[00:00:00] Welcome to the Closeness podcast. The following is based on both personal experiences, opinions, and wisdom, as well as experiences that men and women have contributed to us. Generalizations are sometimes made for the sake of brevity, but are never meant to exclude or offend. Regardless of your gender identity, relationship status, preferences, or sexual orientation, it is our sincere hope that you can take away something positive, constructive, and useful from each topic explored. You can support these podcasts by donating to our
[email protected] closeness, the link to which can be found in the description. Now, are you ready to come closer? Let's get started. Today we're answering a very important question. How do you know when you're being let on? And how do you avoid being let on in dating? What does that mean specifically? That means that you've made attempts, calls, overtures, gestures, emails, text messages. In other words, you've regularly asked your partner out and it's just not moving forward. Maybe they're constantly sending you their physical location and we'll get into what that is later. Or maybe they're telling you what they're up to but never committing to anything solid. Of course, this can be a symptom of the time, since people are always looking out for something better. So this creates problems, like people waiting to the very, very last minute to let you know whether they're going to make your plans or not, whether they're going to pull out and eject or not, and whether something better or not came along, leaving the other person baffled or dumbfounded. Now, this works out great for the person doing the selective sifting, the canceling, the changing of the plans, but for the person on the receiving end, it can wind up feeling like you're just being used, or used for temporary fulfillment. You might feel like you're being blown off if it doesn't work out, or that they're your last choice. When it comes to spending time together, none of these things make us feel appreciated or liked. ThinGS not going anywhere is a symptom of several things, and one of them is people's total lack of accountability and responsibility. These are words that no one likes to hear when it comes to themselves, but it's a total lack of accountability for your own actions and behavior. People like this don't want to be responsible for your pain or theirs, and they'll say things to you such as, oh, you know, I just didn't want to make them feel bad. I didn't want to hurt them. But this in itself is also a selfish act because they don't want to deal with the pain of holding it in themselves. So rather than being direct, and you know what a big fan I am of direct communication. Rather than simply saying something like, I'm not interested, which is such a powerful, clean sentence, instead, people default to some extravagant excuse, anything, to let them know what they're really feeling on the inside, and that makes everyone miserable. So let's say you're on a dating application. You are interacting with someone in some way via text. You send them a message, and you sometimes already know what you're dealing with because it'll take this person a really long time to reply. It's hard for me to even say this without laughing because it's so ridiculous. Rather than providing you with some sort of insightful reply or information or response, you'll hear things like, oh, hey, I never get on here. And nothing else. Oh, sorry, I haven't had my phone on me all day. Yeah, right. Oh, I have notifications turned off. Some almost asinine form of communication. That is a sentence, but it's not telling you anything or moving anything forward. So the lesson here is you've got to look at what's underneath that. The key thing here is to separate what people say from what people do. It's so easy to get sucked into other people's words. So what it seems like is that this person is actually interested in you because you're getting a reply. It seems friendly enough in nature. She's apologizing or letting you know what's up. But the really shady part is the action. The action itself is something completely different. The action doesn't move anything forward. It doesn't allow you to communicate further, and it basically shuts down most communication. Think for a moment what it took for that person to give you this useless reply. They turned on their phone, opened the app, read your message, began typing, sent you some sort of information that gives you absolutely nothing to go on and leaves you completely in the dark. This type of behavior creates a vacuum effect, a sort of drawing you in to someone who possibly might not even be interested in you. So you hear it again and you see the shady behavior. They responded. They had the time to give you a reply, but they magically, somehow were physically incapable and totally incapacitated from answering your question. Yes. No. Yes, I'd like to go out. No, maybe a different day. To respond by giving you an invitation. Suggest an alternative, an answer to your question. Anything in the universe that might move this conversation forward is absent from this reply. I want it to sink in, they pulled out their phone to tell you how busy they are and how unavailable they are, and they thought they should just tell you, a total cliffhanger with no possible way to move the conversation unless you continue asking.
