One statement everyone has heard at some point in their life is, “if they wanted to, they would.” In my experience, it is a hard pill to swallow as it often shatters illusions and brings to light a reality that some individuals would rather exist outside of. Ignorance is bliss, right? But I think that the statement, “If they wanted to, they would,” is more than just the reality check from your best friend.Â
Under common knowledge, the statement, “if they wanted to, they would,” essentially means that if a person was motivated to do something, they would and is often used within the context of relationships, more specifically, difficulties within relationships. It’s a piece of advice that I’ve given and been given again and again, and it never gets easier to digest. The question is, however, is it even something we should be digesting? I want to explore beyond the set narrative that we have placed behind this statement, looking into what it actually means in a broader, even more hopeful, context, and whether or not the statement holds as much truth as we’ve placed in it.Â
There’s no denying that “if they wanted to, they would” can hold an amount of truth from situation to situation. Speaking from the personal experiences of myself and the people around me, dating in college is full of lackluster and lack-effort encounters, where it is quite evident that the person does not want to, so they simply won’t.Â
But the statement can easily become a generalization, and an incredibly insecurity-fraught one at that. Upon hearing a friend tell me that “if they wanted to, they would,” I immediately began to question what I was doing wrong that made that person not want to do something or act a specific way. I took it upon myself to identify some sort of flaw that I was projecting that made this person not want to put effort into me. Because of the way that our society is so reliant on validation from places like social media, our peers, our professors, and more, it builds insane levels of insecurity, but that’s not new news. However, it is intriguing how those insecurities creep into every portion of our lives, including dating insecurities.
A realization to be made from this is that maybe it’s not you, it’s them. You, as an individual, deserve to be treated with the utmost of love and endearment in a relationship, whether that be romantic or platonic, to extend this concept. I’ve experienced many moments where I’ve wanted to do something, but something else has held me back — nerves, other insecurities, timing, and so on. The world has a funny way of getting in the way of things, and I think it’s important to acknowledge this when questions arise as to why a person isn’t behaving in the way you might want them to. So maybe you’re not the issue and it’s something personal for the second party, something you had nothing to do with. If you feel it’s important to address, it’s also always okay to ask someone why you’re not receiving the treatment you might anticipate.
The negative connotation placed in the statement, “if they wanted to, they would,” has established a stigma within the dating world that diminishes self worth. It’s not to go as far as to say that the statement doesn’t hold any weight — it very much can — nor to say to ignore red flags and minimal effort, but more so to acknowledge that the red flags are not your misdoings, oppositional to what your anxiety might be telling you.Â
It’s also important to acknowledge that every situation is different because this statement creates fine lines on all fronts, but knowing your worth regardless of how others behave is foolproof. Relying on your assumption of how others perceive you only feeds the flame of dating insecurities, so having an open mind is essential when stepping into anything new, whether that be a first coffee date or the awkward conversation of “what are we?” because maybe sometimes they want to or maybe sometimes you want to, it’s figuring out how to go about the would that may be tricky.