the science of the friend zone

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as the topic title says, but actually with a more philosophical twist than it suggests:


https://youtu.be/IGK2KprU-To

it seems to me like it's "one of The Big Questions", if not the biggest one. naturally more so for anyone in the spectrum, but increasingly so for everybody else as well:

in concrete, objective, real-life terms, what is it that creates a personal connection to another human being, what is it that maintains it, and what is it that determines the nature of that connection at first and then over time?

more localized societies in the past used to have clear cultural pathways to establishing personal connections. you either did or you didn't, and that was it. your possibilities were limited, but rituals and symbols were shared by a community, and had a particular meaning. when you failed, you knew why. nowadays instead, there is the assumption of more freedom, but in reality it means more responsibility with less comprehension. you're left with infinite choices and, more often than not, the blame for not knowing what to do with them

you're the maker of your own failure, even if you have no way of knowing what you're doing wrong. simply because there is no right. nobody really knows what they're doing, but it's more important than ever to appear like you do. people spend much less actual time with people than they used to, but the perception is the opposite. because with smartphones and whatnot, social lives are more visible than ever, faster and easier than ever. you can't help but see it. and seeing is believing, but doesn't make it true

there is a lot of dissonance. the feedback is broken. social exposure is increasingly more focused on modes of communication that don't give you any clue on what social connectedness actually is about, or even what kinds of shared activities lead to it. sharing becomes synonymous with publicizing. but who is the audience? why is it important to begin with? what meaning has a friend in a crowd, or a crowd of friends? it's as if the concept itself is on its way to becoming a myth. something that everyone talks about on a daily basis, but which no one can really put their finger on

so the distilled question is: how to escape the crowd and its dilluting effect, without finding yourself stranded? what kind of life is still left to be lived where people have meaning? friendship, companionship. can it be filtered out from all the white noise?

It depends on individuals. What formula works for one person, will not work for another. It could be science for one person, totally art for another.

I know it's not "science" for me. It also depends on the day, sometimes. I might go for a Goth type one day, an Emily Dickinson type another day.

I guess a person's scent could be a determinant in attraction, albeit a most subtle one.

Most of the time, though, I find a combination of a visceral physical attraction, plus having important things in common with each other, will determine the life of the loving relationship.

For me, it is really simple. A romantic connection is always initiated by a crush, and it is first maintained with obsessive thoughts, and later becomes a strong attachment. A friendship and a parent-child connection are attachments without an initial crush. You don't need to make it more complicated than that.

that's the thing. whether or not i make it more complicated, it already is. apart from asd, i'm also diagnosed with schizoid personality disorder. which means not just a tendency for unintended seclusion, but actually a personal and consistent need for it. participating or technically belonging in a group of any kind is rarely enjoyable for me. on the internet, i can mostly make my own timing, but even then it's difficult

it took me four years to even make any post here after i created my account. because every time i thought about posting and then i checked the site, my thought was "i can't relate to any of these people". but it's nothing specific to this site, it's simply that i would expect to relate to "others with the same condition" but, with few exceptions here and there now and then, i just don't. the same happened in an adhd forum (except that on that site i felt like i could relate to them even less than to the average person). the only difference about this site is that i don't need to be ashamed about certain things here. it's good enough for passing the time, but there's no sense of belonging. i feel like a crazy person thinking out loud in the middle of a crowd. i don't usually mind looking crazy, but the constant alienation is unsettling

despite the schizoid personality thing, i do want human contact, and it's something i'm always very aware of. but also, despite the asperger's thing, i don't want group contact, and that's independent from my social skills. most of the times when i do interact with people in group settings, even if it's perfectly "successful" and people want to keep in touch with me and all, by the end of it, all i want is to be back home and then never see those people again. and that's what i do. i only want deep, one-on-one contact. but that's a problem, of course. because, generally speaking, the only way to meet people, and to even know who i would want to interact with individually, is by participating in group settings, which i'm highly averse to