[00:05:34] And here's the kicker, if you keep asking, eventually you're just going to sound annoying and irritating to them and they're not going to want to spend time with you anymore. So they're setting you up for failure in the response of saying, hey, I've just been really busy. They create the situation to never talk to you again by giving you useless information, which is going to force you to never talk to them again yourself, or to keep probing, begging, and asking for an opportunity to see them, which will lead to them not wanting to see you at all. In sum, people who lead you on don't give you any information of any kind that is useful to you in bringing you both together to connect. Can you think of a better way to waste someone else's time? Now sometimes people will want to give the excuse that they don't want to be mean, they don't want to be a mean girl. There seems to be this huge pressure and illusion to not wanting to make someone feel bad, to not hurt their feelings. Or people are concerned about offending people, as if offending someone is worse than leading someone on for weeks and weeks and weeks by responding with poor communication. Every single time that someone makes the choice to not directly communicate how they're feeling in the moment, it causes enormous amounts of unneeded time spent, frustration, agitation, and so forth. The number one thing I hear in dating is that people don't want to waste their time, as if their time is so valuable and shouldn't be spent on anyone that they're not interested in. And yet, the irony of the whole thing is that so much time is wasted keeping someone in your life and stringing them along by being nice, which is not nice, by the way. So much of our time is wasted on these excessive time wasters, like keeping someone in your life that you're not interested in instead of letting them go, cutting the ties and moving forward with your life. If you're exerting mental energy thinking about how you should respond to someone that you're not interested in, and you're not saying things like I'm not interested, you're going about it the wrong way. Three simple words just like no is so magical and effective I'm not interested carries the incredibly concise, effortless message of letting your partner know that you don't want to spend time with them unless you feel differently. And so every time this happens, millions and millions of times a day, a false sense of hope gets instilled into the hearts of people who want to spend time with someone who just doesn't know how to say no. So let's say you actually get this person to spend time with you and you find yourself in the same place at the same time with your date. If they're not present with you, if they're not regularly paying aTtention, being considerate towards you, or caring about the fact that you're there, then you are likely being led on. In all fairness, though, most people do lack the ability to tune everything out, tune into you, and really give you authentic presence. But you should expect it, and you should work on giving it to others around you. It's a very special feeling when someone's present with you. In fact, I expect nothing less.
[00:08:50] But if you think that maybe your partner isn't, here are some indicators to look out for. Are their eyes darting all over the place and they're easily distracted? Constantly being pulled by people who walk by or other attractive people? Are you noticing that they're constantly pulling out their cell phone or checking it or reading it every time it goes off? Or making that more important than spending time with you? Are they fidgety or uncomfortable? Have you noticed that they always just need to respond to one more thing, make one more phone call, and be there in just a moment? Of course, we all have things that are in process, and there are always times where something requires our attention and we just need a moment to finish it off. To some degree, that's understandable. And once in a while, that's perfectly fine. I've found myself in that same position. But I'll communicate openly. I'll say, look, I want to give you my full, undivided attention, but I just need one or two minutes here to finish this phone call or a message, and then I'm all yours. And yes, friends, even if it's something new and you like to use language like, I owe them nothing, I don't know them, they don't know me. They're responsible for how they feel. Doesn't matter what I do. Respect, consideration, filling a person in so they know what's going on with you, that's what goes a long way, because you're laying the roots for trust, communication and intimacy. But you're also demonstrating every time you behave poorly like that, you're showing the other person how you show up and what kind of person you are. As a friend, as a lover, or as a family member, what can you do? Where is the silver lining here? Here's the best gold that I can give you. When someone wants to see you, they make time for you, they have space for you, and you do the same thing. When you want to see someone, you make that happen. They don't always have an excuse. There's not something getting in the way. Your interaction feels less like a baseball game where someone hits a ball clear across the field and out of the stadium, and more like a volleyball game. It's volleying back and forth. Hey, I'd love to see you Tuesday. Does that work? I can't do Tuesday. I'm working. But how about Wednesday? Ah, Wednesday I've got this thing. Can we do Thursday? No. How about 2020? No. Why don't we try next year? Okay, great. How about the summertime? Winter is going to be better until you finally make an arrangement to see each other. If you look at the people that you're involved with now, whether it's by default or through the sports and activities that you're involved in, or even if it's through work, these are the people that you've chosen to give your time to. If you want to take control of your life more often, you'll start saying yes to those experiences that are meaningful to you, with people that you care about or that you have possibility with. If you want to not be led on by others, you'll notice very quickly within one, two, or three invitations, sometimes even within one or two or three minutes, you'll know where their focus lies and what their intentions are when it comes to you. Because people who are fascinated by you, they can't get enough. People who are into you, they're gripped by you and vice versa. So it's valuable for you to learn who you can cut out of your life altogether and stop, quote unquote, wasting your time. I also need to strongly encourage you to never tolerate low class, bad, or distasteful behavior from anyone who shares their physical location with you. Do not tolerate anyone who thinks that that is an acceptable way to respond to your overtures, behavior, invitations and suggestions. What does it mean? You might be asking to share your physical location. Listen carefully. It's when you ask somebody out and they answer by telling you where they are and nothing more. You ask them out and they tell you their physical location. Hey, Jessica. Would you like to have lunch with me today at three? I'm working. Hi, Bianca. Do you want to go to the beach today? I met my mom's. Tatiana, can I cook you dinner tonight? I just got home from work, so I always encourage people to ask, was that a sentence fragment, or was there something more to that completely incoherent statement? What you'll quickly learn from people who only share their physical location is that they've only got themselves in mind.
