Relationship Woes and Advice XX: One X Short of an Awesome Title

[Saurus33]

Has Serpentine's guide to self image been removed as part of the "no professional advice" rule change/restatement? A link would be appreciated, as I am having trouble finding it and wish to go through it myself.

[Pheehelm]

Probably not, since it isn't "professional" or license-requiring advice.

That said, here it is.

[Serpentine]

No, it was removed because I wanted to put other stuff there, I'd never gotten around to adding stuff, and I didn't think anyone used it anyway.
People care? Aw

[Saurus33]

Probably not, since it isn't "professional" or license-requiring advice.

That said, here it is.

I don't come to these forums enough to know whether self-image advice is considered psychological information by the moderation staff; I know they are far stricter than most of the forms I frequent, so I though it would be best to ask.

No, it was removed because I wanted to put other stuff there, I'd never gotten around to adding stuff, and I didn't think anyone used it anyway.
People care? Aw

It is fairly comprehensive, and all in one place. I will occasionally go through it and see if I have improved with time. So far, yes! Thank you for creating it.

[DeadManSleeping]

Woe be unto us if they ever come out with a fashion consultation license, though

[Form]

No, it was removed because I wanted to put other stuff there, I'd never gotten around to adding stuff, and I didn't think anyone used it anyway.
People care? Aw

I've looked at it myself as well a few times. I think it's a useful guide. It'd be a shame if it were to disappear or be lost.

[Serpentine]

Well... I don't really have space in my signature... Maybe it could be plonked in the first post?

[DeadManSleeping]

I would need links to that stuff in order to add it to the first post.

[Serpentine]

Pheehelm handily just linked to it:

That said, here it is.

[Maralais]

So, things went surprisingly well with the aforementioned girl. We both confessed we liked/loved each other, and now I'm a long distance relationship. We might go to a concert on October 1 though. Or I'll try going to her city whenever I get the chance.

So I'm happy, excited and kind of confused.

[Serpentine]

OMG OMG OMG youse guise! I actually had a proper conversation with my housemate! About relationships no less! About a relationship he wants to be involved in, in fact! I asked him a straight question, and he gave me a straight answer! :O
(background: I've previously mentioned the weird inability to have a normal, proper conversation with him, and his extra retricience when it comes to the subject of girls and stuff)

So this is mostly a "this was kinda awesome..." thing, but also he has an issue so I figured I may as well air it here.

So, he's an incredibly, amazingly nerdy little man. And he has a nerdy girl he fancies. But he hasn't asked her out as of yet. It seems they've discussed relationships and stuff in a very broad sort of sense, and she seems... well, downright hostile to the whole concept, really. He read out to me a bit of a message from her, and basically love is non-existant and meaningless, everyone's just fooling themselves, and everything related to the idea is utterly pointless.
So he's... well, he's been talking to her over Facebook near-constantly, and they game together and stuff, and some other things, like giving her a necklace I made for her birthday and inviting her over for dinner to plan D&D. Unfortunately I was present for the latter, which was incredibly awkward and sadly cramped his style.
He thinks, though, that she's warming up a bit - not ignoring or dismissing it when he gives her a compliment, for example.

So, I dunno. I said I'd let him know in advance next time I go out so he can invite her over for dinner again without me hanging around. Pretty much going with "keep on keeping on" at this point...
Any thoughts?

[term1nally s1ck]

He is in SUPER danger of being a 'Nice guy' at this point.

When you add that to the fact that she is exceptionally hostile to relationships, something that is quite likely to have been caused by bad experiences of one kind or another, finding out anything that comes across as manipulative would be major bad news.

[Serpentine]

Oddly enough... I don't think he is a Nice Guy, though I can see that given the right circumstances it's something he could fall into. He's too good at saying no and stuff, and has a slightly peculiar but I think still reasonably strong self-confidence. He's just... awkward, with terrible (but improving) social skills, and doesn't know how to approach things. Like girls.

[term1nally s1ck]

Mm, but the situation you describe, where a girl has explicitly said she hates relationships, he continues to act extremely nice and friendly and kind, and then asks her out significantly down the line? She could take that extremely badly.

[Serpentine]

Possibly. If he does ever actively ask her out, though, I don't think it'll be until well after he knows more about whatever issues it is that makes her so hostile to the idea of love and the like. At the moment - and presumably this is based on more than just the snippet of conversation he told me - his theory is that it involves self-esteem issues and possibly a bad relationship in the past, although he's not sure whether she's been in one before.
edit: But like I said, he definitely doesn't have the low self-esteem and doormat features of of Nice Guy Syndrome. And, you know, he doesn't bitch about how girls always end up with jerks...

[DeadManSleeping]

Theoretical attacks against the concept of relationships and love don't necessarily reflect one's capability of entering and maintaining healthy relationships. Lots of people who really idealize the whole 'one partner for eternity' thing can't maintain a decent monogamous relationship for even a few months. People who think it's not the best way of going about things can end up falling into 'traditional' relationships and stay at their happiest. People are complicated!

I think the guy's got a chance, but who knows?

[term1nally s1ck]

No, but from her perspective, the chain of events:

She tells him very explicitly she hates relationships.

He acts very kind and friendly and helpful and supportive to her for an extended time.

He then asks her out.


Could be taken very very badly.

[DeadManSleeping]

I would assume he had already been acting kind and friendly and supportive. She can't say 'yes' to a relationship if he doesn't ask, and she won't ask herself. It all adds up to one conclusion.

[Adumbration]

So yeah, last week attended a college party kind of thing where you move from bar to bar and collect answers, that kind of thing. Fairly soon after people got going I got hijacked by two girls from my class. One of the funniest/happiest events that has happened to me in a while. ^_^ They're both taken, but as the evening went on both straight up told me that if they weren't they would totally hit on me. This is huge for me, considering I have a generally low selfesteem. I think I gained/realized I had 2 new friends that night. Would go out drinking with them again, A++.

