Refusing The Friend Zone

The art of refusing the friend zone to create the conditions to get out of it.

In this video coaching newsletter, I discuss an email from a viewer who says he got friend zoned last week with a woman he has known for about twelve years. He’s new to my work but doesn’t realize he friend zoned himself many years ago.

However, there appears to have been some romantic interest on her part, since she invited him over for dinner, but because he had no game, she didn’t want to teach him how to be a man. My comments are in bold italics like this below in the body of his email.

He’s new to my work. He hasn’t read How To Be A 3% Man. He’s about 150 pages in so far, so he’s new, I can’t roast him. Too bad, because he doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. But obviously we can have some good fun going through his email, looking at some of the silly things he’s done. Because, quite frankly, I can see things that he’s done here. I remember doing these things in my early 20s, and I cringe when I think about those things. But I didn’t know, they don’t teach you this stuff. You either learn it through trial and error, or nowadays, obviously read a book like How To Be A 3% Man. You can learn these things and avoid all this crap.

This is what I love about my work, especially when I read an email from a really young guy that’s learned this stuff. It’s like, man, I wish I would have had a book like mine when I was in high school, or maybe even middle school, and started learning this stuff back then. There were so many good opportunities that I missed out on just because I had no idea what the hell I was doing.

Viewer’s Email:

Hey Coach,

I made some mistakes and got friend zoned last week. I just received my copy of 3% Man and have read 150 pages so far. I will read it as many times as necessary…

Well, I say 10 to 15 times.

…because I don’t want to make these mistakes again – thanks for your work! I’ve trimmed this down as best I can while still providing relevant details.

I’m 38 and work remotely as a cloud computing engineer, and she’s 31. I’ve known her for 12 years. We met during undergrad in a large class. She was the most stunningly beautiful girl that I’d ever seen, so I walked over to her, sat down, and introduced myself on the first day.

Sounds like, for the first day, that’s pretty good, pretty ballsy.

It turned out that she had a boyfriend, so I didn’t pursue it. We exchanged information, but really didn’t keep in touch after the semester ended. I purposefully avoided getting too close, but I did feel a real connection to her.

Since then, she’s put herself in my orbit twice, and each time we ended up having dinner.

The opportunity is there.

We have great conversations and lots of laughs, but I never noticed any signs that she’s physically interested, (playing with her hair, touching me, etc.), so I didn’t make a move to kiss her.

Well, that’s a mistake. Because if you’re out on a date with a girl and you can’t tell whether or not she’s interested, the best way – especially if you don’t want to waste going out on another date and spending more time and money with somebody that’s not interested – is to go for the kiss. I wrote about just such a story. I was out with a girl, she was a little structured, a little masculine at first. She loosened up a lot throughout the evening, and then when I went to kiss her, I mean, she sucked the tongue out of my throat and invited me in. So, you never know.

Think about it like this, if you give her a hug and then you leave and you’re thinking, “Did she like me? Did she not?” then you have to go out with her again, spend more money, more time to get to the same result. So, it’s just better at the end of the date to go for the kiss. See what happens. She’ll either kiss you back or turn her head and you get the cheek, Now, you know. Now, you’re not walking around for the next few days or few weeks kicking yourself, going, “Ahh, I should have done this, I should have done that.”

You don’t want to have regrets. You want to be able to check the box and say, “Nope. I tried. She wasn’t into me.” Boom, on to the next. But when you do things like this, “Well, I don’t want to get rejected,” that’s how you kind of friend zone yourself. You’ve got to shoot your shot, man.

In 2019, we hung out 3 times, but eventually she stopped responding, so I stopped initiating.

That tells me you were doing all the pursuing, and she eventually got bored and blew you off.

I didn’t hear from her again until she messaged me in 2022.

So, we’re talking three years went by.

We hung out once, and then she invited me over to her place for dinner. Again, we had a great time.

So, she invited him over for dinner, that’s in the evening. A man’s job, as I discuss in “How To Be A 3% Man,” is to create an opportunity for sex to happen, to hang out, to have fun and hook up. So, he hasn’t heard from her in three years, she invites him over for dinner at her place. Obviously, sex is on the table. Women don’t invite men over in the evenings for platonic patty cake.

But I didn’t pick up on any physical signs.

He was probably just too timid and shy and afraid of getting rejected. She invited you over for dinner. You hadn’t heard from her in three years. It’s not like, “Hey, come over and let’s be pals.” She would have gone to lunch if that’s all she was thinking. Probably what’s happening, she’s getting older and she’s starting to wonder, “He’s such a nice guy. Maybe I’ll give him another shot after twelve years.”

Hugs are great, but I want to kiss those beautiful lips, dammit!

Well, fucking kiss the lips, dammit! You’re the man. You’re the one with the penis. She’s not going to send you a digital invitation. She invited you over to her house for dinner after not hearing from her for three years. Come on, man!

She told me that she had given herself 6 months to meet someone organically.

So, she’s obviously talking about romance, and she wants something to happen. I mean, she’s throwing out hints. She just wants you to be the leader, dude. Be the leader. Penetrate her with your strength.

She knows that I’ve been dating other women and was asking me about my situation. Towards the end of the night, I said, “Hey, I’d like to take you out on a proper date.”

So, that’s like, “I’m Mr. Nice Guy, and I can’t do anything until I take you out on a date.” Granted, I kind of used to think like this in my twenties, and I wrote about some similar situations, as well. It was like, the girl was right there on a silver platter. All I had to do is invite her over. We could have hung out, had a fun and hooked up. She would have probably even brought some beer over, one of the ones that I remember thinking about. But I didn’t know any better. I just sat and talked her out of liking me over the course of two or three weeks. I went to lunch twice. Those were the days. Young, dumb and full of cum.

