Is She Flirting Or Just Being Friendly?

Have you ever been hanging out with a girl and you think that she’s giving you all the signs that she’s totally into you, but when you lean in for the kiss she backs away and says that she just sees you as a friend and that doing anything else would complicate the situation? Ouch.

After a reaction like that, you’re embarrassed and confused as to how you could have misinterpreted her signals that you clearly thought was her flirting.

Sometimes, you may have the opposite problem without even realizing it. There’s a chance you thought she was just being friendly but she was actually flirting. This could be why you’re still single.

For women, often times, there is a very thin line that separates flirting from being friendly. And more often than not, women will flirt just for the sake of flirting, with no sexual motivation behind it.

I know, how annoying! Flirting is actually defined as behaving as though attracted to or trying to attract someone, but for amusement rather than with serious intention. Yikes, can you say mixed signals?

Women can flirt just for fun without any sexual intent behind it because women genuinely believe that men and women can be friends. Even when they constantly flip-flop between being friendly and actually flirting.

To aid you in making the distinction, I’ve isolated some ways for you to tell if a woman is flirting with you. I should also mention that you should keep an eye out for more than one of these examples when trying to decipher if she’s truly flirting or just being friendly.

1.     Find Her Threshold For Flirting:

The first thing that I would suggest you do is to observe her threshold for flirtatious behaviour. Observe her around other men, and especially her guy friends. If she is touchy-feely, joking and overly playful with them, then chances are that if she is acting the same way around you, she is just being friendly.

Find out her norm first, find out what her personality is like in other interactions so that you can make a judgment about whether or not she is flirting or just being friendly.

If she treats you like everyone else in her circle or everyone else that she encounters, then chances are she is just a nice girl who is trying to be friendly.

And, obviously, on the contrary, if she is acting differently around you, laughing more, flipping her hair, touching you whenever she can, and she’s not like that around her friends, then she could be trying to seduce you.

But find out how she interacts in different scenarios and with different people before you try and decipher if a woman is flirting or not.

2.     Instigating Conversation:

Another way to tell if a woman is flirting with you is if she is instigating conversation.

There is a big difference between answering questions and prompting questions and conversation. If a woman is just answering questions with a yes or a no and not adding anything else voluntarily, then she’s just being friendly.

Conversation is a big indication of whether or not a woman is flirting. In this department, I should mention that if a woman is being overly polite and proper with you, chances are she is just being friendly.

Most women don’t take the time to converse and genuinely get to know men with whom they have no interest. Or if a woman constantly asks you to repeat yourself, then she’s just not listening to you, which means she not being flirty, and she’s not even being that friendly.

In non- face to face communication, if a woman responds to your texts or phone calls in a timely manner and with more than one word, and again, is instigating conversation, then she could be trying to flirt with you and make a connection. In this case, you should do your best to master small talk so that you can get to the bottom of her interest.

3.     Nervous Habits:

When we’re under stress, our brains require a certain amount of hand to body touching says author Joe Navarro, a former FBI agent a regular contributor to psychologytoday.com.  

The touching that he references mostly has to do with where our hands go to soothe our limbic arousal when we’re under stress.

Navarro outlines that neck touching is one of the most significant pacifiers of stress that we, as humans, use. The neck is a sensitive and vulnerable area, and when we’re nervous or feel threatened, then our hand will automatically gravitate to our neck to protect it. This movement happens unconsciously.

In courtship, when a woman is feeling nervous, her hands will play with her necklace and/or touch her neck in some way. And as a woman becomes more and more comfortable with you, she will begin to tilt her head in a subconscious attempt to reveal more of her neck, which is a signal of trust.

Another pacifier that women use to alleviate stress is by playing with their hair and or licking their lips. Women also do this to directly draw your attention to them by their movement.

These are all subtle physiological ways to tell that a woman is flirting with you, and she’s not just being friendly. If she has social anxiety, however, she could simply be using these pacifiers to alleviate stress, which is why I suggested that you look for more than one of these indications when trying to decipher if she’s flirting.

4.     If She Makes Excuses To Touch You:

The fourth and final way to tell if a woman is flirting with you is if she is constantly making excuses to touch you. If you’ve read any of my other articles on body language and seduction, you’ll know that I advocate for men to touch women in non-sexual ways to help increase her attraction for you. Well, women do the same.

Does the girl that you’re chatting with brush something off of your shoulder or your arm or your hair? She could be making an excuse to touch you.

Typical body parts that a woman will touch on a man that she is trying to flirt with include face, arms, leg or back. If you’re sitting next to each other, she could lean over and place her hand on your knee to get your attention in an, “omg! The craziest thing happened to me today!” type of gesture.

If a woman is touching you by slapping the back of her hand on you that’s generally not a good indication of flirting. That’s more of a scolding and/or friendly touch.

Another non-verbal solicitation technique that is widely used amongst women is for women to caress objects around them. If a woman is holding a glass whilst talking to you and caressing it, she could be trying to flirt nonverbally. Or if she is playing with her straw in her drink that is yet another way for her to capture your attention through her movement.

Again, this is just learning to read body language, more specifically, how a woman’s body subconsciously responds to her environment and certain interactions.

Those are four ways that you can tell if a woman is flirting with you or just being friendly. Again, look for more than one of these examples before you make your move. And go out there and flirt with confidence. Because you never know, a woman might just need you to make the first flirtatious move in order for her to feel comfortable enough to flirt back when she knows that her flirtations will be reciprocated.