Girl Logic

Introduction

Girl Logic

It Doesn’t Mean You’re “Crazy”—It Just Means You’re a Girl

Women aren’t crazy. We are not crazy. We are conflicted. Crazy implies an impracticality to our thoughts when, in actuality, we are processing so many dichotomic thoughts that we get frustrated. Then others perceive that as “crazy.” Women want to be appreciated for their mind, but they won’t stop obsessing over the size of their ass. We tell you what we want, then get mad because you didn’t realize that what we said isn’t actually what we meant. We spend hours rehashing details or distinctions that men fail to notice, much less care about. (“I used a peach gold highlighter, not rose gold!”) In any given day—hell, in the span of a few hours—we might want to be worshipped, sexualized, respected, dominated, held, or simply left alone. Depends on who’s around, what we ate, temperature on Venus, all kinds of factors.

Are women crazy? Or stupid? No. (Well, don’t get me wrong—some women are fucking crazy. And, OK, some are a little stupid—as are some men.) On the contrary, women are both afflicted and empowered by something I call Girl Logic. GL is a characteristically female way of thinking that appears to be contradictory and circuitous but is actually a complicated and highly evolved way of considering every choice and its repercussions before we make a move toward what we want.

What we want could be a great job, a hot dude, world domination, or a chicken sandwich—doesn’t matter. Girl Logic kicks in and makes us ponder the past, present, and future all at the same time: “Well, maybe I could like this guy. But he’s wearing a fedora and has a snaggletooth. But the last three good-looking guys I dated were horrible. But what if he’d be a great dad? But I’m not interested in having kids right now. I’m definitely not into him. But I might be later? OK, I’m giving him my number and texting him when I’m bored or drunk.” All this internal back-and-forth might sound maddening, but what Girl Logic is truly doing is helping to prioritize our needs and values in both the short and long term. It’s anything but crazy.

At its best, Girl Logic is a critical asset: an internal guidance system that helps women stay on track toward the thing—or person—they want most, or the woman they most want to be. It can admittedly also kick in at the weirdest moments as we try to sort out what we want right now versus what we want later. For instance, let’s say some less-than-savory guy you’ve been trying to decide whether to go out with FINALLY texts you back after six hours of ignoring you. Let’s say you put aside that six hours of silent rage you just experienced and you agree to go to the movies with him. Then… what about snacks? Girl Logic kicks in to help suss out your desires (Sour Patch Kids dumped in buttered popcorn, duh) and measure them against how you’ll feel once that desire is met (like a pigeon who ate too much wedding rice). Then it weighs that outcome with how you feel that day (tired and bloated) against how you want to feel (like Gwyneth Paltrow^* on a juice cleanse), against reality (you’re gonna feel gross, so maybe just a few pieces? Or have all of it, but with bottled water, and promise to work out extra hard for the next three days but won’t).

While I believe Girl Logic is ultimately designed to help us, it can sometimes feel like a curse. GL can go a little haywire when forced to reconcile the sheer volume of expectations society places on women. See, being a woman is hard. (And to that one guy who bought this to try to “expand his mind,” don’t you DARE set this book down now. Adjust your sack, hunker down, and at least read a few more pages before you go back to your fantasy draft.)

Most of us don’t even realize all the social pressures that weigh on us from the second we wash our faces in the morning to the moment we scrape off our sunscreen, primer, concealer, cover-up, bronzer, and blush every night. The truth is that women are supposed to be everything to everyone. And guess what?

That’s impossible.

We’re expected to be continually kind to our fellow women, caring toward children, respectful of the elderly, supportive of our coworkers—while simultaneously making every dude around us super horny. Oh and we should always stand up for ourselves, while also being likeable. DON’T FORGET TO BE LIKEABLE!

We’re supposed to look eternally young while aging gracefully, and look hot while remaining “respectable.” We’re supposed to be open and vulnerable but without getting “too emotional,” be sexually empowered but not “slutty.” We’re encouraged to eat whatever we want while our bodies are scrutinized for unruly curves, because men like a woman who eats, not a woman who looks like she eats.

Without even meaning to, we’ve internalized these social expectations and let them shape everything we do, say, feel, and believe. And then we spend way too much time trying to live up to unrealistic standards that were put in place before anyone reading this book was even born. Being expected to be perfect in every conceivable way—from the things we think, to the amount of makeup we wear, to the way we parent, run a business, have sex, or recover after childbirth—can be mind numbing and cause our GL to blow a fuse (or, worse, cause us to cry in public or cut our own hair).

