Does it ever turn you on when a guy plays hard to get?
THE CASE STUDY
I ask this question because I was recently advising a very good male friend of mine (porn star name: Harry Berkeley) about how to follow up after he had a great first date with someone. "I'll send her a note to say I had fun, but then I'll play it cool and let the weekend go by before I ask her out again," he said.
Moi: "But you had a great time with her, right? And you really like her?"
"Affirmative and affirmative."
So I took my gigantic red rubber bat out and hit him over the head with it. Well, not really. But I did say, "Please, can you do me and all women everywhere a favor and just BE A MAN AND ASK HER OUT ON A SECOND DATE ASAP?"
He protested, saying he thought he'd put himself in a better position if he hung back and made her wait for it.
Oh boy.
ON MEN PLAYING HARD TO GET AFTER A GOOD DATE
My guess is this: No woman who is interested in finding a serious relationship will be more interested if a guy plays games. If anything, she'll be less interested.
When I have a date with a guy I'm really excited about, and he follows up in a lame, half-assed way — with an e-mail in which he doesn't ask me out again, for instance — it's a letdown and a turnoff. Games always suck, but even more so as I get older. Any guy who is playing them seems insecure, childish, and douchey.
Granted, at an earlier point in my life, such game-playing might have made me obsess more about when I'd hear from a guy. But it wouldn't have made me like the guy more. If anything, all the anxiety would have helped to ensure I felt like a complete crazy person, thereby more or less dooming the whole thing from the start.
ON MEN NOT PLAYING HARD TO GET AFTER A GOOD DATE
More importantly, if a date has gone pretty well and I'm thinking, "Yeah, I dunno if I like him, but I'd totally hang out with him again," I'm more likely to become more interested if a guy has the confidence and assurance to show his interest by not only following up in a timely way, but by extending a clear invitation to have a second date.
And if I don't feel very interested in a guy, I know that within two minutes of meeting him. And in a case like that, absolutely nothing — not playing hard to get, not following up confidently — will change my opinion.
The upswing of all this?
If anything is going to work in a guy's favor when it comes to initiating a healthy relationship, it's being confident enough to clearly ask for a second date very quickly after the first!