Anyway, in addition I sort of confessed a crush to a friend of theirs by asking if she happened to be taken. The answer was no... but that she may have something going on with something. When I asked if I should just back off then, they said no. There was also some theoricising on a possible blind cake buffet date, but nothing solid. Mind you, they told me that I might be too normal for her "but in a good way", so jeah. Apparently she frequently talks about world conquest or something like that.

So yay for friends, beats the crap out of me for the crush.

[term1nally s1ck]

I would assume he had already been acting kind and friendly and supportive. She can't say 'yes' to a relationship if he doesn't ask, and she won't ask herself. It all adds up to one conclusion.

No, it doesn't. Only one conclusion is true, but from her perspective of already lacking trust in people who are after relationships, the conclusion of 'his actions were all based off an ulterior motive that I had already said that I strongly dislike' is completely and totally valid from the information she has. I mean, think about it. In a theoretical world where another guy is trying to manipulate an identical girl into a relationship, and goes about it by winning her trust and compassion and showing he's a deserving and supportive person, what would the difference from her perspective be? Cos I cannot think of a thing that would be different apart from the guy's true motivations.

Remember, she's already wary and distrustful of the whole relationship thing. She is more likely to make a bad conclusion on this matter than a good (and from the sounds of it, correct) one.

[DeadManSleeping]

You misunderstand. The conclusion to which I referred is "Either ask her soon or just move on." Nothing is going to happen that will make her MORE amenable to a relationship (barring unusual circumstances like the guy ending up saving her from a supervillain).

[term1nally s1ck]

Ah. Yeah, that's about right. The longer he waits, the weirder it would seem.

[Adumbration]

Ah. Yeah, that's about right. The longer he waits, the weirder it would seem.

Perhaps instead of just asking her straight out, talk about his feelings first?

[term1nally s1ck]

From what has been said so far about him, I'm not convinced he could do that without messing it up somewhat. If he could, then a very simple 'I'm attracted to you, and while I know you're not a fan of relationships, I'd very much like a chance to convince you they're worth a shot. You should totally take me to dinner this friday.' would be probably his best shot.

Disclaimer: Don't actually say that last line, just ask her for coffee or something.

[Zeb The Troll]

To me it sounds like she might have a case of sour grapes. She's not been able to find herself in a relationship so she's spewing venom and bile about them when, in fact, she'd probably be happy to be asked out, even if it was by someone she doesn't see in that light. I think a proposal like the one terminally sick suggests would probably not be a miss. It might not end up in them dating, but it probably won't end the friendship either.

[Serpentine]

Honestly, I'm mostly just chuffed my housemate and I even had this conversation He most likely wouldn't ever ask for my advice anyway - although he did go out of his way to find a bit of conversation to demonstrate what he meant.
My Boy thinks "girls don't say things like that to guys they'd want to date". I think he has a point, but I also think... I dunno. Nerds, man. They overthink things and do so in an abstract way without really applying it to their immediate and personal circumstances, y'know?
Meh. At least he's actually actively interested in someone, and at least sorta doing things about it.

[Rawhide]

"I know you think that feelings of love and friendships are just hormones, but right now my hormones are telling me that I should spend more time with you and I really enjoy this feeling. How about I take you to dinner so that we can explore this meaningless, but fun, experience together? For science."

[Zeb The Troll]

My Boy thinks "girls don't say things like that to guys they'd want to date".

Unless she's resigned to the fact that he'd never ask her out anyway, so to prove to him she's okay with that, she poo poos relationships in general.

[Serpentine]

"For science."

That's probably the best line he could possibly use.

But yeah, although I agree with those saying it could be a lost cause, I also agree with those saying it could happen. Eh, I'll see what my friends are doing in the next couple of weeks, see if I can get out of the house one evening soon. Too bad we didn't have that conversation a week a go - I went out to a friend's just the other day

[Coidzor]

Better to burn the bridge and not have to ask what if than to let that kind of annoying feeling go on.

Because, let's be honest here, anyone who would flip out enough that the bridge was truly well and burned is enough of a broken person that they'll likely only inflict damage by continuing to be in contact with them even as a casual friend, so it's better to avoid getting more broken than life has to break you in order to not just kill you. [/butchered Hemingway]

But, hey, if you can write it off with no compunctions, reservations, or regrets and avoid being hurt just by knowing such a person to any real extent, then by all means go for it, I know I'd be pleased if I finally got an example of that working in my lexicon of anecdotes.

In more personal news, being simultaneously increasingly attracted to someone and increasingly reminded of why an actual relationship would be untenable is kind of weird and annoying, since generally being reminded of why I don't want to date someone helps with the whole not feeling any desire to date them thing. I feel annoyingly tsundere.

I mean, think about it. In a theoretical world where another guy is trying to manipulate an identical girl into a relationship, and goes about it by winning her trust and compassion and showing he's a deserving and supportive person, what would the difference from her perspective be? Cos I cannot think of a thing that would be different apart from the guy's true motivations.

Remember, she's already wary and distrustful of the whole relationship thing. She is more likely to make a bad conclusion on this matter than a good (and from the sounds of it, correct) one.

Indeed, because if she was actually being rational she'd realize that occam's razor would come into play and that unless he's going to keep up the act forever and thus there's no real difference between it being an act and it being genuine, a human would slip up eventually and there'd no real profit in the charade to begin with, barring some kind of heiress situation, as no woman's body is worth that, and no woman's heart is worth all that to keep for so short a time.

Because it's not really plausiible that she'd be liable to get locked into an abusive relationship she can't escape coming from that starting place, and again, as far as targeting someone for that sort of thing, well, motive.