Happier Hour: Sara Eckel and Heather Havrilesky
Conversations from the Archive
May 2014
Los Angeles
It’s Not You: 27 (Wrong) Reasons You’re Single, Sara Eckel
Disaster Preparedness, Heather Havrilesky
Excerpts:
Heather Havrilesky (on writing an advice column): Someone wrote to me about a man problem. It turns out I had a lot of advice. I had a series of two-year relationships. I tried to kill them from the start. [I was attracted to] devil-may-care men. [The men I dated were] Mr. Flinchy Noncommittal Stoner types. My winning formula was to advertise all my flaws at the start.
I stumbled on Sara [Eckel] a year ago. She had a book coming out I should have written. And it’s better.
What was the inspiration for the book?
Sara Eckel: I originally wrote a book proposal about women who marry after thirty five. Men married us, even though we were the same. [Men wanted to marry women, even though they hadn’t fixed all their flaws yet.]
I sent out a proposal. The feedback I got was, “This is inspiration, not journalism.” The publisher asked me to write an inspirational book for single women.
Havrilesky: And after you finished cleaning up the vomit on the floor . . .
Eckel: I thought, “I’ll write something that would inspire me.”
Havrilesky: It’s a fast read. While I was reading each chapter, I thought, “Oh my god, I’ve thought that about myself,” and “thinking is bad. What the fuck is wrong with me?”
Eckel: [Friends] want to help. The thing women hear most is “you’re too picky.” This assumes you’re getting lots of offers. I really wasn’t. This whole too picky thing—I don’t meet women who say, “I don’t like his car.” I don’t know anyone like that.
Havrilesky: [Before I married, I thought,] “Well, shit, I guess I’ll be alone forever and ever because the stoner without the job is moving the cutout of the Emperor out of my house. I need to live it up now because I’m going to settle for someone shitty. I need to be more picky.”
Audience Member: Who’s your audience?
Eckel: I just write for my friends. There are a few people I send stuff to, and they’re really smart. [The book is] extending that to women who would be my friends if I knew them. We have an aversion to the word “inspiration.” We can be inspired without being insipid.
Havrilesky: It’s almost like talking to your girlfriends: “Don’t fuck your boyfriend’s brother. Really, don’t do that.”
And then I have three thousand words.
Audience Member: You get criticism or self-improvement, or you get inspiration.
Havrilesky: Social media is what it fucking is: profound isolation. How does anyone build a community [when they move three thousand miles away from their support system]? Everyone is eating each other alive in these little apartments by themselves. In the old days, someone would write a great novel. Now the publisher wants you to start with “rule number one.” I find negativity inspiring.
Eckel: Being positive is anxiety-producing because your brain scans for negative thoughts. “Gotta be positive. Gotta be positive.” I started practicing meditation and Buddhism. Our goal is not to be happy all the time.
Audience Member: We live in a culture that is utterly commitment-phobic.
Eckel: [I used to think,] “The ones I wanted to be with must have been commitment-phobic,” but those guys are committed to other women.
Havrilesky: There is this moment when you decide to welcome people who welcome you. I was used to it. A little bit of neglect feels like home. Women do have a moment when they look at the past: “What is the pattern here?” When you’re chasing someone down, all you can see is a tail disappearing around the corner.
Eckel: You don’t know if you have commitment phobia until this person comes along, and it works. You’re not commitment-phobic if you meet the person you fit with.
Havrilesky: I like to frame things in negative ways. Lead with your flaws.
Eckel: These [dating] rules alienate us from our own instincts. [Friends and magazines] mean well.
[A Buddhist saying:] “You’re the only one who’s been with you your entire life. You know what’s best for you.”
Cut through the chatter.