Men, The Friendzone, and Simping for Women.

i don't know if you guys have have noticed but um i make less i make fewer boomer mistakes now i'm proud of you yeah wait hold on i can't oh i i can't see myself i was just about to make another mistake um so welcome everyone thank you thank you so i think maybe what we can do is um so i understand we're going to be talking about setting boundaries and potentially the friend zone is that right yeah yes okay and i noticed that there was a pretty lively discussion ahead of time but i i wasn't i haven't read it yet um just a couple of things so what we'll do is we'll start with introductions and uh we'll also kind of do like a sound check at the same time and and maybe we'll have to adjust a couple of things um and then yeah we'll kind of see where things take us just a quick disclaimer i tend to say you guys which i don't mean to offend anyone um so i sort of use it in the gender-neutral way which maybe is part of the problem but uh so forgiveness i'll do my best to avoid using that oftentimes i'll just say y'all which i think is way better um but you know i don't mean to offend anyone so let's go ahead and let's get started with introductions so why don't we start with um intuitive cutie hi my name is alyssa i'm 23 years old and i'm from california and i'm really excited to be here because i've never talked about setting boundaries with a group of ladies before so awesome and i'm sorry what was your name alyssa alyssa okay yes welcome melissa thanks for coming on thank you for having me um linda you want to go next well hi uh yeah i'm linda that's pretty much it okay welcome linda um math of the valley yeah hi my name is math uh i'm a student and i'm 19 years old and i can come here with more of a perspective of uh someone who hasn't had many things happen to her but the few experiences i've had are bad enough that i want to speak about it and i also want to speak as a few like i want to speak stories that my friends went through as well okay wow that's yeah i don't know if that's like fortunate or unfortunate that on one hand you know you haven't dealt with it a whole lot but it sounds like when you have had to deal with it it's been pretty bad sorry to hear that thanks for coming thank you um and risaka yeah my name is risa i am 24 years old i'm currently working as a content manager in the team fight tactics esports scene and yeah i'm really looking forward to this conversation all the ladies here has been extremely supportive and wonderful and i think that this is a great conversation for everyone to kind of have more insights about okay great yeah so we're i think we're really here to learn and we'd really love to have your perspective i think you know most of our community is men although that's changing rapidly so i think when we started streaming it was like 95 to 90 percent men and and five to ten percent women and i think it's like closer to 70 30 now um and so i you know hopefully we can learn a lot thanks for coming on risa thank you uh star sleeps yeah you can just call me star um i'm 22 i'm an artist here on twitch but i'm also a student studying engineering so i've had some stories in both of those categories that we can get into oh unfortunately real life stories and the internet stories yeah okay that also i don't know i mean that sounds actually unfortunate because it sounds like there's nowhere to escape to native style stay in bed i guess um champaloo yes um you can call me champ okay um i am 23 years old i live in switzerland that's in europe um i'm working in the banking industry and i'm a business admin student um i have also experiences in real life and online and i think this is a really relevant um like thing to know like about setting boundaries um yeah and i'm just i just want to spread that aoe healing for all of you guys thank you so much i hope we can learn from that yeah so let me ask y'all um you know just to start off so first of all thank you all for coming uh i was i'm trying to debate a little bit about how do we want to approach this discussion so you know champ said this is an important thing to talk about and i'm wondering whether we should start by defining what is this or if we just want to jump right into like an actual experience what do you guys think would be like better to do first definition doesn't it yeah okay um i didn't even know what boundaries were what does that mean so remember that like you know there's a group of people who are watching and maybe you know hundreds of thousands more will watch on youtube one day and i i don't know um i know there's a sort of a presumption that we're going to be talking about female male boundaries but you know this could apply beyond that there are certainly women who don't respect boundaries in terms of um their relationships with men um and also i think we're going to sort of take a default heteronormative approach which we don't necessarily have to but in my experience you know boundaries it doesn't matter whether you're heterosexual homosexual or something in between boundaries or boundaries doesn't matter what gender you are um and so yeah it sounded like star you wanted to say something oh no i would i said i waved because you said potentially hundreds of thousands um so yeah so what is this how do we define what are we talking about today um yeah go ahead today we're talking about boundaries so boundaries can affect in a lot of different parts of the life so with your partners you have to talk about like what you're okay with each other peop like are doing but outside partners who is even more than that right like you have friends you have people that you just meet online so like what are some stuff that you're comfortable talking with them about how you interact with them every person is different and this is the type of communication that's so important you have that most people don't people just assume certain things that is okay from another person do those things and then make others uncomfortable so that's why this is such an important conversation to have especially with covert going on there's so much online interactions right now so just kind of learning how to define this boundary that you have between people through online would be really helpful okay yeah and strangers in the street as well like a lot of people in the street think um just because you don't know the person it's okay to step out of the boundary it's not like it's i think it's in every case online friends and strangers yeah okay so how is someone supposed to learn what the right boundary is um i think setting boundaries has always been about well what i've learned is that it's about communicating your limits and how you want to be treated so in order for somebody to know how you should be treated you have to communicate that to them in a way where they'll understand yeah okay um but unfortunately i have had more cases of strangers of people that i don't really talk to and it's really hard to communicate with someone you just met like two seconds ago so i think it's also just uh common sense in what you should or should do but when you have that close relationship with someone yes like they should be more established after that okay and also what i think gets confused a lot is like when you finally express your boundaries there are still some people who think that they are entitled to deflate those boundaries that they know better what to tell you what is right and wrong like oh no this is actually not that bad or oh this is you know this is don't make a scene out of this right but i think there's nothing wrong about setting your boundaries and communicating your boundaries okay what do you guys think motivates someone to try to deflate your boundary ego what does that mean um i think a lot of people don't like um being told something don't like being told that they were doing something wrong and out of ego they try to deflate you and what makes you comfortable or uncomfortable okay linda i think i think maybe a lot of people also just don't think that things apply to them because they like try to read you and then they assume that they're special for some reason so that the boundaries just don't apply to them anymore for some reason interesting okay i think it could also be a power dynamic um because i've experienced that at work and in relationships too because when people feel like they have a certain authority over you it's almost like they're setting the boundaries not necessarily listening to yours so it makes it hard to communicate what you're not okay with um just out of fear that they might retaliate or um won't listen to you okay um is it okay if i kind of challenge some of what y'all are saying i know it sounds bizarre yeah for sure yeah so so like we don't have to get into this now but i just want to think a little bit about like a counterpoint so as a psychiatrist i'm a big fan of setting firm boundaries you know here's my cell phone it's appropriate to use it if you want to schedule something or if you're in a true crisis but it's not uh just text me at random hours of the day at the same time so when we think about um so i think setting boundaries is really important it's a lot of what i try to educate people on at the same time when it comes especially to romantic relationships i think a lot of romantic relationships thrive with a lack of boundaries right so i'm trying to figure out like if you think about flirtation so flirtation is almost like kind of by definition not saying thanks yeah right yeah okay so some that's why i'm so it's just a different perspective you all are welcome to disagree or sort of educate us on like how that isn't the case but i i just know i'm i'm actually thinking about you know when my wife and i got together like we were apparently dating and i wasn't even aware of it i thought i was just showing her around town she thought we were going on dates and there was a lot of you know confusion there yeah and and i think frankly i probably would have done a far worse job if i thought i was on a date i thought we were just hanging out and and so sometimes when i do look at relationships sometimes things are a little bit ambiguous right so like at what point do you set a boundary with someone about like what your relationship is like do you meet someone and say hello i'm so-and-so i'm single and i'm not looking for a relationship nice to meet you you know when you meet people online kind of yes to be honest so it's actually a genuine question right so like i i get what you guys are saying about the value of setting what your limits are completely agree with that the thing that i'm a little bit confused about um and i imagine our community is confused about is like when and how do you actually do that in my experience and i don't think this is like the best way to do it but in my experience most of those conversations have happened like after someone's crossed a boundary and you have to like go back and be like hey sorry that i gave you the wrong idea um i'm not in love with you you know yeah or whatever it might be and that's a huge problem right is because like there's a lack of setting boundaries and then you get into a situation where there's confusion on both sides and so what i'm kind of like really curious about is like part of what we try to do on stream is to make things applicable and what i'm envisioning is like if i'm a 17 year old kid watching stream what can i learn from y'all about how i interact with like women i feel that whenever you are unsure ask and obviously not from the start we don't go out and just be like i'm single and i'm talking to you because i'm interested like that's just not going to happen right yeah so yeah like obviously a lot of interaction starts off as friendship and maybe that person is flirting you don't know you're confused so after hanging out ask them be like hey like i just want to make sure i'm not taking the wrong hints like is this that whenever you're unsure about anything at all regarding you and another person it's so scary for that confrontation but you just have to go and ask okay so scary for the confrontation i think that's a really important point yeah and also um at least in my experience i think um that part of if you're if you don't want if you're scared to communicate in your you might step a boundary i think it should only happen when you know for sure you're already very comfortable with that person uh i think like if you already have a little bit of not trust like friendship with that person you already know them well the person you you didn't come in like trying to immediately step um step on the boundaries then like if you have that trust then at least in my case if i already trust someone if they step a boundary and uh i think i like if i have like a responsive um with the same way they they're coming towards me i will also i'll be comfortable with it because i already trust them but i think a lot of people step the boundary too soon sometimes okay and there needs to be a trust okay so i'm seeing a bunch of questions kind of rise to the surface how do you develop trust right um and not that we have to answer these right away but and then i i also kind of heard from um star that you know it sounds like sometimes the boundary conversation happens and oddly enough i can kind of see how mafin and stark kind of may be talking about something like that's similar which is that you start a relationship you're not sure exactly where the boundary is you start to develop really like friendship and trust and then maybe they think it's one thing you think it's another thing you kind of cross that boundary and then you have a conversation about it although that doesn't really sound ideal but i'm sort of seeing value to you know not having the conversation the first time you meet someone and also like that seems too early and then in in stars case it seems like some of those conversations happen way too late and so you know how do we find that medium and i think that's something practically that if the at the end of of today if we could sort of have some guidance around that i think that would be a really cool like takeaway what do you all think for sure okay so does anybody want to like let's let's dive in does anybody want to share like a situation that they've been in i kind of want to hear from star but which one which is not i don't know i'm just trolling you so seriously anyone wanna i mean i do want to hear from you but i didn't mean to put you on the spot no you're good um you see guys what i did there as i tested a boundary i was like asking oh a storm is it okay but does anybody feel like they want to share a situation later i think if she goes first it's it's okay i have um so mine gets into power dynamics i had a situation i guess i could say with a professor oh [ __ ] yeah yeah and so like i'm laughing because i'm uncomfortable same i'm good i don't know look we're here to talk about real experiences so as long as it's not going to the one thing that i strongly strongly recommend that people do on stream is recognize that this is public and if this is going to actually impact you in a negative way in terms of your education star i would actually actually say you know no you're okay i've already been through uh some stuff with my school regarding the incident but basically yeah um basically i i'm an engineering student and you're like first two years of engineering they kind of make you take classes in every field to get you like up to speed on the different industries and so i had a professor that wasn't really in my major i'm mechanical and he was an electrical engineering professor um and he was like hey like i think you should come and work in my lab which is like a huge opportunity for a student right and especially like i definitely wasn't qualified right like i'd taken one electrical engineering class at this point and i had like a b in it i think um and so like he sort of had ulterior motives there right um and so i went out to his lab once he it was just kind of uncomfortable he like hugged me when i got there and like like put his hand on my waist while he was showing me around the lab and stuff and i was like okay not going back there right like but i was then put in a situation where like i have to go back to class and see him right like i have to continue to be you know like i can't like if it