If you’ve felt like you had a great connection with a guy, only for him to turn around and tell you it’s just not working, you’re not alone. We guys can be jerks when it comes to communicating our feelings or lack of them. However, there are ways to avoid being blindsided by noticing the signs that we’re not feeling it early on. If we’re doing any of these things, ladies, you’re better off moving on.
- We only text you late at night. This is not a 2 a.m. invitation for a Friday night date or us checking in because we were thinking about how much we enjoy your company and were overwhelmed with the need to tell you right then and there. It’s a booty call. If we only text you in the wee hours, we’re really only interested in one aspect of the relationship and unless you’re just looking to hook up too, you should probably not respond.
- We don’t make an effort to get to know your friends. Because let’s be honest — if we’re just hooking up, we’re not going to stay in touch with YOUR friends and we both get bored. Especially if it’s a bit of a messy disengagement. We’ll only care about making a good impression on your girls if we plan to be in your life for a long time.
- We’re always “too busy” to make time for you. It’s not that we’re lying when you text us and we say we have to work late or we have other plans; it’s just that our relationship isn’t a priority. If you’re looking for someone more than a hookup or a friend, we’re not really worth spending time or energy on.
- We’re utterly unperturbed by your presence. Even James Bond gets a bit fluttery when his love interest wanders by. If we’re totally smooth, confident, and relaxed, bad news: it looks like you’re just not under our skin. That doesn’t mean we don’t like you, but we’re not going to be head over heels anytime soon.
- We don’t seem to make any effort to clean our place up before you get there. We’re kind of gross and we know it. We leave our hair in the sink when we shave and our sheets have wrinkles in them even though they’re the kind with grippy corners. But if we DO really like a woman, we’ll make at least a token effort to tidy up our humble abode to meet your standards. If you find pee on the toilet seat, we probably just want to be friends (or hookup buddies, depending on if we’re currently having sex).
- We tell you about our other love interests. We guys tend to be a jealous breed when it comes to new relationships, so we’re usually a bit more aware when we’re dating someone we like to NOT mention other women, Tinder dates, the cute barista, or really any women at all ever. This means if we’re telling you about some other romantic misadventure, in our heads our dynamic has already shifted past romantic and into something else. It doesn’t mean we don’t like you; we’re just not into you in that way anymore.
- We treat you like we treat the rest of our friends. If you feel like we don’t treat you differently from the rest of our friends, it’s probably because we don’t. One super strong signal that we send that we’re not into you (rather than, you know, having a conversation) is to just treat you like a friend and assume that you get the message. Yes, it’s quite a terrible thing to do but if you’re being treated exactly the same as our cousin Sarah, then odds are we’re not that into you.
- We never initiate contact. Are you always the one reaching out and/or losing your mind when we don’t? If so, we’re probably just not into having a romantic relationship with you. If we really liked you, we wouldn’t leave you hanging — we’d contact you pretty regularly.
- We have an awkward amount of respect for your personal space. In contrast to when we DO like a woman (when our grasp on personal space is tenuous at best), if we actively don’t like you as a love interest and see you more as a friend/hookup then we’ll be careful to always be aware of where you are in relation to us. Inconsequential touching (e.g. brushed arms), which is totally normal between two people watching a movie, will absolutely not happen. If you can feel us trying to not touch you, we’re probably not the guy for you.
- We tell you we’re not that into you. It’s not an invitation to fix us. Please, you have better things to do – I assure you. We’re not worth the effort to convince us to fall in love with you, and it’s a recipe for mutual unhappiness. Just move on, be awesome, and someone who wants to be with you will come strolling along.
