDZONE.deb 1
carhill Posted March 25, 2013 Posted March 25, 2013 IME, in the case of true friends, yep they were great networking allies. In the more ersatz cases, reflecting back, one commonality was a decided lack of a wide female social circle, along with 'complaints' about how females are, generally 'catty' and untrustworthy. I think 'backstabber' was the most common word used. I never met any romantic interests through my close female friends but I did meet a lot of their female friends all of whom were married or LTR, as was normal for our area. Good people.
apple OR orange Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 if a guy is FZ then the dating part is over, so if you do this you wont find anyone, your be known as a "player" or "user".. He wanted you, you didnt, now you want him.... questions will be asked.
Poppy fields Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 I like having guy friends, but before I was married I pretty much wanted to screw all the cool ones. So, no friend zone would not have been cool. FWB usually worked out best if we both were not looking for so something serious. 1
todreaminblue Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 if a guy is FZ then the dating part is over, so if you do this you wont find anyone, your be known as a "player" or "user".. He wanted you, you didnt, now you want him.... questions will be asked. who is being known as a user or a player and why would questions be asked and what does it matter if questions are asked???? there's a trilogy of questions in that.......questions rarely need anything other than a simple answer....not too hard to answer a question.....deb
grkBoy Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 No offense, but I rarely see any MALES say they like the friend zone and/or they like to do "friends first". Even here it seems most of the pro-friends-first opinions are from females. I also wonder sometimes how well these women (who want guy friends so badly) get along with other women. I think the main "dislike" of being friends first is too many guys see this as a dead end. We'll be her pal, get to know her, hold back the lust, but then suddenly some "amazing guy" comes along ans she'll go straight into dating him. No "friends first" or anything. Somehow he was allowed to bypass that little test. Now we sit here, feeling like we wasted weeks or months of our lives, and some other guy gets the girl. Worse she'll come cry on our shoulders when she's hurt by this guy, but if it goes well she suddenly vanishes...even as a friend. I'll be honest, and this might sound cold, but if a woman FZs me, and I accept her friendship, then I 100% write off her as a potential girlfriend. So if in a year she suddenly professes love, I'll reject...even if I'm alone. It might sound like I'm punishing her, but it's not. It's that I see her as a "sister" and thus it seems weird. Women who want to do friends first have to be careful with this. It's why I tell women to "take it slow" rather than "friends first". In the end, I think guys need to check their lust at the door when they meet women. Go out with women with zero expectations, play it as if she'll FZ or flake in a heartbeat, and just enjoy her company for the moment. What this does is soften the blow if she wants to be just friends. The guy has no emotional investment in her, thus won't be hurt. 4
pbjbear Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 I see people complaining about being in the friend zone like its the end of the world. I personally prefer to be friends first before I even think aout dating a guy. I like to feel comfortable interacting with him without feeling the pressure over making the right moves or saying the right thing, impressions, signals ect. If I can be friends with a guy and we have things in common, I feel like I am getting to know him for who he is and not as the guy that is trying to impress me. Whe people date you really play up your positive attributes and sometimes that means hiding the negatve ones until they come to the surface later. Am I the only one that thinks like this? Curious I think the same exact way. Men wont be happy to hear that even though they have a higher chance of getting with a girl by being friendzoned first than vice versa. A guy is either interested in you or not- alot of men's deciding to date a woman is placed on visual attraction. So being friendzoned by a guy gets you nowhere. He has already deemed you too unattractive and very very few men will change their mind on that and if they are, they are settling. Women tend to be attracted to other things that can make up for visual attraction, so often relationships grow out of friendship for them. Most of the best relationships I have observed, they were friends first where the guy grew on the girl. And you are right, with normal dating their true personality doesnt come out until later...my biggest dating issue and one of the reasons I despise online dating is that can happen even more strongly. 2
pbjbear Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 No offense, but I rarely see any MALES say they like the friend zone and/or they like to do "friends first". I think the main "dislike" of being friends first is too many guys see this as a dead end. We'll be her pal, get to know her, hold back the lust, but then suddenly some "amazing guy" comes along ans she'll go straight into dating him. No "friends first" or anything. Somehow he was allowed to bypass that little test. I'll be honest, and this might sound cold, but if a woman FZs me, and I accept her friendship, then I 100% write off her as a potential girlfriend. So if in a year she suddenly professes love, I'll reject...even if I'm alone. It might sound like I'm punishing her, but it's not. It's that I see her as a "sister" and thus it seems weird. Women who want to do friends first have to be careful with this. It's why I tell women to "take it slow" rather than "friends first". . Thats because men are selfish and wants things RIGHT NOW. The OP is not talking about choosing another guy over her friendzoned guy so your 2nd point is irrelevant Thats your problem, you will prob. turn away one of the best girlfriends you can get by doing that. Being friends first is good in alot of ways. 1