One simple way to illustrate Girl Logic is with the common mealtime question, “What do you want to eat?” Most men will, perhaps unthinkingly, perhaps out of an attempt to accommodate, blurt out whatever sounds good and easy. To them, most things are black and white: “Pizza sounds cool” (probably because they won’t have their worth be judged by how good they look in a fun top).

But women live in the gray, bathe in the gray, and summer in the gray. There are more than fifty shades of it, many of which don’t involve S&M. We invariably consider the past, present, and future when making any choice because for us the stakes are higher emotionally (because we care about consequences) or just logistically (because we are aware of consequences in the first place). If you pick the wrong shoes, your feet could end up killing you all night… and tomorrow. If you push back against a coworker, you could lose your job or be harassed, ostracized, or labeled a bitch. If you text a guy after not hearing back, he might start referring to you as a desperate psycho. All these possibilities are constantly floating through our heads when considering any situation, including dinner. So instead of saying “pizza,” we’ll take into account what we’re wearing at present (too tight for pizza?), what we might wear this evening, what we might be drinking, the potential messiness factor, and if the crust is made from wheat.

The pizza conundrum only highlights the ongoing battle between how we see ourselves, versus how we want to see ourselves, versus how everyone else sees us. All of these conflicting directives are exhausting to process and can leave women spinning in circles, headed in the wrong direction, or simply crashing and burning. (And by crashing and burning I mean that feeling where you’re like, “I’m gonna be so healthy this week,” and at the end of Monday you’re rationalizing, “If I don’t finish the whole pint now, I’ll just have to eat more of it tomorrow.”)

It’s no surprise that in so many woman-centered TV shows, books, and movies, the main character suffers from a multiple personality disorder: “a wife, mother, cop, alien… and trying to balance it all!” When the heroine doesn’t have kids, she’s still a mishmash of familiar stereotypes: “Chloe’s trying to find Mr. Right but is weird about commitment because she’s been hurt before! Can she carry an overflowing cup of coffee and maintain a high-powered career? Can she make it work? WILL LOVE FIND HER?!” I mean, can you think of any lead male character pitched as “ever-frazzled Scott is trying to balance work, fathering, marriage, and his exhausting recreational tennis team? Also, the poor thing is kind of a klutz!”

(Have you noticed that women are always klutzy when they are supposed to be adorable? Falling into boxes, knocking over food, walking while trying to look hot. Sandra Bullock, Anne Hathaway, Drew Barrymore… apparently men like a klutz. Not only because falling is funny but also I suspect because being clumsy makes you seem less powerful. Plus if they’re falling down they can’t emasculate you!)

This book is both a commiseration and a celebration of Girl Logic. I’ll discuss the way we collectively think but also give you some insight into my own personal experiences and how they connect to GL. I wrote it because I wanted to give women a break from the never-ending stream of nonsense in our mental in-box telling us we’re wrong for feeling how we feel. “Psycho bitch,” “bad feminist,” “single weirdo,” “mean girl,” “crazy ex-girlfriend,” “female comic”—these loaded labels are constantly applied to women as a way to write us off.

This book is my effort to help you tune out all that unnecessary chatter from within and without, and keep your GL working for you instead of against you. I wrote this book to let all girls know that whatever “psycho” thoughts you’ve had, I’ve had them, too. Sometimes my GL causes me to suffer a break with reality. I’ve been paralyzed between two outfits because one is sexy and one is comfortable, which leads to a fit of heavy scrutinizing (of both my clothes and my life choices).

I’ve censored myself in a conversation for fear of not being liked, only to replay it over and over, acting out different witty retorts should that exact conversation ever occur again. I’ve wolfed down a ham steak while thinking, “Whatever, I can just work out harder tomorrow.” And then when tomorrow came and I was tired, I rationalized, “Whatever, I’ll just eat less today.” What a fun cycle of delusion!

And thanks to GL, nothing will send me into a mad rage more than texting a boy who doesn’t write back. WE MADE OUT ONCE, AND I ASKED IF YOU WANTED TO GET COFFEE—THIS DOESN’T HAVE TO BE COMPLICATED! I SEE THE THREE DOTS MOVING, SCOTT, I KNOW YOU’RE THERE!