was if it was outside of school i could be like [ __ ] off you know but with a professor i don't really have that opportunity so it was just like he would he got my number to like i don't know why i [ __ ] gave him my number in hindsight but i gave him my number to like coordinate when i would be at the lab um and he would text me like hey like what are you doing today you want to come out to the lab and i'd have to like like 12 times in a row i had to come up with some excuse because i didn't want to say no to a professor that like had my grade in his hand you know i'm processing that's fair i'm gonna need a second this is just how old was the professor uh like 50. okay what do you all think about that but it's also not surprising which is i think the more like like it doesn't even really shake you anymore it's almost like you're used to listening to stuff like that linda what's not surprising about it that that the situation happened like it feels so normal to hear about these things almost to a point where it doesn't yeah almost like oh you too you know yeah yeah which is a sad thing you know to yeah to relate i mean to be fair that kind of behavior oversets boundaries and it's just predatory like uh what's predatory about it he is a fifth year old professor who is trying to have this type of relationship or conversation with a student who is much younger than he is so yeah yeah there's the power dynamic there with the profession obviously and then also the setting of where all this is taking place as well um i also have a story about more of the theme of power dynamic that happened to a friend of mine um she was being followed by a man and yeah she was being followed by a man and she went to the police i went with her the first time then we had to go to another place and she was taking care of the business of the matter and the policeman that gave her his number and so she could call him when she was being followed and they could get there he started asking if she had a boyfriend and if they could meet out outside of her house at night alone and she had to get one of her co-workers to pretend to be her boyfriend for him to stop messaging her and it just really makes me angry because it's you can't call the police on the police so it just makes me really angry that she had to go through that situation where her only safety net just exploded basically and we only didn't report this because um she was already so devastated about the whole thing that she did not have the emotional energy to go report it okay this is way heavier [ __ ] than what i was mentally prepared for no i mean i think it's like i'm just sharing how i feel i don't think we should stop it's just like wow i was expecting something along the lines of you know someone messages me on on discord and then i have to block them after a couple of days you know we can talk about that too yes we also have those stories there's a lot more of those i mean so you know it's interesting because you know lin uh star said i can't tell him to [ __ ] off and i'm noticing the same thing in math story the thing that i think actually terrifies me the most and when i think about what's my instinctive reaction to hearing you guys is it's actually like a powerlessness because when someone dm's you on discord you can tell them to [ __ ] off yeah but it's like these situations where sort of like it almost feels like you can't enforce a boundary right and yeah and so i'm kind of curious how do you guys deal with a situation where you can't tell someone to [ __ ] off and then that also begs the question of why can't you um um can you repeat the questions i was just saying why can't you tell them to [ __ ] off for me it's like let's start with alyssa it's what alyssa um it's always been a fear of retaliation something bad happening to me um you know getting punished or um you know i've watched lots of those um stories about girls who have you know said one wrong thing and then they got killed or you know something really um terrible happening so it's just a fear of any of that on top of um even having to go to the police sometimes like i was also um followed by a man when i was about 19 to my job and um i didn't know what to do i didn't feel comfortable going to the police so when he showed up to my my job i was like i froze i'm the type of person to freeze so um yeah like you're saying in that moment i felt very powerless and i think that that um that pressure to like do something but also not knowing what to do is what has kept me silent many times because it's like i don't want to make a wrong move and have that backfire on me lisa you had something to say uh for me just due to a lot of bad experience i've learned now to just simply say like like you suddenly [ __ ] off or in a nicer way but like be very firm with people but the times that i yes how do you say that in a nicer way um so like if it's dms and they like keep pushing be like hi sorry i'm just not interested or like i'm going through a lot right now and i do not want to make this connection with you and then they keep pushing and overset that boundary i was like i actually will tell them be like hi you are going way overboard right now i'm actually going to block you now so that's usually the most direct way if it's someone that are really persistent the times i did feel very powerless is usually if it's in regards to people related to my career um just because i can't say [ __ ] off to someone that may be uh detrimental to like a networking system um so those times it's very hard for me to share with anyone because it's like who do i trust where this won't spread or like i don't want this to cause this like deal or anything so just just a lot of uncomfortable feelings usually during those times i will talk to like my someone like i'm really close with in terms of my co-workers i'll tell my boss about it or like someone in hr and but i have to say that not much is usually done per se it's usually they listen to me we feel better about it and they try to limit my interaction with that person but there's been not a lot of repercussion towards that individual which is honestly kind of my thing too because i'm scared of it i'm just oh i don't want repercussions to him because i don't know like it will like fire back at me so those are the times where i'm definitely really quiet and i'm scared even though any other time i'm usually the first one to talk yeah it's interesting i don't know if you guys get the sense but i i get the sense that risa doesn't [ __ ] around you guys we've learned that about her in the last three years so it's like it's pretty easy to tell and at the same time there are also things that get her to kind of like step carefully and and remain quiet which also is like extra terrifying because rhys is staying quiet which means that there's got to be something you know pretty significant um so i i'm noticing some and i'm sorry did somebody else want to speak linda or champ okay no it's fine maybe later um so i i'm noticing a certain tone of language which is like repercussion punishment retaliation um so it sounds like you guys have some amount of fear about what could happen if you set a boundary right so like on the one hand there's like repercussions which is like hey i think this is inappropriate and someone should be punished but that's like at one end of the spectrum so i i do think that like a formal complaint against this professor like sounds like a good idea um just because but on the other hand i also wonder a little bit about like um you know education and i'm just thinking about observing some some of my own experiences so i i once worked in a hospital where there was uh there was like a senior doctor who was like from foreign country where sexuality was like way more acceptable and so he would like openly say sexual things to people including his junior people and they seem to actually be okay with it like i'm not sure i didn't really have a conversation but he would even like talk to his junior people and he would be like when are we going to have sex and then everyone it's crazy and then everyone would just kind of laugh and like it sort of continued and and i don't get the sense like honestly just reading people's facial expressions and stuff i i thought that everyone was just sort of like oh like that's just how he is and some people even he was also like a good-looking european dude um you know in shape and in his 40s and with a good head of hair and so sometimes i wonder a little bit about that kind of thing but it's like a strange thing where i'm not sure like a repercussions appropriate is education appropriate like what's the right you know so i think that's the thing is they're pro oh sorry you go first i've talked more um i think that in that case people just let it slide because they i don't know maybe they're used to seeing people like that it's just oh it's it's just how he is but you should really educate them that no one said anything but they could have been very uncomfortable maybe there was one person who had a closer experience with him and no one said and no one knows about it i think it's more of an education thing even if yes how do you do that i don't know but what i could observe like in a work environment is that you know everyone kind of don't want to like you know stand out they just want to blend in and don't make a scene and keep it you know yeah professional and quiet so they are just observing you know their environment and they are just can adapt to that you know they are they can't really like give some like authentic view on things because they think that yeah i have this job now my job is just to do that job and to kind of like blend in and not cause a scene so it's really hard in work environment i think see i i work as a strainer as well sometimes um and i mean it's like sort of like i will flirt with people that come into my gym i will [ __ ] with my co-workers and stuff like that because it like gives a little bit of an extra kick and motivation if it makes sense so it's like it doesn't actually seem that odd to me personally so i don't think you can't even blame that person just because like like you mentioned the reception seemed positive everyone's just like laughing along with him and there's also this quote that i like and dislike heavily that's just how he is right and honestly he doesn't know better if no one has ever spoken up against him i think the most important point here is that if someone goes up to him and it's like hey i am uncomfortable with this he should never respond with that's just how i am but if noah has ever spoken to him like that before then him acting this way honestly i'm not upset just because it has been positive for him yeah so i'm gonna once again challenge this or play devil's advocate for a minute okay so like let's say that i'm a 19 year old guy in the gaming community and and or let's let's not even say 19. let's say i'm 26. and i'm a caster for a particular esport and i'm a prominent caster and i tend to be a little bit vivacious a little bit inappropriate a little bit humorous it's part of my on-screen personality that makes me successful and so what i'm kind of curious about is like especially when you kind of think about power dynamics if you all are reluctant to speak and i'm not blaming you for feeling that way because there could be repercussions and we've heard some of those stories before and and you know at the same time like no one has really ever told me that i'm doing something wrong um you know how am i supposed to know like what's appropriate or inappropriate i guess and if i can talk i guess in that situation i wouldn't blame that person unless someone came to them and said this was inappropriate and they like tried to brush that off does that make sense like i think in some situations it depends more on the person's reaction than on their initial actions and i mean in a way especially like public people like casas like that especially when they're like popular i mean those are one of the most like discussed people i don't really know how to say it but like there's like [ __ ] tons of reddit posts and people's opinions online so i mean i guess i can get like really hard to filter stuff out and to listen to what's like probably morally right but then that's like different for everybody anyway so um yeah so i mean that makes a lot of sense to me i'm just and it kind of goes back to what risa was saying too if they respond with that's just how i am so what i'm hearing you guys say is not so much that i mean it sounds certainly like some behavior is inappropriate right very inappropriate and at the same time there is like there's a space between punishing someone for behaving inappropriately and educating them and really not so much about like that you're setting a boundary with them but the way that they respond to and respond to your boundary setting that's actually like the really important thing the setting that you put to the caster as someone who works with a lot of casters and they're all amazing like saying that first it's so important for them to like bounce off of like the other casters and whoever they're working with and that's how they get their reactions they gauge reactions observing is literally their job and so i feel like it's very hard for them to miss if someone's obviously uncomfortable interesting like in your in your example where if someone's just the personality is that they just make a lot of these like remarks out if i was a fellow caster and they did something like that to me and i suddenly just shut up and go like that i feel there's certain stuff that i will automatically instantly react to even if i'm not like hey that's like awful that caster is ignorant if they choose not to look into that reaction i feel like they're just like all right just moving on this is just how i am so like i mentioned that's the excuse again that's just how i am i feel like if you're uh okay uh i don't know i just feel like working on observing because i think the pivotal is still for someone to speak up and tell him like hey like this action actually makes me uncomfortable because you can't just assume they would know but people should work on observing skills in general to try to like view boundaries absolutely it sounds like it's really important um so i'm kind of curious when it comes to uh you know responding or or so what i'm hearing is that at some point you guys generally or may or may not try to communicate depending on your sense of of fear about repercussions your sense of power and the relationship um you know so maybe you guys will say something maybe you won't and then the way that they respond to that is really important so can you guys share just your experiences of when you have tried to communicate so it sounds like sometimes you don't feel comfortable um and and when you have tried to communicate what happens i i saw a star raise your hand i well i just wanted to share with my professor um so well this is just like his response um which wasn't to me so i ended up telling another professor that i trusted and he told me that there was like an office that handles this kind of stuff and so i went to them and said like hey like this professor made me a little uncomfortable they did like these things you know um and i later found out that i like wasn't the only student that said something about him that semester um and so they like wrote up our statements and like sent it to him and then he made a statement and then they like sent us the like follow-up or whatever and he literally said like this generation is so sensitive like that was his like official quote in response that he was like what what do they want by saying this and i was like all right dude like gr you know at that point what do i do what what what do you do i mean i don't i just blocked his number i never talked to him again how'd you do in the class i actually got an a i stopped going to class but my grades on my like tests were enough to get an a i didn't need him yeah wow what other experiences of trying to respond to people and how that that's received like i i often see like guys playing that yield card whenever you are addressing your boundaries like for example like there was a user who you know i was just in the mood to listen to someone and there was a user who explained me his things and i'm like okay you