It's the year 2043, you and your husband pick up your pre-teen daughter from school. She hops in the car and randomly asks how you and her dad met.
You snicker and give your husband the side eye. See, twenty years prior, you were in the library at the University you went to and you and this cute boy made eye contact like a dozen times. You had given him the nickname Zayn (because honestly, he could be a distant cousin of the ex-One Direction singer) a few weeks before, and all of your friends knew exactly who you were talking about when you mentioned him.
"GUYS. I saw Zayn walking through Red Square and he's wearing a backward baseball cap again! EEEKKK he's so cute when he wears a backward baseball cap!"
And…
"OHMYGOSH! Zayn walked right past me at the gym today! He sort of smiled at me, but it could have been at the person in front of me that he walked over to! I couldn't really tell." *squeals*
Well, he really was looking at you in the library. So, you checked your teeth in the reflection of your iPhone, smeared on some lip gloss, and strutted over to him, like the badass you are, asking for his number. He gave it to you, and the rest is history.
We have this idea in our heads that for the most part, boys are the ones who should make the first move.
And, while this is nice and all, boys are chickens and frankly, they don't really know what the hell they're doing.
So often they give us the wrong impression. Either they lead us on or they like us and don't tell us or don't like us but like the attention or have no idea what they're doing and just kind of stay in that weird we're-friends-but-we've-kissed zone, which is just uncomfortable for everyone. (Don't get me wrong, girls probably do this even more to boys). But, what I'm saying is that you will spend hours trying to decipher whether or not he's being flirty when he uses the parenthesis and colon emoticon smiley face versus the emoji smiley face when all you really want to be doing is buying a necklace with his initials on it.
Boys need our help.
They need a little nudge.
This is our time to defy gender roles and slide into his DM's or go talk to him in the library or ask him to go get coffee.
It is actually the most terrifying feeling (I've shamelessly done all three of these things) but at least you know where you stand and you can either let him pursue you (because he knows where he stands) or you can move on! It's more like ripping off a band-aid rather than getting the flu and questioning who every girl is in the background of his Snapchats for months because you don't know what you mean to him. Get what I'm saying?
It's summer. You're thriving. You have nothing to lose. Well actually, you might lose a little pride and your ego might deflate. But, better now than like three years from now when you still don't know where you stand and he's talking to seven other girls.
So, where do you get the courage to shoot your shot?
After chatting with one of the most confident girls I know, she told me that she began to shoot her shot in order to build her confidence. The reason why girls don't make the first move is that they don't think the person they're interested in is going to be interested in them. She told me that this is all based around being insecure and the only way to get over that insecurity is to put yourself out there.
She explained to me that dealing with rejection helps you learn how to laugh at yourself and learn to love yourself even more. Because why wouldn't he want to be with you? You're awesome.
Strong women go after what they want. As the Cheetah Girls once sang, "I don't want to be like Cinderella sittin' in a dark cold dusty cellar waitin' for somebody to come and set me free."
Life is boring when you spend it waiting. I mean, you don't have to walk up to a boy and be like, "I'm not waiting. I think you're cute and I want to get to know you better." He would actually run away from you. But, you have to do what you would want a cute boy to do to you. Smile, catch his eye, start a conversation, ask for his opinion. There are so many ways that you could make the first move, the trouble is finding the courage to do it.
Don't lower your standards and don't chase boys who just aren't that into you.
But, if you want it, go get it. No shame.
