Rejection

So, in the last column, we talked about dating in the era of #metoo, and so basically about personal choice and responsibility as a man towards women. Now I think we need to talk about rejection because nobody likes it.

First, some people have asked, where have I been? Honestly I've been in jail. I was arrested in October of last year and have spent most of the last eleven months in a “correctional setting” both in the county jail and in residential drug treatment. It has been a long and painful process. There were a few bumps along the way but somehow I got out of this without dying and without spending the rest of my life in prison.

The reason I'm writing these things down is because when I was in jail I realized that I was a mess in a few different ways. One of those ways was that I wasn't treating the women in my life well. I was a fairly toxic man in a fairly toxic patriarchy. One of the major goals in my treatment is to rebuild my moral compass. One of to the best ways to do this is to improve the way I treat women. There's a lot of detail missing from these sentences because I think that might be tedious and banal for the reader. If you want to hear more about me and my recovery plan, please send me an email to ross.winn@gmail.com. If I get enough responses, I'll write more about my recovery and how it has worked for me.

So hey, back to the point of this. You may have managed to approach a woman in a respectful and polite manner. She laughed at your jokes, you laughed at hers, and you thought you might have made a connection. You ask for her number and she says no. She's not overtly rude about it. She might even tell you she's flattered but she's not interested. So what do you do now?

Well I'd thank her for her time and walk away smiling. However many people aren't as enlightened. Here's what you shouldn't do. You definitely should not try to play the sympathy card. You shouldn't try to guilt her into going out with you. Don't talk disparagingly about that person or their choices in life. Most especially, don't get angry or violent. Yes, I know this seems to go without saying, but there are many extremely insecure men who are so self centered that they feel every rejection is completely about them. Some of these unfortunates can't conceive that this rejection doesn't even take them or their feelings into consideration.

As hard as it is for some men, and many women, to believe and understand much of the rejection that each of us will face in life has nothing to do with us. There's no reason that it should be about anything except that another person made a different decision than we were hoping. Maybe they really dislike guys who wear skinny jeans or green shirts or maybe they aren't interested in your gender or maybe there is no reason at all.

When we don't respect the decisions of others what does that say about us? If we whine to our friends that she's a little tease or whisper that she must be a lesbian that diminishes us. When we diminish ourselves we make our next bad decision into a habit. All of these things are incredibly disrespectful of women, but also of ourselves. If we can't respect all women why should any of them want us? 20 years ago this was a completely unthinkable chain of logic, women should be glad we gave them any attention at all, or so we thought. 35 years ago when I graduated from high school nobody thought this way. That's why I have a lot of problems with this stuff and I do carry a lot of cultural baggage with me.

It can be difficult for older people to wrap their heads around these ideas because they're so alien to the way that we were raised. I was taught many antiquated views about women and about holding doors and protecting them. Even when I was in treatment 6 months ago a counselor said that women's addictions were more difficult because they were prostituting themselves to get high. One of my male friends stood up and said “women aren't the only ones who prostitute themselves”. This is true, lots of men do as well, but the commonality and the experience isn't analogous with men. So just as it's wrong to think that only women can prostitute themselves, it's also wrong to assume that everyone does and this can be a double blind.

I think this cultural baggage is permeated through our society. Well maybe not as much in the Northwest but especially here in the south. People over 40 think differently. We are in many ways, culturally disconnected from the more modern world. Many of us who are middle-aged realize that we are disconnected or are becoming disconnected and take steps to remain culturally fluent in the mores of the time. However we struggle because the things that we learned as children are difficult to overcome because those patterns are deep and worn.

However those of us who are more mature also have an advantage. We have seen 40, 50, or more years of change in America and many of our attitudes have changed over time as well. So while it may be difficult to change we know that it can be done it just takes more time, awareness, and effort now that we're older. At least it does in my life, in my recovery, and in my morality. Maybe some of you will even make this a part of your own journey too. Please share in the comments if you have used these ideas to make positive change.