know so i listened to that person and then at one point he messaged me and said like oh like i think i have a crush on you you know that stuff and i'm like okay look first of all like did this how how does this work right like i'm just here listening and you have a crush on me like you actually don't know really who i am and it's kind of like weird to me that just from speaking to someone you can have a crush on right like i can tell you whatever i want online basically right you don't know me you don't know where i live you don't know when like you don't know anything about me um so i was saying to him like look this is this is this can't work like i was just like fine listening to to you and i feel bad for your situation but this is just um yeah like this is not my attempt you know like i didn't try to you know to engage any like relationship with you so what he said is oh like you know uh i am like really in a good spot and why are you rejecting me and why are you doing this to me and i'm like like how how how should i react in that situation like should i feel guilty for rejecting him for telling him my boundaries like right i i thought i was like i don't have to tolerate everything right i can right yeah i don't have to do this and that's like that guilt card on me is like yes and it's not the first time like it's also in real life that happens like what is that feeling what is the feeling that you get when someone says like why do you think that you have to put all your weight on my shoulders like why do you think that i have to be that person manipulation yes how does how do you guys imagine champ feels when they do that frustrated by what math because she is afraid that her actions will have um a reaction but at the same time it's not her job to take care of him like he's a baby so it's just guilt it's manipulation sounds like emotional blackmail yeah i've had that happen to me too i was 17 i had a group of friends on discord and this 24 year old dude started speaking to me also a thing of like two three weeks speaking um i wasn't saying i was like not interested but then in the end i just i just like no i'm not interested at all to speak to you and he made me feel guilty for rejecting him to the point where i was crying my eyes out even though i didn't like him and he was fine i called him and he was fine and i was crying my eyes out he was making me feel guilty for rejecting him and after all of that happened i was banned from the group of friends so i felt at the time i didn't see it but now i look back into it and i realized i was just some someone he could speak to for them it didn't work out so just they didn't need me anymore and the worst part of it they made me feel bad for it okay so because i didn't want to be with him yeah so let me ask you something how does someone make you feel guilty because they're expressing their sadness and you think and it's obviou when you make someone sad it could be from your actions but in that case he was faking it he was manipulating it to make me feel sad for for me to stay how do you know he was faking it i called him and i was crying my eyes out and what he was saying in text was he was fine and called he was speaking normally he wasn't sad at all it was his stone sure i can i cannot be 100 sure but he was fine okay so what i'm hearing is that sometimes people yeah linda go for it oh i was just going to say that for me a lot of the time is like when someone like confesses to me or something that that especially online it's been that we've already spent time together and we've like sort of built a bond as in like a lot of guys actually open up a lot and talk about their problems with you um and i'm not sure whether that comes from like they don't trust to guys to talk about it um but they're a lot more open towards well me or something like that um and then at that point it's like you know the [ __ ] that is going on in their life you know how bad they feel about certain things and like in a way how like lost they are and you like want to help them um but then then they come out and they they tell you that they like you and then you suddenly sit in that spot where you have to hurt them and you sit in a call with them and you listen to them to their like voice while they speak to you and it just like destroys you because you're like you're their friend and you're trying to be there for them but you literally can't and it just hurts them and it sucks yeah so i i think that's also uh there are a couple of important points here about what confiding in someone means and i think sometimes different people me think it means different things one thing that i kind of want to point out for a second is that what i'm hearing from math and and from y'all is that you know they can say words that make you feel a certain way is that fair yeah and so what i'm kind of curious about in hearing linda's case is i wonder if the opposite is also true where you can say words that make them feel a certain way i mean absolutely so then what i'm kind of curious about is like if you hold them responsible which is sort of what i'm hearing for making you feel guilty can they hold you responsible for making them feel love i don't really like i i can't really blame them you and and like i also like sort of if if someone has feelings for me i could sort of encourage that they get it out because it like helps right it helps to talk about um so i don't actually mind it too much it's just like i'm i'm just like not sure how to like emotionally deal with it myself because i'm inflicting this pain by rejecting them yep the thing with that too is that if someone is protecting their sadness to me i don't find them like guilty of anything they're honestly i don't even call them fake or anything if they're sad they're sad right but the issue is if i tell them that like oh hey like so i'm going to use a specific story so someone messaged me and just gave me their life story about how i'm very similar to their ex i remind them of her she she broke his heart and that he's going through a lot mentally through depression and a lot of very serious issues right i've never really talked to him much prior to this so i don't know this man well at all so this was just like his life story suddenly at me so i told him hey i'm really sorry about everything that you went through that sounds horrible i think you should speak about this to someone close to you like a friend and he retaliates saying like oh i'm already going through like so much i guess like people these days on internet just don't want to listen to others that you don't care about anyone and for me that made me very angry right like i didn't show it but it's just a responsibility that you don't put on someone i don't blame him for sharing all that story for me was it weird sure but i'm not here saying like you can't do this you can't say this to me but if i'm telling you like hey like sorry go next you go next you don't then be like no i told you this now you have to respond to me that makes sense so i'm hearing a common theme of so it's interesting right so if we go to a champs case and and you know champ is listening to someone on i presume the the internet champ is that right yeah yeah and then when he says hey i have a crush on you do you guys think that that's a good communication or a bad communication on his part i don't mind that yeah just be okay if i say no yeah yeah but do people disagree because i mean you're allowed to not feel that way right so like i i think the problem is when people don't stop after you tell them um like i've had so so generally whenever someone confesses to me i i sort of try to stay friends with them because they're like good people and i mean i am sort of close with them um but i had for example one um case in real life where this this friend of me um just like kept trying to make make moves of me and kept like touching me inappropriately and stuff like that even though after uh even after i told him multiple times that i wasn't interested in him at all and i didn't like um i would say that i didn't do anything back to him so it should have been in a way obviously from obvious from his side that there was like nothing coming for me um and that just like sort of kept happening and happening to a point where it was like i couldn't bother to deal with it anymore and i just i gave up the friendship even though i would have loved to like wow yeah it's like there's a difference between someone saying like i feel this way about you and someone saying like you're responsible for this happiness or like you owe me this happiness and sometimes it's like like any confession you're not sure which side that it's on yeah like i didn't mind even though i find it kind of weird and i find it it kind of didn't make sense that he just said he has a crush on me after just like hearing his story um and and just me hearing him out um i didn't have a problem with him like saying to me directly that he has a crush on me but when then i told him like look i i already told him like look i appreciate you saying that's this to me so i can give him like that feedback but this is not like uh this was i'm sorry if this was my like if you thought that this was my attention right that i tried to engage any like relationship uh thing so the thing that bothered me was like when he played that guild card like oh like you know exactly that i'm going through things so that i'm really like you know not good with you know taking bad responses so better act the way that i want like this is how i felt um i felt really like off and this is when i was saying to him look i don't deserve this goodbye and this is where i blocked him yeah and i'm actually glad that this was like on the internet and not real life because you know i don't know if yeah with the real life you can block and people yeah block people in real life yeah i okay so a couple of thoughts so i i want to kind of return to this idea so here's the general theme which i'm hearing so first of all there's ambiguity at the beginning of the relationship and then at some point it sounds like for the most part you guys are okay with people sharing their feelings about you even if they're weird and they come from like you know we don't know where they come from that you kind of talk to a stranger on the internet um in reese's case that just sounds so [ __ ] you remind me of my ex-girlfriend like that is the worst just don't even anyway um right because it's like it's not even about and i think this is what i'm hearing from you guys is it's not about you there's like something coming from them that you sort of fit into a mold does that make sense yeah yeah and and so the tricky thing so i the interesting thing is that i actually am hearing even though it can be make you uncomfortable and can be hard in terms of a conversation that it's actually a good thing for them to tell you like hey i have these feelings about you and then comes the key thing which is that like they should respect your response but instead what seems to be happening is when you guys respond they respond in such a way that they kind of make you feel guilty maybe they do a little bit just a touch of that sprinkling of that emotional blackmail or something like that they don't really respect the boundary it's interesting because it's like it's not so much that they're ambiguity or their feelings it's that like the boundary is not respected once it's set um it's a problem with your generation star y'all are just so right i've been inappropriately groping women since i was 20 years old and they didn't have a [ __ ] problem with it i don't know what's wrong with y'all jesus kids nowadays [Music] right so here's here's my next question for you guys and and i want to kind of like tunnel down into this so like you know i don't mean to be let me know if this comes across the wrong way or if you guys feel like i'm asking an inappropriate question or making an appropriate assumption so in a sense we think it's like okay that i mean we sort of acknowledge that they can do certain things to make you feel a certain way the common nature of your experience makes me think that you guys are consistently doing something to make them fall in love with you or have questions i think it's just the image they have of us it's not like we're even doing anything for i feel like oh okay so i'm going to calm down a little bit but simply being a approachable person i've learned makes people assume that we fit like you mentioned a mold of theirs and ideal of theirs that makes it okay to suddenly bear their stories and to be a certain extent a lot of us here as i mentioned but all these ladies have been really supportive and they are all very approachable and it's like welcoming to others but it's about taking advantage of that when we put the boundaries of saying no this is going too far yeah dude like i had i had weird stuff like people just speaking to me for five minutes and they were like doing statements like yeah i know for sure you my dream wife whatever and i'm like you don't even know me you don't know maybe i'm a terrible person like maybe what you heard in those five minutes is not even me like how can you tell me that like i don't want to be like i don't want to have this confirmation of like men [Music] telling me that i am their fantasy after five minutes talking like are you even interested to understand me to know me or is it just like okay she's my fantasy check let's go no don't do that i think that comes down to them having like a very a very small checklist to be fit it's like she plays games you know what she's a woman she's female oh nice okay that's it i need those three things and that's perfect now we're good we can get married now i think a lot of people also confuse this happens with both sides friendliness with flirting a lot of people also confuse that being nice oh i obviously want you because i'm not telling you to [ __ ] off so yeah that's also a problem that happens to a lot of people so so when i trust yeah go ahead melissa there was a point in my life where i had this happen so often that i figured okay the only way to stop this from happening is to be mean and that didn't really fit my narrative as a person so i would always feel a lot of conflict if somebody you know confided in me and you know told me that they had feelings for me and then sort of expected anything more and i didn't feel the same way it was just it sucked that it happened so often in relationships with my friends and um i guess i just wish that there was an easier way to navigate situations like that so that it's not so uncomfortable was that an okay question to ask absolutely so i think here's what i really liked about y'all's answer so i i think so i sort of said if they can make you feel guilty can you make them fall in love and what i heard you guys say is that you know i i do genuinely think something is going on here where there's clearly a common pattern of men feeling this way about you so then the question becomes if there's a common pattern you know where does that come from and what i'm hearing from y'all is that they have some kind of like strange preconceived notion that they're not actually falling in love with you they're falling in love with some like i yeah it's weird right like and you can hear you can hear it with risa like like some guy randomly and he's like you remind me of my ex-girlfriend which signals to me that there are a lot of feelings on his end which have nothing to do with risa and and where do you guys think like where like how does talking to someone for you know five minutes on the internet turn you i mean don't get me wrong champ i've known you for a little while and i think you're an awesome person but i'm still a little bit confused about you know what you're doing that makes random strangers consistently fall in love with you on the internet i i think you're great i don't think you're that great i it confuses us too yeah so what do you guys think like what's up with that uh i think it's an experience right like if you're someone who is not used to someone being responsive to you and then you're talking to champ and she's like so nice it's like yeah i'll listen to you and it's the first time ever someone listens to him i understand where it's coming from where someone's just like oh my gosh this girl's so nice to me she's the