#19 18-year-old girl asks, what am I doing wrong?

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Gabby
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#19 18-year-old girl asks, what am I doing wrong?

Post by Gabby » Tue Dec 16, 2008 11:29 pm

#19 18-year-old girl asks, what am I doing wrong? / How can I inspire spontaneity and truthfulness in men?

DEAR ABBY: I’m an attractive 18-year-old single female from a good family. I enjoy wonderful friendships and am about to begin my first year of college. I am wondering if you could figure out what my problem is, because nobody else can.Whenever I like a guy, I make it clear with friendly "interested" actions. (But believe me, I’m not too forward.)
At first guys seem to like me, too. But then they quickly become uninterested and end up never asking me out—or ever talking to me again. This has happened soo many times. Please help. What am I doing wrong? DATELESS ON SATURDAY NIGHTS IN CALIFORNIA

DEAR DATELESS: Your friendliness could be misinterpreted as needy and desperate. This is a huge turn-off for members of both sexes. Tone it down a bit and see if you get better results.
P.S. You might more closely observe what your friends do. —ABBY


Gabby's Reply 

Hi Dateless: Great question. Thanks for reaching out. I once asked a similar question. I’ll paraphrase the answer. "You haven’t found your purpose in life. You have nothing to offer your "Number 10" other than more of the same, of which they are disillusioned." They continued, "…find someone who has a purpose that you admire and serve that person. Through service you will discover who you are and your purpose will reveal itself—and, interestingly, your partner-to-be will discover you. They will so admire you and your purpose that they will find a way to hang around you."

In lay terms, you aren’t ready for dating. How do we know? One clue is your emphasis on "good family." It could be said that your "good" parents have produced a clueless, perhaps even pathetic, daughter. A daughter from a family who communicates openly, honestly, and spontaneously simply doesn’t have the problem you have. It appears the "apron strings" have been too tight.

You don’t say what either parent or any relative says is the problem. I suspect you haven’t asked. Quite often it’s a question not presented to "good" parents because there’s fear, or uncomfortableness, or embarrassment, in the relationship. The barrier you have to talking about this problem with your parents is the same one that keeps you from asking your dates/ex-dates the same question. These barriers have been anchored-in from childhood interactions with your parents. They come about through incomplete, less-than-satisfying, interactions with parents.
Another clue is your use of the words, "friendly interested actions." This conjures up thoughts of coyness verging on deceitfulness. A woman from an actualized family has completed her experience of coy (deception). She has discovered, through countless satisfying conversations with her parents, that up-front truthfulness and candor works. She has discovered that deception attracts/creates deception. For example: I suspect you don’t verbalize to your dates how attractive you find them, and so they hide certain thoughts of choice from you, thoughts such as, "Boy she sure is self-righteous." "What a ball-busting sexist/feminist." "Too smart, too pure, too Christian, for me." etc. We simple don't know what thoughts they are hiding, only that they aren't being open and honest with you. They are in fact mirroring you.

I say "self-righteous" because you added, "But believe me, I’m not too forward." This suggests that you have judgments about women who are spontaneous and forthright, those who go after what they want with zeal and frankness, those who capitalize on their femininity—those you judge to be too "forward." I suspect you have dozens of such judgments that you suppress, rather than verbalize, because you are afraid about what people might think. Lonely, smart, polite, people can’t be trusted to say what’s on their mind and so they attract deceptive partners who are equally shut down.

An actualized young woman, from a healthy loving supportive family, has what most other women don’t have. She is space, and love, and openness, and candor, and up-frontness and humor. She communicates judgments in a way that feels good to others. She is whole and complete and is not waiting for a relationship to be happy. Such a woman chooses from everyone (not just those that come up to her) and, she communicates in a way that works— "I have the thought that I’d enjoy spending some time with you. How say you?" She knows who she is and therefore can read the aura of those who don’t communicate openly and honestly, those who are addicted to abuse or to stuffing their thoughts. Of course she would not go out on a date with a bound-up person because such a person can’t be trusted to share their experience or their thoughts spontaneously. She would communicate her thoughts about his nose-picking by handing him a tissue. She also might say, "I almost didn’t ask you out because I thought you were self-righteous." etc. all within the first few conversations.

