Ask And You Shall Be Denied

Ask And You Shall Be Denied

Are you a man? A manly man? Have you ever bungee jumped from the high mountains? Have you ever gone deep sea diving amid a school of  great white sharks? Have you ever wrestled hand to hand with The Rock and Hulk Hogan? And do you think these are scary? You are wrong. There are things even more scarier than getting your maths exam marks. Like, romance as an example? Romance in the view of a single brown male for instance There are few things in this world as terrifying as asking a woman out on a date. Ask any man and he will immediately agree unless he is already married and pussy-whipped into submission. Then he will pretend he never dated anyone at all prior to meeting the one who said yes. The hardest question any male has ever faced in his life is asking a girl he fancies “do you want to go out sometime?” the answer means more than passing IIT and getting a H1B visa job. Its putting your fragile ego on the line to get crushed. Its being vulnerable to rejection on a most personal level- getting hit where it hurts.

Unless you are man who has been there, done that and got crushed you cant possible understand in its entirety that  internal struggle which every male  faces when he tries to be romantically bold with someone he’s just met and had a few words with in a social setting.  In most mens experiences, everything, every prior experience, every particle fiber in your mind is yelling “Just go the fuck home already, lock your room doors, put some sunny leone on and just shag off. Save your heart  from total damage, just don’t do this dude, run when you can”. But being a man means you close your eyes, harden your heart and do it anyway because there is an infinitesimally small chance (say like once in a million) there's a possibility that she’ll say “yes, ok, i will have a coffee with you”. But chances are that nine times out of ten she’ll say no.  And that can feel like a kick up your balls just on the day you forgot to wear any undies.

The easiest way to deal with the pain of being turned down for a first date is to go get drunk with your friends. Its quite educative, especially if you are teetotaler and your friends like to drink theirs straight up on the rocks. Buy them a couple of drinks and watch how they philosophize it all away. Chill dude, it’s her loss, they  will assure you with a straight face “the bitch just doesn't realize what an awesome catch you are. She must have her own issues that have nothing to do with you. Just forget her and order us another beer”  and which is the cue to ring in that “tasmac song” in gana bala’s lyrics. Come to think of it, its not just your friends telling you that same shit- its not you, its her, everyone is saying it online. People who spend their lives creating and sharing memes on facebook and watsapp – memes analyzing all about love rejection and heartbreak keep saying the same thing that if a woman didn't straight up tell you why she wont even have a coffee with you, assume it’s because of her issues rather than because of any deficiency of yours. Its just not possible for any woman to weigh you up in seconds and make up her mind dismissing you as a possible long term partner based on such a short scrutiny. And yeah, you might believe such love pundits at first. But then it’s late night and you’re wide awake, staring at the ceiling and wondering how you ended up becoming  such an unlovable person,the beast from the “beauty and the beast”series.

 And deep down in some part of your brain you know there’s not a lot you can do to change whether women do or don’t find you attractive. Your hit ratio, or to put it more crudely the hit-on ratio is very random and arbitrary and doesn't make sense at all. Not when you succeed and not when you fail. No one is going to share the real reason why they liked you or why they unlike you. Only that  the reason people are attracted to us  or not is for all sorts for reasons that are way beyond our control.  There is no need to worry about finding the the right words to spell it out, the right way to approach them to ask out, all that externalizing shit we use to convince ourselves as the the perfect way to impress and get that first date for attraction- doesn’t work that way.  In the authors experience there is no single right move at all . Some women like guys whom other women abhor at first glance and vice versa. One women’s hrithik roshan is another’s tushar kapoor.

Then there are those who offer  a quick fix solution (something which you’re probably tired of hearing a lot)- to be more self-confident. How many times have you heard that advice? It’s not about how you look, it's whether you exude self-confidence. But what the hell does that actually mean? How can you exude self-confidence if you’re not, in fact, all that self-confident? And how can you be self confident after getting beat up all those many times on asking and facing rejection after rejection. Beats me. The only person who can be self confident in such a situation is a ghajini-type with total and instant short term memory loss.  In fact more than self confidence what you need is masochism (a form of sadism where you inflict pain on yourself) when you are about to ask out an insanely hot woman who you are damn sure is way out of your league.  Masochists never take no for an answer because they love getting slapped again and again – even when the opposite party makes clear that she is not interested at all- because they never believe that they are not desirable. They think they are the cats whiskers, the axe ad men and gods gift to women.  And you know what? Sometimes they get lucky as some women prefer the the persistent pests to the more suave gentleman who believes a clear “no” is a real “no” and moves on with their life. So being a bit of a bastard who doesn't take no for an answer often gets you that girl who would otherwise  brush you off at  first hit.

So to conclude its pretty much given that girls will say no and it hurts if they dont want you to. But you cant stop looking and stop asking and allow yourself to wallow at home in self pity, licking your wounds. You just have to go out there and keep asking- hoping the right woman says yes, the woman who feels lucky that she found you and vice versa. Good luck asking...