only one she must be a nice person she must be someone that could help out with x y and z going forward so i think inner experience does deal a lot with it but as mentioned like once champ was just like oh no i'm sorry and he's just like oh you know what i've already gone through how dare you do that it's just him being upset because you no longer fit that idea yeah yeah like reality check this is not gonna work i oh yeah that's that's interesting right so then like suddenly they have this idea of what champ is and what this relationship is and then you guys come along and i can see where a lot of the toxicity towards towards women comes in because then they sort of blame you for tearing it down how dare you not live up to my fantasy yeah it's like we've denied them something yeah and that's that's interesting right because i i've heard this thread of entitlement or expectation yeah what do y'all think about that what's up with that like i can't i can maybe say something go ahead um because it's kind of like mixing like rl with online relationships um so when i had my first relationship i i don't know i didn't thought that i could like set boundaries or i this was not a thing that i i i don't know i just didn't think that this was a thing that you have to do in a relationship i yeah so like i was just like so happy that this person wanted to be with me and um it felt great to be honest like you you're really overwhelmed if like someone wants to be with you so i was like basically like i i really wanted to like expect like meet his expectations see him happy so i keep doing that for years and then at one point i realized that holy [ __ ] i'm so tired like i am tired and i don't know where this is coming from this was when um it was a phase in my life where i was really you know like i set goals for myself i had to push a bit more than i was used to and then i realized like holy [ __ ] i don't have any energy um and then i communicated that to him and i set boundaries after four years right and then he was so confused he gave he was going mad man he was like what do you mean and you know he and it kind of fell apart from there but i have to say like i'm also the one to blame for because i never communicated those boundaries right so he was used to like me being this person who meets every expectation right so yeah this is a huge learning that i had like it's okay to set boundaries because at the end of the day you want to be loved for who you are and be accepted for who you are and boundaries your boundaries is also a part of you and this person should love you with your boundaries too and this is a huge learning that i had um and i'm actually applying it to my um recent like my actual relationship now and i can see a huge difference so i'm just like really trying to motivate you guys to just set your boundaries in relationship too sounds like someone leveled up yeah that's awesome um yeah so what do you guys think have you guys sort of dealt with the sense of expectation or entitlement from interactions online or professors entitlement for sure okay so i will talk about tinder data that i had three years ago i think never met him i'll explain why um texting wise where you set up a date you meet and then it starts storming like crazy etc and then the person was just like hey we're still meeting i was like hey like trees are falling down storms are awful let's take a rain check and meet up like next week instead it was like oh no no don't worry about it like i'll come pick you up and i was just like oh hey like i'm actually not comfortable with that um so let's just do the rain check and he just kept pushing he's like why are you not okay with this like i'm even offering to pick you up right now and you're still saying no and i was just like hey sorry like it's just something i'm not comfortable with but like i do want to meet with you so like next week and then you reply with c-u-n-t and then i saw that i was just like what just happened what does nt mean y'all are gonna have to educate me i don't know that's true i don't know c-u-n-t oh see you aunty yeah yeah got it gotta go i i thought you said s e e space why are you space [Laughter] yeah i figured it out i thought it was like some you know i'm a boomer and i like see you no time it's like short for c-u-n-t in no time like a case that like this person was i was like really nice and everything and i felt like i was rejecting the nicest way possible while setting that boundary of just not wanting to pick me up but something just didn't live up to that expectation and he just called me that and yeah so i and that's not like the first time not in terms of dating just in general where if i nicely reject someone they will just retaliate or something like curse where like okay bye [ __ ] i didn't know you actually just cruel and it's just like and that's what i am apologizing as nicely as possible hey i'm really sorry about this but i just like can't have this right now so i think those are the worst retaliations i've gotten yeah uh i've had like a very soft case of that i haven't had that experience yet but um i've i was speaking to a guy and then after a while i just realized i'm not vibing with it i don't want to be with him i don't want to speak to him nothing he did personally i was just not feeling the situation and then i told him that once and then i felt bad so i said okay i can give you a chance but don't expect me to after still not have the same idea if i have the same idea i will just stop speaking to you and he was fine with it then that time came and i said i'm still not clicking with you i don't think it's gonna work out and i i said i don't think we're on the same page and he he just told me oh he was like okay fine but he was kind of like passive aggressive where he said since you've decided not to be on the same page since i've decided to be on the same page like i get to decide if i'm not on the same page as you like he he basically said oh you're just basically calling me basically calling me cruel like i've just decided to not that i just didn't want to speak with him for no reason but no i was just feeling that and i get the choice too well i mean that's like because he's also deciding to not be on the same page with you right it goes both ways like that's the whole thing um yeah obviously like he could tell me the same and okay that's fair like but he was just upset i guess or more like passive aggressive about i think he wasn't too bad also always like amazing the length that people will go to to like try to make that noah yes for you because like so for me it was i once um was like really close with this guy um and he so first of all while we were just friends we were just hanging out we were watching movies together sometime um he broke up with his girlfriend later he told me that he broke up with this girlfriend because he had feelings for me um and we even met irl once at an event and then um i mean i told him there's nothing gonna be between us nothing's gonna happen and then after i told him that he told me that he would literally do anything for me he would like pay rent for me i could just live with him i could just play video games all day i could just like chill there um and and i was just like i've i've told you for like two or three days straight that nothing's gonna ever happen between us and now after we met you you're gonna come at me with with that and then i had another instance of a person um that that said that they were in love with me um and i said that i wasn't or whatever and then he like tried to stay friends but he was being like really pushy and he was just really like he needed a lot of attention so i decided to stop talking to him um and then he tried to he literally tried to bait me with anything possible to still talk to him like he he came into my dms at some point and he was like yeah my therapist told me um to ask you what three things were about me that you liked and three things that you didn't like or were the reason for us not being in a relationship and i just sat there like huh what no and it's just like these kind of things it's it's kind of strange i i i'm sorry i kind of missed you on that last part is that what felt inappropriate about that was just because you didn't want i mean the thing is just no the thing is that there was like a clear no from my side like i told both of these people that nothing was gonna happen but they just kept trying to push it and kept trying to like turn that no around um so which just gets tiring linda maybe i i totally understood what you were saying in the first one in terms of like you know someone asking you to pay their rent and i mean sorry that they'll pay your rent and you can play video games and and things like that that sounds really wack what i'm a little bit confused about and maybe somebody your colleagues can enlighten me is like when someone asks you three things that i was good at three things i was bad at and why things i mean wouldn't work out he used the excuse of a therapist first of all but then it was it was just like i hadn't talked to him in like weeks and i had ignored messages over messages over messages and it was just like okay it just wouldn't stop even after months to me to me it feels like also like he's looking like he's requiring you to have a concrete answer when really it should just be like i'm not interested okay yeah to me it sounds like he tries to get like any feedback from you because this is something that he quite don't understand but i totally understand that like you know spamming a person and not reacting to a person is also kind of yeah not comfortable yeah so that i think makes thank you so much for clarifying that because on the one hand i was kind of wondering i was like you know because we were talking earlier about education and whether like that's a good opportunity to educate someone and at the same time it sounds like if that comes after the conte or in the context of weeks of repeatedly trying to get something from you and then they pull the therapist card that paints a pretty different picture right yeah and because on the one hand i was like that sounds great like if someone you know if someone says like hey if they're respecting your boundary and they ask like can you tell me you know if i did something that was inappropriate that sounds to me like a good opportunity to educate but on the other hand it also sounds like my therapist using their therapist as a way to re-engage you yeah like from my perspective it just seemed like he wanted to know three things that i liked about him and then to give him three things that he could like work on to like be a better person in my perspective so then i see he might make the like he turn that note he had something to work on for himself for me i guess but like grind on his like knows that he maybe can get you yeah i'm almost noticing like it's interesting because i i didn't realize this assumption but now i kind of see it there's almost an assumption there that if he grinds on those things then linda won't have an excuse and that kind of goes back to the entitlement and expectation i did everything that you said i was bad at love me now and when you still say no the retaliation gets worse yeah but i did everything lisa i did everything for you yeah right so so this is the other trend that i'm kind of noticing is i i'm getting the sense that they don't really treat you like people yeah does that make sense they treat us like an image like some an addition to their we're something to make their life better they don't come talk to us to because they like who we are and they want to experience moments with us they come to us because they have the idea that when we're in their lives we're going to make everything better i actually think that in a lot of the situations that i've been i was actually like close enough or had close enough often like friendship with them already because i just like i mean when you're friends with someone online you can spend like hours talking and i i would say that you like when you get to know people online you get to know them better than if you would meet them in real life but um so i would actually say that they were there because they like liked who i was yeah and they sort of understood that um but they were just like confused about like themselves because i think that it's more of like the idea that a girlfriend will just solve everything and then also um like it's a distraction almost like having a girlfriend like it's a nice addition like it's a past time kind of like a new car new car it's like i feel like it's a common issue amongst like everyone like guys and girls it's just the idea of when you are talking to someone and i do this stuff like in my past as well like where i'm talking and i'm only thinking from my own perspective right like this conversation's benefiting me i'm like opening it up et cetera and i feel like it took years and a lot of situations for me to realize that sometimes like i am overstepping my boundaries like this person's going through a lot x y and z or i don't know what they're going through so like me doing this right now could honestly be really stressful for them so i think it's something that i actually check now like if i'm going through a really hard time i talk to my friends i'm like hey like are you okay with this and if they ever say no like hey sorry i'm like dealing with a lot be okay with that okay if they i think that's the most crucial part and it's not something to like instantly like learn but try to practice that try a thing on their shoes and if they you get rejection no it's okay and it's not ever on them wow that's i mean that's pretty introspective of you recently really think about you know that sometimes the the roles can be reversed and maybe you're burdening someone inappropriately have you guys run across issues either in your own life or like kind of people that you know in terms of women taking men up on their offers of you know paying rent and and things like that and like i mean is the reverse also true have you guys seen that like where women are not respecting men's boundaries obviously yeah a hundred percent mm-hmm i mean a common one is uh i these days a lot more women pay for themselves but i do have friends and i love to death but they do have the opinion of like men should pay for them for example and then i've been a situation my guy friends was just like that's not fair like i'm at dinner and then they are pushing this expectation over me and crossing that boundary where sometimes they're like i never bring my wallet because i thought this was expected of you and so that's something like on the reverse side that i think is completely unfair that is more common with females than guys that occur and that's that's a friendship or a romantic uh usually romantic for those yeah other situations does that resonate with anyone else yeah i mean i was in a a six-year relationship where um it started off with me um compromise or not compromising um [Music] uh or i guess what i'm trying to say is i didn't allow myself to have boundaries in the relationship so i felt like i was catering to this person and making sure that they were happy and giving them everything that they needed um so eventually i started to feel exhausted kind of like what champ was talking about in her relationship and that led to a lot of resentment later on and so when i did finally find my voice um it almost felt like it was too late and um um that person didn't respect what i was trying to say and what i needed and so it just kind of became a really toxic situation where we were both um crossing boundaries and we never really had a chance to fix that so it just um it made things very toxic between the two of us so i can i can honestly speak for both sides when i say that um it's not good to give in to um i guess the pressure to like um i guess be there for a person and meet their expectations if you feel like it's hurting you or affecting you because later on it's just gonna lead to a lot of anger and frustration and um you know sometimes it just feels like it's it's too late to even salvage the relationship or the friendship at that point because there are no boundaries it's just like anything goes at that point it sounds exhausting to try to be someone that you're not you know sounds tough um anything else that like