The Friend-Zone isn't what you think it is. Read More Here.

I’m going to talk about the Friend-Zone today, this is because despite what people might think, a) it does exist, and b) it is not what you think it is.

This prompts three questions: What is the Friend-Zone? What does it mean to be Friend-zone’d? How do you get out of the Friend-Zone?

So what is the Friend-Zone?

The Friend-Zone is a state of being, wherein you are romantically drawn to a friend, but rather than risk the ruining of the friendship you decide not to act on those feelings. Or that you do try and act on those feelings, but since they are not shared you decide to ignore future feelings of that kind and strictly stay exclusively friends with the person, and not letting your feelings have an impact on your friendship. But in actuality there is already an older phrase besides Friend-Zone; Unrequited Love. Now if you think of it that way, you end up having far less negative energy associated to it, plus it is easier to define: Love that is not returned or reciprocated.

What does it mean to be Friend-Zone’d? (And common myths about what is called the Friend-Zone).

The Friend-Zone is a form of rejection, plain and simple. But as I see it, in its’ truest form it really is one friend telling another that their friendship is too important to them to risk it ending poorly. Common problems with the term Friend-Zone can originate from people not being able to handle romantic rejection from a platonic friend. This truly brings into question whether the friendship was true in the first place. This can bring forth a whole new set of problems for people who go into the “friendship” with the expectation of making it into something more than just friendship. And that is not true friendship, just crappy people being crappy, because that isn’t friendship. This next piece touches on the fact that the Friend-Zone is commonly seen as a negative thing; the myths of the Friend-Zone.

“The friendzone is just a male constructed response to being rejected by a “friend”. (Let’s analyze this sentence).

Male: Girls and Women can be put in the Friend-Zone; it is not a strictly male “construct”. I know this of course because I have experienced it, by that I mean I have both been put in by and put girls in the Friend-Zone. With my previous clarification on what the Friend-Zone is, it should be clear that it is not a gender specific thing.

Construct: This implies that the Friend-Zone is not real. But it does, and as I mentioned it has existed longer than people know but under the name of unrequited love. It is not an unnatural thing, or at least when it comes to modern human nature. Romantic pursuits are all a game of risk versus reward, even more so when it involves friends. (More details here)

Being Rejected: Not a myth, there is a certain level of rejection associated to being Friend-Zone’d. But not for unknown reasons, because one of the common reasons people are angered by rejection is because the reasons are unknown to them or they believe that they are unreasonable reasons. (Which is ridiculous because that is taking away a person’s right to say No)

By a “friend”: Therein lies the key point. FRIEND. There’s a common phrase associated with the Friend-Zone: “Girls are not machines that you put kindness into and expect sex to pop out”. Now the problem that stem from this is that this is not true friendship. At any time where in which you are expecting to get anything but friendship in return for friendship it isn’t actually friendship at all, it is you being a douche canoe. Being irritated by someone saying no implies that the rejecter does not have the right to say No, and expecting all the same people to have all the same feelings as you is a completely absurd expectation. It is not your friend’s fault you have romantic feelings for them. People have “types”; what they are looking for, and personal preferences in relation to romantic partners. Just because they are your “type” it doesn’t mean you’re theirs and it completely invalidates their opinions if you are truly upset by that fact.

Just be a friend, what’s wrong with platonic relationships? Answer, NOTHING.

So when the above described people use the term friendzone it lessens it because they are not real friends. A real friend respects another friend’s choice. Where in actuality a real person should in fact respect another person’s choice, always.

Finally, how do you escape the Friend-Zone?

When it comes to getting “out” of the Friend-Zone, you have two options.

You can leave. This is the harsher of the two; you literally leave your friend. Not necessarily forever, but for now, for the purpose of speed I believe this to be the best option. The side effect of this is that you lose this person, they are no longer in your life, and when you become ready to return to their life there will be a rift, not always but at least a 90% chance, it will take a lot of work to fix what you broke.

The second option is to stop. You can’t necessarily, immediately stop having romantic feelings for this person. But you can stop. How you might ask, well simple, space and time. You don’t stop being their friend, but you spend less time with them, you give them space, or rather you give yourself space. And you try and find someone else or something else to direct your romantic energies towards. This will certainly take more time than straight up leaving, but it is the better option, you don’t make a rift within your friendship, and you keep your friend.

You could always do nothing, and hope for the best, that is always an option as well.

So herein lies my problem, I cannot find myself being romantically attracted to someone who is not my friend first. And if I “do” it is probably just a physical attraction masked as romantic. Is it even possible to be (romantically attracted to someone who is not your friend)? Well it would have to be for some people, because that is what dating websites etc. are for, finding someone to date whom you are not friends with. And there’s my problem with those for me. Yet I still find myself constantly returning to dating sites and apps, like PoF, OkCupid, Tinder, and Bumble. But sadly what they don’t have are sites like that for making friends, probably because some people would abuse the use of them to try and find a relationship be it physical or romantic, and as previously mentioned if one person is looking for something romantic and the other person is looking for something platonic it just doesn’t work.

In conclusion, it’s hard to control who you develop romantic feelings for. And sometimes they are directed towards your friends, if your friends don’t feel the same don’t be a dick about it, let your friends just be your friends, and treat them as such. Actually in general if you develop feeling for anyone, and they are not reciprocated, accept it and move on.  Also friends are great, don’t mistreat them, they are essential to good living.