Self-Help or Hinderance? A review on 'He's Just Not that into You'

*Originally written and posted in January 2012

Ladies of modern day society (and society yet to come) I charge you: do not let moderate boredom lead you to unwittingly seek counsel in worldly self-help material.  It will only make you feel more crap.  Here are a few things I discovered a few days ago whilst searching for a Paullina Simons novel on my flat mate’s book shelf....

Firstly, in my defence, the book had a bright pink cover and was completed with an orange trim.  So already, being the girly-girl and visual creature that I am, of course it was likely I would pick it up – at least to read the cover.  I should have left it at just the cover though, and I even sensed a not-so-unfamiliar foreboding as I read the brief about the author being a “writer and consultant for Sex and the City”.   Yet even in the face of a niggling to stop right there, curiosity was leaving its’ nest and coming towards me (cleverly disguised as a quick-fix answer to a long held question).

Some say ignorance is bliss.  I can now hereby say that this is actually true.  At least, in a sense...

I guess the whole “do not awaken love until it is time” thing is because if you are oblivious to something you don’t have to spend all your energy trying to pretend like it isn’t there.  But alas, I don’t want to turn this in to a self-help blog.

 

According to Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo (are those names real?) if he hasn’t asked you out it is because (yes, we all know what I’m about to say) he’s just not that in to you.  Now, if that managed to kill every ounce of hope left in you, get used to it: this book quips 272 more little droplets of supposed-reality just like it.

The female writer (presumably) of the book goes on to say this about mixed messages (which was a little too tempting for me given I’d recently been thinking about mixed messages): “All these years I’d been complaining about men and their mixed messages; now I saw they weren’t mixed messages at all.  I was the one that was mixed up”.  I know, right?  Share brilliance.  Say, whose feeling more pumped to be getting out of bed each morning, complete with a spring in their step?

This really takes me back to a conversation I had with an old flatmate recently.  Consider that false hope is better than no hope.  And where in the bible does it say to have no hope?  Not that it made reference to hope in man, though certainly it described to the desires of one’s heart. 

Here is another one that stood out to me: “We’re taught that in life, we should try to look on the bright side, to be optimistic.  Not in this case.  In this case, look on the dark side.  Assume rejection first.   Assume you’re the rule, not the exception”.  It then goes on to tell you that taking this advice is “intoxicatingly liberating”.  Bah!  Squandering all belief that a man could actually be interested in you is “liberating”?  What – in the same way that the woman to woman civil union bill was liberating?

 And get this – “A man would rather be trampled by elephants that are on fire than tell you he’s just not that in to you”.  Ah, I see a flaw in this little impartment of dream thrashing advice now.  See, earlier we were told he’s just not that in to you if you have to try and figure him out.  In other words, if we’re having to ponder a list of questions in our own minds to try and decipher what is going on with him, he’s probably not worth it (aka “he’s not that in to you”).  You should cut him and count your losses.  However, it seems that this very act of apathy on his part is a clear signal (black and white, and without exception).  And it has been my experience that men can hurt women very easily not only with their fob-off comments but also with their restrictions on saying anything at all (generally termed ignoring you).  So why then, given he can knowingly (and I don’t believe they are oblivious to it – men experience hurt too) cut you with his cold shoulder/short answers/insensitive remarks, must we assume he would rather burn his feet than say a few short words....”he’s just not that in to you”?

 It seems to me that he already has said he’s just not that in to you.  Guys don’t use that phrase exactly anyway, especially not now that it has been held up as a batten of man-hating by the authors of this now popular book and movie.  Let’s assume though that we did take what this book has to say to heart.  We already know he’s not in to us because he hasn’t called.  No, really, we get it.  So we aren’t stupid enough to need to hear him say it.  Actually, I’m pretty sure he DID say it when he didn’t text us back or respond to a comment on Face Book.

This book boasts a measure of quotes sure to stir any single woman’s emotional juices (“the ‘Maybe he doesn’t want to ruin a perfectly good friendship’ excuse”), as well as little tit-bits to try and make us feel special: “You’re worth it” (say “Aaaawww”).  Now flash back ten years to any L’Oreal television commercial and see this for what it really is: a marketing ploy.  Why is this book and movie so popular then?  Because the content did everything it needed to in order to attract (dare I say it – desperate) women.