i have my interests, but i learn much better and do practically anything much better by myself (either that, or simply not good at all, in which case it can only be frustrating). trying to find people based on my interests is like looking for someone to hold me back and to spoil the things i like, and then expecting to grow fond of them for it. i love languages, for instance. i signed up for a chinese class, and i got along great with the teacher and the other students. but after a couple of months, i completely lost interest in the classes. there was no more novelty in it, the pace was too slow, and the people still felt like strangers to me just like any random person out there. that's disturbing to me, and the mental association with that feeling is enough for me not to want to learn chinese anymore

i have crushes on celebrities and women who i'm fully aware are not compatible with me. it's how it's always been. i make money working at home doing freelance work, but, for several reasons combined, i'm unable to work as a "team member", which makes me unfit for stable employment. that means work is also not a possibility as a medium for initial human contact and for expanding social networks. i'm not bothered by religion or religious rituals and customs, as long as they're peaceful and tolerant. sometimes it's even enjoyable. but it's not a viable bonding element either, because i can only see it as an anthropological thing. i don't believe in any of it myself, and i just don't have the ability to

i'm planning on moving to a place where marijuana is fully legal (for several reasons, including financial ones. legal marijuana is just a fortunate coincidence). for me i think that's great, but i know how it's a slippery slope. in several ways, it's a facilitator for human contact, but it can't be the very substance of it (no pun intended...). it's a mistake i've made before, and i don't want to repeat it. i don't want to start sliding down the slope again without a rope that i can grab and hold on to and climb my way back to safety and sanity. i'm looking for that rope

i do have friends. they are few (currently only two, in practice), and they are long-distance (although i did meet one of them irl last year, and i'll probably be meeting the other one in a near future). these are stable friendships anyway, and these friends share my daily struggles with aimlessness and lack of meaning in social life. they do matter and make a difference to me. but they have their lives. they know who and what they're living for, even if they may not know how to go about it. they're needed. i'm not. maybe i'll never find that kind of thing in my life, and that's something i've come to terms with. but either way, i have to keep searching. the search itself is important. it's something i believe in

LOL....I don't relate to most people...but I posted right after I got here.

My feeling is: one cannot relate totally to anybody; so I allow myself to communicate with people with whom I don't relate to right away. Frequently, I find myself relating to them after a little while, though.

It's the topics which interest me---more than the people. The people's reaction to the topics.

Interest in the people comes after I "talk" to them a little bit, like I stated above.

It's not natural for me to be "interested" in a person, or relate to a person, right away.

yes. and i would have posted here right away too if i weren't posting elsewhere already (i only started posting here because the other site started to feel dead)

the problem is that i've never come across any situation where one thing leads to the other. instead, what i've repeatedly come across are situations where one thing pulls me away from the other. i can be excited about many things, and even about certain people sometimes. but the initial excitement tends to lead to less relatedness over time, not more. and if there's no excitement of any kind, then obviously i have no drive to act. any possible solution to this is tricky and elusive

the only people who feel to me like exceptions to that rule are the ones who struggle with this precise issue. my ex was one of them. she struggled too much with self-doubt and self-loathing for something lasting to be possible though. now where and how can i find those people who do struggle with this but don't struggle with irreparable self-loathing? it's actually fairly easy if you ignore the latter requirement, but... i've learned that it's not wise to ignore it

so, the thing is... i'm not the one who finds himself constantly friendzoned. i'm pretty good at making myself unavailable, believe me! i am the serial friendzoner. and it's not even for good-ol' fear of commitment, it's actually the extreme opposite. it's for the exact reasons the guy explained in the video, on steroids

I just wanted to say I relate to much of what you said here: especially about the conflict between needing my alone time to function, but also desiring companionship (not in a group setting; I also do much better and get more out of one-on-one socialising). I have a single very good friend that I've known since my school days that is mostly long distance but I talk to every day through IMs and who comes to visit for a few days several times a year. Most of the time that's enough companionship for me, and though sometimes I feel like it would be nice to have someone to share more with at the same time I don't do well in the sort of group settings that I would need to be involved in if I were to actually try to meet someone new. I also have my interests and hobbies and get a lot out of my life (even if it would probably seem boring and rather humble and cloistered to most people) but I can't help but wonder what it would be like to have a little more human connection than I do.