[00:13:07] Their life, their time, their schedule. They make it about me. Me.
[00:13:12] Everything revolves around me. It's hugely egoic. Only me in my life, I can only think about what's important to me.
[00:13:21] My life matters so much more than yours that the only thing I can give you is my physical location. Look, we're all selfishly oriented, there's no doubt about that. We're all doing what's best for us and our families and our lives. But there's no way to live happily, healthily, and full of satisfaction in a world where we're all connected and we are all interconnected. If your only focus is yourself and sharing your physical location. Now, for those of us who are more selfless, it's extremely critical for us to look out for others who are always putting themselves first. It's very easy to give away our time, our energy, our love, our help, and sometimes it's not met in return. I sometimes wonder what makes people feel one way or the other? What makes someone more empathetic and another person more careless and selfless. And I do think it comes down to their perception of the world. Maybe some people think that the world's against them, that it's a dangerous game, that they have to get all they can get to get theirs. So some people from a very young age don't respect others, don't answer others, don't answer to others. And so what type of people do you think they're going to keep attracting into their lives? On the other end of that is hope, consideration, caring, love, thoughtfulness, sweetness, closeness.
[00:14:36] And if for some strange reason, all of those beautiful emotions don't resonate with you, the best thing you can do when you're considering how you respond to someone is to put yourself in their shoes. But you know, I've given a lot of thought to all of this, and sometimes I wonder if the people who need to hear this most, who are doing the leading on and who are behaving in the strange ways. I sometimes wonder if they'd even ever have access to a podcast like this, or listen to it, or want to fix it. And luckily it's a two way street. It takes two. So if you are someone who has found yourself in this situation, you know what that feels like. You know what those signs are to look out for in your future relationships and your future interactions. And it really comes down to presence. So many times people feel like they're blindsided or something just came out of the blue. And I really think that there's usually obvious signs. Yes, some people are a little off the rocker, might be a little crazy, what have you, but I really do find that if you pay close attention, something that you'll see me talking about more and more in future episodes. You're deep listening into your partner or your future partner, that the signs become obvious where they are, where that other person is, and where their intentions lie. You could sit with someone for five minutes and get a sense of that. So what can you do to not be let on? You can pay attention. You can watch their actions and not their words, and you can see how long does it take for you to connect? A person who wants to see you says things like, I can't wait. I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be fun. I want to see you. Yes, I'm excited. There's a real demonstration of interest and that's what you're looking for and what I hope you find. And I think we'll stop right there for today. Have a wonderful night. Thank you for listening. We hope you've enjoyed this immensely. You can learn more about the closeness lifestyle and movement by visiting Getcloseness.com. If you've been touched by what you've heard here today, or if the Closeness podcast has inspired you to make a positive change in your life, please consider contributing to our
[email protected] closeness. If listening has inspired you to get your own questions answered on an upcoming episode, or if you'd like personal or couples coaching, you can find what you're looking for on any of the Closeness websites. All of these links can be found in the description. Until next time, stay close.
