He's Just Not That Into You

You probably think it's a movie. And yes, it is. 'He's just not that Into You' is a movie. It came out in 2009. Not my cup of tea though, but it has interesting life value and relatable plot. It gave me new perspective in how I perceive love.

The movie started with a narration of how girls were taught that if a boy was being a jerk, it means that he liked you. It's true tough. I remember in elementary school, my friends told me that Avi (not his real name) liked me a lot, and I believed it. I didn't like him in that way, but I do like him as my frienemy. To think about it again, why did I believe in them? Me and Avi fight every second of the day like I'd pinch him real bad spontaneously. He'd play tricks on me. It doesn't make any sense that he liked me. But I believed in my friends anyway.

In general, us, girls tend to comfort each other with lies. This happens all the time, even when I am in college. Every time the subject 'love' comes out, there will be so many lies. For example, I liked a boy in high school. I was so into him. But, being the awkward potato that I am, I didn't even show that I liked him one bit. I act too normal around him. And then came the day he said he liked someone else. My heart broke in instant. From that point on, I kind of wasted my friends' time just to talk about him. They comforted me, of course, but with lies. 

'He likes you, that's for sure. He's not the type to hang around girls easily and the fact that you're close with him and him being comfortable around you is enough proof. I don't understand him though. Why her? You're more fun to hang around with.' - Friends. I believed it, again. And so I kept liking him for three years. THREE FRiKKIN YEARS. Thanks to those lies that I could survive 3 years of being brokenhearted.

I must admit that I also did that to my friends.. and even to my own self. The weird thing is.. when a friend is sad because of a boy she must be thinking of bad things, like 'maybe he doesn't like me because I am fat, annoying, etc', so I comfort her by saying the opposite, like 'No! it's not like that. He likes you, but he's just stupid not to show it.'. Like Red Velvet song says: It just comes automatic.

This phenomenon also being showed in the movie, and I just realized that it is really not good for everyone. You know, being comforted with a lie does make you feel better and less broken. But it's not really good in the long run. In fact, it's bad for you. It left you hanging--The hope that is caused by those lies.

It feels like when you're being interviewed for a job and the recruiters say 'We'll contact you later if there's any good news' while you should finish talking about salary with them in the interview session if you really get the job, and you're still hoping that they would accept you. Your friends also said that you'll definitely get the job. You wait for that day to come. The day they call and say, 'Hey! You got the job!' but it will never come. It's not really a problem if you searched for another job while waiting for the phone call. But what if you don't want another job and just wait for the phone call? You're wasting both your time and your life. Maybe there are recruiters out there that is looking for someone exactly like you and you're still there waiting for that god damn phone call.

Comforting lies give us false hope.

Same goes with love life. A man said,

Sometimes I heard boys say 'She deserves better than me', and I can't help but roll my eyes. It is only a subtle way of saying 'I don't like her', and yet girls are still flattered by it. If a guy wants to be with a girl, he will make it happen. No matter what. And if he truly likes you and want to be with you, he'd not leave you to someone else 'better' than him, he'd try to make himself a better man.

So girls, enough hanging onto the person who never replies your text, calls you annoying, calls you ugly, enough. Enough telling yourself lies only to temporarily heal your broken heart. Enough telling comforting lies to other girls. It's better to tell the truth, and then moving on. It's better to accept the fact that, He's Just Not That Into You.

Girls are taught a lot of stuff growing up. If a guy punches you he likes you. Never try to trim your own bangs and someday you will meet a wonderful guy and get your very own happy ending. Every movie we see, Every story we're told implores us to wait for it, the third act twist, the unexpected declaration of love, the exception to the rule. But sometimes we're so focused on finding our happy ending we don't learn how to read the signs. How to tell from the ones who want us and the ones who don't, the ones who will stay and the ones who will leave. And maybe a happy ending doesn't include a guy, maybe... it's you, on your own, picking up the pieces and starting over, freeing yourself up for something better in the future. Maybe the happy ending is... just... moving on. Or maybe the happy ending is this, knowing after all the unreturned phone calls, broken-hearts, through the blunders and misread signals, through all the pain and embarrassment you never gave up hope.

By the end of reading this post you should have concluded the reason why I even started to bring up this topic. If you haven't figure that out... well, this post is addressed to me and it's actually a reminder for me lmao