Situationships and Other Emotionally Immature GenZ Behavior

The irony of me writing this right next to my own situationship, who just asked me about meeting another female friend, does not pass me by. I am going to be alone the whole day tomorrow, even though this is part of a one-week trip I am taking with him. Few crushers would be so oblivious to go on a joint trip and not realize that the other person is into them.

But this is not just some “crush”, this is a situationship. If you thought crushing was hard, try this. Mario would say: Level up! So I am sitting in a cafe with him, silently ranting about him through my keyboard, but I have to get this down now, otherwise I will not get rid of the feeling that I am missing an opportunity.

As someone who is a terribly lost victim, I have deeply explored how the psyche of this weird emotional anomaly works. This article will present some different viewpoints, like social media and a book on what is generally recommended in this shaky wonderland. And if you dare to read to the end, I will present you with my tragic, but novel way to deal with my personal situation.

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The Social Media Review

The nature of social media allows me to review some very interesting angles on this topic. First of all, there are the “non-GenZers” who are reviewing this phenomenon.

The consensus amongst this peculiar group, whose main job seems to be ranting about GenZ behavior, is that “situationships” are a new invention. A new concept by an emotionally incompetent generation.

A new way for corporate-brainwashed individuals to navigate meaningless emotional expressions that would have in previous generations held more significance. It is described by this group as a “strategy to avoid commitment” and live outside meaningful connections.

If you were to pop into this bubble, you would find yourself amongst (mostly millennials) who are arguing, convincing and urging you to stop your immature behavior and finally get that guy/girl to confess. Or just do it yourself, so you can be done with this “disturbance”.

In contrast to this, there are some voices, mostly from a late millennial and GenZ bubble, who are posing arguments similar to this:

“Situationships are not good for us, but god are they fun and entertaining.”

This statement comes from a dark-style standup comedian in New York, who makes no secret about enjoying such emotional rollercoasters regularly. Should you take advice from a comedian? Maybe not.

But something about this description rings more bells with me than the simple “run away, you dumb idiot” that I regularly get. Maybe it is that I have a general dislike for overly simple answers, even when they are very logical, clear, and straightforward.

Maybe it is that this statement is actually true for my situation. I am fallen for (past tense, because I do see myself in rehab rather than the downward spiral) a very safe type of person. He would never hurt me in any meaningful way unless I did it by myself.

So I can confirm he is a safe player for sure. Too safe possibly, considering he believes he is quite the “bad boy”. I have a thing for finding the broken guy with the soft heart. But I am more like a drunkard at a poker game: Losing my shit, basically, but at least in the most fashionable way possible. So yes, it is fun, though probably not healthy for me.

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The Art of F***ery

Right now I am reading a self-help book titled “The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A F***” by Mark Manson. Yes, that is what I am reading, Jesus Christ, I can’t believe either that I am doing this, don’t worry. But honestly, it is good, and readable for a GenZ, which with my theorized attention span is supposedly statistically impossible.

The book is stuffed with life advice of course, but a surprising amount of it is applicable to situationships, I find. I don’t dare assume that is because he describes himself as a fuckboy for a good chunk of his life. The point I want to highlight is when Mark talks about the concept of our brains trying to interpret reasoning into our actions, even when there is actually no logical consequence.

The example he used to illustrate this was an experiment, where contestants were asked to get into a room with buttons and their job was to figure out how to make a bulb light up. Each contestant left that room with a different strategy of how they had made the bulb blink. However, all of them were wrong.

This is because the researchers made the bulb light up at random. They proved that our mind wants to interpret reasoning in everything we encounter in our lives, even when our answer is completely false. Our lived experience seems to need to be ruled by laws and logic. However, sometimes there might be no logic and yet, we would come up with a fake one.

Situationships are kind of like this: You interpret more and more into a relationship that is actually just a simple “friend zone” until you actually find yourself in a situationship. The term as a whole seems to only be born from the fact that our minds can’t fathom that maybe our brains are seeing and interpreting things that aren’t there.

