The Sweetness of Surrender (His)

I love Jason Mraz’s song I’m Yours. Doesn’t every woman? It’s been on Billboard’s Top 100 chart for 74 weeks, a record. It’s the third-best selling digital song of all time, having sold 4.4 million downloads, and it’s still going strong. Why?

Surrender.

Jason Mraz, Adorable Hipster

“Well you done done me and you bet I felt it

I tried to be chill but you’re so hot that I melted

I fell right through the cracks…

I won’t hesitate no more, no more

It cannot wait, I’m yours”

In the ongoing battle of the sexes, Jason gives in. He wants a commitment! He acknowledges it’s not what he had in mind at first, but he couldn’t help but fall in love. He fell right through the cracks, and he’s happy about it. What I find fascinating is that in this song, this love anthem, he’s open about his reluctance. He tried to be chill, because it is so not chill to have a girlfriend. Then he discovered he was in love, and that it made him happy. He knows he’s a lovesick fool, and he’s cool with that. Lucky, lucky girl.

Here’s a contrasting lyric from Say It by Blue October, a newish song getting a fair amount of airplay right now:

“I will never let you fuck me over

Stop talking down to me your war is old

your game is over

So here’s my coldest shoulder”

Obviously, the opposite of surrender. I can assure you that it won’t be women who propel this song to the top of the charts. This song carries the more typical male sentiment. It’s usually not expressly stated in this way, but most women who’ve hooked up with a guy a few times are intimately familiar with the preemptive strike, the cold shoulder, the upper hand job. Guys don’t want to melt and slip through the cracks. If they see it coming, they disappear. Dunzo.

Why the struggle? It wasn’t always like this. The Art of War by Sun Tzu wasn’t always appropriate bedtime reading for teenage girls. Girls and guys getting together used to be collaborative, not competitive. Hooking up frequently turns adversarial, which is defined as “characterized by conflict or opposition.” When a woman wants an emotional component, and the man wants to keep it strictly physical, they are in conflict. They want opposite things. The problem is, adversarial dynamics produce negative outcomes. Even when a relationship does develop between hookup partners, its foundation is often one of conflict and opposition. That conflict has been resolved to the extent that one or both of them “slipped through the cracks.” But the long-term prognosis? Usually not good, because the power struggle continues.

And yet. Human beings need connection, we need love. We want intimacy. Even the most determined guy is capable of playing the lovesick fool for the right girl. We all have that in us. New Age guru Deepak Chopra says that after couples fall in love, they need to learn how to be in love. That requires surrendering the needs of the ego. “Surrender is the door one must pass through to find passion. Without surrender, passion is centered on a person’s craving for pleasure and stimulation.”

Understanding the stages of relationship negotiation in the hookup era isn’t easy. I actually created a flowchart once to understand the anatomy of relationships.

1. Random hookup
2. Regular hookup
3. Exclusive hookup
4. Being “together”
5. Dating

If you can get a guy to Stage 2, you have a pretty decent shot at getting him to Stage 4. (Stage 5 is always a surrender, and therefore most difficult to negotiate.) Or at least this used to be the case. Increasingly, I’m hearing reports of guys going for a land grab, trying to combine Stages 3 through 5. In this view, being exclusive is exactly the same as dating, and is therefore an unacceptable surrender. Being exclusive feels like a public declaration, too Jason Mrazzy for most guys. A better arrangement is keeping things at Stage 2. Hookups are somewhat regular and ongoing, but both parties retain the right to hook up with someone else at any time. Divulging new hookups is not necessarily required.

“I’m Not Yours!” What should you do? The key thing to remember is this:

Surrender should feel good. It should feel fantastic! Surrender if you will be happy to play the fool. If, on the other hand, you can see heartache down the road, from a power struggle you can never win, then don’t hoist that white flag. Call it a draw, and live to fight another day.

Related posts:

1. Why Doesn’t He Call?
2. The Girls’ Kickass Guide to Getting Over a Breakup
3. 5 Ways to Get More Control of Your Relationships
4. The Man Code Sucks!
5. Are You Dating a Narcissist?

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