How To Text A Guy To Keep Him Interested ... By Texting Like A Dude

By Sarah Fader

As women, we tend to be verbose in casual settings. I know I love to talk.

Unfortunately, with the advent of smartphones and text messaging, this gives men a chance to communicate with more brevity than we might like.

Texting a guy can be frustrating for women like myself who love communication and connection, but I’m going to teach you a trick that I learned from a close girlfriend.

How to text a guy to keep him interested:

Before I learned how to text a guy in a way that would keep him interested, I used to communicate in huge blocks of text.

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I wanted the guy on the other end to hear my life anecdotes. My daily adventures surely must be fascinating to everyone, I assumed.

But no, they are not as fascinating in text as they are in person. I am an animated storyteller and people love to hear me speak. They do not (so much) like to read paragraphs about my life via text messages.

So here’s what I began to do ...

I have a lot of guy friends in my life and they like to communicate with brevity. So I started to mirror their communication style. It’s so simple, yet brilliant.

Here’s an example of an actual text exchange with a guy:

Guy texts: "What’s up?"

Me: "Chilling."

Now he’s thinking, “What is she doing? What is this chick thinking?”

It keeps him on his toes. The onus is on him to think of a conversation starter.

Keep your texts brief (like a dude) and you will win — every single time.

They won't know what hit them. The guy on the other end will have to figure out what to say next, and you won’t have to do anything at all.

RELATED: How To Know When & What To Text A Guy You Really, Really Like (A Lot!)

It’s genius.

I swear, I had been living life under the impression that I had to provide details about my life to people all the time, when that’s really not necessary.

Here’s another texting example:

Guy texts: "How’s your day going?"

Me: "Fine."

Freaking brilliant.

He’s now got to think of what to say next. I can sit back and let him do the over analyzing.

It turns the tables back on him for a moment. I don’t need to be verbose and provide details about unnecessary things. Instead, he now has to figure out how to capture my attention.

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You may be wondering, what do I gain by texting a guy with brevity like this?

It allows the person (read: man) on the other end the opportunity to examine his inner monologue.

I don’t have to be the one initiating conversation or digging deeply to try to find out information. By texting one or two word responses, it puts the charge on the man in question to come up with witty banter that he thinks will engage me.

As a female with an alpha personality type, learning how to text a guy like this has been liberating for me.

Ladies, stop trying so hard and reserve your words for “real life” when you actually go out with someone.

You don’t need to give out your inner monologue over Verizon.

RELATED: What It Means If A Guy Texts Every Day (But Doesn't Call)

Sarah Fader is the CEO and Founder of Stigma Fighters a non-profit organization that encourages individuals with mental illness to share their personal stories. Her writing has been featured on Psychology Today, The Huffington Post and Good Day New York.

This article was originally published at The Good Men Project. Reprinted with permission from the author.