yep

there's a difference between having someone you can count on and having someone who shares their existence with you. it's not even a matter of frequency of contact, but really the nature of it

i think one of the reasons why many people don't understand what i mean by this is because they have a personal bond with their family of origin already. i don't have that. my parents are essentially housemates that i'm figuring out how to get rid of without ruining my finances. and if i'm going to risk ruining my finances and long-term security, then i want a good reason for it, something better than just "getting rid of housemates". i want to be looking for something i don't already have

or else i'm probably just staying here playing video games. i can always just keep traveling once or twice a year with the money i save. sounds like a life to me already. but i need to keep searching anyway. it's part of my nature. and it's what makes travel enjoyable anyway

maybe that's a loophole?...

i should post a thread about it. i've never been into multiplayer gaming, but who knows, i might be into it if i found the right game(s) for me

I think "friends" is something unnatural for NDs. I really don't have any friends in the NT sense of the word. I do have a few people that I'm attached to and like a lot, but our communication is kind of sporadic. We only write each others when we have something to discuss, and sometimes we have no contact for months, while sometimes we send several messages each day. We typically discuss technical stuff, and we never discuss emotions or things like that.

that's why the two friends that i do have (and all the friends i've had in the last five years or more, and even my one remaining friend from high school, who i see once every year or two) are all women. because if i want to know something about some technical thing, i'll just look it up, or figure it out myself, or ask some random person on the internet. friendship is irrelevant for that. if i want to discuss philosophy or politics or anything like that, same thing. i don't even discuss ideas anyway. i just collect, connect and enunciate them instead. a friend is actually a rather limited source of new ideas and perspectives to tinker with

friendships work as an excuse/motivation for me to travel to other places and then help me enjoy the place once i'm there. they help me find direction in my life. also there's personally-directed humor/entertainment, which is much more effective coming from someone similar to you and who knows you well. but the one thing which is really more specific to friendship is emotional talk. because emotions and emotional matters are the things that i can't deal with on my own, and which i struggle with on a daily basis. and talking about emotions with guys is just... weird

besides, making friends with women is a much better alternative compared to regular dating. two birds, one stone. several of my online friends over these last few years have told me that they don't have a clear distinction between friends and (potential) love interests, just like i don't either. i've had several friendships that were sort of like online dating, considering the content, tone and frequency of contact

the women i talk to online often like to talk with me about sex and such, and imply that i'm unique to them in one way or another, and say that it's "refreshing" to talk to me, or something to that effect. those have been recurring themes. several times there was a significant element of exclusiveness, just no commitment to the continuity of it. sometimes i would disappear after a period of intense contact, sometimes they would. sometimes we would "reappear" after a while

to me, "love interests" are actually very separate from crushes (which i've learned to see as fantasy), while the distinction between "friend" and "(potential) love interest" is only a practical one instead. the main reason why most of those friends didn't turn into real-life "dates" was distance. otherwise, it was clear that they would have been open to it

the main reason why one of those two friends is not a potential love interest anymore is because she's essentially married now. but at one point we did discuss sharing an apartment, including an implied possibility of "benefits". not counting her partner, i'm currently her only friend. and the reason why the other friend is not a potential love intest is because she's much older than me (not a matter of appearance though; she's still good-looking) and has no desire and no place for a relationship in her life. and that's actually why those two friendships are stable. because they're permanently excluded as potential love interests, even though, under different circumstances, they wouldn't have been

ideally i would find someone very similar to that friend who's essentially-married. but... it would have to be someone who, unlike her, doesn't want to have kids ever, and who, unlike my ex, isn't plagued by self-loathing. in short, a female version of myself . that's an exceedingly rare combination to find. but i just can't see things working out for me with a woman otherwise

Last edited by anagram on 02 Aug 2016, 5:02 am, edited 1 time in total.

