Friendships cannot develop until one side takes a risk and shows they are ready to like even when there’s as yet no evidence that they are liked back. We have to realize that whether or not the other person likes us is going to depend on what we do, not – mystically – what we by nature ‘are’, and that we have the agency to do rather a lot of things. Even though we may initially get very few signs of their interest (they might be looking a little distracted and behaving in an offhand way), we should assume that this is only a legacy of a restraint that springs from fear that they are not able
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