Dating isn’t what it used to be.
There was a time when single adults valued actually getting to know one another. The thought of being exclusive didn’t seem scary, and marriage wasn’t the step right after commitment. Today, singles over index what it means to be a couple. They date casual as long as they can assuming that if they were to couple they were practically walking down the aisle.
Never has the gap between dating and commitment been so wide, and the assumed gap between commitment and marriage been so close. At this point to date, is to remain single. Dating has become easy. It’s no longer sparking conversation with a stranger in a bar. It’s just a swipe away. Everyone you might ever want to meet at your fingertips.
This makes wanting a relationship hard. But most singles aren’t looking for just a relationship. They want exclusivity. They want a chance to breathe in and out without before jumping on to someone else. Today most single men and women just want enough time to slow down with someone in order to get to know them but without the pressure of having to commit. This is understandable with the pressure to be partnered falling on every single person’s shoulders these days.
Instead of just dating just to date, make the goal of dating to reconnect. We have spent the last twenty years of the digital age hiding behind screens and masking our feelings. We are so out of touch with love, that the real goal of dating should be to let as much love in as you can.
Love 2.0 author Barbara L. Fredrickson writes: “Love is that micro-moment of warmth and connection that you share with another living being”
It doesn’t have to be the deep rooted hallmark connection that we see lasting decades. Love and the invitation to connect with another human is all that is required to start letting more love into your life and ultimately finding the person that is right for you. The formula isn’t designed to find the one at any particular time. Finding love this year should be about being open to all the ways that it can be found.
Shift Your Attitude
I’ve heard many single men and women view dating as “work”. Getting to know someone doesn’t happen overnight. Dating only feels like work when you are engaging with strangers but never quite connecting. That’s one sign that you’re dating the wrong way.
Finding the right person as a concept is as simple as replacing negative habits with success habits. How you speak about dating, and the dating market will color how you see dating as a whole. With language and context you can change your attitude and your luck. If you refer to as work and you have a negative view of work then you will not want to put any effort into improving your love life.
So how do you shift your thinking when you’ve looked at love as work in the past but you’ve gotten little reward from the process? The first step is to reframe what it means to make time for love. Most people think dating takes way too much time, but relationships consume more time than any other endeavor. What would it take to adopt a new perspective? Our idea of love as a verb permeates every aspect of our lives. As the saying goes the way you anything is the way that you do everything.
Make Time For Love
Make time for self-love. Make time for romantic love. Make time for platonic love. Make time for familial love.
Make time for your love life today and every day that follows. Consider the many ways that you could invite more affection, appreciation, and passion in your life. What could you do to add more thoughtfulness and intention into your heart.
Activity suggestions:
- Updating your online profile
- Exercising to improve your health
- Reading
- Socializing to increase your networks
- Volunteering to do good in the world
- Meditation, and thinking positive thoughts
- Catching up with friends
- Journaling
When you make time for loving yourself you’re training your brain to associate positive thoughts with pleasure. Love is pleasure and you have more than enough time in your day for that. Remind yourself that you deserve it. When you use positive reinforcement, you’re training your brain to enjoy healthy activities and rewards.
Imagine meeting the right person and having a laundry list of exciting and joyful things you can do together. Don’t wait to create space for the things that you really want.
If you view having love in your life as work think about how you can reframe that to mean meaningful work.
Ask yourself, “What meaningful work can I put into myself today?”
When it’s reframed this way, you can cultivate several ideas of how you could make time to add meaning to your life.
You could do a favor for a friend, donate your time to someone in need, or call your parents. You could run a warm bath, curl up with a good book, or spend a few minutes improving your online dating profile. In order to make this a habit you must commit to doing something every day that will add more meaning to the life you want to invite someone to be a part of.
How much time do you currently invest in your romantic life. Not just swiping on online dating, but actually dreaming about what life could be like with a partner. Think about this for a second: imagine life with a future partner. There will be romantic dinners, late movies, fun baseball games, or grocery shopping together. Maybe you’ll cook together.
Being too busy to have exactly what you say you want is ridiculous. If I told you that you were destined to win the lottery would you be too busy to buy a ticket? If you lay down at night thinking about a partner, or wishing you had someone to call or hold on to then it’s important to make time for your love life.
You can say with your mouth, all day long, that you want love but if you don’t back it up with the right actions you will never attract the love you want. If you are willing to make the time to cultivate love in your life, you will attract it much faster than if you convince yourself that you’re too busy. You must set the intention. You must decide that it’s ok for you to have love and acceptance in your life. What if instead of maintaining an already busy schedule, you create space for those activities now?
Make A Change
If nothing changes, nothing changes.
Many singles want to find love, as if it’s being offered as an option but they won’t change their lives in order to see new results. You can’t create a solution with the same thinking that created the problem.
Change can be scary. The reason we rebel against it is because it happens too fast. If it was subtle we would barely notice. But it’s with this speed that you could find your next relationship. When we think about making room for someone else, it’s easy to be negative and think about all of the things we’d have to change to accommodate them.
Once we start making room for someone else as a daily practice, you’ll know see how easy it is to meet someone worth spending time with. Think of it this way, the reason it feels like you’re too busy to date, or have a relationship is because you’ve carved out no time for love. The universe, being as receptive as it is, ensures that you will never need to make time by keeping you single. Are you telling the Universe that you don’t have time for love you’re reinforcing the belief that you want to be single.
Admit That You Want It
In my 10 years in the dating industry I’ve seen so many adults deny themselves the love that they want but not admitting that they really want it. To want a partner is to be human, as we are made for connection. More than admitting that you want it, you also have to deeply accept that you deserve love. I believe that love is your right. There is someone out there looking for a partner just like you. This person isn’t fiction they’re real.
The beauty about finding partner is that they are a living their life, and they breathing just as you are. The person that you want to be with isn’t someone you need to make up, you aren’t inventing them. They are already born, and living the life they’ve created a life for themselves. The only problem is they’re looking for the right person. Just as you are looking, waiting, and wishing for your partner, they are looking, waiting and wishing for you.
You have to believe in their existence, they have already been born whether you believe it or not. All you have to do is to create the circumstance that will lead the two of you to meet. It starts with setting the intention and performing a daily action, or actions, that invites more love into your life.