Same here, with only one or two exceptions. I typically make friends with women for some reason. I also mostly have women as friends on Facebook.



Well, I do. One of my friends is a professor in psychology, and it has been useful to discuss neurodiversity and research issues with her. I don't find friendship irrelevant for that, and I keep useful contacts so I can ask people about specific issues.



I consider a partner to be like that, but not a friend. Actually, I find it necessary to have some common ground and interests with a friend, but not necessarily with a partner.



I'm not like that either. When I was single, I didn't need company to travel, rather would travel alone, and I certainly didn't need anybody to discuss emotions with. I like to discuss relationships and courtship from a scientific POV, but not from an emotional.



As I stated before, it doesn't work like that for me. I have a very clear line between romantic interest and a friend, and without a crush, I wouldn't even consider somebody a "love interest". Also, when I know somebody too well without having a crush (or at least having done regular flirting), they can no longer turn into romantic partners. Even regular talking with a girl will put her permanently in the "friend zone". My natural courtship simply has no place for getting to know a potential romantic partner with conversation.

^I feel some of what you said is rather shallow. I'm the opposite really, how could I know I want to spend my life with someone before I get to know them as a person?

For me, the theory of what makes a good partner is simple.

Two questions: is this person a really close friend? Is this person attractive? If yes to both, that's partner material right there.

Attraction isn't necessarily instant. The last girl I had a crush wasn't attractive to me at all when I first met her. After a couple of years, I felt totally different about her. Her qualities that struck me as unattractive at first became unique and endearing to me.

In my mind, the "friend-zone" is the best position a girl who's interested in me could be. If I develop a crush on her at first sight, I'm never going to be able to truly appreciate her as I would building a real relationship from scratch. I expect any "love at first sight" relationship to lead to a breakup in the end. Just because I'm not attracted to a particular woman now, does not mean I will never be attracted to her.

^ ditto to all that

especially:

-----

there's one friend i really wish i could know why she disappeared. it was never clear if she decided to stop talking to me or if she just happened to, for whatever reason. she's sort of a technophobe (ironically, considering that she is/was an online friend). she didn't even have the habit of checking her email regularly last time i talked to her, and has probably changed her email address by now. i've tried to contact her, but no response so far. she's a graduate student of feminist english literature. in turkey

I don't find it shallow. I'm a person with pretty narrow interests, and if I search for girls with equally narrow interests, my dating pool would be small or non-existent. That's one part of the reason why I don't want to match on interests. Another one is that if the girl has some random interests that I find somewhat appealing, I would love to get to know more about those and thus widening my own interests. Lastly, my narrow interests typically change over time, so by matching interests I will need to move on when either I or she change interests. That's acceptable with a friend (you can find new friends that have your new interests), but not in a relationship.

Maybe you now will claim that at least you need to share political and religious views? To tell you the truth, I've hopped all over the political scale, and I also have been interested in several religions as well as atheism, so the problem is basically the same there too. That's not something that is long-term stable, so thus not something I can build a relationship on.



For me, answering the first one with "yes" makes it a friendship only. As for attractivity, I really don't care. I'm not going to have regular sex with her anyway, and I don't need a social trophy to show-off at parties.



I expect any friend-based relationships to disintegrate as soon as one or both of you get new interests, and that can happen quite fast.

It sounds from you that "love at first sight" is something random, but that is not the case. I don't fall in love with random women, and unless they show good qualities during the observation phase, I won't get into a relationship with them either.

@rdos: i'm curious, and i think this would be relevant here, to better understand both your point of view and your quiz itself. what are your own results you get on the latest version of your quiz?

for reference, this is what my results looked like when i took the quiz a couple of weeks ago:



(it's interesting how it says i'm "about half aspie-social" and "practically zero nt-social". "where's the other half?" . it kinda makes sense, actually)