Many of these little quotations leave a vial after taste in the crevices of my mind as well.  “If you don’t think you gave him enough time to notice you, take the time it took you to notice him and divide it by half”.  This book assumes that beyond the early days (make that – first day) interactions you have with a guy, he ain’t ever gonna dig you if he didn’t on day one, honey.  So I guess those people who told us to marry our best (male) friend were lying to us.  The whole “being friends first” thing was just what people said because it seemed like a bright and breezy idealism, I suppose.

This little gem hits you for about six pages straight with get-over-it-and-move-on memos.  It held your attention, but now you just feel crap and want to put the book down.  But wait!  The next page says I (insert one’s name) am a superfox, and I’m worth asking out! 

One more thing to brighten your day: “he’s just not that in to you if he’s not having sex with you”.  Do you know what this means?  Yep, true church guys have never been interested in a chick.  Ever.  I mean, how do they bring themselves to walk up the isle and say “I do” to spending the next 60 years for their life with you when, straight up, “they’re just not that in to you”.  I know, I thought so too (note: the book waited until the 90^th page approximately to start talking about that deed.  It is entirely likely – and advisable – that this is because the trusting in heart would have stopped reading long ago).

Hhhmm... I wonder if these writers have met the dude who wrote How to Make Friends and Influence People?

The pages in the 120’s carry a predominant theme of cheating.

Pages in the 130’s – his frequent binge drinking.

Yep, I should have stopped reading much sooner.  I would like to tell you that my reason for reading it (to the mid 130’s anyway) was because I wanted to be well informed about what exactly it was I planned on telling you not to read.  And why it wasn’t worth the half-hour of your time.  The truth was, I wanted to discover that there was in fact hope in my exact case, even if it wasn’t build on certain truth.  Now I pay the price – and in more ways than one.  Did I mention I was mid-level bored earlier?  ‘An idle mind is the devil’s workshop’ may be fitting?

 I really should have stopped polluting my mind with such worldly snip-its after having read the back cover blurb (er, I never considered reading it until after I’d had enough of the inner contents).  Here, Oprah Winfrey touts that this book should be on every single woman’s nightstand.  That profound sentence was promptly ended with an exclamation mark.  In her guard, I do have to wonder if she wasn’t too serious about every word that came before the exclamation mark.  At any road, does Oprah even have a husband?  Because as this book reads, following the advice and ditching the lukewarm guy is supposed to free you up to then take the man who is really a trophy (so... where is he?).

Final conclusion:  ditch self help books, particularly those aimed at the secular audience.  I don’t care how pretty the cover is or even if it was a box office smash at the movies: ditch it, girlfriend.

Also, let’s not support the guy who wrote at least half of these pearls of so-called wisdom: he’s probably feeling rather smug with himself right now.

 -Wendie

Is 40 Really the New 30? A Probing Billboard

There seems to be something about round numbers that catch my eye now.  Maybe it’s because I landed on a round figure myself a few months ago (30), or maybe it’s because there are certain stigmas attached to most of the decade-ages.  If you are turning 20, you need to know that you are no longer a teenager, you should be doing something about your career path and you need to start putting childish ways behind you and become responsible.  If you are turning 30, ideally your work life should be stable, you should be in a secure relationship and parenthood has either started or is at least in the foreseeable future.  But if you are 40: You are either married, or you aren’t.  You either own a house, or you don’t.  And you either have children, or.....

As I was driving down Khyberpas in Newmarket on my usual route to the gym a few days ago, I couldn’t help but notice the new bulletin board to the left of a set of traffic lights I’d stopped at.  “Is 40 really the new 30?” it asked the question without apology and without beating around the bush.  I felt a surge of panic as I read the remainder of the board; it was posted by Fertility Associates, a group of fertility specialists who operate a clinic by the Mercy Ascot hospital. 

