Welcome to another regular feature, where I read dating books so you don’t have to!
This month I read How To Make Anyone Fall In Love With You by Leil Lowndes. Lowndes’ concept is basically that everyone is an insecure puppy craving attention from someone who appears to like most of the same stuff as them, and therefore by faking these interests while laying on compliments thick and heavy you will fool them and they will fall head over heels in lurve with you. Let me break her ideas down so you never have to bother cracking the cover…
1. Men and women are utterly different. Women want to talk about stuff, but men want to do things.
Lowndes says that a woman will only go somewhere active with a man to make him happy, and that you should fake that love of windsurfing, spelling bees, or blood sports, till you make it. Apparently a man just needs to ask me how I feel, or whether I’m truly truly happy, to win his way into my cold cold heart.
As a woman who hates talking about her feelings with a passion I have to disagree. Also where are these feeling hating fuck-it-lets-do-it men that Lowndes seems to bump into all the time? London is full of touchy-feely saps who want to know all about my period pains and discuss the relative merits of Belle and Sebastian versus Hefner, and therefore if I were to attempt to go on an ‘active’ date with them, I reckon nothing more strenuous than watching a Pastels special on VHS would occur.
2. All anyone wants in a partner is a cheerleader.
I mean, not literally a cheerleader, but someone to tell them what a unique never to be bettered snowflake of a person they are all day, every day, for the rest of their godawful life. Apparently the reason that relationships fail is because someone forgets to say “I love the way you chopped those mushrooms darling.” or “It’s so amazing when you stroke my cheek.” I am not even joking, these are actual examples from the book.
Of course people want to know they’re great, but a never ending stream of sugary compliments would any sane person up the wall. Also, what is never explored is what if you do all these things and the other person professes to be in love with you, and they do none of these things back? In fact why are you with someone who needs constant reassurance? Isn’t that what babies and dogs are for?
3. When people fancy each other they leave do all sorts of strange things with their body language. If you fake all that then someone will fall in love with you.
Apparently lowering your eyes and then looking up very slowly through your eyelashes, touching their arm for emphasis, and mirroring the way they are standing are all things to give your crush the not so subtle hint that you like them. Oh and wearing a strapless dress because they’ll think of you naked OH NO WAIT that’s from Clueless. Easy mistake to make…
In conclusion… What Lowndes barely addresses is once you’ve faked an interest in Cro-Mags, Bambi-eyed them, and complimented their prowess at Call of Duty, where you go from there? How do you live as a mirror to their greatness? Where do you come in? Relationships are a two way street and Lowndes seems to forget this repeatedly. What happens when you find yourself standing at a sweaty anarchist march with a bunch of Spanish punk-a-bestias and realise that you just want to be at home slagging off the Sex and The City The Movie while eating microwaved pizza? What then? Lowndes just doesn’t know.
Alternate recommendation: How To Lie With Statistics
Photo by Bob Fornal
One Comment
’3. When people fancy each other they leave do all sorts of strange things with their body language. If you fake all that then someone will fall in love with you.’
Brilliant! Actively planning to start a relationship off falsely!