When To Let Her Know You Care & When To Let Her Wonder

When to let her know you care about her and when to let her wonder if you do.

In this video coaching newsletter I discuss an email from a viewer from Rome, Italy, who started following me a few months ago and has read 3% Man six times so far. He shares a story of a woman he almost became exclusive with that he dated for about two months, but who suggested they breakup.

He shares their interactions and asks me to critique his performance so he can learn from the situation. My comments are in bold italics like this below in the body of his email.

This particular email is from Bob. He lives in Rome, Italy. Said he started following me a few months ago and, because he’s being a good student, has read 3% Man six times. He shares a story about a woman he’s dating for about two months, and he almost became exclusive. He shares all their interactions because he wants me to critique his performance. It looks like there was a little bit of a missed opportunity there because, as I discussed in the book, when a woman’s ready to be in a relationship, she’s going to hint at it, she’s going to bring it up, and that’s when you want to bring up good quality questions instead of assuming that she wants a relationship, getting her to explain to you exactly what she wants instead of assuming, because us guys, especially when it comes to women, we assume the wrong things way too often.

Viewer Email:

Hi Coach,

I’m Bob, 24, from Rome. I started following you a couple of months ago and have already read your book six times, planning to read it even more, possibly over 20 times.

Well, people that are the best students, and have the best success stories, that’s what they do. When you read a book 20 times like that, you get to know it so well, you could teach it, you could teach a class on it. That’s the level of competency that you want to have with the material. It’s one thing to know it though, but it’s another thing to apply it when you’re dating somebody who knocks your socks off, because when your emotions are engaged, since we make all of our decisions based upon our emotions, and then we use logic and reason to justify those decisions, oftentimes we talk ourselves into things we shouldn’t and we ignore red flags because our feelings for somebody are so strong.

Especially in the first 90 days of a relationship, again, what are you looking for? Easy going, easy to get along with, a woman who communicates well, especially a woman who is nice to you. If a girl is not nice to you, if she’s difficult, if she’s a pain in the ass, if she’s too much of a boss girl and she’s always challenging your authority as a man, eventually you’re just going to get tired of that. Everybody watching this knows somebody that has a wife or a girlfriend that just dominates their lives and walks all over them, so you don’t want to be one of those guys.

I wanted to share my story, knowing where I went wrong, to perhaps offer some insight to others in a similar situation. I was dating a girl for about two months. She initiated most of the contact, around 70-80%, and everything was going well. She would text, call about 70-80% of the time, and we got intimate quickly (2nd date indoor Olympics and every time I set a date we had sex, also multiple times but it felt like love and no sex). Our relationship was strong despite living an hour apart and seeing each other 2-3 times a week.

Around 7-8 weeks in, she asked if I was seeing other women, saying she would start seeing other men if I was.

So if you hear a comment like that, your question should be, “Are you saying you want to be exclusive, or are you saying you want to be official boyfriend/girlfriend? What are your intentions? What is it you really want?” Remember, as I discussed in the book, whoever is asking the questions is the one that’s running the conversation. As a man, you want to make sure that she tells you explicitly, “Yes, this is what I want. Yes, I want to be boyfriend/girlfriend. Yes, I want to be exclusive.” The fact that she’s basically eight months in or eight weeks in and it’s like, “Hey, if you’re still seeing other women, then I’m going to start dating other men.” So that’s typically the roundabout. She doesn’t come right out most of the time and say, “Hey, I want you to be my boyfriend.” Women typically do not say that. They say things like this.

I jokingly reassured her that she was my favorite, acknowledging her question seriously as well.

So it’s OK to say, “Well, you’re my favorite,” and she’ll probably say, “No, I’m serious.” “Well, what do you mean? Are you saying you want to be exclusive? You want to be boyfriend/girlfriend? You want to be official? What is it that you really want? What is your heart’s desire, my love?”

She seemed satisfied with that and without saying it loud we became exclusive.

Sounds like he just assumed they were exclusive. Again, you got to ask good quality questions, so that’s kind of a missed opportunity there. What you basically did was you jokingly reassured her that she was your favorite, and also seemed to imply that there were other women in the background and she wasn’t the only one, and you never really had the conversation, you just kind of evaded it. If you’re evading the conversation when a woman is bringing something like this up, then she’s going to start to think, “This guy doesn’t really care about me. He’s just enjoying getting the milk for free. He’s not interested in buying the cow, apparently.”

