By OnLion Staffers
Every year, we ask you to share your romantic questions on our Valentine’s Day survey. And every year, y’all respond with questions that range from silly to incredibly sincere.
We do our best to answer those questions with equal parts sincerity and humor. Sure, it’s nice if we can be helpful, but our primary goal is to have some fun.
PLEASE REMEMBER (and here’s the disclaimer part of this article), we are the staff of the Lovett OnLion, NOT trained psychological or relationship experts. If you are truly struggling and feeling like the waters are rising too high in your life, TALK TO A TRUSTED ADULT, a parent, a school counselor, a therapist, a favorite uncle. Nobody expects (or wants) you to solve significant emotional and interpersonal challenges all on your own.
Q: How does one know when to deploy rizz vs when it’s a lost cause??
A: Well, it depends on whether you’ve ever talked to the person. If you guys are kind of friends, just say a casual “hey” and ask a question about a class or something mainstream. Then sus out the vibe from there. If the person seems completely uninterested, you may just want to quit while you’re ahead. But who knows, maybe sparks will fly, and you can put your rizz to use.
Q: Is music taste a good way to find someone you like?
A: Yes, 100% I think that music taste is a great way to find someone you like. It creates a great conversation starter and makes car rides a little less awkward. Personally, I am a huge country artist fan. And, fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, 90% of the guys I have liked have played the guitar. I have heard just about every song I like played on the guitar. As fun as this may seem, it also comes with consequences. Sometimes, I felt like Margot Robbie in Barbie getting a guitar played AT her. I’ve also been a victim of just having to sit there awkwardly smiling while they play, and you have to just nod with approval (even though it is not very good). Maybe it would be better to look for someone who has different music taste? And maybe I should take my own advice and seek out boys who play a different instrument.
Q: How do you talk to someone quiet, when you’re ALSO someone who’s quiet?
A: It really depends on whether this is online or at school! If you are chatting on Snapchat and texting and find it hard to keep conversations going, start by talking about things you both have in common. This could be a favorite food, sports team, or maybe a class y’all are taking. This just makes a conversation less awkward, and it will also help you feel comfortable branching off into different topics, especially if both of you are shy. Talking at school can be a bit easier, especially when you have a class with them. You can talk about projects, homework, etc, and then hopefully you’ll just randomly start talking about non-school-related subjects. If you have basically never talked to them before, it’s not impossible! This can start with a simple “hi,” and if you are scared, they might suddenly be wondering why you said that, if you have never spoken before, most people aren’t one to judge a simple “hey.” Overall, if both of you are shy, start by talking about things you have in common, or simply acknowledge each other to begin.
Q: What if I want to break up, but I’m scared he needs me?
A: Well, first of all, good for you for caring about the well-being of another human. Now, we will assume that the “needs” you are referring to are more significant than, let’s say, “he needs a ride to school,” or “he needs the delicious banana bread I make every Sunday,” and enter the realm of psychological or emotional stability. You’re concerned that if you break up with him, he will have a really hard time. If that’s the case, remember that you are in high school. It is your job to be a good, kind person, but you’re not married to him, and there are grown-ups in his life who are responsible for caring for him. If you are very, very worried about him and “scared” for his safety, consider reaching out to a trusted adult in his life or perhaps a counselor here at Lovett. Remember. The first part of your question states that you WANT to break up. Given that you are a student in high school, that is as important as, if not more important than, the second part about your fear. The key point is that you shouldn’t feel you have to handle this decision and situation on your own. If he is struggling as much as you’re implying, then that is way bigger than something you should try to manage on your own.
Q: Do people actually go on dates?
A: Yes! Even in an age of high school relationships where checking snapscores as well as “saving a snap in chat” equates to a gesture of undying love, teenagers are still going on dates! A few OnLion staff members have formulated a list of the best date spots in Atlanta; however, according to this unqualified expert, restaurant dates are a great (and slightly nerve-wracking) way to get to know somebody one-on-one rather than through a phone.
Q: What do I do when I like three people and they all like me, but one of them is lowkey still talking to their ex, and I like that one the best?
