Finding it hard to figure out if someone likes you? We’ve all been through it: that agonizing period between meeting someone you find attractive and figuring out whether they like you or not.
For the lucky few, this period lasts just a few days or weeks; for others, it can last for years. And staying in this for years is definitely not recommended for your personal anxiety and mental health.
So how do you tell if someone likes you? In this article, we discuss everything you need to know to help crack the case: from why exactly this can be so hard, to the common (and not so common) signs of attraction, to the steps you can take after you find out.
Before we get into the exact signs to know if someone likes you, let’s first talk about the subtle differences between flirty and friendly that could save you embarrassment.
Flirty VS Friendly – The subtle differences that can save you the embarrassment
The age-old question that all of us have dealt with at one point or another – is someone you like reciprocating your attraction by being flirty or are they simply being friendly? The hints and cues differentiating flirtiness and friendliness can be extremely subtle, and knowing these differences can save you the embarrassment of professing your love to someone who doesn’t actually feel the same way.
Some people are just really great at making us feel good about ourselves simply through their social behaviour, and that can sometimes come off as if they’re flirting. It’s up to you to know whether they’re flirting because they like you or just being nice. Let’s go through these behaviours one by one and see their differences:
1. Eye Contact
Friendly: They look you in the eyes and keep eye contact during the conversation. They may look away from time to time but they will give you the respect and courtesy to stay attentive while you are talking.
Flirty: They look longer and with greater intensity as if they are really trying to speak to you telepathically with just their gaze. There is an unironic intensity in the eye contact – instead of a nod, the person might lean towards you instead.
2. Their Questions
Friendly: They don’t really care about any specific thing, but they want to be friendly by engaging with you and making you lead the conversation. They can ask casual questions – what brings you here, how are you, what are you into, and more.
Flirty: The main difference in flirty questions is the agenda. There seems to be a direction to the conversation, and they’ve been dictating the direction with each question. They eventually get into more personal questions such as your love life and sex life.
3. Teasing
Friendly: Friendly banter is just part of everyday life, especially if you’re a girl with guy friends. Friends turn each other into the butts of their jokes all the time, so a few light (and sometimes heavy) jokes don’t necessarily mean that they like you.
Flirty: They seem to go overboard with their teasing, and even your friends or the other people in your friend group get that feeling. You are the target of their jokes much more often than anyone else, but they don’t like it when other people start to tease you.
4. Attention
Friendly: It’s normal for friends to pay attention to each other, and this includes giving each other eye contact during conversations, replying to each other’s messages, and asking each other about their days and how things are doing.
Flirty: Attention can go from friendly to flirty if they simply up the ante, and they start becoming attentive in a way that may seem unnatural. For example, if they remember special dates that you might have mentioned to them, or they surprise you with something you like such as food or movie tickets. If they like you, they make more of an effort to impress you with their attention.
Now that you understand the differences between flirty behaviour showing that someone likes you and friendly behaviour, check back for part 2 where we’ll go over surefire signs that someone does indeed like you.