You’ve probably been advised at some point that you can become more addicting to a man if you show a little bit less interest than you really have. Playing hard to get is a dating strategy that has been around forever. Well, how hard to get should you play? The answer to that depends on you and your personality. Here are some tips on playing hard to get.
Don’t obsess
If you are obsessing about if you should text back, whether you should text, why he didn’t text and so on, then it’s time to step back. All of this communication scrutiny is going to turn you crazy and the stress and insecurity of it all is going to carry right over into the relationship. If you are constantly freaking that you are going to blow it with a guy, then it only increases the likelihood that you actually will blow it!
Be authentic
Playing games on purpose isn’t the smartest thing in the world as it will be so obvious to any alpha minded guy. On the other hand, recognizing what kind of girl you tend to be and trying to strike a good balance between playing hard to get and being easy, is essential.
If you are the type of girl who lombs onto a guy big-time shortly after meeting him, dating with him, or getting intimate with him, then you need to apply the hard to get strategy more, since that will help temper down your clingy personality. You know you are this type of girl if you have been dumped before due to needy, crazy, or clingy behavior that was smothering him. You know if this sounds like you because undoubtedly you’ve had these issues with other men. This particular type of girl needs to keep tabs on her needy behavior and watch it. She should learn from past experience and failures that tempering her personality is a positive thing. For example, you should not be the only one asking him to get together and you should not be the only one who initiates and texts him first.
If you are the type of girl who does not become instantly clingy and needy, then you really shouldn’t over think things. If he likes you, the fact that you jump on any opportunity he throws out there to see him, or text him way to much, likely won’t alter the course of things. That’s because you aren’t clinging and you are showing him enough interest to keep him coming back.
Be sure to think about what type of guy you are dealing with also. If you start acting too needy, he is going to turn him off. On the other hand if you start acting like you aren’t interested at all and he has plenty of other options with women he is going to get deterred by game playing and simply focus his attention elsewhere. Therefore, when deciding how hard to get to play, recognize your own personality and whether you need to calibrate yourself, and recognize the type of guy you are dealing with (one that’s solely interested in you or one that has numerous other options).
Recognize if you are on the chopping block
If things are going great then you are going to show him enough interest to keep getting asked out, be pleasant and super fun to be around, and be somebody he does not get bored with. In this situation, the little things you do probably won’t dissuade him from getting to know you better because his interest level is high enough.
If on the other hand, you are dealing with a guy that is not very interested in you in the first place, then things like whether you act too needy, or whether you act like you are not interested, are going to actually matter. That’s because he is making up his mind about you and therefore the way you act is going to get scrutinized. The girls who start to wig out over texting issues such as frequency of texts, response times, etc, are usually the ones that are on the chopping block. It stands to reason, since his casual nonchalance about the relationship is the exact thing that is spurring on her obsessiveness about text message issues.
Here is a way you can look at things. If you are that much on the chopping block to where any wrong move you make such as bothering him on text is going to get you dumped, then you really never had a strong enough hold on him in the first place.
A perfect example of this is when you are dealing with a guy who is dating other people. If he is seeing another girl that he likes more than you, you are definitely going to be on the chopping block. Any wrong move will get you dumped. So instead of obsessing to the point of not even being about to behave naturally, realize it’s a losing battle. If you can’t be even close to your real self with him, then a relationship would never have developed anyways.
You can’t be sitting there muzzling your mouth, analyzing your every word, or stressing out about him flaking on you. You need to be able to relax and be yourself. And he needs to be able to see how you are when you relax and are yourself so he can know if he likes you. Calibrating your behavior a little bit because you know you tend to be clingy is one thing, changing who you are to the point where you aren’t even comfortable, is another.
You need to recognize that it’s not always you that is guiding the relationship. He might have other stuff going on, other women in the background, and other doubts about you. Let’s say he’s decided you aren’t relationship material because you are much older than him, or live to far from him, or don’t have the particular looks he goes crazy over. Essentially, you are in a losing battle, and any mistake you make is going to trigger him into dumping you. That’s because he’s already decided and that switch has been flipping in his mind that you aren’t the one. Can you see that anything you do in this situation is going to get you nexted? Playing games and attempting to contort yourself, putting up with his flaky texting, faking that you are okay with him seeing other people, etc, is not going to make or break it. If you are already someone he’s not too interested in, your behavior becomes splitting hairs. He is going to find a reason to dump you.
Relax
So now you know that you should quit obsessing. If you are a needy girl, calibrate yourself by playing a little hard to get so you can temper down your neediness. If you are an aloof girl, be sure to show him enough interest so that he doesn’t give up and move to greener pastures. Beyond that, it’s ridiculous to obsess.
If you are constantly plotting, scheming and calculating your next move in a relationship or watching the texting patterns too much, it’s just a sign that you are in a losing battle with a guy that probably isn’t all that interested in you in the first place. Try to relax, be yourself, and accept the possibility that you might get rejected in any dating situation. If you do get dumped it may be because he just wasn’t interested in you enough in the first place and so it was easy for him to single out reasons to dump you. Getting dumped can actually be a good thing because women who obsess about guys who don’t text back are better off getting dumped than getting strung along.
The worst thing for a girl is to waste her time obsessing about a guy that is just stringing her along but has already boxed her into casual relationship territory for evermore. No matter what she does, she will never make it girlfriend, and that right there is the reason she is obsessing. Sometimes getting dumped is a good thing because it beats getting strung along and used as a side kick any day. Don’t be the girl that chases after and obsesses over a guy, keeping him company while he keeps on searching for the One.
Playing hard to get can be useful if you are a girl who knows you need to temper your naturally clingy personality but in the end you need to be your authentic self and see if he likes you enough to stick around. Realize as well that your clingy behavior could be a reaction to a guy that is just not interested in you enough for a relationship in the first place. At that point, you are in a losing battle and analyzing text message frequency, initiation and response time isn’t going to fix it. Realize that you are obsessing because he is not into you enough to develop a relationship with you and move on from a doomed situation instead.
Playing hard to get
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