晚饭时朋友讲的一对情侣
While having supper with a friend, she told me about this couple.
The guy studied design, comes from an extremely wealthy family, and didn’t look for a job after graduation—he’s in the process of setting up his own company. But he’s not terribly busy, living in a semi-leisurely state, just taking on the odd freelance job here and there to get by.
His current girlfriend is a high school classmate. After graduating from university, they suddenly got back in touch, gradually started talking more and more, and the girl suggested she’d come to H City to see him. The two of them wandered around together for several days and naturally ended up together. Since the girl hadn’t settled on a city yet anyway, she simply found a job in H City and moved into the apartment he rents in the city centre.
That’s the backstory.
The beginning of the story as my friend told it is that these two already know full well they won’t get married, but neither wants to find someone else just yet, so they’re dating for now.
“You know what I mean by ‘know full well’, right?” My friend blinked and looked at me.
“I know,” I said. “But… why?”
My friend went on.
Actually, there are many reasons, but the biggest one is money. This guy’s family is very rich—back in high school his monthly allowance was already tens of thousands of yuan, so he’s grown up completely privileged, with no habit of being frugal. But the one thing he’s unwilling to do is spend money on this girl.
On Valentine’s Day he sent her an 88-yuan red packet, and whenever they occasionally go travelling, he takes her to the cheapest hotels. If the girl wants to stay somewhere decent, she has to cover the room costs herself. He pays for their dates, but he only looks for places with discounts—whether the girl actually likes the food is never his top priority.
Fortunately, the girl’s own family background isn’t bad, so she’s not after his money—she genuinely likes him. At most, she just feels he doesn’t value her, and one day when she feels like it, she’ll break up. If she were really after his money, it would be so tragic.
I’m not trying to debate “if a man won’t spend money on you, does that mean he doesn’t love you”.
I just feel very strongly that people have huge misconceptions about the rich, thinking they must be splashing cash around constantly—that if they date a girlfriend they’d want to spend the equivalent of an entire villa on her. That’s really not the case. Most rich people are extremely shrewd; deep down they know exactly how every bit of that money was earned step by step, bleeding sweat and tears. So when it comes to people who just show up halfway wanting a free ride, at most they’ll pluck a tiny feather to give you—genuine, substantial meat, they can’t bear to cut off even an ounce.
The rich guys I know really don’t just casually transfer girlfriends a hundred thousand yuan or something the way people imagine. For ordinary people, Valentine’s Day might be a 520-yuan transfer; for them it might be 5,200. If the girl is equally wealthy, 5,200 yuan to her is nothing special, just an everyday expense. Scenarios of showering money just to make a beauty smile are very, very rare.
In short, girls, don’t think you can use dating to upgrade your quality of life—that’s far too naive. If you’re dating, properly value the person’s feelings. Trying to go after their money comes at a huge cost.
A reader once told me that she saw her best friend get a very rich boyfriend who gives her so-and-so perfume and so-and-so cosmetics, and she felt deeply unsettled. She thought about herself, working hard at part-time jobs every month only to earn a thousand or two, feeling so miserable, wondering if she’d be better off just finding a rich boyfriend.
I said, when you’ve worked for a few years and look back at cosmetics and perfumes costing a few thousand yuan, you’ll realise what small things they really are—who doesn’t have a few thousand yuan by then? Your best friend just got a little lucky, meeting someone willing to give her things while she’s young, but have you ever thought about it—if they break up and her spending level plummets back down, how is she going to cope with that drop?
If they are each other’s true love and make it to the end, then they should be even more blessed. It’s a random event; there’s no point comparing yourself to others all the time. It’s meaningless.
I, for one, firmly believe that girls need to have their own money. Many of my single female friends have bought their own homes—put down the down payment, slowly paying off the mortgage. Although they’ve taken on a burden while still young, the security that brings is incomparable.
On a smaller scale, when a girl is financially independent, even if buying La Mer makes her grit her teeth a little, she can still feel at peace. Try swiping your boyfriend’s card to buy a few sets of La Mer—when you’re having a fight and digging up old grievances, he’ll throw at you, “You eat my food, use my stuff, the cream on your face was all bought with my money—what more do you want?” And you’ll have absolutely no comeback.
Being financially independent feels wonderful. My boyfriend’s been job hunting recently and asked me what expectations I have for him. I said none, just find work you enjoy—a monthly salary of 3,000 yuan is fine by me.
I genuinely mean it doesn’t matter. I’m not the kind of girl who thinks, “If my boyfriend earns tens of thousands a month, I’ll just find some casual job.” If my boyfriend earns three thousand, I’ll work hard and earn my own money; if my boyfriend earns a hundred thousand, I’ll still work hard and earn my own money. I’m rather earthly, like I said—money is my security, and it has to be money I earn myself.
Honestly, I do think it’s a nice thing if someone is willing to spend money on me, but I don’t count on it. Because I’m always most self-assured and most at ease when I’m swiping my own card, spending my own money.
Standing tall when talking about love is much better than bowing and scraping for the crumbs of another person’s wealth.