I felt bad enough reading it as a thirty year old.  There might still be time for me, but there isn’t heaps of it.  I feel I’ve almost reached an age where, even if I met someone tomorrow, there is still a year of courting, and then a year of engagement before a marriage would come to be.  I would then ideally need to start having children immediately if I was to have any more than two. 

So what about the female driver who is 40?  Or is 39 and is as single as one can be?  What hope is there?  We know where we are at, because we’ve been told about the reproductive years since we were in high school and sex education states such facts.  We have mothers, and we know what menopause is and generally at what age it occurs.  The board hinted at woman putting their careers first, and so the idea of parenting played second fiddle and was to wait until the last minute.  Of all the Christian women I know though, none of them choose to put their careers first.  The fact of the matter is there simply wasn’t a man waiting for them when the so-called ideal years of reproduction commenced.

 I visited a friend today who I used to flat with six or so years ago.  She got married just over a year ago, and is now more than half way through her first pregnancy.  It struck me (not for the first time) that she is the only friend of sorts that I have who has gotten married, and consequently is also the only one I know who is entering motherhood.  I feel it is odd that I have so many female friends, and yet I’ve never been to an engagement party, I’ve only been to one wedding, and I’ve never gone to visit a friend in hospital who has just had a baby.  It is not that any in my circle are without great qualities, talents, Godly values or attractive traits.   It is not that any of them are clearly single because they haven’t overcome some great ‘issue’.  I honestly believe the reason is simply that no man ever arrived on the scene.

 I stood in the kitchen of my friend’s small unit listening to her tell me all about the costs involved of buying baby gear and what she’d been leant from a number of family members as in-the-family hand me downs.  A bassinet, clothes, a stroller.  She told me how there was quite a few others in her church who had recently had babies and how they’d been passing on advice.   Things like what sort of capsule to purchase (what is a capsule?) as well as an exchange of stories about morning sickness. 

I once dated a guy from her church; this was a few years ago now.  We met at a dance and really hit it off, we were obviously liked each other.

We went out once, and on the day of what was to be our second date he texted me to say he couldn’t see me because he didn’t have the “time or the capacity”.  Another friend of mine who used to go to that same church heard about a year later (that is, a year after we’d gone out), he gotten married to another girl from his church.  I’d be highly surprised if he wasn’t one of these new-to-parenting people, ready to dispense new-father advice without any reluctance.  Who wouldn’t be thinking about kids after having been married a few years?

 

It still hurts, even those some years have gone by.  “No time or capacity” must have been cue for “It’s not me, it’s you”, and so he found another.  Yet even after having seemingly lied to me, he was still lucky enough to find a spouse and live that life which all single Christians yearn for.  I’ve seen a few guys since then, but nothing has worked out. 

 

I feel like the years have been kind to my friend.  By starting married life close to the age of 30 she now gets to decide when to start a family, and how many to have as age will not be a barrier for her.  It is all very well for the rest of us, slowly climbing the ladder in our years, to reflect on the story of Sarah and Abraham, but such a story holds no hope for me personally.  For one, the reality is none of us are going to be able to reproduce at the age of 99 nor are we likely to be sexually active at such an age.  And for another, I’m not even sure I want to live that long let along bring another human being into the world at such a grand old age.

After leaving my friends house I nipped down to a nearby Christian book store to exchange a DVD I’d bought just before Christmas.  As I waited patiently at the counter I noticed the collection of ornamental crosses and engraved stones laid out in the display cabinet.  My eyes landed on one block piece that read: “Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from Him”.  The word reward seemed to embrace all those who’d had babies, and dispel “the rest of us”.  There are other rewards, a small voice seemed to say inside my head.  But the truth is though that the gift of a baby is not a reward I want to miss out on.  I don’t want to be expected to welcome some other reward and have to match the same enthusiasm about it as I would if I was with child.  I don’t think anything else does compare.

I can really only draw the same conclusion here as that which I’ve always ended up with: there are no solid answers.  We don’t know why some people get married and others don’t, we don’t know why some people can have kids and others can’t.  We don’t know why some people can hurt others in their wake and still reap blessings, whilst others are sensitive towards fellow man yet are forever alone.  We don’t often choose the cards we are dealt with in this life, all we can really do is choose how we respond to them.

 -Wendie