A: Wow, that’s complicated. I think the easiest thing to do for each one is to make a spreadsheet (staying organized with your locker and your love life is key!) or some kind of list of what you like best about your relationship with each person. Maybe one of them just gets you. Maybe one of them is super fun and makes you laugh. Maybe one of them is always there for you when you need them. It’s not reducing them to statistics, but just helping you understand what each relationship means to you, and which one is worth the most to you. For the one you like best, honestly, just talk to them about it. I know that those things can be scary to bring up, especially when you’re not official with that person, but wondering about it will only make you more anxious, and that anxiety will definitely seep into your relationship. If you find out they still like their ex, I’d say just end it, because if you get together and that person is still on their mind, there’s definitely gonna be problems down the road. As Princess Diana once said about her relationship with King Charles, who was still in love with his ex, “There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.”
Q: How do I talk to women?
A: Well, the first and best answer will always be to talk to them respectfully. To dive a little deeper, that means acknowledging their personalities, hopes, fears, etc., and not just that you think they’re attractive. If you want them to like you, the best thing you can do (beyond just being compatible) is to do your best to compliment them. Tell them what you like about them directly; trying to “play it cool” and seem disinterested only makes them think you don’t like them, and especially when you try to get more serious with them, it makes them anxious about whether or not you really want to make it official. If you like someone, tell them, no matter how nervous you are or how cool you want to present yourself. Overall, the strongest piece of advice is to just put yourself out there and be vulnerable. You’ll never know what you could be with someone if you don’t try!
Q: Is having a high snapscore (above 500k) still considered a red flag?
A: This is not a yes or no question. After all, some people got Snapchat in middle school and have had it for a while. A person who has had Snapchat for several years and has a 500k+ Snapscore is very different from a middle schooler with a 500k+ Snapscore (but I assume you’re not snapping middle schoolers, right?). If someone has only recently joined Snapchat but has a high Snapscore, it means they’re probably spending a lot of time on Quick Add. And you know what they say: “Snapchat quick add? More like a speed dating app” (no one says that). But you get the point. Someone who has a high Snapscore after a recent debut to the platform probably superficially mass-snaps people they barely know, perhaps in search of surface-level romance. In that case, it is probably a red flag. On the other hand, someone who has had the app for a long time but has the same Snapscore as the latter-mentioned snapper might be… a beige flag? They likely snap a smaller group of people with whom they have actual connections, and their high Snapscore is accumulated over time. At the end of the day, though, if you are judging someone based on the number on their profile of an app whose logo is a yellow ghost, perhaps you should take this opportunity to approach a romantic interest in person. Like real-life Quick Add, you might say.
Q: How do I not get bored of a boyfriend after 16 days? (That’s my record.)
Hm? Who says you shouldn’t get bored? I mean, if they were interesting, would you be getting bored? High School is about having fun, not locking in with someone who’s boring. Think about it, do you want to tell your grandkids that you had fun in your heyday or tell them you spent your years in an uneventful relationship? And hey, 16 days in high school isn’t that bad! Ultimately, you can’t really control the emotions that come to you. It’s all about what you do with them once you feel them. So you could lean in to your boyfriend, and be curious, and maybe he’ll turn out to be more interesting than you thought. Or you could break up, and try someone new. Eventually, you’ll find someone you can spend more than 16 days with! And if not, perhaps your attention span has been permanently wrecked by TikTok. And just as you look for dopamine hits when doom scrolling, you’re probably also looking for it in the people you talk to, who knows.
Q: Nah
A: So we asked you to submit questions for the advice column. It was TOTALLY OPTIONAL. And yet this person wrote “Nah.” On the surface, this would seem to indicate that they did not have a question and felt the need to declare that, despite it being COMPLETELY OPTIONAL to submit one. AND YET. Perhaps this “Nah” is a cry for help. Perhaps this student, by writing “Nah,” actually meant “Yeah, yeah, I do have a question, but my heart is too raw, too broken, or too hopeful to ask it.” Perhaps “Nah” is an acronym for “Need a helping hand.” Perhaps they struggle with vulnerability. Perhaps when they were a child, they would stand beneath the monkey bars, staring helplessly and hopelessly up at them, unable to ask for an adult loved one to lift them up so they could hang there. And all these years later, they still can’t bring themselves to solicit help or advice. So we will offer it anyway. We will say: Open your heart. And to paraphrase the great Rod Tidwell in Jerry Maguire: “Help us help you. Help US help YOU.” Love is a mystery. And instead of walking away from it, walk towards it. We are here to be your Sherlock Holmes, your Miss Marple, your Benoit Blanc. We will walk beside you toward romantic illumination! And if all that is a bit much, remember, the question was TOTALLY OPTIONAL. You could have moved right on down to the next one.
