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He's Just Not That Into You:
The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys
by Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo

Based on an episode of Sex in the City, this particular relationship book has been extremely popular since its debut last Fall, probably due in part to being featured on an entire episode of Oprah. Every once in a while a dating book will shake us to our very core with advice so simple that we wonder how we’d survived up to the point of purchase. What I loved about this book is that you could really just take the title and print it out on every page and it would still send the same shoulder shaking message – Women, stop making excuses for men who aren’t attentive enough to be really dating you.

It’s a simple enough message, but trust me, many women have a hard time digesting it, because to us, logic flows on a different plane. For example: Ted and Nancy had a great first date. Nancy is excited and thinks there is potential for a real relationship with Ted. After intermittent contact, Ted tells Nancy that he’s really busy and will contact her when he is free. Nancy thinks Ted is really busy and will contact her in a few days. Ted has moved on and is currently dating three cheerleaders from Duluth. Nancy gets upset when she finally realizes that Ted isn’t following up on his promise to call. The Reality: Ted is just not that into Nancy. The book offers up dozens of similar scenarios to help women figure out what’s really going on when a guy does this sort of thing.

One reason that this book is so popular is that it saves us well intentioned girlfriends from being forced to offer up our “mean-spirited” observations that some guy is being a total jerk to our best pals. We can just give them the book as a gift!

For example: You might easily observe an obvious horrific end to the new relationship that your close gal pal Suzie is so excited about, while she is apparently oblivious to her new love’s bad behavior, and not only that, she will easily make excuses for it. When you’ve had enough of Suzie’s increasing complaints about her new man’s less than fairy tale-esque behavior, and you dare to offer your "warnings" with all good intentions, she will likely turn her anger on you. I believe this probably happens at least six million times a day.

Why do women make excuses for men? Is it because we so desperately want to be in relationships that we’ll put up with all sorts of bizarre behavior? Are we really that hard wired to give men the benefit of the doubt? Are we destined to stay simmering on assorted back burners until that fateful day that we finally meet someone who likes us enough to stick around? To make my point, I offer up three examples of bad boy behavior that have hurt some friends of mine:

Friend 1: They meet, go on half a dozen dates. She’s very excited and happy. He seems so different from the guys she usually meets. This one really seems to "get" her. After the sixth date, he gives her the “I’m busy at work” line and promptly disappears. For a month. She’s very hurt, and left with no explanation. When her friends cautiously mention that perhaps the guy isn’t interested, she’s angry and full of excuses.

 

Friend 2: They meet; date for a year, everything is peachy. One day he decides that he can’t have sex with her anymore, as it is interfering with his suddenly new spiritual side, but he is serious about her. She buys it, and hangs out with him for another year. To the rest of the world, had they known, this would be a clear sign that he is not that into her. But she can’t see that. After a frustrating year of dating her ‘brother’, she leaves him, very hurt by his now apparent cowardly behavior.

 

Friend 3: They meet, start dating. He’s her boss, she’s his executive secretary. He’s married, but very unhappy and in the process of a divorce. She falls in love with him, dates him, and waits for him to be free. Truth is, he has no intention of leaving his wife, is caught one day, and forced to call his secretary to end things, with his angry wife on the other line. Secretary is stunned to learn that everything he’d told her was a lie, and that he’d actually forged legal papers showing divorce proceedings just to keep her as his mistress.

Now, to be fair, not all men fall under the category of “not being into you” because he hasn’t called or followed through on some plan he’d mentioned. There are, I believe, four categories of men to which this particular behavior does not apply:

1. Men who are legitimately busy when they say that they are busy. IE: work deadlines, sudden business travel, family issues, funerals, injury or illness.
2. Men who are passive by nature, and who prefer an aggressive gal to get (or keep) things moving in a relationship.
3. Men who are shy.
4. Men who have died in the last half hour.

Unfortunately, the left over huge percentage of the male population who don’t ask you out, call you, date you, have sex with you, marry you, cheat on you, only want to see you when drunk, break up with you, disappear on you, are married, selfish jerks, bullies or freaks – let’s face it, those guys are probably just not that into you.

Why do they do this? Perhaps they’re lazy, they want to avoid conflict, they get off on the thrill of the chase. Who really knows? The rules I choose to follow are simple: Treat someone like you would want them to treat you, give them the benefit of the doubt, and create dating boundaries for yourself that cannot be crossed. IE: You stand me up once, I’ll forgive you. You do it twice; I will be a lot less forgiving. Once I start to see a negative pattern emerging, it’s my responsibility to walk away gracefully. Life is just too short.

This book is set up as illustrative examples in a question and answer format, and it covers all of the types of men mentioned in the previous paragraph. The author, Greg Behrendt, is a Los Angeles based comedian and consultant for Sex in the City. He’s like that big brother who cares about you and tells you exactly what’s going on from a male perspective. His co-author, Liz Tucillo, was an executive story editor for Sex in the City, and is still currently dating in New York City.

Buy this book:  He's Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys

Hardcover: 176 pages
Publisher: Simon Spotlight Entertainment (September 1, 2004)
Language: English
ISBN: 068987474X

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