Can anyone really play 'hard to get'?

 

Hello team of loyal readers (a small handful of my mum's friends and some people in India)

I was actually not intending to defibrillate this blog back to life again, but here we are ladies, gents and everyone in-between.

On Monday night, I sat down with my girls to watch the first episode of a profoundly intellectual documentary that subverts all our ideas about love and relationships. Yep, it was Love Island. 

As with all group arrangements to watch TV, it soon dissipated into chaos of talking over the show and me spilling prosecco on the couch. Because my friends are actually more interesting than watching people suck each other's toes in HD (but only just) this wasn't such a bad thing.

The topic of the night was all about how and when to message a guy who you're in the early stages of dating. My god it is a motherfucking minefield. Every single option has an equal and opposite. 

If you message after the date to say thank you, is it keen? 
But then if you don't message after the date to say thank you, is it rude?

If you message them twice, do you seem pushy?
But then if you give them a one word answer, will they think you're not interested?

If you go on a date with them this week, is it eager?
But then if you wait two weeks until you're back from holiday, will the moment have passed?

In the words of the great Taylor Swift, it's bloody delicate. (Isn't it, isn't it)

What I realised this all comes down to is a power struggle, and that power struggle is in trying to play 'hard to get'.
Now I'm sure a lot of people are thinking 'why do you have to play games, just let things happen as they're meant to' and for those people I'm going to lay down some truths. This shit is a game. If both people are sweating, planning their next move and have an outcome in mind then honey whether you've picked up a racket or not - you're in the game. 

After a great deal of consideration, I have come to find that no one can successfully play hard to get. You will ALWAYS trip yourself up. The only time I have ever seen a person succeed at playing hard to get is when they were actually being hard to get. 

If I look back at every dating experience of mine, however much I've tried to play hard to get I've fallen on my arse. Whether you say it with your eyes, your actions or in my case often your voice you will find yourself communicating to the other person I AM OBSESSED WITH YOU. (If you think I'm lying that I've actually said this to men, please run a survey in postcodes HA8 to W2, you will find many a frightened man)

There has been one time and one time only that I have succeeded at playing hard to get, and that's because I actually was. When my fiancé first started contacting me, I had no idea who the geezer was and rejected his lovely messages in complete earnest. 

For some juvenile reason, I thought that because he was a year younger than me that meant that he would be short and weird. I promise you that if I'd met all 6ft tall dark and Jewish of him before he tried to ask me out, I would have blown it years ago. I probably would've proposed over Facebook chat with a little ring emoji and got blocked. 

If you don't believe me, let's look at some of our favourite romcoms. 

1. Bridget Jones. We know full well that our national treasure Bridge can't play hard to get. But she succeeded at hard to get with Mark Darcy because she was genuinely more interested in Daniel Cleaver sexually harassing her in the workplace. 

2. 10 Things I Hate About You. Title says it all, she absolutely loathed the fella. My girl Kat was way too busy devoting 24 hours a day to being an angsty teenage feminist to be giving any attention to him even when he was literally singing at her. 

3. Pretty Woman. "I'm sorry Richard Gere, you absolutely stunning silver fox, I literally can't kiss you because I'm being a prostitute right now and it totally goes against the T&Cs." This hard working, necklace giggling bird was totally accidentally hard to get. 

So this begs the question, if you can't play hard to get then how the hell do you avoid blowing it by showing all your cards?

There are some practical options, for example Ann Summers sells some fairly tasteful gags you can wear to entirely avoid speaking. But of course, you can still give it all away with eye contact. 

But if we're to be realistic, there's only one thing you can actually do. Take the goddamn pressure off. 

There is this huge unspoken race to find a boyfriend, get engaged, get married and have kids. Not only is that not remotely the only way to have a fulfilling life, but if it's not with the right person then it's absolutely awful. 

Not every date has to end in a second date for you to feel good about yourself, and not every boyfriend has to turn into a husband. Depending on the lifespan of the average person, if you want a romantic relationship you only need it to work with ONE PERSON. You're not working on commission here, and trust me you don't want to be in love with more than one man at a time. 

The only way to make it work for yourself, is finding a way to be hard to get based on your own standards and self worth. Focus on your friends, your family, your career and yourself. If you meet someone who wants to fit into that life and more importantly who YOU want to fit into it, then fabulous. If it doesn't work out, then he wasn't the guy.

If all else fails, focus your energy on Hugh Grant, being a feminist or being a prostitute. We have proof that this works!

Until next time,

The Geisler

xoxo