One of the worst things women do when trying to snag a man is to make themselves accommodating. They play the cool chick and present themselves as having not many needs, or even the exact same needs as his. It’s completely artificial! Anyone who is authentic can identify and connect with authenticity in someone else. If you are being fake, he can feel it and he will immediately bangzone you.

The bangzone for women is similar to the friendzone for men. It’s where your relationship potential has limits because the other person is willing to take what he or she wants but won’t reciprocate and fulfill what you want. If you are providing emotional support and connection to a woman but she won’t let the friendship move in a romantic, sexual direction, you’re in the friendzone. If you are having sex with a guy and he isn’t interested in investing his emotions, his time or his loyalty, you are in the bangzone. You are just a bang, just a notch, just someone to kill time with, get his rocks off with until he finds someone who can really keep his attention.

Accommodating, compliant girls are the best kind of girls for the bangzone.

You may think you are the unicorn because you are doing everything you can to be compatible. But you aren’t – you’re being compliant. Compatible isn’t “the same” and compatible doesn’t come without conflicts.

Compatible means you can disagree openly, you can respect his different needs and wants and you expect him to respect yours as well. Compliant is when you always agree with him to appease him,and you minimize your own needs to take care of his. He doesn’t think you are a unicorn, he thinks you are a fake. And if you are fake with him, that gives him implicit, subconscious permission to be fake with you in return. Players gonna play, and girl, when you’re not real, you’re playing.

A player will fake a relationship to get uncomplicated sex. And guess what you are doing? Faking that you’re chill and have no expectations beyond easy sex when what you want is a relationship.

There will come a day when you suddenly want him to recognize you have needs and wants (a commitment, a relationship, public validation of your semi-relationship, maybe just a little favor…) and he won’t give it to you. You wonder why he’s being such an asshole. But the truth is, you set it up that way. You asked for little and you got little. You act like you need nothing, you get nothing.

A certain amount of time passing doesn’t automatically earn you status or affection in his mind. Just like how, when a “nice guy” buys you dinner, or listens to your emotional downpour, it doesn’t entitle him to sex. You’re bartering sex for attention.

You being a complex, caring, interesting person is what will earn his affection and interest. You would have been better off showing him who you are and letting him bail if he doesn’t like you.

Being in the bangzone is confusing and painful! You’ve invested in him! You’ve sacrificed (too much) to be with him and now that you are finally wanting something from him (even just a small thing) and he’s not budging. He’s got nothing to give you. And he feels like you changed the agreement on him out of nowhere. You used to be the chill girl – the one with no needs and no expectations! Remember? You didn’t give a fuck, you were just chill.

Don’t be chill. Chill is fake. Chill gets boring. Be you.

When you try to change the rules like that, men will do one of two things:

1. Try to keep you in your place, in the bangzone of a casual fuck by doing the bare minimum to appease you without pleasing you.

2. Bail.

You will cry to your friends and obsessively analyze what you could have done wrong, and you will be baffled because for all outward appearances you did everything right!

But that’s not real. You were fake. Men know what women are like! They have friends, sisters, ex-girlfriends and mothers! The women in their lives are complex. They are emotional. They are fun. They are demanding. They are resilient. They have needs and passions and dreams and frustrations. Men want women who are also complex and who inspire them to be more.

You playing small doesn’t inspire him. It bores him. Your accommodating doesn’t interest him, it amuses him. So when you text, out of a need for validation, with the expectation of a response from him, he will not want to reply. He will likely not reply until he wants something from you as well.

Listen, guys aren’t all douchebags. But even great guys will fall into the convenient relationship. Even amazing guys will take something given freely, especially if you package it up as being all fun and no work. That’s what you are doing when you are the accommodating chick. And while you think it might be the foot in the door to girlfriend territory, you just wrote your own ticket to the bangzone.

If you really like him, if he’s a great guy, then make him earn your attention and time. Make him work for it. He loves to work for it! Reward him for his efforts by sharing more of you, giving more, opening up more. Then make him work again. He will love it. This is building trust and intimacy. It’s a process.

Be real with him. Tell him what you like and don’t like. If he asks you to do something you don’t enjoy doing but are interested in doing with him, then let him know, “I don’t like football but I like being with you, so I will go.” He will appreciate your company even more. And if you really don’t like football, then don’t go! Meet up afterwards. If he’s into you, he will make time for you later and he will miss you while he’s watching football.

Men are simply better at standing up for their needs in a non-confrontational way. Women are taught to be compliant and so we often won’t stand up for ourselves, or we will do it in a bitchy, confrontational way. Take a note from his playbook. It’s okay to do what you want to do! Just be real with him.

MEN LOVE REAL.