people i i know we've been been kind of bouncing around a lot does anybody want to share anything that they kind of haven't had a chance to yet otherwise i've got a couple other questions or maybe some direction but does anybody feel like they wanted to share something and didn't get a chance because we moved too quickly or so overall i just want to say and we're not done quite yet or anything but i just want to say like i think it's really really useful to hear especially when i sort of challenge or play devil's advocate it's really useful i think for me to hear y'all's perspective when i do challenge something um and and for i think it's it's really uncovered a lot i hope that people who are watching can get a sense of what your internal environment is when they interact with you in this way because what i'm hearing is a complete absence of appreciation that you have an internal environment right that like you or a person with thoughts and feelings and needs and that you are not this thing that they think you are i think that's a broader question is to like why they form these opinions or where these beliefs come from in the case of the 50 year old professor it sort of makes sense because it's like he's 50 and maybe he believes certain things and was conditioned a certain way and honestly i wouldn't be surprised if when he was 20 that kind of behavior was more acceptable right so like if you look at people who are boomers like disrespect for various reasons including your age or your gender or whatever your race was like more acceptable 50 years ago than it is today um a couple of other things that i kind of was was curious and so i think it's like worthwhile i'm curious about where these impressions from people come from i also wonder a lot about like i get the sense that a lot of people that you guys talk to are really starved and hungry for something that they don't get anywhere else and it's been my observation that like when you treat them like humans they confuse that because that's also some of the way that we're conditioned as men that we don't disclose really personal thoughts or feelings unless it's romantic that talking so weird what's weird about that i don't know like i wouldn't have any problem talking to friends about that like i wouldn't i wouldn't think it was anything more than friends if i like went to someone for advice or to talk about something that i was going through i like wish it was more normal you know like i wish i could just have that conversation with friends that are men without it being weird you know um i guess they hold um speaking to someone about their problems um more special to them than we do because we have no problem sometimes depends on the person but speaking with a friend but they associate speaking with someone to someone who's more special maybe that's where that association comes from but it that that association also comes with a lot of insecurity because they are told sometimes men are told like you cannot cry you cannot speak about your emotions because you're seen as weak so when someone gives them the chance to be themselves they might attach to you because you make them feel good but it's just in fact like they should just be able to speak with everyone normally and have a lot of friendly people treating them like humans yeah and i completely agree with you math and i think that actually is like part of the problem because you know they should be able to speak to other people like that that way but they're not and so if you're yeah i think if i can imagine and based on my conversations with like gamers and even like in cells and stuff we've been trying to get a real incel on stream and we haven't found one mostly what is the real infill i don't know but like i thought it was like like most of the people that we get on stream end up being decent human beings which is you know i feel like once you have one-on-ones with people they are actually decent human beings yeah but then like through i really think so like uh but then like when there's the online persona like all the insult comments come in they don't think before they speak but like i feel like when they go on a show with you dr kayla you start targeting with specific questions and for once they're actually analyzing before they speak they're naturally and so if they put on some thoughts about it a lot of um sorry a lot of the incel um behavior at least i think comes from a lot of bad feelings that they have that they just to cope put out their hate on women but i think it just comes from a lot of bad feelings and that emotions that they have on their daily lives so when you speak to them like face on face i mean i'm saying like a few of them i can say it's all of them but a few of them are just nice people who are going through a hard time and not doing the right things with those those emotions before they've had a couple of bad experiences and these were enough to make them feel so angry at women yeah i i think that i'd agree i mean there's a lot of understanding i i think you guys are speaking a lot of sense to me i mean that's my sense too is that a lot of times what happens and if we even think about your experiences you know when they feel rejected or hurt by you oftentimes like you know hurt turns into anger and when i think about where did where's hatred born it's usually born from one of two places in my experience one is hurt and the second is conditioning and in the case of some of these online communities like you know they feel hurt and then there's a community that embraces them with open arms and at the same time you know kind of thinking about what i'm hearing from y'all's stories i mean i get the sense that you guys are providing something that's rare and valuable and frankly what sounds like it's intoxicating to some people and they don't really know what that means because they've been taught that you know when you talk about feelings like people don't really listen to you and being listened to and respected and treated as a human can really be confusing for them um because they were just taught by a different kind of playbook not saying that you know it excuses their behavior but i can also understand um how hard it is to find somebody to trust because that's something that i've dealt with in my life and so when you finally have an interaction with somebody where you feel like you can you know really open up and be vulnerable it it changes the dynamic of the relationship or the friendship and some people are able to separate themselves and understand that it's not romantic but then there are other situations where people can't and they take it as okay this person is interested in me because i can trust them and they trust me and i can take it further because we have that type of relationship but it may not be the case and yeah go ahead math uh i also see sometimes when you set the boundaries a lot of people are actually respectful like okay i'm sorry i didn't know this i will uh respect your boundaries i lagged i don't know if you heard me yep but um and then the other when people don't react well i think it's because they don't know how to separate um the rejection from their value i think they they take the rejection as immediately like you suck so i don't want to be with you it could be just the thing of we're different people we don't fit together i don't think it would work out but they take it to their ego and that's why and it hurts them that's why it comes off as anger sometimes yeah so i i know we're talking a little bit about you know valuing someone as a person but not necessarily being on the same page about a relationship that's what we call the friend zone i know we've sort of been talking about this does anybody want to share an actual like experience of like friend zoning someone and what happened champion linda um yeah after that everyone okay i will start so um it's a uh real life experience that i had so like some years ago i had really like a lot of friends and most of them they were men and um then i realized why i have so many many male friends um so they tried to have a romantic relationship with me and when you know they were like clear evidence like when they said it because back then i didn't quite understood it like like wait what kind of evidence are they there out like are they out there so i thought like yeah a guy just being nice to me and want to hang out with me this is like this is cool you know this is this is not a relationship like this is not us trying to go to the next level this is just us appreciating each other and just hanging out so you know when they try to make a move like try to hold my hands or something i was like wait um this is not quite what i was going for like can we just like like how do you say can you can we just be friends right um so they were like oh yeah sure but then they ghosted on me we never like hang out anymore so i lost like almost 10 friends like that because after i communicated that look this is the friend zone i never heard for them again so like now this kind of stick with me because now i'm like scared of having like male friendship like or even having like a guy friend that i can be just like that i can just hang around with um because i'm scared of having like this confirmation of again that all they wanted was just like me fulfilling like their fantasies and not actually like me like appreciating my presence and just hang around so yeah this is my friend's own experience so so let me just ask a quick question so they ghosted you so clearly they were not interested in friendship they were more interested in something else um you know what i guess i'm sort of envisioning if they had said no i'm actually like i do have strong feelings for you and i don't think that we can be friends i understand they didn't say that if they had said that do you think that that's okay i'm trying to think back like that's back then how i would um yeah i don't think there's nothing like wrong with them saying it it's just that i can't give them the answer that they want yup you know yeah so and i i'm i'm kind of noticing that like this is one of those situations where they may be on one page and you're on a different page which is totally cool it sounds like you set a good boundary but then also like maybe what would actually be healthier is if they do have feelings and it would be hard for them to be friends instead of ghosting you just being transparent right like respecting your boundary but also sort of sharing their feelings and saying you know hey i don't know if i can do that because i do have feelings for you what do you think about that yeah i would appreciate that because it will give me like clarity and i don't have to guess it on my own and interpret it that oh like my presence as a female friend for male friend is giving hints of me wanting a relationship with them i don't know yeah yeah i think that also kind of goes back to the ambiguity of of like you know when do you know whether you're hanging out or you're dating or what and yeah and it just kind of goes back to like the common theme that i'm sort of hearing because it's not so much about so it sounds like it's important for you to set a boundary right so it's also maybe important for them to try to signal to you that they are interested by trying to grab your hand or hold your hand and then you kind of say hey i'm not really interested in this so i so far based on what you guys have said i'm sort of assuming that it's okay for them to let their intentions be known if they do is feel a certain way about you we on the same page there or yes yeah as long as they're like respectful exactly it's what you want kind of like i i want to know so i know how to like react right and then for you to set the boundary in terms of what you're comfortable with and then they too get to set ideally they would set their own boundary in response to your i mean respect yours but also are allowed to set their own which is that i'm actually not too interested in friendship yeah that's something i feel like sometimes it doesn't have to be so like blunt or straightforward like oh i have feelings for you what are we gonna do it could be as simple as like just checking in with each other and making sure that um what's going on is comfortable for both parties and go from there because it can be a lot of pressure to hear somebody tell you that they have feelings for you and you don't have the same feelings back um it's just it's harder to respond in that situation because you don't want to anger them you don't want to make them feel like bad for being vulnerable so i think just check-ins are nice yeah i think even like if it does progress to a relationship check-ins are nice because like i was in a relationship for like three years where there were things that i was uncomfortable with but it like felt like it was established so early on that it's like too late to set a boundary now or like if i set a boundary now would it be offensive to my partner you know and that's like i i didn't know like when i didn't set those boundaries early on it was because that was confrontation and i didn't want to be like hey you went too far this time but instead of having that conversation then he just thought he didn't go too far and it happened again and again and i wasn't comfortable with it you know and so it's like in hindsight i wish that i knew um so what i'm hearing is that that you know it's easier to set a boundary than it is to change a boundary like or set an expectation than it is to change an expectation and i actually hear a common theme that just in terms of y'all's relationships um you know i don't know how old many of y'all are but i'm in my mind you're young none of y'all are boomers and so you know i think it's normal to not know some of the things that you guys know now right like we we've heard you know champ leveled up like all of you all have leveled up and that's what happens when you're in a relationship for three years four years six years that you level up and you learn and that sometimes you have to kind of adjust expectations you have your own insecurities you're trying to be this person that the other because you care about you want a relationship so you're willing to compromise certain things and that's actually pretty normal in relationships by the way and that healthy relationships are not the ones that start one way and stay that way but that expectations and relationships change over time and that in my experience healthy relationships are the ones that are not the same as when they started and it involves changing your expectations setting new expectations hey it was great that you played video games for 15 hours a day when we were 19 but now that we're 28 and we have three kids i know it sounds like a joke but it's actually kind of sad man [Music] um and what alyssa was kind of saying about sort of feeling things out and checking in with people like actually reminds me of what risa said in the first five minutes which is if you don't know ask right i can imagine that champ's situation would have been like smoother if people had sort of let her know ahead of time or even that if you would let them know that hey just checking in like how do you see our relationship um yeah so so any i think someone else had a story about the friendzone linda oh yeah i've i just want to say something before it's something that is like sort of interesting to me is that um i every time i meet new people or i engage in a new community i like sort of make it very clear um that i'm not interested in starting a relationship here like and and the thing is like even though people know they will still um develop those feelings for me or still try to make a move whatever um but then okay so it's it's probably one of my favorite or not favorite friend zone stories but my best friend actually confessed to me um like a year ago when we barely met we we'd met each other for like two weeks three weeks um and he said that he thought that he had feelings for me even though he knew that i wasn't interested in anything and stuff like that um but out of that confession a sort of like openness in our relationship developed where where he realized that i was just accepting and i was like okay with him telling me these things um and we sort of like talked about it and stuff like that and he realized that um he didn't