When I read that, and what you said, “Well, we didn’t say it out loud, but we became exclusive,” that tells me you assumed you were exclusive, and you assumed she was on the same page. That’s a bad way to go with women. Again, this ends up ending a few weeks later, so that’s part of the reason. This is an opportunity to let her know you care, she’s special, but again, you got to get her to say that she’s at a point where she wants to be exclusive. Again, that’s her saying, “Hey, if you’re still seeing other women, then I’m going to start seeing other men.” So she’s implying that she’s not dating other men. What she wants to see from you is that you’re serious about her, you care about her, that’s the important thing. You care. If you cared, you wouldn’t have left things ambiguous like this. So that was kind of a fuck up on your part. He’s only been following me for a couple of months. What are you going to do? Mistakes are going to happen. This is how we learn.

Two weeks later, she continued initiating contact most of the time, sometimes waiting 1-2 days before she texted. Around 9-10 week in she texted me after two days, expressing frustration about my silence. (I was busy with work and didn’t text her in two days) When we text, she was upset and told me if I didn’t want to see her anymore, I should say so to avoid wasting our time.

So you thought everything was resolved in the conversation and you were on the same page, and what you really did was you made an assumption. You have to communicate effectively. You’ve got to make women tell you explicitly, “Yes, I want to be boyfriend/girlfriend. Yes. I don’t want you dating anybody else.” You didn’t do that. You just kind of joked and laughed it off, and because she had high interest, she put up with it because she didn’t want to lose you. That’s how she felt at the time, though.

I joked about it, but she remained upset, saying we’d talk later and went out dancing with friends.

Again, it’s like she’s saying, “Hey, do you really care about me?” And you’re cracking a joke not being serious. So it’s great to be humorous and playful, but she is starting to feel like you don’t care. If a woman’s got a healthy self-esteem, if her dad did a good job and she’s been dating a guy for a couple of months, then she’s going to start to think, “This is just a fuckboy. He doesn’t really care about me. He’s just liking the free bucks.” That’s it. A girl who’s more insecure will probably put up with it for longer. A girl who has her shit together is going to, just like she said, she doesn’t want to waste her time if you’re not feeling it.

Again, it’s like another missed opportunity to say, “What do you mean? Where are you coming from? What are you thinking? Why?” If she says, “I want you to tell me. What did I do? What did I say to make you feel like I don’t care about you or don’t want to see you anymore? Why would you say that? Things have been going great between us. We even have a lot of fun. Our sex is really passionate. It’s like, why would you think after all the time we spent together the last two months, that I don’t want to see you anymore? What would make you say that?” So that’s two opportunities where she’s brought up basically wanting to know, “Does this guy care about me? Do you care about me?” And he laughs and jokes it off and kind of sweeps it under the rug and, in essence, ignores her question. You can only do that for so long, especially if you’re dealing with a girl that’s got a healthy self-esteem before it’s going to blow up in your face.

While she sometimes waited 1-2 days to text me back, I almost always took around three days to text her if she didn’t initiate first, which she did about 70-80% of the time.

So I don’t know if this is a language barrier or misinterpretation just because of the English, because the way it sounds like is that, in other words, they had their last date, and then usually a day or two later she reaches out, but the way he worded it, it sounds like he sends her a message and she ignores him for one to two days. So it’s not really clear on what is real, what he really meant by that.

Again, I think that might just be English translation, because obviously he probably speaks Italian, I would assume. By the way, he’s from Rome. What was her name? Virginia Raggi? Who was the former mayor? She’s hot. The former mayor of Rome is hot. Hot! Now there’s a soyboy socialist, I think that’s running Rome? He’s like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man? Anyways, back to our regularly scheduled email.

I know I reacted poorly. The next morning, I checked in to see if she was calmer, but she took hours to reply and eventually stopped responding.

Yeah, definitely. Now she feels hurt, feels like you don’t care, feels like she’s being punked. “This guy’s not serious about me. He’s a fuckboy.” Again, a girl comes from a good family, you’re not going to be able to slide this shit by her and just sweep it under the rug and laugh it off, so this is definitely a missed opportunity. Definitely fucked up here.

I made the mistake of sending another message, criticizing her behavior. I know, bad way to go. After this, everything changed.

Because what you just did now for the third time is reassure that you don’t really give a fuck. On top of that, I don’t know what you said, criticizing her behavior. Again, t wasn’t really clear the way you worded this. If she was purposely ignoring you for two days, or you had a date and it was still taken one or two days before she texted or called you again.

When we finally met, she said my message had turned off a switch for her, making her unsure about us.

