He texted me back, which obviously means we're getting married
- Isabella De La Cruz
- Jul 27
- 3 min read
Stop confusing the bare minimum with a green flag.
By: Isabella De La Cruz
It’s 12:30 a.m. on a Friday, hour seven of being on delivered…sound familiar?
Your phone lights up with a text: “If you wanna come over, my roommates are gone…”
Who needs flirting when you have permission?
“I’ll be there in 15,” you reply in a whopping five minutes. He's not even calling you an Uber. Channel that independent energy and order your own babe.
Don’t fret about the fact that he’s too busy to take you to that nice restaurant — he has half a bottle of merlot left over from his frat’s steak and wine dinner.
He’s following the situationship playbook to a tee:
Invited you (Romantic)
Texted first (Initiative)
Has wine (Provider)
Put them in order and that's basically a date, right? Wrong.
Here's the issue with our generation: we’ve started confusing attention with effort. The bare minimum has become a love language where the only person benefiting is the one doing the absolute least.
He doesn’t cheat is now “he’s such a good guy.” He answers within 5 hours is taken as “he’s obsessed with me.” He tells you he likes you is labelled as “soulmate behavior.”
News flash, that's all wrong.
I am not innocent when it comes to taking any remotely positive sign from a guy as him being “different” or caring. Our brains have been wired to think that the bare minimum from men is something groundbreaking and all we could ever need.
Because why would we want flowers or a planned date? Touch grass.
I always recommend this watch to anyone worried that they're expecting too much, not sure how that one person really feels and making excuse after excuse for them:
“He’s Just Not That Into You”
The protagonist, Gigi, crashes out after a date with a guy who didn't call her back. She took his silence to mean he was shy, nervous or busy — anything but the obvious truth. If he had eventually called at 10:30 p.m., saying, “Come over,” she would see it as confirmation of all her excuses for him.
The whole movie boils down to a key indicator that justifies the bare minimum: “If he likes you, you’ll know. If he doesn’t, you’ll be confused.”
It’s as simple as that.
Respecting someone and not cheating aren't love languages. Being responsive to texts isn't courtship. Saying you like someone is not the same as trying to be with them. Consistency and effort does not make you a “simp” — it's just maturity.
That is our problem here. The reason we fall for this bare minimum so easily is painfully simple: we are not used to consistency. There is a deficiency in common courtesy and communication.
We are so used to mixed signals, emotional unavailability and uncertainty that we treat them like the norm. A late night text saying “wanna come over” is not them doing their part. It's an after thought, and it's okay to acknowledge that and not accept it.
We treat a reply as reassurance and simple interest as long-term intention. A guy will treat communication like an optional side quest, and because of this, when we simply like a guy, we automatically hand them way too much power in this dynamic.
Someone liking you does not give you a get out of jail free card for your minimal effort. I like a lot of things: matcha, butterflies, free samples — liking you is just another item on my list, bud.
What we want is not confusing or impossible, it is basic: consistency, effort and clarity.
These are things people easily give to friends, so why do we pretend as if they are too much to ask for when dating? There is no reason to twist yourself into knots, overthinking, gaslighting yourself and shrinking to fit into something that is clearly not working — especially when your gut is screaming at you.
If you were wearing the wrong shoe size, you would not keep walking in pain trying to make it fit. You would take it off and try another pair. Dating should be no different.
Isabella De La Cruz is a third-year Business Administration major specializing in Mass Communication. When she’s not being a corporate siren, you can find her adding “Maneater” to her resume. IG: isabella_de_la_cruz__
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