Your buddy Dave has been single for three years and thinks "hey u up" is a valid strategy. Your other buddy Mike just got dumped and told you to "just be yourself."
You showed them her text. You asked them to decode the emoji. You drafted four responses and sent the screenshot to the group chat for a vote.
She's been waiting forty minutes.
Put the phone down. Stop crowdsourcing your love life. Type something that sounds like you. Hit send. Then go do literally anything else with your evening.
Dinner ran three hours. She laughed at everything. You walked her to her car thinking this one's locked in.
Then: nothing. Two texts. No reply. What happened?
You did what most men do on a great date. You filled every silence, answered every question, and left her with nothing to wonder about. No mystery. Nothing to sit with when she got home.
Rule 3 of the "22 Rules" changes the ending: tell her a little, hold back the rest, and let her imagination do the chasing. The ghosting stops too.
YawataNoKami said:Marriage is a minefield. If only fifty percent of land mines actually blow up, are you really going to walk across that field telling yourself that not all land mines are like that?
Are you going to willingly enter a game of Russian Roulette where there are three live rounds out of the six chambers in the gun? Are you really going to hand someone (her) a loaded gun (marriage), and then beg her not to pull the trigger? (divorce, financial support demanded, separation/alienation from children, shift in friendships and family life)
In the mine field of marriage, every day, week, month, and year is a new step in that field. Every fight, disagreement, trip, party, and even the seeming minor events are just another step in the field.
No matter how carefully a man can navigate the field, even if he can walk through the field without an explosion,she's still got that gun and she can use it at any time. No thanks.
I think it's a combination of factors: feminism, social acceptance of divorce and single mothers, job opportunities for single women who are willing to work, generous alimony provisions for divorced women who are not willing to work...The social environment has changed dramatically in a very short period of time. In 1970, Alvin Toffler wrote a book called Future Shock. In it, he argued that "disorientation" resulting from rapid technological and social change was the cause for many of the social problems at the time. Today, we are seeing a new kind of future shock: the sudden and rapid breakdown of the traditional family structure in late 20th/early 21st century and its devastating consequences on the kids growing up in this environment.Social_Leper said:I believe the high divorce rate has less to do with feminism's impact on female solopsism and more to do with the fact divorce is so much more socially acceptable and there is a huge safety net for women that wasn't there 50 years ago - not to mention the fact women have greater opportunities in the jobs market too.
^^^^ LISTEN, can we STICKY THIS? Not this thread, just THIS quote?YawataNoKami said:Marriage is a minefield. If only fifty percent of land mines actually blow up, are you really going to walk across that field telling yourself that not all land mines are like that?
Are you going to willingly enter a game of Russian Roulette where there are three live rounds out of the six chambers in the gun? Are you really going to hand someone (her) a loaded gun (marriage), and then beg her not to pull the trigger? (divorce, financial support demanded, separation/alienation from children, shift in friendships and family life)
In the mine field of marriage, every day, week, month, and year is a new step in that field. Every fight, disagreement, trip, party, and even the seeming minor events are just another step in the field.
No matter how carefully a man can navigate the field, even if he can walk through the field without an explosion,she's still got that gun and she can use it at any time. No thanks.
When a woman says it, guys hear a confession. A heads-up. A scheduling conflict.
Here's the translation: I don't feel anything. Right now. With you.
Watch what happens when a man triggers actual attraction. The busy career, the recent breakup, the "not in a place to date" — all of it evaporates instantly. The same woman who was guarding her freedom is suddenly free every night.
The "22 Rules" explain why. When the right switches flip, her timeline rearranges itself around you.