like actually fall in love with me or whatever and now we're like he he is definitely the person that i'm closest to in my my life um and i'm like super happy that i have him and i know he's also watching so so i'm gonna troll you a little bit so it sounds like he's playing the long game [Laughter] the thing okay so he he recently moved to the same city as me um and and i thought especially in the beginning when we like met up and stuff i was like a little bit skeptical i was like wait so so i picked this up i picked i picked the discussion up again and i was like just making sure and stuff but that just like again cleared things up and it was nice like okay so linda pardon me for being skeptical but i don't really know your situation i'm gonna actually ask your colleagues what do you guys think about the situation because like they're the experts right i'd be curious if in like a year it's still you're just pals living in the same city oh really i say good for her i like think that's yeah which is great i think he he understood that he had a deep friendship with her in connection and in the beginning he might have confused it with love but i think once like he understood okay so i can have a really good friend that i can talk to and she can can not be my girlfriend she could just be my friend and that's okay like so yeah yeah if anything it shows growth on his part because he was able to express how he felt and understand what your friendship meant to him and whether or not it was important to keep going or to say okay this is not going to work out one thing is you know i actually hate the term friend zone so i think it's a really fun meme term to use like i love it which has to only see something else you're like oh you've been friend zoned it's funny um but in terms of like real life if a guy or a girl and bisexual by the way tells me that like hey like you're a good friend of mine first insane it's like cool they're a friend too let me see them in a friend's like view and even if i did initially find them attractive in a relationship sense that's fine it's just simply change that kind of mentality like all right they told me that they see me as a friend i see them as a friend too great i'm not like oh no i've been in the friend zone now like that's not my first reaction and i think that people who have that first reaction whenever a girl or a guy tells you that they see you as a friend and you're like oh wow i've been zoned i think that's actually a really bad mentality to have yeah i think a counterpoint is like you've been girlfriend zoned right yeah right because that's what happens to you guys you guys get girlfriend-zoned from the get-go oh you listened to me for five minutes about how i lost this game in league of legends and you were sympathetic girlfriend's own time to be honest it isn't even that it's not a lot of the time i think guys don't even confess in the hopes of have of like getting with us for me at least like because because i always make sure that people know that nothing's going to happen they know they just want to get it off their chest um but the the problem that i mainly have with this is like how much it happens and the frequency of it sure like i would almost say like maybe every fifth to seventh person that i become friends with online is like at some point um tells me they're attracted to me and because of that it's just like you lose a very big amount of friends and it also puts you sometimes at a like awkward spot in a community um yeah sounds hard so it kind of puts you out like it just yeah i'm i'm gonna just challenge again because i i sort of heard a lot so linda said hey this happened he moved to the same city i was kind of joking a little bit and and i i do think that you know it sounds like the majority opinion is that this is a sign of growth and it's like healthy and i think everything you guys said makes a lot of sense in terms of sometimes it's important to just get those feelings off of your chest have a mature conversation and that's how the friendship moves forward at the same time star was a little bit curious right i'm just like actually just curious because that seems like a big step i can't think of any friends that i would make that step for but that's just me personally like i'm not saying one way or another i i think if we think a little bit about why we're talking today i think actually the way to be the most supportive is to not necessarily just agree with people what people are saying even though i don't think you guys are just agreeing with linda i think everyone brings up good points sounds like linda's very good at setting boundaries early on and that she's good at like managing things and that they are genuinely very good friends and at the same time i also think what star says you know like something flipped in my mind because just like she said i don't know or let me be clear i have never well maybe even that that's a not a good i was about to say i've never moved cities for a friend but that also assumes for a moment that he moved for her which is like probably not a fair assumption right it just happened he wanted to move out of his country in the first place sorry yeah and and so it sort of makes sense to move to a place if you're planning on moving to like move to a place where you have some kind of connection in some kind of roots but i also do know people that have played the long game and and so just something to think about you know it does sound like it's she set a firm boundary and there are good reasons to move and and things like that linda am i making you feel uncomfortable you look good no okay sorry yeah good and i i think what everyone else said too but i'm also curious and i i wonder what will happen in the year i hope it's not being an [ __ ] to say that no no no no no not at all i mean it's as i said yeah yeah because i i think frankly part of what i where this is coming from is that i also know that some people will do their best to try to be friends and that over time those kinds of feelings can re-emerge or as he sort of figured things out and then you know as as time goes on you can figure out oh i actually like do have feelings right just like relationships change and evolve and you guys have conversations it's possible i can imagine if you take a hundred people in linda's scenario some of those conversations will probably end up being oh i actually do have feelings for you y'all is that fair risa you wanted to say something yeah so i just want to say that has happened to me where i friend zoned someone and then we actually dated like a year later and the concept was that though i'm so sorry i'm so sorry about this i'll make a proper point about this okay so do you realize how many women you just screwed with that statement because now but i will make it clear though let me finish like the thing is is that he was not continuously hitting on me like after i made it clear he became a good friend like honest to god never was just like hey you're cute today or like hey like we should do this together it was a very respectful relationship and then things just ended up that way because eventually i caught feelings and then i reached out to him about it not the other way around with him forcing it on me so much hope to the internet reset i would definitely rare completely it's a rare case it's a rare case for sure like i'm so sorry if i screwed people no it's true though it's true because i wanted to say like relationships do change but the idea is that you're not forceful about it right like so even though you are yeah like if you're a friend your friend act like a friend that's what my ex did right and then uh things just happened with that one and it was a rare case but in general this is not like the long time when you get friend zone and you're like all right let me figure out what is the plan of how i can still hit on her and get each other points and he did not have that expectation if anything like it just was out of nowhere that i confessed to him so i mean the key is just like being open with your communication especially in these like situations and it's also like i have that with my best friend that when he confessed to me it was like when he caught feelings i had feelings for someone else and i was talking to him about those feelings and then like a little while after that he was like the way that you felt about that guy was exactly how i felt about you um but like that sort of established such a like close trust factor that even if he now caught feelings for me i would trust him to say it again and if i developed him i i would like be open about it and be able to talk about it to him as well um so i think that's why i trust him in that way by the way to also save the conversation slightly just because i know that lineman is screwed there are people that has confessed to me that i will cut out of my life instantly because and continue to try to flirt and etc and that's not proper friendship for me so i would be like hey i just goodbye no but i mean i i think it is common right so i think part of the reason that that some people stay in the friend zone is because i have heard a lot of situations where um until my wife explained to me that this wasn't true i thought we were friends first right and that's not unreasonable right that like you can be friends with someone because what we're talking about is people grow and change over time and so like if someone is in your life and they grow and change as a person and you grow and change as a person the nature of a healthy relationship is one that changes over time and sometimes that can start as a friendship and end up as a romance or bizarrely i've also worked with people who are like you know divorced and are on amicable terms and realize oh actually like we make awesome friends and we were just confused and we should have never been in a romantic relationship even gotten married and that's true too right so i was kind of trolling you but i i do think that you know i can understand why some people hope or i can understand why some people would stay in the friend zone with their fingers crossed and what i'm hearing from you guys is what makes that okay or not okay is the openness and the trust with which you do that right it's like in the back of your mind if you're like waiting for her to fall in love with you that just sounds unfair toxic and frankly unhealthy in your life and at the same time if you can value another human being and set aside romantic feelings and at the sa you know things change over time then like so be it yeah because i think there are men that are pretty good about hiding their feelings but we're very good at one or another yeah i think i'm actually i'm actually deeply in love with one of you right now can you guess who that was a joke maybe i think like if you have this hope that you might um be able to get into a relationship with somebody um it'll show and it will make things uncomfortable so it's not like you can just play the long game and never show it i think sooner or later the other person is going to feel that something's going on or something's happening absolutely right i think it does blend in and you guys can tell right that's what i'm hearing from melissa how do you know yeah oh it's just i've been in situations too where it's just like you trust them as a friend and then it's just like a parties when alcohol is involved people take advantage and that's not okay and it's just the idea that if you're a truly good friend if you see a drunk friend like that or such a your first instinct should be to just help them not like this is the girl that i have had a crush on i've been playing this long con let me think of the intuition like that i just want to put that out there that is just never ever okay and so even if you do still have a crush on someone please just if they tell you that they see you as a friend and vice versa like just keep with that mentality and if things happen sure but yeah be a friend first just wanted to put that out there yeah so i i think you guys are kind of transitioning to something which i've been sort of thinking a lot about which is like i'm almost hearing a playbook come out of this in terms of y'all are sharing a lot of important stuff from your perspective about what's acceptable behavior and what's not acceptable behavior and i wonder if actually you know we were talking a little bit about repercussions versus education i wonder how do you guys feel about like can we just go from start to finish about you know how what's an appropriate way to interact with women whether it be on or not i mean people um but i'm sort of thinking a little bit about you know this group of people who like approaches you guys online it sounds like it's relatively frequent right up to like 20 of people in linda's case um and and to kind of think a little bit i mean it doesn't sound unreasonable to me it's probably true for all of you guys but um and for us to like think a little bit about you know how should they speak what should they say when should they say it how should they respond to what you say um and like how can we sort of like maybe actually concretely educate people about like how to deal with women how to deal with romantic feelings how do we know when we're friends versus flirting like you know what happens because sometimes people flirt with their friends right and and so how do you navigate that like what do you guys think are there kind of take-home points that we can kind of put together from our conversation today i think i guess go ahead oh no i guess if i had like one point it would be like asking if something you did was okay after the fact in like as neutral a way possible like hey just wanted to make sure like i made this joke just wanted to make sure you know it was just a joke and it didn't make you uncomfortable like there are friends that i've had and even like relationships that i've been in where if someone had said like hey i just want to double check that you're okay with this like that would have meant so much to me and like could have opened a conversation if i wasn't okay with it versus like oh is it worth starting a fight by bringing this up and like putting me in a situation where i have to like you know like confront them to have that conversation and i know that's like hard like i don't normally do it in my relationships but i'm trying to now and i think it'd be like really good for most friend groups if that was a conversation everyone was willing to have so what i'm hearing from you just i want to recap each point as we go through it is that okay guys okay so what i'm hearing is like sometimes in the past you're gonna feel like avoiding a conversation because of the conversation could be difficult or could cause waves but really when we think about healthy relationships they involve having difficult conversations exactly risa champ sure so in addition to that i just want to say try to do it beforehand this one's a lot harder to do but if there are something you are uncertain like for example if i am someone made a lot of provocative jokes first thing i would do before this call is ask these ladies like hey like i make these provocative jokes i actually asked them about my cursing is cursing okay like just because i do curse on a normal basis and just to make sure of that on just little things that you know from history but then my most important point though is to observe observing is a skill set that takes a while to build but try to when you do something look at the person's reaction or if you're sending messages even you can't see reactions if you send 50 messages and this person replies with k or like not much response chances are you're not very close to the person okay or you can just be like hey like are you going through something awful if you guys are a really close friendship just check in gauge reactions and then respond accordingly through that so let me ask actually quick follow-up so that was really useful risa because you said if someone's sends 50 messages and they respond with hey what i'm getting the sense of is especially a lot of people don't know how to interpret communications online and especially that sometimes it sounds like you guys are trying to be like tactful and not mean and that there's ambiguity like so you guys have a choice between on a scale of like zero or