Friendzone



 Nation Free

 
Of all the things that could happen to a person, today’s youth assumes being friendzoned is the worst of them all. Of course, there may be a few confused by the term. Simply put, the friendzone is a place for all your friends of the opposite sex who you have no intention of dating. This doesn’t sound too bad, right? Personally, I prefer being friends with people knowing they don’t expect anything more than friendship. Yes, it is nice to be with someone you think is boyfriend material, and to feel all those emotions you felt when you had a crush on some boy when you were fourteen! Yet, friendship isn’t a path that must lead to a romantic relationship.

The order of events isn’t always, strangers, friends, lovers… It can be that, and it is romantic when best friends fall in love with each other. However, you don’t make friends with people with an ulterior motive of dating them. You don’t make that friendship ‘happen’ hoping they will someday fall in love with you. There are such instances. However, the friendship either dies down or becomes something that makes you forget the intention with which you started that friendship.

For this reason, the friendzone seems like an insult. If someone tells me I’ve been friendzoned, they will definitely lose a friend in me. However, the friendzone has another side to it. This side makes the friendzoner look bad.

One is friendzoned when they are under the impression the other likes them, only to find out they are liked ‘only as a friend.’ This is when it hits them that all those favors done for them were done in vain. While one can argue that favors shouldn’t be done in hope of a reward, in a friendzoning incident, the friendzoner often misleads the friendzoned. No matter what we say, we can’t deny expecting a reward. When we do something for another, we expect payment. In the case of most, when a favor is done for a friend they ‘like,’ the reward expected is a date. And so the unassuming do everything they can for a friend only to be told they have been friendzoned.

Thanks to the friendzone, we are more cautious with our emotions. We tend to not care too much or show how vulnerable we are. We are afraid of being rejected, of being friendzoned. When you think of it though, being friendzoned isn’t too bad. It allows you to be someone’s friend without worrying about coming off as flirty. There’s no embarrassment about being seeing together, and you don’t have to worry your friend will misunderstand the teasing of your other friends. You both know your friendship won’t take another path, and this allows you to truly trust and love each other.

However, if you are being used, don’t wave it off as something you have to deal with as someone who has been friendzoned. You shouldn’t be misled and given hope just so another’s life will be made easier.


Sri Lanka, of course, has a few more zones you can get stuck in. The ‘machanzone’ is something you either love or hate. Males tend to consider each other their machans. However, some females also fall into the machan category. This is when you are one of them. Often tomboys are the ones who are machanzoned, and they absolutely love this. Its like being accepted into that world you so want to be part of. However, for someone who wants to be more than friends with her male friends, the machanzone is the worst place they could be in. This is when you know things have gone too far in the wrong direction.

There is also a brozone. The brozone is the friendzone taken to another level. Here, you are looked at as a sibling. Why people take this as a bad thing, I’m yet to understand. I would be honored if someone treats me as a sibling, and takes care of me as one. However, what people want in a friendship is quite difficult to understand, and this is why the various zones you can find yourself in will continue to baffle people.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Availability, dating, love, etc.

There’s a line in Sally Rooney’s Conversations with Friends where, towards the very end of the book, one character says to another: “You know, I still have that impulse to be available to you.” This line struck me when I first read it, because it seemed to describe simply what love is: an impulse, a desire to always be available for a person. Now, when I first read the book, I hadn’t really dated, but later, when it happened, I saw how this simple need to always be available to someone wasn’t love. Not necessarily. Not always. It was sometimes a sure-fire way of hating yourself and perhaps even hurting others. I don’t like dating; I’ve vowed to never date. And the reason is this sense of availability, this sense of giving it my all. I haven’t particularly liked any of the, let’s see, two people I can say I dated, even though it’s a stretch, really. But in both instances, there was no real attraction to the person. They were available and bored. I was available and bored. Quite roma
Read more

Alone time

Image
Nation Free editorial Alone time is a few minutes or even hours all for yourself. It can be spent at home, at a bookstore or library or even in an unknown city. There are no rules or regulations or rituals regarding alone time. Sometimes you just feel you need to be alone and you find a place you feel the most isolated from others. A need for some alone time arises in most of us. It starts like a mild breeze on a hot day and can end like a tidal wave that hits you with great force. This need, when not addressed, could turn into anxiety or depression. Pic by Sakuna Gamage However, many assume needing alone time is a sign of mental weakness; that it is only the troubled who need time away from other people, or in most cases, those familiar faces. This is far from the truth. We can’t continue to spend night and day with the same people and at some point or the other, we need to get out. If you feel like a trapped animal in your own home or school or workplace, plan a vacation wh
Read more

Learning to Let Go

Kumara is only a name in my memories. I think he was dark, and not that tall. I think he wore shorts, but I can’t be sure. What I do remember about him is related to bikes. Since my brother was the leader of the pack, even though the pack had three girls and only one boy, we were mostly tomboys. We never had Barbies and tea sets to play with. Among our various treasures were our bikes. Since the pack of cousins was nearly all the same age, we went through the same phases together. The most excited phase for me was the bike phase. Each of us had a cycle and we loved racing each other around the heart shaped lawn in my uncle’s garden. We never spent too much time with the training wheels, and had our knees scraped too many times. I still remember the time I fell off, my bike landing on me. The sun was setting, and my body was covered in sweat. I knew my knee was bleeding and dreaded the moment the adults would clean the wound. When my uncle and aunt rushed to me, I told
Read more