WHILE TALKING TO or texting a guy first is clearly aggressive behavior and not The Rules, you might be wondering if sitting next to a guy you like in class or standing next to a guy at a bar or party or flirting with him is okay. Isn’t “innocently” sitting or standing or walking over to his area or making flirtatious eye contact relatively benign? No! It shows much more interest than you think!
Such flirtatious behavior is a futile way of trying to get him to notice you—and a complete waste of time. Remember, The Rules are about not making anything happen with a guy, because he has to notice you first or you will most likely get hurt. In consultations, many women have said to us that they didn’t realize that flirting with a guy first was the crux of their problem. They spent years in therapy talking about the guy and never understood why he sometimes behaved badly and eventually ended the relationship. We help them see it was because they started the relationship. A lightbulb goes off and they can trace the problem back to the first moment they met the guy and flirted with him!
If you ask someone to switch seats with you on a train so you can sit next to a guy you think is cute, you are wasting your time. You will never know if he would have switched seats to sit next to you, and you may be initiating a relationship that was never meant to be. A guy knows within minutes or even seconds of boarding a train or walking into a party who he wants to sit next to or approach, and doesn’t need any help figuring it out. So even if you sit next to him or make eye contact from across the aisle, he will still track down the girl he thinks is pretty or is his type.
Women create situations in which they can subtly flirt. They reach for the same item at the grocery store, they wait next to him for a drink at a bar, they purposely brush up against him at a crowded party, or they take the elevator going down instead of up. You can stand next to him all day at the gym, pretending to be waiting for the elliptical machine, and you can put a force field around him, but he will eventually find the girl he likes and walk over to her, chat her up, grab her phone, and even call himself from it so he has her number for sure. Don’t even bother! If you see a guy you like, wait for him to walk over to you. That’s the only way it works with men!
You are probably wondering how he will know you like him if you don’t sit or stand next to him or make eye contact or flash a smile. Many women ask us about flirting techniques and other ways to get a guy to notice them. We don’t believe in flirting or staring because it is a dead giveaway of interest—the opposite of being a challenge. A guy knows you are interested if you give him your number when he asks for it and if you say yes when he asks you out. Really, guys don’t need you to tap them on the shoulder or even glance in their direction.
You might argue, “But what if he is quiet? Can’t I stand next to him if he is a more passive type?” No! We have found that even a shy guy will ask a mutual friend to introduce him to the “cute girl over there.” He will point to her and say, “That’s the one,” and then his friend will bring them together. Or a shy guy will pretend he likes the pretzels that she is standing next to at a party. He will figure out a way to meet her, even if he has to trip her to get her attention!
Not only should you refrain from doing anything flirty to get his attention, but you should actually do the complete opposite and pretend not to notice him at all. You should look the other way or walk the other way because sometimes it’s hard to disguise the fact that you think he is good-looking. It may be written all over your face. And if he notices you staring at him, he will know that you like him. He might typecast you as “easy” and lose interest.
We are not making this up! We have heard countless stories about women who stood next to guys at a bar all night, hoping that would make them take notice. Sometimes such behavior leads to a mercy date or two, but the guy texts only to hook up or he texts to talk about another woman who won’t go out with him or who cheated on him. He wants the girl who doesn’t give him the time of day! Invariably, standing next to a guy at a bar or party makes you his consolation prize, his free therapist—not his girlfriend. Sometimes flirting first does lead to a longer relationship, but there is usually some fundamental problem. There are fights or miscommunication or intimacy issues.
Lexi, twenty-six, told us she would never approach a guy at a bar, but asked what was so wrong with “standing next to him and swaying to the music” to get his attention? Lexi had seen her Matt Damon look/type and thought her dance moves would catch his eye. She danced around him for fifteen minutes while he gazed around the room. He finally looked her way and asked her if she wanted a drink. She said sure triumphantly. She was proud of herself for not speaking to him first and confident that he was interested. He talked about his ex-girlfriend the whole night and then asked for her number and said he would text her soon. But he didn’t, and she wanted to know why not. We explained that he was never interested in the first place—just bored. We told Lexi that swaying next to him created a conversation that would never have happened otherwise, that got her hopes up, and that wasted her time. He spoke to her the way you speak to someone you sit next to on a plane or in a doctor’s waiting room: simply out of politeness.
So lest you think you can get into a guy’s heart by invading his space, think again. If you have to even walk over to his area, forget it. He is supposed to notice you and find you on his own. The guy who likes you will ask if the seat next to you is taken or ask the other guy to move. He will be obvious about it and you won’t have to wonder if you’re reading him right. He will sit or stand next to you, pretend he drinks coffee so he can wait on line near you at Starbucks, and get your name and number. So think twice before “innocently” sitting or standing next to a guy in class or flirting with a guy at a business networking seminar or museum. Rules Girls wait for guys to sit and stand next to them. They don’t make anything happen or waste time, and neither should you!