like on two ends of the spectrum one is like being nice and being mean and you're trying to set a boundary and i i thought maybe i heard alyssa say that what she's had to learn how to do is to be mean because sometimes when she i i may have it may have been someone else but that sometimes when you guys are trying to like let people down gently or like not hurt their feelings or you know you know not like you recognize it could be insecure and so you try to be nice so what are some signs that you're like not interested in someone in that way like what i also i guess i want to clarify that um i haven't been mean in the way that like i was cussing at somebody or saying like things that were hurtful it's more so i had the mentality that maybe i might have to be a little bit more aggressive and um i think what i do more now is i'll just ignore it yeah firm i'll just ignore it or i will send a message that's really short and um i guess to try to let them know i'm not interested anymore instead of having that conversation because i don't always feel the need to talk about you know boundaries with a stranger or you know to sort of like open the floor up for that because at the end of the day i don't really know you so i don't owe you any explanation as to why i'm rejecting you or why i'm not responding and i think that's what's important for me is being respected as a person and as a woman to just be able to say no and have that be enough for me so yeah so what i'm hearing alyssa says that you should you know just because someone says no doesn't mean that you deserve an explanation even if you want one so that's kind of an important take-home point um math yeah i was answering to the what are some signs a woman is not interested um you usually have to start conversations or you start the action of interaction between both of you if in those actions she's not very interactive as well like the the spamming and the k and the third one sometimes if they just say i don't want to speak with you i think that's a pretty big sign and yeah is that they don't understand that some stuff yeah most i'm not like sometimes most of the times they are they kind of back away but sometimes they don't like i had one severe case where this guy he spammed me on discord and then i'm like okay easy thing to do i'm just gonna block him on discord then he found a way to message me on another platform he messaged me on facebook spammed me on facebook blocked him on facebook i thought i was done then then he spammed me on steam blocked him on steam then he messaged like somehow he got my number then he messaged me on whatsapp had to block him on whatsapp four platforms already and then he used another person's account to contact me and i'm like what should i do i can't only react you know like with the block because i i i when he was spamming i said stop stop please stop and then i had to send it to him on facebook that and then block him then on steam please stop this is not gonna i'm not gonna read those messages yeah i would say go to the police but i've i've had stories where the police haven't been so nice so i don't know yeah i met a guy at a dog park and um i gave him my number just because i was being nice and he ended up finding me on instagram finding me on snapchat adding me everywhere and um at first the conversation was pretty casual but it turned into him messaging me every morning every afternoon like pretty much any time he could it seemed like and it got to the point where i told him like hey i'm not interested i don't want to talk to you anymore and um he got mad at me one time and kept messaging me um and another time i had blocked him on everything and i guess he found my whatsapp somehow and he started um acting like nothing had happened basically and was like hey how are you doing what's going on i was like i thought i told you you know we're not talking i'm not interested and then he called me a bunch of really terrible words and um i decided to just you know leave it there and block him i didn't even respond to the things that he was saying because they were so terrible i think one final advice that i could give is that do it this is something i do it's like a final message basically if i don't know this person likes me or like maybe i'm getting mixed signals and stuff like that i will send one message that's just like hey like i'm sorry if i'm disturbing because i sent like this is my third message to them or something like that um just when i know my doors are open if you ever want to talk and if i ever bought you anyways i apologize and i just kind of leave it at that if at least for me when i see a message like that if i truly like the person and i see them as close or a friend i will 100 reach out to clear out that misunderstanding but if i don't like you or then i would just leave it ignored and i for me at least i like the final message policy send one last one make your points clear and give them an out yeah give them a now if they want to respond they will if not you leave it at that what does that mean star give them an out so like give them an opportunity to end things there like like oh like no worries if you're not interested but if you are blah blah and then if they're not interested they can just leave it at that without any hard feelings because you've said no worries okay so anything else that people want to add in terms of you know what yeah we'll do champ and then linda okay so um when you when you see someone communicating their boundaries please respect them don't deflate them don't try to put them on your standard like oh i'm actually okay with that why is that person not okay with doing that that is not normal so i can like no like these are two different boundaries like your boundary doesn't have to be the other person's boundary and there's no likes over like an universal like standard that can be applied for anyone like uh we are all individuals and we have different boundaries and we should respect them especially like for me like boundaries is first you communicate then you can respect the boundaries right because you have like legit no evidence what this person is okay with because i sometimes also had like interactions where i crossed someone's boundaries and i was like oh wait like how did this happen right like i thought this was perfectly fine um but when this other person like communicates their boundaries just don't be like oh yeah like this is you acting weird this is norm not normal you know don't deflate them those things because i heard also from um other girls that um they got like their boundaries got also deflated from like close friends and families which i think it's not great and if you want to have like a safe place you sh this is this should be like a criteria where people can like communicate their boundaries and that you know that those people will respect those fantastic linda oh um yeah i'm okay so for me it's like when i guess the advice that i wish a couple of people would like think about is that when you feel like you're in love with someone maybe ask yourself if you're like in love with the idea and not the actual girl and like maybe maybe think about like how your relationship would work because like i know for myself that i'm like a sort of really confident person and i know that just with the amount of like people that don't have that confidence there would be like a sort of power dynamic between us if anything great to happen just thinking about it it would just like wouldn't work because we're like not compatible i guess um so just like think about what like this does this even make like any sense sure so let me let me hear yeah go ahead i also have something to add um nowadays people are more open to speak about these issues but what i feel like what happens after is that is that the idea of that if you if you do this if you do the right thing you're better than other people no it's just a normal thing that should be respected in the first place you should not feel more special because you respect women or respect their boundaries is a thing that should exist already math i'm a bit confused and and maybe you'll help me out you're telling me that if i don't respect your if i you're telling me that if i do a good job of respecting your boundaries and treat you like a human i'm not entitled to date you no no you're talking about nice guys right now no what [Music] i'm confused but i i did everything that you guys said why aren't you yeah but sometimes this is the thing like we just don't click you're respectful thank you very much for being respectful but sometimes this just doesn't work out and what i've yeah basically i thought was dr hey i think he'd be a great friend but i thought that being the great friend is the way that i become your boyfriend that's what reese said i'm just at the boy to the friend and then you become the boyfriend yeah right so like i think i think maybe what was missing is that like you guys didn't understand what my gender was so i can send you a particular picture proving it and isn't that isn't that what i'm supposed to do oh thank you yeah so so it's what i'm hearing from math in all seriousness and you guys have to let me know if i overstep okay so you know all right uh but that's funny so but i i think what i'm really hearing is that like you know basic respect and talking about boundaries and treating someone like a human being is what is just like that's just being human it's not like making you boyfriend material like sure a boyfriend should do all those things yes but it's not sufficient to enter a romantic relationship and that what we're talking about here is a playbook of interaction not a playbook to like get a girlfriend exactly although i do think i do think it is necessary although not sufficient to to be boyfriend material to like treat someone like a human it's the base yeah it's a business okay so let me see if i can recap all right so the first thing is that you know like when you interact with people online the first thing to understand is that you are a stranger and they are a stranger if you talk to someone for five minutes you guys are not even friends y'all are strangers also that like certain things while they may be on the path to boyfriend don't necessarily mean that they're on the path to boyfriend like if alyssa meets you at a dark part and gives you her number it does not necessarily mean that she's romantically interested in you right that there are lots of gestures like maybe a a good thing to do would be to like you know reverse the person's gender to like something else in your mind like if i met a dude at a boy at a dog park and i'm a heterosexual male and i'm gonna assume that he's a heterosexual male and we exchange phone numbers that's fine right that like just because someone is a man or a woman doesn't necessarily indicate romantic interest so the first thing is that when you interact with a woman online that they're like y'all are still strangers and you guys can maybe get to know each other a little bit um if someone does respond to you if you're interacting with a woman um that you know it's fine to interact and for you guys to connect but that actually like unless there's something like flirtation going on that the presumption is that you guys are friends and that if you're interested in being more than friends you should signal that in some way and probably do that early before you invest a lot of the into the relationship and that because the further i one thing that i've noticed is that you know when people invest a lot in the relationship they expect a lot out of the relationship right i've done so many things for you why won't you date me and that's why they feel kind of like let down because they've given a lot oh yeah i like moved across the world for you and i'm paying your rent and like we're great friends but like why won't you love me and and from y'all's perspective i would really think it's it's like healthy if someone does seem to be investing a lot in into the relationship that that you really kind of stop and think about like you know what is the assumption here even though you think you guys are friends that that you know boundary setting conversation or like trying to figure out what your relationship is actually goes two ways and i think a lot about what star said and that sometimes as human beings we like to avoid difficult conversations but that it may actually hurt more in the long run to avoid those difficult conversations so probably relatively early on you don't have to be like you know overly expressive or or go too far but probably men who are interested in you and once again i'm assuming a heteronormative standpoint should indicate to you somewhat early on but not too early on right like not after five minutes of dms but they should try to get to know you as a person move past a stranger point and then i think someone i forgot exactly who said this but maybe it was linda who was kind of saying that like if you feel like you're in love with someone like ask yourself what are you in love with because what do you actually know about this person and so far all you know is that they warded well when you were playing league of legends and like wow that's amazing right ending all of my standards yeah and and so so to really think about okay what do you know about this person as you guys start to interact a couple of warning signs one is like an uneven communication and oddly enough i know this is going to be kind of a weird analogy i don't know if any of y'all play tennis but you know with with tennis i sometimes think about there's a ball and then you hit the ball from one side to the other side and then the ball has to get hit back before you hit it again so it goes back and forth and sometimes what i'm getting the sense of is people that you interact with on on discord or through dms or like those tennis ball machines you guys know those machines where it's just like they're just shooting bubble after ball after ball so ask yourself am i playing a game of tennis with this person or am i a tennis ball machine blocked me on instagram challenge accepted i'm gonna find your your phone number block me on whatsapp challenge accepted i'm gonna find out where you live so don't be a tennis ball machine right and and so to try to reciprocate the level of interaction and this is where what risa says i think is really important observe which i really just am shocked by the lack of observation i don't know how you can expect people to observe if they're like you're blocking them on multiple platforms and they're hunting you down on others like you know observation that just sounds so on a different level i don't even know where to start there um and i think part of you know i think i feel like ultimately what we're having is half of the conversation and what we need to do is talk to the tennis ball machines talk to the people who have been friend zoned and get their perspective because i i do sort of think like i can sort of understand that if i you know meet a cute girl at the dog park and she gives me her number like hey can i call you sometime um and i can understand how there's ambiguity there so there's also like that's why and it's not that you guys should and we sort of acknowledge this at the beginning right it's not like you can say i'm giving you my number but i'm not interested in you romantically but i'd love to hang out as friends like that seems like a bit much right so there's ambiguity at the beginning and that's actually kind of comforting but then as as someone graduates past stranger if you find yourself feeling in love with them ask yourself why and recognize that that's probably not um appropriate full disclosure though i fell in love with my wife the first time i saw her and you know i just don't so i struggle sometimes with that and then everyone doesn't say like reese is like oh no one says [ __ ] creep right but that's like that's how we treat the people who fall in love with us it could have been right so that's like there's something more here like i absolutely just you know i saw her like i remember i like literally remember the first time i saw her and it like it like it was like i got hit in the chest with something and then for years i didn't even understand what that what the [ __ ] that was um but so i was playing long game too uh i would love a room half and