One of the great traditions in Cosmopolitan magazine is the Cosmo quiz. Every month, the editors of Cosmo come up with 10-12 multiple-choice questions designed to expand your knowledge of yourself. Recent quiz titles include “Are You Easily Tempted?”; “How Seductive Are You?”; and “Is Your Ego Big Enough?”

If you sit down one day and take nine or ten of these quizzes in a row, like I did, you will start to see a pattern emerge. You're probably hallucinating, but you do have a point. Each question usually has three choices after it. One of the choices is always exaggeratedly introverted, another extravagantly extroverted. And then there's the third answer, and it's just right. Actually, it's not just right but it's the only answer a sane individual would give. For example, let's say the question is, “how do you approach a guy you think is attractive?” The prudish answer might be, “I don't. I hide in the corner and hope he doesn't notice me.” Meanwhile, the extrovert answer would be something like, “I write my phone number on his chest with a magic marker.” Both of these answers are ridiculous on some level. While a lot of people no doubt feel like running and hiding from attractive strangers, very few actually do. And come on, no self-respecting woman writes her number on a guy's chest. He'd just sweat it off.

But then there's the third option. That answer is something more reasonable, like, “I talk to him for a little while and, if I decide I like him, ask if he'd like to get coffee sometime.” It may not be your ideal approach, but it's the only one of the three that you'd even consider.

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