“What do you mean? Why would you say that? What is it specifically you’re unsure about?” You got to ask good quality questions. The quality of your relationship is in direct proportion to the quality of the questions you ask each other. So it’s several missed opportunities here.

She said she thought she was falling for me, but now something felt off.

Again, if I look at what you said and what you communicated, you basically communicate like you didn’t care it and you gave her the impression you’re just a fuckboy.

When I accompanied her to her car, she unexpectedly jumped on me and we started kissing again.

Because despite the fact she’s hurt, she’s still attracted to you and she can’t help herself.

Despite this, she suggested we part ways…

It might be, but she didn’t say it would be better if we didn’t see each other anymore.

…Saying it might be better…

You got to understand, sometimes women will suggest ending their relationship because they don’t think you’re into it. They don’t really want to end it, but they put it out there. If you’re just like, “Yeah, let’s go our separate ways,” and they’re like, “OK, he really doesn’t care,” the reason they bring up the end of the relationship is they’re trying to make it easy for you to dip if you don’t really want to be there, especially when they’re doing most of the pursuing.

When I was younger, I had opportunities like that with girls I was dating and I just assumed she was wanting space or whatever because maybe I had screwed up. In reality, she was starting to feel like I didn’t care. Then when she suggests we need time apart or we shouldn’t see each other anymore, I was like, “OK well, if that’s what you want.” Again, this is where good communication and good quality questions is super important. Otherwise, it’s just like two strangers missing each other in the middle of the night.

…Not to see each other anymore. She asked if I’d wait for her if she changed her mind, but I said I wouldn’t, not wanting to convey the wrong message.

So the proper response when she says, “It might be better if we part ways,” is like, “What do you mean part ways? Like not see each other anymore? I want to keep seeing you.” Again, because she is trying to make it easy, because she cares about this guy a lot and she’s giving him an opportunity to say, “Yeah, I’m really into you. Let’s continue this,” or “Go ahead and dip and let’s end things,” and he’s just basically constantly communicating that he doesn’t care because he’s too focused on being a jokester. So this is inappropriate. Again, he’s new to the work. He’s only been follow me for a couple of months.

We ended things amicably, I was with a smile and I was joking around and doing the James Bond mood during all the interaction.

Again, you just acted like you didn’t care.

In fact, I felt a sense of strength, as if I was expressing that I didn’t want any drama in my life. Right before I left, she told me, “I really respect the way you handle things, I respect the confidence with which you handle things. That’s something about you that drives me crazy… (By the way, I’m sure I conveyed an attitude like, “I’m sorry I won’t have you in my life anymore, but hey, I wish you the best, and I’m confident I’ll be happy regardless. If this is your choice, I’ll respect it.”)

Again, you’re the problem. Where you went wrong is that you’re just making too many assumptions and you’re not asking good quality questions. So it’s clear this girl was really into you. Looking at her behavior, the fact that she was willing to end it and walk away shows that she’s got a pretty good self-esteem. That tells me more than likely her parents probably did a good job, and she’s not going to stay with somebody that, in essence, continually communicates he doesn’t really give a shit about her, and it’s just all a big joke to him.

I doubt she’ll reach out, but I’m at peace with that. It was disappointing because she was a wonderful person, and I made some errors that I have learned from. I wanted to share this story and hear your thoughts about it.

Thanks and greetings from Rome!!!

Bob

There’s a new gladiator movie coming out with one of the greatest actors in all of human history, Mr. Denzel Washington. One of my favorites. He’s fucking awesome. Everything Denzel Washington does is amazing. I’ve never seen him in a bad part or a bad movie. He brings it every fucking time. He’s a fucking acting genius. Love Denzel Washington. Like I said, I wouldn’t handle that, but you guys have broken up. The fact that she said she may change her mind if she does reach back out, just like 7 Principles To Get An Ex Back says, she reaches out, assumes she wants to see you, make a date in the evening to make dinner at your place, hang out, have fun, hook up and next time a girl is trying to find out whether you care, make sure you ask good quality questions, because I pointed out there were several missed opportunities here and you guys just missed each other in the night instead of really connecting and moving things forward.

So again, she reaches out, make a date, hang out, have fun and hook up, ask better quality questions so you don’t have something that’s really good blow up on you unnecessarily, which is kind of what it looks like here. I mean, these things are going to happen. You’re going to make mistakes, and that’s OK. You have to give yourself permission to be a beginner and fail. Nobody starts out as an expert. Everybody starts out as a beginner. Repetition is the mother of skill.

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