half by the way where like guys can talk about like things that we might be doing that are misleading them and yeah because my point of view and they can explain their side as well so i would love that interaction cool yeah i think that's a great idea recently um so then to think a little bit about you know reciprocating in terms of conversations and a couple of you know things to watch out for because rece i don't think observe is enough i think people need more direction than that um so you know first of all obviously if someone is well i guess not obviously if someone is blocking you on a platform don't assume it's a mistake within this clip right so so if someone is trying to set a boundary respect that boundary and then also recognize that if someone sets a boundary with you and you feel hurt you feeling hurt does not entitle you to anything from the other person so that seems to be a big one that we haven't really said explicitly and then also i would encourage people if you're expecting a lot out of the relationship figure out why you're expecting a lot out of that relationship and then ultimately have conversations with people so the first conversation is like hey like let's hang out and then if you have feelings maybe have a conversation about that and then you know down the road even if you guys do end up as friends that it's okay i think to have conversations about developing feelings or if you guys are in a relationship it's okay to have conversations about hey i actually don't feel this way about you anymore um even if it sucks even if it sucks right so to have a lot of hard conversations um but not too early because they don't owe you that after five minutes of dms okay and and the last thing is like it's not your job to get on their page and it's also not their job to get on your page which also means that if they girlfriend zoned you and you say i'm not interested in that they're allowed to walk away even if it hurts your feelings and also if you friend-zoned them you're allowed to walk away even if it hurts their feelings right until while there's ambiguity there's going to be mixed expectations and like that's just why we have conversations um yeah and then i guess kind of the last point that i just want to acknowledge is that i think that a lot of the people that maybe y'all are interacting with are hungry and even starved for some amount of basic humanity which math was talking about about listening to someone when they've had a bad day about supporting them emotionally and that that doesn't mean just because a woman or a man is supporting you emotionally doesn't mean that they're romantically interested in you did i miss anything you think so no that was well summarized actually i left one or two out if you are someone's professor don't touch them if you're a policeman please do not take advantage of already disturbed victims thank you yeah true okay any last thoughts or questions thank you for having us yeah very much sure we're a little bit over time are you guys okay with not meditating today or is that something that you guys really were looking forward to i was actually looking forward to it yeah i was like okay let's do it can i can i confess something to y'all by the way the word confess was used a lot you guys noticed that it's like what's that i'm curious about that but so so part of it is that i feel like i owe you guys a better meditation than what i can give you today so that was actually part of my hesitation so i i do some meditations that are shakti oriented meditations shakthi is the sanskrit word for energy um and it's also like by definition principle i mean feminine so like shakthi also it me is literally the translated as energy so like you know any kind of energy and it also is translated as goddess so it's kind of weird s-h-a-k-t-i um and and the challenge is that like just after even after like five or ten minutes of talking to you guys i was like you guys should really learn to shakthi meditation because i think there's just something about that that's resonating with me the problem is first of all i don't know those meditations very well because they're uh traditionally they're they actually are taught by female teachers and so part of my hesitation to teach you guys that i think you guys deserve something that i don't know that i'm the best to teach so i'm going to teach you guys something and if you all are okay i'm going to think for 60 seconds about how i can access any kind of shakti but the other thing that i ask you all for is a rain check that one day i'm gonna learn how to do these properly and teach them over the internet and i just don't know when that's gonna be but i hope that you guys check that out when it happens um so can i think for a second of course for sure thank you very much okay is everything okay yeah yeah okay okay so i'll try something i don't know if it's gonna work but we'll try something okay so i want you all to sit up straight all our gamer posture oh my god you're a gamer check all my boxes she said gamer posture i'm in love we have the same posture man i met this girl you'll never do that okay you're joking but yeah okay so let's sit up straight so close your eyes and what i want you guys to do actually open your eyes sorry put your right hand in your left like this right and then put your thumbs together okay okay and then put this in your lap okay and i want you guys to sit up straight and i want you to close your eyes and the first thing that i want you to do is feel your spine and as you feel your spine notice that it's straight keep your neck erect you know make sure your neck is straight that you're not leaning forward keep your chin sort of level to the ground like parallel to the ground and what i want you to do is imagine that the rest of your body are like clothes on the hanger of your spine so relax your shoulders let your arms relax let your legs relax that you have a pillar a core of yourself that is your spine and let everything else drape across it and now what i want you to do is feel the weight of your body feel it resting on your spine and almost as if it's traveling through your spine into the ground that your spine supports who you are as a person and now what i want you guys to do is feel the circuit of your arms so i want you to imagine for a moment that there's almost light or energy that is coming in from the top of your head and that it's kind of passing through your arms and down to your palms and now for a moment i want you to pull your thumbs apart and feel how unnatural that is and let them come back together and it's almost as if there's like a circuit that you're closing and with your eyes closed i want you to either nod or shake your head if that makes any sense or not okay okay i see mostly nods but some shakes at the head which is okay so now what i want you to do is feel the warmth so if you feel the closed circuit kind of focus on your fingertips or what you can do is focus on the sensation of your palms and feel the heat of your left palm on the back of your right hand now what i want you to do is focus on your right palm and how there seems to be heat almost emanating from it or above it not if that makes sense or shake your head if you don't feel okay now for a moment i'm just going to invite you to look at something a little bit strange which is that it almost feels like you can feel the heat coming off of your hand which is weird because you can't feel anything off of your hand but just notice that sensation and focus on the area above the palm where you feel the heat and now kind of notice that you have this circuit this warmth this energy and feel the person that you are there's something just warm and pure untainted we've been talking a lot about expectations and feelings and fear powerlessness but in this moment none of that is you those things may apply to alissa or linda or star or resa or champ or math but in this moment there's the pillar of your spine there's the weight of all of your being hanging on it and the spine can easily handle that way and there is warmth and energy and now what i want you all to notice is that there's something like perfect and even divine about the person that you are right now and is it is it any surprise that people are drawn to you and that you are able to give them something wonderful even though it causes you problems and that that's okay that sure we're going to do all the things about setting boundaries and limits and things like that but at the end of the day no matter how they make you feel or who they are you can always come back to this place that no one can ever take this away from you and that this thing that you can feel will support you throughout your entire life throughout any challenges through any trials and in your relationships now sit with that feeling for the next 60 seconds or so pick your choice of sensation whether it be the weight of your spine the tips of your fingers the warmth above your palm or light coming in through the top of your head and focus on that now we're going to take a deep breath in for three seconds and out for three through your nose and now in for three and out for five and then in for three and out for seven and when you're ready come back i'm so glad that i asked for that meditation it's like more emotional than i was expecting i almost cried at some point honestly what were y'all feeling nice to me it was not like strong oh yeah like i was like oh i have a strong spine i felt very light me too and um i could feel the warmth it was so intense um and also um when you said that we should like focus on like a light in your our head i could see like the color yellow and i could see blue yeah so i'm happy that some of y'all had some really positive experiences um i'm relieved so this kind of meditation is actually not my forte so i've learned some of these techniques before and i try to do my best but i'm i'm really glad and this is kind of a lesson to me too it was really good i'm glad um so a couple of things just to think about so first of all you guys can do this technique uh you know and you can pick on whatever sensation you kind of feel but your shakti rests in your spine there are also a couple of other advanced techniques which i can teach you down the road but um you know to elevate and generate that energy the last thing that i kind of want to say and i sort of hinted at this but i want you guys to really understand this i do genuinely believe that you guys each have a spark of divinity within you and i know this is not egalitarian or equality or anything like that but i tend to find that women are actually closer to that spark than men are and and i'm not trying to make it's just my observation and i i'm not kidding when i when i say that i think that you guys are able to give people on the internet like something that they really don't have in their life and as best as you can and as frustrating or unfair as it is to you i'd encourage you to like try to have some compassion towards them i'm not saying that you guys don't but really that these people are approaching you from like a place of hurt and loneliness and then you do the wonderful gift of like giving them support and you listen to them and you try to be their friend and sure they respond to you with toxicity which really isn't fair to you i'm not trying to excuse all of that but i think that like it's kind of sad that you guys are in the situation and they're in this situation and as best as you can try to forgive them because there is something really amazing and divine within each and every one of you and and it really is kind of like you know you're like you're giving emotional support to like a human whose life is a desert and it's like water and they're drinking it up and they just don't know how to not ask for more and they get confused because everything we've taught them is like you know it's love that's when everything is gonna be okay and you guys know that right like you know that they look at you and they're like there's some fantasy in their mind but it's because there's something real that you are giving them and it's something as simple as compassion not saying it excuses it i'm not saying you can't tell them to go [ __ ] themselves but as best as you can don't become bitter and and as best as you can forgive and if you can't that's okay too and it's an unfair burden that i'm placing upon you by asking you to do this it's more than you or it's more than you should do and yet i see something like absolutely amazing and divine within each and every one of you and i think that that's like what we've got to even if it's unfair risa you wanted to say something i feel a little bad since like has all hearts and everything right now that's the only part of meditation that i couldn't continue afterwards is when you mention the divine and pure and untamed part i i don't think what we do is or at least what i do is that great of a gift to people i do agree with everything you said to not find bitter when to be on the receiving side of things like this but i don't think what we're doing are godly i think is simply being supportive of another person and if someone retaliates or responds negatively yeah don't feel better but that was the one part of the meditation that sure i couldn't yeah that that's that's totally fine so like let me just explain just one quick thing so there are three steps to meditation or understanding meditation the firs and we're going to talk about two today so the first is to listen and the second is actually to doubt in the hindu tradition there are actually texts designed to train an aspirant to doubt and so i want you all to understand this very clearly i don't know the answers what i'm giving you guys is hopefully a tool for you to figure out what's right for you it may be this technique it may not be divinity that you feel risa which is completely fine so use whatever parts of this kind of resonate with you and if you disagree with the rest so be it you know it ultimately the truth is not going to be determined by what i tell you it's going to be determined by your own experience cool yeah thank you last questions or thoughts just thank you honestly like i've been watching this dream since before my breakup and i don't know if i would have broken up with my boyfriend if i hadn't been and i'm just like in a period of growth that i think your channel started honestly ruining relationships yes no seriously the bad ones yeah i mean i think it's hard right i think one of the worst things that we can do is live life on autopilot and sometimes not living on autopilot looks rocky when you first start to do it but all the more power to you because that's how you actually take control of your life is by doing the hard things so props to you my condolences to your boyfriend or ex-boyfriend's heart but good for you and you guys are very welcome thank you all very much for coming on and you know sharing who you are and sharing and also responding to my challenges pretty well um i really do appreciate that i think it really shows what your experience is when i push back and i think that's some of the most educational stuff and i do apologize if especially the joke about you know me being in love with each one of you right now out of line i'm sorry if that did offend people uh sorry that's all right but thank you guys very much and and i agree let's get let's get the counterparts on and see what that looks like yeah yeah i think it's cool looking for e-boys what's that okay i don't know what that means but okay if you guys um but thank you guys yeah thank you it's like it's like a boy gamer that goes after girls are like is very particular about his appearance for women on the internet okay well learn something new every day okay so thank you guys very much and really thank you and good luck to all of you thanks a lot thank you thank you so much bye okay

Channel: HealthyGamerGG

Views: 311,112

Keywords: mental health, drk, dr kanojia, healthygamergg, healthy gamer gg, twitch, psychiatrist, friendzone, relationships, boundaries, keep getting friend zoned, toxic relationships, healthy relationships, tinder, tinder stories, tinder experiences, dating advice, friend zone, setting boundaries, setting boundaries in a relationship

Id: fu65PqBbwUI

Length: 151min 12sec (9072 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 13 2020