Blog Posts by The Frisky

A couple months ago I posted a letter to my younger self , to which many of you responded with letters to your own younger selves in the comment section. Turns out, we had a lot to say to our mini-me's - from dating advice to style tips, we've learned a lot since the days we donned jelly shoes and spent weekends cruising the mall (or should I say we've learned a lot since the first time we donned jelly shoes and spent weekends cruising the mall?). I combed through the letters to our younger selves for the best lessons learned and wisdom gained. After the jump, 15 tips for the young women behind us.

1. Drink one glass of water for every cocktail you consume.
2. Appreciate your body and the great shape you're in.
3. Be nice to your mom.
4. "Screw worrying about being popular because in 10 years all of those people who you thought were so pretty and cool are now chubby accountants with 3 kids and a sexless marriage."
5. Start an exercise regimen NOW and stick to it.
6. If you

Revenge On Ex Boyfriends

Well-known peacenik Mahatma Ghandi famously proclaimed, "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." Sorry, Ghandi, but I beg to disagree. The sad fact is, there are times in a lady's life when revenge tastes pretty sweet. (Even in a blind taste test.)

One of those times is after some cad shatters your tender little heart into a billion tiny shards. Sure, embracing the gloom is one way of dealing, but who are you really hurting by forcing ice cream down your pie-hole whilst weeping over Lifetime movies and stalking his Facebook page? Answer: Yourself.

Wouldn't it be more fun to hurt him? The dude who done you wrong?

New York City-based psychologist Dr. Catia Harrington says, "the desire to seek revenge or retribution in some form is a natural reaction when we have been hurt. Especially in a relationship; when we often feel emotionally vulnerable."

Of course there are degrees of revenge. Replacing his Rogaine with Nair, emailing his parents with pictures of him

The discussion of the trials and tribulations of long distance relationships is not a new one. Some swear a couple can survive the distance while others refuse to entertain the possibility that two people can stay connected when there is significant mileage between them. I used to be a bit of a compulsive long distance dater. My first two serious relationships were with British boys, which would soon later develop into a habit of only getting involved with foreign guys. Until recently I never questioned if getting involved in a relationship which is destined to be mostly long distance was a good idea. In my mind, if I was in love it would be sheer madness not to stay together. If true love can overcome death in "The Princess Bride" than of course it can overcome a minor issue such as distance. A few years and broken hearts later, I am not so sure.

Maybe I will meet someone, maybe he will, but it seems inevitable that one of us will find someone else. Even if we don't meet someone

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A male blogger named Anthony Michael Rojas posted a little list entitled, "How To Treat A Woman On A Date: The Basics" on his Tumbler blog this week and it got quite a few angry reblogs from women who felt like his suggestions were sexist. Rojas clearly believe his suggestions to be basic "chivalry," while his detractors seemed to suggest that there is a difference between chivalry and manners, because chivalry is rooted in sexism. I found many of the responses to not only be silly, but also bordering on unintentionally satirical of "feminist" anger. It was clear to me that the original poster wasn't being an a**hole, so why did the responses treat him like one? Still, the back-and-forth did bring up the issue of whether these eight seemingly harmless gestures are actually offensive because they are supposedly treat women as the weaker sex. Let's go through them one by one, shall we?

1. Do not let more than 1 day go by without contacting her.

I think Rojas' point

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The U.K.'s edgier counterpart to our Paris Hilton, Peaches Geldof, insists that despite her clearly provocative looks (the heels, that ink, those bedroom eyes), "it should be obvious I'm not dressing for men." Huh. In fact, the 20-year old, who just launched a clothing line with PPQ , told the Times, "I don't want to dress for men, I think it's almost like a feminist thing." It is almost like that Peaches! Meh, we're not gonna hate on the girl just because she's stylish, rich and, arguably, young enough to get away with making kind of ridic statements like that, but her comment did make us consider who women really end up dressing for anyway.

From the millions of teenage girls who stuff their bras to the women who undergo repeated breast surgeries in order to fill out their tops, it goes without saying that women have always acknowledged that in many ways, we get dressed each day with looking attractive to the opposite sex in mind, at least on a subconscious level. Then again,

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Passive aggressive behavior is probably on most people's list of annoying qualities in another person. Scratch that, passive aggressive behavior usually falls into the category of legit reasons to banish someone for your life. I have never been pro passive aggression, in fact, I get rather peeved when someone pulls the hot/cold routine on me. I think my thoughts on passive aggression and its unfailing ability to make any situation worse is probably shared by most of you. Over the past week or so I have posted on the complexities of friendship, especially girlfriendship, and many of you commented that the tendency for girls to engage in passive aggression was one of the number one reasons you did not pursue female friendships. I was totally on board with this popular sentiment until I realized that not only have I been acting all passive aggressive myself this week, but I was glad I had.

It's challenging to truly define passive aggressive behavior. I am sure there is some

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I remember being a little girl and hearing my mother use the term "soul mates."

"What is 'soul mates'?" I asked.

"It's beshert," she said.

"Be-what?"

"It's meant to be," she explained.

Beshert is a Yiddish term that expresses how soul mates are "meant to be together." Building on my family's unwavering faith in this beshert thingy-my parents met when they were 17 and my grandparents when they were 16 -I assumed that I, too, would be welcomed into the warm, loving arms of this soul mate phenomenon. I vowed to keep my eyes peeled for my one and only perfect, dream lover-the man who would sweep me off my feet and love me as no one else ever had, my soul mate.

When I was 13, I thought my first boyfriend Jeremy, the guitar-strumming pothead, was my soul mate. "Run away with me and let's get married, dude," he pleaded during one of our marathon phone conversations.

"But I don't have a ride to your place," I said. When he cheated on me later that month with a

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Gollum slithered around the picnic tables in a bald wig and a loincloth. Bilbo Baggins manned the barbecue. An elf with pointy ears asked if we had any veggie burgers.

My boyfriend, David, and I had not come dressed for the "Lord Of The Rings" theme for his family's annual group vacation with their friends. But costumed or not, I knew I'd be under scrutiny: I'm the first woman he'd brought along to introduce to everybody in his 26 years of attending.

As Gollum lumbered by towards the card table full of key lime pies and cookie burgers, I turned to David and grinned. "Real love," I said, "is spending the weekend with your parents and their friends when everyone is dressed like Hobbits." He grinned back and we kissed.

Forty-eight hours later, David and I decided that we would move in together, waking up next to each other every morning and falling asleep together every night. Beginning our lives together this way felt like the right thing to do.

But did I