A few months ago, a friend met me for coffee near the Sorbonne.

He seemed distracted.

The kind of distracted that usually means someone isn’t thinking about work, exams or money.

Something else was bothering him.

After a few minutes, he finally told me what it was.

There was a woman.

And he didn’t know what to do.

Then he asked:

“How do I get out of the friendzone?”

He had been talking to the same woman for months.

Every day.

Every night.

They studied together.

Texted constantly.

Shared stories about their lives.

Inside jokes.

Dreams.

Fears.

The kind of connection that slowly becomes part of your routine.

Eventually, he told her how he felt.

He liked her.

More than a friend.

She listened.

She understood.

Then she told him something he wasn't expecting.

"I care about you."

"But only as a friend."

The conversation ended.

The question didn't.

A few days later, we were sitting together when he asked me again.

"How do I get out of the friendzone?"

It's an interesting question.

Because hidden inside it is another one.

How do you make someone desire you?

Most people answer that question with tactics.

Disappear for a while.

Play hard to get.

Create distance.

Become less available.

But the older I get, the less convinced I am that desire has much to do with absence.

I've met people who were physically present every day and emotionally impossible to reach.

And I've met others who lived thousands of miles away and somehow occupied a permanent place in someone's imagination.

Maybe desire isn't about distance.

Maybe it's about discovery. About question marks.

The problem wasn't that my friend was too available.

The problem was that Louise already knew exactly who he was.

Or at least she thought she did.

Every conversation gave her what she expected.

Every interaction confirmed the image she already had.

Nothing challenged it.

Nothing expanded it.

Nothing surprised her.

I think this happens in many relationships.

Not just romantic ones.

Friendships.

Partnerships.

Teams.

Families.

At some point, we stop being curious about each other.

We replace discovery with certainty.

We assume we know who the other person is.

And once that happens, the relationship stops growing.

A few months later, Léon stopped asking how to get out of the friendzone.

He started travelling.

He started writing.

He started pursuing things that had nothing to do with Louise.

Not to make her jealous.

Not to win her back.

Not as a strategy.

Because he was becoming interested in his own life again.

And something about that stayed with me.

I think we often misunderstand attraction.

We assume people fall in love with answers.

With certainty.

With compatibility.

But I suspect we fall in love with worlds.

With the feeling that another person contains places we haven't explored yet.

A different way of seeing.

A different way of feeling.

A different way of being.

Artists understand this instinctively.

Not because they're famous.

Because they create worlds.

A song.

A novel.

A painting.

An idea.

Each one opens a door.

And invites us inside.

The same is true of people.

The people who leave the deepest impression on us are rarely those who explain everything.

They're the ones who keep revealing new rooms inside themselves.

A hidden passion.

An unexpected ambition.

A contradiction.

A question we never saw coming.

When my friend asked me how to get out of the friendzone, I don't think he was really asking how to become someone else.

I think he was asking how to be seen differently.

My answer today would be simple.

Open your world.

Share what moves you.

What fascinates you.

What scares you.

What you're still trying to understand.

Not because it will make someone love you.

There are no guarantees.

But because the most meaningful relationships are built between two people who continue discovering each other.

And themselves.

A world only remains interesting if it’s still expanding.

So here's my question for you:

What world are you building that other people haven't seen yet?

Cheers,

Kevin GK