grkBoy Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 Thats because men are selfish and wants things RIGHT NOW. The OP is not talking about choosing another guy over her friendzoned guy so your 2nd point is irrelevant Thats your problem, you will prob. turn away one of the best girlfriends you can get by doing that. Being friends first is good in alot of ways. Selfish? Selfish is pretending to be someone's friend in the hopes you get her later as a girlfriend. And I'd love to hear how many guys went from "friends first" to relationship versus "stuck in the friendzone while some other guy instantly jumped into boyfriend status". Life is not a chick flick. I played the friends first game several times before...and ended up alone as these supposed "friends" vanished when they each found boyfriends (who didn't have to do "friends first"), and then only turned up when the guy broke her heart. Suddenly then our "friendship" mattered. My fiancée didnt need to do this BS "friends first" crap. She became my lover, my best friend, and soon she'll be my wife. Those past women? Still single and still unable to make it work with men. Don't presume to claim men are selfish because we won't play by the woman's rules. Look at all the blogs and news articles on how much harder it is for women to find marrying men. Who's the ones having trouble? You women want strong, no-nonsense, confident men with convictions. Suddenly when we show this, we're deemed "selfish". Either date or don't date. That's how we men do things. No in-between. 1
ltjg45 Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 (edited) Thats because men are selfish and wants things RIGHT NOW. The OP is not talking about choosing another guy over her friendzoned guy so your 2nd point is irrelevant Thats your problem, you will prob. turn away one of the best girlfriends you can get by doing that. Being friends first is good in alot of ways. Actually, I have seen that first-hand. When females say "I just want to be friends.", it's more-or-less a nicer way of saying "I'm not interested in you." Could that actually turn into a relationship worth having? Perhaps but I'm not going to risk 1-2 years of my life to find out the answer to that question. Either the males get your attention or he don't. Women doesn't keep men around that they are not attracted to around as back-ups while continuing their search for the men they really want. So I don't believe this, "Let's be friends first." crap unless I approach her as a friend, in which case, there was no chance of romance to begin with and I only have interest in her as a friend and nothing more. If I do approach her as a possible long-term partner and she friendzoned me, that is that. There is nothing else left to get out of it. Edited March 26, 2013 by ltjg45
iKING Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 I typically put everyone in the friend zone at first. It's a pre-screening process. How long they stay there however, is a different matter. 3
Shocksock Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 Although having female friends is nice, when you are trying to get a date and almost every woman acts like you're one of her girl friends it can also suck. Meanwhile women have the oppisite problem they try to make new friends yet most of the guys they spend time with want to bang them. Both genders tend to experience "Grass is Greener" in this case since women can very easily turn friends into dates while it never seems to work the other way around. On the other hand men who want friendship with women can do so since a lot of women prefer to be friends 1st anyway while women who want guys as just friends sometimes have to be careful about not sending flirting signals.
Geiss Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 Am I the only one here that watched When Harry Met Sally. Guys can't be friends with girls they want sex with. Being friendzoned is like being put on the shelf. A reserve boyfriend. That shoulder to cry on when there is problems with your real boyfriend. Someone to bitch and complain to about the guy that she is seeing. Wishing you were that guy but she just strings you a long and has no problem crushing your heart in the process. But she is too blind to see it. Or she doesn't really care about you anyways. I refuse to be friendzoned. That is why I don't have any female friends. The only way I can have a female friend is if she is going out with one of my other friends. Or is a relative. But that is it. The friendzone is a bad place to be. Any guy that allows that to happen is a sucker. 1
ls32ssibm Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 I thought by definition the FZ meant one person had feelings for another which went unrequited. When neither have feelings then they are just friends and nobody is in the FZ. So no, the FZ is not a good place to be in for anyone.
Els Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 I agree with the gist of your post, OP, but I think when people talk about the 'friendzone' they mean a platonic R that will NEVER turn romantic, ie one person has already rejected the romantic advances of the other. Not just 'friends first'. Being friends first gets a lot of bad rap on LS, for some reason. All my Rs, and many couples I know, started out friends first. I'll not have it any other way; fortunately I don't have to.
Author meeji Posted March 26, 2013 Author Posted March 26, 2013 My relationships have all evolved from platonic friendship. I wouldn't be interested in dating a guy who wouldn't want to be my friend. I am approached for dating alone but pfft you don't really know someone that way I have decided. And that means real friends. Not constantly making moves and upping the sexual ante when I am not up for it. That would put a guy into I will never give a chance no matter how single and wanting to date I am. Thank you! I feel the same way. If a guy takes his time getting to know me that's when I feel like he actually iis inerested. If there is a lot of pressure to date then I feel like its a means to an end-sex...and I feel like the motives are not good.
Bengal Tiger Posted March 26, 2013 Posted March 26, 2013 The key is managing expectations and being honest when communicating. Nobody likes being mislead. And everyone gets upset when they don't get what they want. I hope these guys know what's going on.
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