Dating Games: The Single Against the Married
Photo: suchitra prints
One of my co-editors at Matador, Carlo Alcos, took a particular disliking to a piece I wrote a couple of months ago called, Dating in 2010: Is it All Four-Man Plans and Online Shenanigans? Well, maybe dislike is a strong word, but it certainly triggered him. So we decided to hash-it-out, mano a mano, in the classy, mature way – on a blog for everyone to see (and comment on…hint hint).
Thing is, Carlo and I are generally nice, subdued people, so our conversation may not involve as many sucker-punches as you would have liked to see. For that, I apologize.
Carlo
I was going to write a comment in response to Christine’s article, but then I thought maybe my services would be better put to use if I wrote an entire post. So I emailed her to present my masterplan, then promptly forgot about it.
But the time delay worked out well because Christine’s friend, Vera (if that is her real name…which it is not), later responded herself in the comment area that the dating plan she was trying didn’t pan out so well for her. Which is what I was going to say anyway. So, in essence, it gives strength to this post.
Before I begin, I thought you’d might be interested in a bit about me. I am in no way a “dating expert”, psychologist, psychiatrist, sociologist, or any other type of professional who’s spent the better part of their lives studying relationships. But I am human. And I’m a guy. In fact, I’m a married guy. For over three years. So I think that qualifies me to at least be in the discussion. In fact, I’ve counseled many girl friends in the past on dating issues, mostly ending with the sentence, “maybe you’re just dating the wrong type of guy.”
When I first read about the four-man plan here I got really defensive for some reason. I can’t explain that reaction, but I felt I needed to respond. The gist of this plan is that a woman dates four men at the same time, with the idea that the men will be more competitive.
What I came to hate during my twenties was the “game.” And this is a game. I’ll admit I haven’t read the book, so I’m not going to sit here and attack this plan because I don’t know enough about it. (Although on the website it does say you “keep track of how you feel about each of them with the help of some visual graphs” which pretty much sounds like a gameplan.) And yeah, back then, I played it. Because that’s what you were supposed to do. Or, that’s what you were told you were supposed to do.
The whole “don’t call for 3 days, don’t let on how interested you are, play it cool” thing. It’s fucking ridiculous when you think about it. Why shouldn’t we be encouraged to express our thoughts and feelings? If everyone were just open wouldn’t that make things a lot easier? If you are the kind of person that likes to express yourself, and you’re with someone who gets freaked out because you tell him/her you like them, or you call them “too soon”, is that the kind of person you want to be with long term?
Christine
Photo: nattu
When it comes to dating, the thing about creds is, who really has them? In the immortal (ha) words of Carrie Bradshaw, “I’ve been dating a hundred years. I haven’t a clue” (yeah, I went there). Each experience is original in some way, though we certainly bring our very own colorful patterns to each dating dilemma.
I’m a horrible dater, as I alluded to (or insisted loudly) in my article. Never been good at it. Laid in bed the other night thinking about how I just can’t seem to be casual in my life about, well, anything really. But certainly not love and romance. A guy I dated a few years ago once said to me, “You’re too damn intense.” A version of that statement has been repeated to me many times before and since. Yep. I’m an all or nothing girl. What can I say?
Oh, I fight against it all the time. Although I would never have the energy to participate in the four-man plan, I get it. It’s friggin’ tough out there. As a woman, you can’t be too available – men like the chase (I think this is also often true on the flip-side, hence the whole “girls don’t like nice guys” issue).
If you say straight up in the beginning, “Hey, I like you. I’m feeling a connection here,” that often makes the other person friggin’ high-tail it in the other direction. The most honest I was able to be with my feelings early on was when I started seeing a man in an open marriage – and we both agreed we felt comfortable to not play the “game” partly because nothing long-term was at stake.
I think most of us wish we could be honest with our feelings right away, but the thing about feelings is sometimes they grow at different rates. I know that for me, there have been a few guys that I’ve dated who I didn’t really have feelings for when I first met them. It took time and persistence on their part to make me see how great they were. And really, most of the men I’ve dated for longer periods of time didn’t necessarily look at me romantically in the beginning – as our friendship grew, they became interested (and I know you guys out there reading this are calling bullshit, but I think it’s mostly true. I could always sense the shift).
I think it is a pretty normal human condition to hold your cards close to your chest. And if you’ve been hurt, or played by guys time and again, it feels like you have to play to win in this crazy game.
I lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for nine years. It’s so f’n hard to be a straight woman dating there. Whether you chalk it up to the amount of gay guys (although my gay guy friends seemed to have to play even more games), the higher ratio of (gorgeous) women to men, or the fact that it is a transient area with total commitment phobs, I understand thinking, “Hmm, I’m getting rejected left and right here. I need a new strategy.”
And so even though the Four-Man Plan ultimately didn’t work for my friend – and I didn’t really think it would over time – the experience might have been worth it within itself. Sometimes, it’s about resetting your own boundaries.
Check in next week to see the married and the singleton continue to duke it out.
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About the Author
Carlo Alcos is the editor of Brave New Traveler, co-edits Confronting Love, and keeps a personal blog at Vagabonderz. The end of his marriage in 2010 started him on a new life journey so, yes, he has much to say on the subject of love and relationships. He currently calls Nelson, BC his home, where his yoga and meditation practice go a long way in keeping him sane. Follow him on Twitter.
Hi, my name is Kendra, I am 39 years old and have been married for five years.
) Reading this conversation reminded me of a workshop I took on spiritual direction several years ago. It was on the importance and meaning of longing. In a nutshell, the teacher was suggesting that the answer to our longing is the longing itself.