And I suggested this restaurant that I know she likes. She teased me and said, “Ooh, a proper date?!” and agreed. She told me that she’s going on a trip soon, but to pick a date after she got back on the 16th, which was approximately 2 weeks away. We said our goodbyes, she gave me a hug and I left.

Come on, man. You should have gone for the kiss there during dinner, bruh. You’re in her house, dinner, you know, twelve years. But in all seriousness, he doesn’t have the book. I can’t break his balls, too bad. But twelve years? Come on, man.

The next day, I texted her during my lunch break and suggested we get together on the 19th. She responded a few hours later with the following message:

“Hi! Our taco night was so fun, thank you again! I have been thinking over your ‘proper date’ proposition since last night and I have arrived at the following; I would prefer if we don’t go down the romantic road, and I’d like for us to stay on friendship street. I hope you understand, and I hope we can still hang out as friends!”

I had sensed nothing but positive energy from her the night before. She told me that the positive energy was real, but that it came from a place of camaraderie for her, and that she wasn’t expecting my “date proposition,” which I find hard to believe, because women know when we’re interested.

Yeah, she just knows that you have no game and you don’t know what you’re doing.

She’s a total knockout, so I’m sure she gets a lot of male attention.

And she knows guys that have game and know what they’re doing and guys that don’t. And you have consistently, for twelve years, acted like a guy who didn’t have any game, didn’t know what to do. She invited you over for dinner, bruh. If she invites you over and you go over there, at least go for the kiss.

In fact, she told me that one of her male friends is pursuing her now and that she’s hesitant about it – either because she’s not into him, or because she always jumps into things too quickly.

No, it’s probably because, just like you, he acts like a pussy. That’s the harsh reality.

On Monday morning, she texted me wishing me a happy belated birthday. Initially, I wanted to tell her in person.

He wanted to have ‘a talk’ in person.

But ultimately decided to text her because she only texted me when she rescinded the date, and I’m going to match her effort. This was my response:

“I’m jammed up this week and won’t be able to meet up after all. I finally had a moment to think about your response to my date offer though, and my stance is this: you are too beautiful of a woman for me to just be friends with, and there’s no way I can do that. I’ve had a romantic interest in you since I met that stunning girl in class all those years ago. No hard feelings at all, but I’m not willing to compromise how I feel or who I want. If you change your mind in the future, please reach out because I’d love to get together. I hope you understand, and please take care!”

Take care is like, “have a nice life.” That was fine.

That was 4 days ago, and she didn’t respond.

I wouldn’t expect to hear from her again. She’s probably a little surprised that you stood up to her and said no dice on the friendship. “No thank you for the blue balls.” Like the Buddha said, “If someone gives you a gift and you do not accept it, to whom does the gift belong?” She tries to give you blue balls, and you say “nope.”

Missing on this one stings.

I think it’s been stinging a lot for twelve years.

But I will never contact her again unless she reaches out. Did I say the right thing?

Well, yeah, at the end.

It’s likely that I will eventually run into her at other events around town. When I do, how should I interact with her?

Smile, wave, go about your business. Don’t go out of your way to talk to her. She tried to put you in friend zone. She has a gift. She has an arm full of blue balls for you. So, when you see her, you should be like, “Hi. No thanks for the blue balls,” and go talk to other pretty girls who are excited to talk to you. And if she comes over to talk to you, it’s like, “Hey, sexy. Hey, cutie. You miss me? Have you been thinking about me? Having impure thoughts about inviting me over for dinner to have me do naughty things to you in the kitchen that you don’t want to tell your parents about?”

In the meantime, I’ll continue to pursue my passions and career, other women, and work on myself. I’m also about to close on my first home, so I will be busy fixing that up once I move in.

All the best,

Bob

Well, Bob, at least you are now reading “How To Be A 3% Man.” But if she ever does reach out, I wouldn’t take her out on a ‘proper date’ or any of that bullshit. Just invite her over to your place to make dinner together. And if she refuses, or tries to get you to meet for lunch, or reiterates the friend thing, just say, “Yeah, I’m not down with something platonic. I want to kiss those beautiful lips. I think you should come over and we can make dinner together. If you change your mind, get in touch.”

I’d be following the script out of “7 Principles To Get An Ex Back.” But in the meantime, I would be employing what you read in “How To Be A 3% Man.” You need to practice your game, because you’ve got none. You’ve got to learn to read the signs. But like I said, in this particular case, if you’re standing extra close in the kitchen as you’re making dinner together… I mean, making dinner together, dude, you should have gone for the kiss. You should have done something, just to know for sure.

And even if she never bumped into you, or touched you, or came near you when you were leaving, I would have gone for the kiss. And the ‘proper date’ thing, it’s just kind of like a Mr. Nice Guy, White Knight routine. It’s a bad way to go.

So, if you’ve got a question or a challenge and you’d like to get my help, go to UnderstandingRelationships.com, click the Products tab at the top of your screen and book a coaching session with yours truly.

“Women want a man to be confident and know how to be direct, decisive and get to the point when it comes to their romantic interest and making physical moves to escalate intimacy. They don’t want to teach him how to be a man. When a man has romantic interest, but he tries to fly under the radar by being friends first, he’s too timid to make a move, waits for her to make the first move, and generally gives off the vibe that he is too unsure of himself to lead, he will get friend zoned. Women want to be penetrated by a man’s strength and are turned off by a lack thereof.” ~ Coach Corey Wayne

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