Re: "wonderful friendships" yet none have told you what it is about you that turns them/others off. To be 18 and so clueless smacks of superficiality. Quite possibly you have been hanging out with just your fellow high school Stamp Club members. Within most social groups the agreement is, the norm is, to be superficially polite (read, deceptive, by withholding certain thoughts essential to ones growth).

I know you would get tremendous value if you joined a co-ed organization at college. You will create at least one person with whom you can ask the important growth-stimulating, self-realization, questions. Also, join a Co-dependent Support Group or get some counseling having to do with completing your relationship with your parents (such counseling is free in college). You are living a huge lie regarding them. That’s not to say they are bad or worse than most others; on the contrary, they have done a comparatively excellent job. It’s just that you have yet to have an experience of being in communication with anyone. You have yet to learn how to create space for others to tell you the truth. Ask for support in discovering what the fear is between you and calling up a guy you recently dated and asking, "...I’m conducting a self-improvement survey. I’d like you to reward me for the courage it takes to be calling you by telling me the truth. Tell me three things you like about me and three reasons why you no longer wish to date me." This exercise will effect a breakthrough for you. Depending upon how safe a space you are for the truth to be told the experience will be invaluable. —"No crap now. Don't be polite. I need the truth."

I say that you have never experienced being in communication with anyone because you have spent time with several boys and couldn't experience that they were not with you. They were not being open and honest with you, they were bound up. A conscious person can tell in a nano-second when there's something in the space that needs to be acknowledged. "You don't look happy" "You look preoccupied." "What's going on? I'm sensing something." "Is my breath OK?" or, if theirs isn't, "Let's stop and get some breath mints." A person of integrity addresses it. A person who is out-integrity either can't see it or they compromise their integrity for reasons.

My sense is that you have not used the promise of sex to attract or keep men around and for that I applaud you. For you sex would only compound the problem and postpone the inevitable—you completing your relationship with your parents. Quite often people hide their truths and withheld thoughts by pulling someone closer into a hug rather than staying at arm's length and being with them through their eyes, in so doing it reveals that which needs to be verbalized.

Lest you surmise otherwise from my reply you are right on track, perhaps more so than the majority of girls your age. Each girl (person) your age requires thousands of conversations so as to be whole and complete including this one. That which is BS in my reply will drop away, that which is true will work for you. You are perfect and your future is awesomely exciting.

Many will see themselves in your letter. Thank you, Gabby

P.S. If I were either of your parents I would be proud of you, and, disappointed to know that I had not been a safe space for you share your concerns. They would benefit themselves, and you, if they attended, separately, some counseling sessions while you're away. Each needs to recall the specific conversations (incidents) that caused you to shut down with them about certain subjects. Each have over a dozen such incidents which when guided by a communicologist they will be able to recall. Their job is just beginning, there's a whole new leadership-communication skills curriculum ahead for them. There are thousands upon thousands of similar questions/concerns ahead (thoughts that linger and occupy space and get in the way of being, and of communication, when not communicated verbally) that if you can share them with them, will facilitate life, marriage, and parenthood. For example: "Mom, my husband's crotch smells bad even after a shower what can I do?" The answer: "It works to tell the truth." Both your Mom and your Dad will have different and extremely valuable replies. If you can't ask them you're doomed to a life of putting up with.

Conversations you're too embarrassed/afraid to have with your parents are predictors of the degree to which you will be open and honest and spontaneous with your spouse. Thoughts you withhold in your personal relationships cause the other to withhold their thoughts of choice from you.

PPS. To optimize the value of this reply, show it to your parents.


 
 

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