Trust me, it hurts to type this next to your situationship, just as much as it hurts to read it. But read it again. Possibly nothing of what you are interpreting into him is true. Possibly, your own feelings are just yours to bear. Possibly, there will never be anything, especially if you never say anything.

I do it with every one of his moves: When he acts nervous, when he looks up, when he walks to me and when he smiles. I think that I am the cause. But maybe I am not. Actually, likely I am not. With the amount of issues that man has in his life, I am truly his smallest problem. Likely he has a nervous disease. Onset of OCD or something like that, according to my humble diagnosis.

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Detachment Theory

Theory 1

Now in my research about situationships, one thing seems to be unavoidable: Detachment. Or “the art of detachment” as many propose on the internet. And something tells me that all these artists of the field, have never actually held a brush in their own hand.

Like me, you might watch the self-helpers who are seriously trying to convince you of their opinion in less than 40 seconds on TikTok, regarding a topic that they can’t even explain properly. At first, this sounds fancy, but if you seriously look into it, all they are really telling you is to trash that guy or girl. This model of “detachment” seems to mean to get rid of that person entirely.

Kind of like killing the mouse in a sling-trap to kill it right away, without further detours. Death is the easiest and most radical solution. If you’re dead, there is likely very little harm a mouse can cause. Few cheese lost, little money wasted.

The problem for me is that I cannot get rid of him. He sits in my dang courses, walks the halls of the same buildings, and likely when I actually try to avoid him, I would bump into him more than I do on purpose. Also, that seems like a very dull thing to “learn”. Detachment must be more than that.

Theory 2

Turns out, yes, there is more to detachment. You could learn to just detach internally if you are unable to do so physically. And this one is much more challenging, so due to its complex nature I trust this approach a lot more. Plus it is part of the book “The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F***”.

What this means, is to learn to detach yourself emotionally, while in the same room. Just not caring about them. Not looking. Not thinking. Basically becoming Switzerland. Or brown. Or whatever is most neutral to you.

The magic is that I think this definitely works great if you can achieve it. In other domains of life, this strategy has already saved me or kept me afloat for a long time. And I also tried to apply it to this situation for a little bit. Turns out, however, that suddenly, my success rate decreased dramatically.

I don’t know if I didn’t try enough, but I can’t seem to struggle my way into non-f***ery. My friends kept telling me “Forget him”, “ignore him” and “Stop caring”. Well, I still have him on my mind, he doesn’t escape my presence and I haven’t stopped caring either. No success there.

If you can do this, great, all the more power to you! If you are like me, however, maybe you would need a third option. Lucky for you, I have been in this situation for long enough, to have figured out a new “art of detachment”. But be warned, this strategy has no proven results yet…

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Replacing Detachment with Exploitation

So I have chosen another route recently: Exploitation. I try to get the dopamine I crave so bad, whenever I have access. But I try to learn not to crush myself after. I try to have other dopamine sources to channel if I need to. Writing, even if about him, is one of them. This has lead to a significant increase in readership, which drives my dopamine in exchangef

The thing is, I have stopped lying to myself about not liking the butterflies. Damn, I f***ing love them. Maybe more than the actual guy that sets them free. This is actually a problem many people touch on as they ask the age-old question:

“Do you really like him, or do you just like the idea of him in your mind?”

I would be a damn liar to say that I knew for sure. Probably I like what his image in my mind feels like more than the reality. There is never any reality-resembling awkwardness in my head, but all the more naked skin, which is also not there in real life at all. Touch is something we are working on through thick jackets at the moment.

But I also like to laugh with him over a beer, have meaningless conversations and when a lady yesterday asked us if we were a couple, I enjoyed it too. Giggling inside, while he cleared up the fog. “We’re just friends.” He explained with a kind grinn. *sigh*

And now I am spending the wee hours in my bed imaging how I can craft that experience into a neatly packaged uncomfortable convo for him to handle. I know I am mean, but it feels so good.

