It happens to all of us. You become friendly with a guy and start hanging out with him casually, and you realize sparks are flyin’ – but only on your end. Soon, he starts sharing all of his deep, dark secrets with you, including his last hook up and how he wants to bang a totally hot chick in his chem class. It is then that you realize the unthinkable has happened: you’ve landed yourself in The Friend Zone.
TFZ is a dreaded, horrible place to be, but it’s not irreversible. In fact, plenty of relationships evolve out of friendships. And so goes the tale of my first love…we’ll call him Justin (after Timberlake, of course. Just some wishful thinking on my part). We started out as really close friends, and I even had a romantic fling with his friend; and I told him all about it. Oops. Justin, however, successfully pulled himself out of TFZ by being confident and forward, without losing the same great qualities that I found so appealing as a friend.
One night, he sat me down and told me how he felt, and as he was going through this little shpiel I began to realize I felt the same. I was so comfortable with him already, and I could easily imagine spending time with him as a couple. We decided to give it a try, and it was the easiest, most stress-free relationship I’ve ever been in. When the time came to end things, it was an amicable split – and unlike so many other relationships, we remain good friends. I fully credit that to the fact that we were friends first, and a couple second. SO, the moral of the story is this: don’t rule out those you’ve placed in The Friend Zone. Give a relationship with a good friend a try, and you might just be lookin’ at marriage material.