I'm not your type.

I have a type when it comes to men. If we’re banking on Freud’s theories, it’s no surprise that I prefer them tall, dark-skinned, and hairy — preferably in the chin area. I like them lean and athletic with nice hands, a nice smile, and muscles. Those things will draw me in, but they won’t keep me.

I hardly get asked what my type is by other people, but I frequently revisit the question in my head just to see if anything has changed. While thinking about it today, I realized that nothing has changed regarding the type of men I’m attracted to, but much has changed regarding my feelings about this question in general.

I hate it.

Let’s say I meet someone, and upon seeing him for the first time, I describe him out loud and to my friends as “my type.” “I met someone at work today, and he’s 100% my type.” “I saw this guy at church, and he is exactly my type.” “This guy at the gym this morning was so cute and totally my type.” Nothing about who that man is exists to me or my friends any longer. He is no longer a son, a friend, an uncle, a leader, a mentor, or a kind person. He now, essentially, exists to fulfill the role as my type. His agency is no longer his. The things that influence him no longer matter. He belongs to me for my purposes.

Because he is my type, I now expect him to operate in a way that would allow him to fulfill his new role to the best of his ability — which is perfection since technically, his abilities now belong to me, too. He is expected to look at me and smile, to compliment me on my appearance, to ask me to spend time together. He should take interest in my hobbies, ask me which book(s) I’m reading currently, and take special consideration of bunny rabbits. He should ask me about being a vegan, too. Because vegans love to talk about themselves. A lot.

This is his new role. This is now who he is and what he does because he is my type. In the event that he can’t fulfill that role, then that sucks for him because now I’m gonna get angry. I’m gonna get distant and I’m gonna draw my own conclusions, and the only thing worse than me drawing my own conclusions is me living out those conclusions and then projecting them onto you. Oh, boy.

This sounds INSANE! But it’s what happens when you turn people into your type instead of allowing them to belong to themselves first. People belong to themselves. They don’t exist for you, or to check off your boxes, or to heal your past, or to practice your self-help tips on, or to fulfill a fantasy that you wrote out in your journal when you were 13 years old. They belong to themselves. They cannot fulfill expectations for you or make you feel better about past decisions that you made. They cannot be your Prince Charming or your Cinderella, and they cannot do the things for you that you can’t do for yourself. They’re people, and they have their own stuff (for lack of better terminology). They’re not your type. They’re not your anything.

In summation, I absolutely and without a doubt have a type. He is handsome and so kind, and I get nervous when I think about seeing him. But he’s not my type. He isn’t my crush, or my muse. He isn’t anything for me at all. To label him as these things would be erasing him, essentially, and what a disservice I would be doing to myself by failing to see him for who he is, right now, in this exact space in time. He is incredibly imperfect, and he has the goofiest laugh. He is elusive at times with the biggest heart and the biggest smile and the biggest likelihood to disappoint me at a daily and sometimes hourly rate. But that is who he is. He is a son, a friend, a brother, and a hero for some. He is frustration for others, and excitement for many. In none of those descriptors, however, is he mine. The way he looks to me is not who he is for me, so I’ve stopped seeing him that way. And now I can see him like never before. “My” type, indeed.

In summation (the remix), don’t let your assumptions about your type erase those people to you. Let them exist for themselves and for the people closest to them, and meet them where they are in the meantime. Maybe you’ll realize that they aren’t really “your” type after all, or maybe you’ll appreciate them more in a different space in your life. Whichever way the vegan cookie crumbles, you’ll have much clearer vision when you commit to seeing people for who they are and not as occupants for spaces that you need to fill.

Cheers to you being the best version of yourself this year and to treating people even better than you did yesterday.