But there is a method to the madness, as I’ll show you in this book. See, GL can also work in positive ways. Yes GL will sometimes fill your head with exhausting thoughts and options. (“Do I really want to buy that, do that, eat that, date that?” A thousand reasons why “that” might not be a good idea to start from.…) But it can also be a rallying cry to take on the world. (“I’ve got this. I’ve totally got this. I’ve done it before, I can do it again, I will regret it forever if I don’t DO IT RIGHT NOW!”)

That’s the great part of Girl Logic: it nudges us to push ourselves, question what we want, and refine our own ideas about what will make us happier, better people.

It’s GL that keeps us engaged in sooooo many more things than men could even dream of doing. Just imagine your mom, or your aunt, or your best friend’s mom. You know, all those real-life sixtysomething women taking a Spanish class on Monday night, a pottery class on Tuesday, attending a lecture on Wednesday, seeing the opera on Thursday, an art opening on Friday, and doing educational yoga retreats each summer. Sometimes their GL is working overtime trying to help them figure out what would make them happy: “I’m Sheryl! I’m taking an earthenware formation class while learning about mushroom whispering. I’m flirting with bead making, but cooking with sustainable thoughts is my new passion.” (And just because you took on Oprah and Deepak’s Twenty-One-Day Meditation Experience and only got through Day 3 doesn’t mean you failed; it means you are three days closer to being the person you wanted to be… or thought you wanted to be.)

Now, think of your dad. He’s probably had the same one or two hobbies all his life, right? OK, fine, maybe some dads eventually get into motorcycles or dating Asian women; my point exactly.

Understanding Girl Logic is a way of embracing both our aspirations and our contradictions. GL is the desire to be both strong and vulnerable. It’s wanting to be curvy but rail thin at the same time. It’s striving to kick ass in a man’s world while still being loved by the women around you. Your GL is that little voice in your head that makes you aware of the practicality of your everyday choices, and how they’ll shape your reality tomorrow: “If you don’t read the Washington Post tonight, you will be left out of the conversation tomorrow.” Of course there’s always the dangling carrot of instant gratification: “But what I really need to do is unwind with some Instagram cake-decorating videos; I’ve earned it!” And… here comes GL again, swooping in to remind you how you felt last time you did that: “Didn’t you say your New Year’s resolution was being more informed?” It’s your job to consider the options from every angle; your GL presents them all to you, and the one that weighs heaviest wins. “OK, I’ll read a Washington Post tweet, THEN I can, unencumbered by guilt, watch these Snapchats of regional cheerleading competitions.”

So why am I talking about this? Me, of all the people out there? No, I don’t have a sociology degree, and I’m certainly not a psychologist. I’m a stand-up comic who has spent a lifetime obsessed with questioning things and observing people—especially fellow women—and calling out the humor and pathos in their/our contradictory behavior. I’ve collected a lot of data, and now I get to put it in a book. I wanted to do a baking cookbook, but it would have been all blank pages; the last page would just say, “I don’t like chocolate, sorry.”

This book is my attempt to continue that conversation, to rip open my girl brain and spill it out for you, so you can say, “Hey, wait—hers kinda looks like mine!” The truth is, all women sometimes feel misunderstood, including me. I, too, want thinner thighs. I, too, have freaked out at THAT BITCH STACY after she got the promotion/gig/part I wanted. I, too, have gotten pissed about not being pretty enough and then, in the next breath, gotten even more pissed about the idea that I have to look pretty at all.

But I love that I got to write this book for you. It’s for all the young girls who think they’ve figured it out (which is adorable, but, because you’re still shopping at LF, you… haven’t). It’s for frustrated women in their twenties and thirties who thought they had it all figured out until life was like, “WAIT ’TIL YOU SEE MY DICK!” It’s for older women, too, who might reminisce about the good ol’ confusing days as they give a throaty laugh in their flowy Chico’s pants.

And this book is also for me because apparently expounding on stage for two hours a night wasn’t enough. (Trust me, if I could start a cult I would, but I hate the idea of deliberately dying in a group.)

This book is a celebration of women in all our gray and all our glory. It’s meant to remind you that no matter how kooky, conflicted, or off-kilter your Girl Logic may sometimes skew, that very same thinking bonds you with countless other women across the globe—and it serves a purpose. I promise.

* FYI, I picked a white woman because it’s harder for us to stay young looking. Also I have a better shot at looking like G.P. than I do of looking like Beyoncé.