So honestly, as I am milking my butterflies for those highs that I love to ride so much, I don’t care if I like him or just his projection. I am certainly intrigued and happy in those moments. Unfortunately, I would be pathologically ill to not recognize that the downside of being high is that you have to sober up.

The last time I went completely sober, I was at the bottom of the stairs, crying. Not fun or safe for a lonely girl in a foreign country. I have been on multiple rage dates, but that never worked enough to chase him from my mind. So the issue with the technique of exploitation in situationships is, that you have to mind the step-down, so you don’t fall into a bottomless pit.

So how do we construct a safety net to cover the mouth of hell? I can’t say I know for sure, but here is how I do it:

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My Approach

And now, that Diana Krall is musing “Temptation” into my ears and the situation next to me (typing as giddily as me, but completely unaware of me) is continuing, I am trying to make up what my stance is.

Him fixing his pants and shoes next to me, manspreading eagerly, doesn’t make coming to a conclusion very easy, to be honest. A little bit of pride in me however leans back in chilly happiness: I am writing an article about my issue, next to my impersonated issue, and other than me smiling giddily about my issue, there is no way he would be able to tell what I am doing. I FINALLY feel like the bitch I should be.

Interestingly, I gain a tremendous amount of pride and joy from playing with this awkward situation. I gain a sense of self that is cheeky, proud, and a little more brave than you would initially imagine me to be. I feel a little mean too. Very mean actually. And that feeling is so goooood, like female rage. Like sugar-coated strawberries.

So my way of interpreting this obscure situation is actually very fruitful to me so far. I treat it like a personal lab: I act, then I look at what he is doing. Of course, I fall into the false fallacy that whatever he does is actually caused by my actions. I do what Mark Manson warned me of.

Yet, though I admit my victimhood to my neural tendency to overinterpret things, I manage to be even more delusional: I actually believe I am learning something from this. He is my personal experiment, that I am currently neatly surrounded by. It helps to have a being to try to manipulate when that is something that is such a pivotal life skill.

If I don’t have a boyfriend after this week, but at least superior male interpretation sense and acting skills (like crying on command or manipulation), I think those might pay more than his pocket can ever give. Though I wouldn’t be mad about either.

I keep trialing if how my head is positioned does anything, or how I let the fork rest on my lower lip before putting it down. Yes, I am absolutely insane. But besides that, I feel like a researcher. Like the weirdest psycho-Einstein you have ever seen. And I am so f***ing happy in the process.

My conclusion thus far is that my upper body positioning is the most influential, but I will report more secure outcomes as they are evaluated. Taking my hair down right now might have done something, but I wouldn’t call this a secured sign. Three trials haven’t changed it.

Next, I will try staring at him and then when he asks why saying: “Nothing, just looking for inspiration.” 3–2–1… Ok, I just stared for over 25 seconds (and yes I counted!) and nothing happened. This man has serious perception issues. New diagnosis: Senseless. So as you can clearly see, this is a work in progress. But one of the best I have had so far.

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And as Diana Krall keeps humming “Let’s Fall in Love” into my ear, I have finished my coffee. I reached the bottom of a cup that wasn’t full to start with, of a brew that was never beyond mediocre in taste. The only spice was his presence.

Well, what does that say about the grander scale of my situation? Maybe it says less about me and more about someone else? Oh, I am being mean again, I’d better stop…

Anyway, I hope you can find some applicable advice between these lines, hidden in the meanderings between my mind and the coffee in my belly. At the very least, I hope you had a little smile, as you read my *live* experiments.

I hope you had a spicey peppermint latte with this article, just in time for the holidays. I send a hug from my mug to yours!

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If you would like to be ready, anytime I serve a fresh cup of coffee, follow me on Instagram. Hit me with your opinions on Threads, where I source my inspiration, and would love to discuss this article in more depth! If you are in need of an extra written espresso, check out my TikTok.

Yours, Hug in a Mug 🙂

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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