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it doesn't actually HAVE to be that way though. You can have closeness without romantic interest if you realize that's what's happening. It's a learnable skill.

it doesn't actually HAVE to be that way though. You can have closeness without romantic interest if you realize that's what's happening. It's a learnable skill. Having a nice cuddle is good to recharge your batteries.

bigiain 5y ago
And you can have romantic interest in someone, while at the same time knowing that’s just not going to happen and behaving accordingly. I have at least half a dozen close woman friends, all of whom I have or have had “romantic thoughts” about, but for various reasons have either not tried, or tried and been rebuffed but stayed close friends with. One example, a girl I met in ‘99 (I still remember the day) and fell head over heels in lust with. She had a boyfriend, so that was out of the question. In the next 15 or so years we were never in a position where both of us were single at the same time. That situation happened about 5 years back, and we ended up in a drunken flirty conversation, where we both agreed that we weren’t going to do this, because we both valued the friendship too highly to risk losing it over a hookup. (Neither of us have great track records of staying friends with exes…) Others had/got boyfriends/partners/spouses, and while all of them involved awkwardness and sometimes outright distrust, I totally understand and acknowledge that’s a normal human reaction to a girl having very close guy friends they’ve known a lot longer than “new boyfriend”. You need to earn trust in those situations, and all you have to do is behave like a rational and respectful human being. It can take a long time though, the girl from the example above got married, it took 3 or 4 years before her husband go ok enough with our friendship that we can go out together alone. And that’s Ok, I reckon I’d have acted exactly the same were the positions reversed.
- biztos 5y ago
  > She had a boyfriend, so that was out of the question. I’ve always found this “blocker” interesting. I’m that way too but many, many men and women do not treat a significant other (on either side) as some kind of natural and impenetrable barrier to pursuing the object of their lust. Sometimes it goes nowhere, sometimes it blows up, sometimes it gets them what they (both) want. I’m sure there’s a lot of cultural variation, but for myself, I think when I was younger this was way more about a lack of confidence than it was about morality. And now that I’m older I’m pretty sure it’s 99% “don’t want the hassle.”
  - openknot 5y ago
    I believe the lack of a moral element is due to Hollywood movies normalizing cheating. I mentioned it elsewhere in these comments, but there's a lot of celebrated cheating in widely popular movies (both classic and modern) like Casablanca, The Notebook, and Sleepless in Seattle. Perhaps the behavior came before the movies, but I'm skeptical because it seems to be the natural behavior to avoid pursuing people in relationships (it will probably cause emotional trauma for the person in a relationship, as it would be natural to feel guilty about cheating, though I indirectly know of a person in a relationship who seemed to have felt no guilt about cheating at all).
    - alisonkisk 5y ago
    - biztos 5y ago
      Maybe in America? When I think of my friends who treat monogamy as situation-dependent, I think that’s more normal in Europe than the US, but I haven’t made a study of it or anything.
  - bigiain 5y ago
    > many, many men and women do not treat a significant other (on either side) as some kind of natural and impenetrable barrier to pursuing the object of their lust If they'll cheat with you, they'll cheat on you. I don't need that sort of complication or grief in my life. And I respect myself too much to be the sort of guy who cheats on his girlfriends, or the sort of guy who cheats with someone else's girlfriend. It's probably cost me some hookups, it has never cost me a relationship I'd regret, because who wants a relationship with that kind of person? Having said that, I'd also never let someone having a SO be something that stops me from working at kindling a friendship. For me at least, while finding a "life partner/soul mate" is an extremely worthwhile objective, making good friends is a more important thing for me than hooking up with every available (or unavailable) woman possible. So I'll still pursue a friendship, just being rational enough to think with my head not my dick, and keep the "lust" in check.

bigiain 5y ago

And you can have romantic interest in someone, while at the same time knowing that’s just not going to happen and behaving accordingly. I have at least half a dozen close woman friends, all of whom I have or have had “romantic thoughts” about, but for various reasons have either not tried, or tried and been rebuffed but stayed close friends with. One example, a girl I met in ‘99 (I still remember the day) and fell head over heels in lust with. She had a boyfriend, so that was out of the question. In the next 15 or so years we were never in a position where both of us were single at the same time. That situation happened about 5 years back, and we ended up in a drunken flirty conversation, where we both agreed that we weren’t going to do this, because we both valued the friendship too highly to risk losing it over a hookup. (Neither of us have great track records of staying friends with exes…) Others had/got boyfriends/partners/spouses, and while all of them involved awkwardness and sometimes outright distrust, I totally understand and acknowledge that’s a normal human reaction to a girl having very close guy friends they’ve known a lot longer than “new boyfriend”. You need to earn trust in those situations, and all you have to do is behave like a rational and respectful human being. It can take a long time though, the girl from the example above got married, it took 3 or 4 years before her husband go ok enough with our friendship that we can go out together alone. And that’s Ok, I reckon I’d have acted exactly the same were the positions reversed.

biztos 5y ago
> She had a boyfriend, so that was out of the question. I’ve always found this “blocker” interesting. I’m that way too but many, many men and women do not treat a significant other (on either side) as some kind of natural and impenetrable barrier to pursuing the object of their lust. Sometimes it goes nowhere, sometimes it blows up, sometimes it gets them what they (both) want. I’m sure there’s a lot of cultural variation, but for myself, I think when I was younger this was way more about a lack of confidence than it was about morality. And now that I’m older I’m pretty sure it’s 99% “don’t want the hassle.”
- openknot 5y ago
  I believe the lack of a moral element is due to Hollywood movies normalizing cheating. I mentioned it elsewhere in these comments, but there's a lot of celebrated cheating in widely popular movies (both classic and modern) like Casablanca, The Notebook, and Sleepless in Seattle. Perhaps the behavior came before the movies, but I'm skeptical because it seems to be the natural behavior to avoid pursuing people in relationships (it will probably cause emotional trauma for the person in a relationship, as it would be natural to feel guilty about cheating, though I indirectly know of a person in a relationship who seemed to have felt no guilt about cheating at all).
  - alisonkisk 5y ago
  - biztos 5y ago
    Maybe in America? When I think of my friends who treat monogamy as situation-dependent, I think that’s more normal in Europe than the US, but I haven’t made a study of it or anything.
- bigiain 5y ago
  > many, many men and women do not treat a significant other (on either side) as some kind of natural and impenetrable barrier to pursuing the object of their lust If they'll cheat with you, they'll cheat on you. I don't need that sort of complication or grief in my life. And I respect myself too much to be the sort of guy who cheats on his girlfriends, or the sort of guy who cheats with someone else's girlfriend. It's probably cost me some hookups, it has never cost me a relationship I'd regret, because who wants a relationship with that kind of person? Having said that, I'd also never let someone having a SO be something that stops me from working at kindling a friendship. For me at least, while finding a "life partner/soul mate" is an extremely worthwhile objective, making good friends is a more important thing for me than hooking up with every available (or unavailable) woman possible. So I'll still pursue a friendship, just being rational enough to think with my head not my dick, and keep the "lust" in check.