Ever since I wrote about our culture as a society of waiters and how technology has weakened our interpersonal relationships in my first Skiff article, I couldn’t help but notice how this breakdown of communication transcends formal encounters to matters of the heart, often damaging our intimate relationships.”Don’t write about the same thing twice.” That’s the first thing your editor will tell you from the list of opinion article do’s and don’ts. But sometimes, there are issues that affect so many of us so often they simply cannot be left alone.

Lately, I’ve had many friends dealing with rejection or suffering from a broken heart, and although I’m no expert, I work the Rejection Recovery Hotline 24/7, so I hear a lot of different stories. The one thing they all have in common is a lack of honesty. Because people don’t say what they really mean, we are forced to read and decipher signals, whether or not they were meant for interpretation.

The cliche solution: “Honesty is the best policy.”

But this time, it’s deeper than honesty equal to admitting you spilled the grape juice on the white carpet. Let me explain by starting with the problems created by holding back.

Especially in romantic relationships, we are so quick to assume the negative – we’d rather convince ourselves that people don’t like us instead of convincing ourselves they do. And this is understandable; it’s easier to face rejection when you expect it. But there seems to be a problem with not reading the subtle signals of warmth and love, and yet we can easily detect the subtle signs of disregard, hatred or contempt.

This is where honesty plays a part. Both parties, men and women, are guilty of keeping their feelings inside and/or fighting the motivation to say what is on their minds. Imagine what a field of daisies our world would be if guys would just ask their burning questions, prepared, of course, for truthful answers; and women would actually say what they want people to know instead of assuming men have mind-reading powers.

Yes, I know it’s not that easy. But the reason is because people are unwilling to do it.

In my experience, I have yet to meet a woman who would say she would rather play the guessing game for the duration of a relationship than be momentarily vulnerable to the opposite sex, by ending a conversation in a resolution. Women want to be honest, but they just aren’t given a venue.

I truly urge men to ask women in their lives the questions they want to be answered, because in establishing an open relationship – not of the Facebook kind, but of the truthful kind – you’ll be amazed at the wealth of knowledge available at your fingertips.

Women really are open books; guys are just too intimidated by the dust to look inside the covers.

Anahita Kalianivala is a freshman English and psychology major from Fort Worth. Her column appears every Wednesday.