Without doing a lot of emotional jujitsu, what I’m suggesting is that the way we go about dating, or about seeking a mate, or seeking whomever you may seek for whatever purpose, may in-and-of-itself be the meat of the matter, as opposed to the outcome being the meat of the matter. The way we want something is as important as whether or not we get what we want.
Of course that’s hard to snuggle down with on a Saturday night…but I want to be able to look myself in the mirror on that Saturday night, even if it’s just me by my lonesome.
If I do meet someone, and we end up spending a significant portion of our lives together, how will I feel in retrospect about how I handled the beginning of our relationship, how I treated this person, how I acted, how I achieved the outcome of our being together? Is it something that will match up with the rest of my life, or something that will seem like a series of forced plot twists in a May-sweeps episode of “This Is Your Life?”
If you’re following guidelines that help you be yourself better, that’s great. If your “rules” force you to push your own envelope, let go, play with being uninhibited; or if they hold you accountable to being your best you, fantastic. If they are coercing you into being someone you’re not, or someone you don’t like, for the sake of achieving a certain outcome, maybe it’s not the best approach, and maybe it won’t build the strong foundation you might want for the long haul–either with another or with yourself.
By the way, Christine, I’m right there with you on being repeatedly labeled as “intense.” Don’t ever let anyone talk you into shutting down anything for your lover. You deserve someone (or ones) who can meet your intensity however you want it to be met. Why not go for it? I know…because it hurts. But that label says nothing about you so much as it says volumes about the ones who said it. Intimidation be damned, shine your light. As you wrote recently, the world sure can use light right about now–as intensely as we can give it.
Thanks Kendra, for your wisdom (as always). I agree with you on many points, though in having learned about myself quite a bit over the last few years, I see where I have had (and partially still have) a tendency to attach to someone too quickly, believing I feel more than I do right at the beginning. Or they seem to be more into me than I think is possible at that point, as in they are more into the “idea” of me than the real me – they don’t know me well enough yet to love me in that way, and often the love fades as they get to know the real me.
None of this is necessarily an argument for putting on a fake self, but sometimes I think we (by we, I mean I) have to check emotions a bit at the beginning, as they may be more of a representation of longing rather than truly feeling that way about the other person. So, it may come off as a game, but rather it’s about the balancing act of stepping into relationship with a person, and if the two of are ready at the same time.
Of course, I love the idea of ease, moving through the levels of relationship seemingly at the same time (or at least close), and do think that is possible – it’s happened to me a couple of times in my life. But more often than not, it hasn’t worked that way, and I don’t want to give up on a situation necessarily because it’s not all flowing perfectly from the first moment. Then again, if it’s too much of a struggle right off the bat, it’s sure not to get any better, and what’s the point of moving forward?
Wise words indeed Kendra. I couldn’t agree more. I guess what I was saying in a nutshell: No games and be honest with yourself. Of course, being honest with yourself is actually harder than it sounds, especially when you don’t know yourself, which, let’s be honest, is probably almost everyone.
Yeps to both of you. Christine, I’ve always attached too quickly and gotten swept away by ideals and what I dream of and hope for…it’s really all Disney’s fault, isn’t it? I admire your ability to have a balanced perspective on that and be able to measure emotions with reality. I admire your awareness.
I’m in my 30′s and still attempting to learn how to date. One of the most interesting advice bits I have heard in the past year is a variation of the Golden Rule: “Treat others the way you want to be treated.” The advice ran down the lines of don’t go expecting others to give you something that you yourself are unwilling to give.
I read the linked article about the 4 man plan and there was a mention in the comments on how offended the men were. Well for one thing, don’t expect any sort of loyalty from the men that would be happy in that situation. Think how you would feel if your guy mentioned he was dating several other girls and you should show him you want him more??
If you go about dating playing a game, expect to meet others that are also playing A game. (Very unlikely you are both playing by the same rules though.) The unfortunate consequence of a lot of these game players is that the rest of us feel somehow forced into playing just to make any headway. I imagine that to some the game is there to cover up things that would make them otherwise undateable. Like mentioned as well, if the rules help reign in bad habits, good. If they force you into bad habits, no.
Back to my friend’s advice. Project what you want, project what you are willing to offer as a partner. Think about these things and whether they fit somehow. Looking for a one-woman man? Don’t go dating 4 at a time.
Sweet, online fisticuffs. Will tune in for round 2 (got 100 bones ridin on you, Carlo).
How very intriguing! I’ve started to “date” again after several years in the past month! In my 33 years, I’ve been extremely resistant to the whole concept of dating, exactly because it felt like a game to me. So, I’ve refused to do it and focused my energy in developing myself in others ways.
About a month ago, a man appeared in my life unexpectedly. However, I had an image on my vision board about companionship…so I probably helped call him in that way.
We went on a couple of dates, had a nice time, and it end up fizzling. However, that encounter reactivated me and let me know that I was ready finally to embrace my dating self and find a way to do it authentically and skillfully.
As a part of developing my comfort with dating and my dating consciousness, I’ve been engaged in active study about the topic. A friend suggested Steve Harvey’s new book “Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man, another friend suggested Sex and the Single Girl, and I learned about a book “If the Buddha Dated” and another book Don’t Bring Home a White Boy: Other Notions that Keep Black Women from Dating Out.” I’d recommend any of these books to single ladies reading this.
As a part of working through these books, I am creating a dating strategy, not as a game plan to get the guy though. Instead, I’m creating a map about how, when, why, and what to communicate and inquire about over the course of dating someone. It’s so easy for me to get caught up in the rush of dating or to start feeling vulnerable and then to clam up. So, I need a strategy to hold myself accountable to myself and my vision for what I want to experience in life.
As an example, Steve Harvey’s book encourages women to be up front about what they want and to have standards. I want a long-term committed relationship. After I take like 2-3 dates and intermittent conversations to get to know if the attraction and interest is there for me, I’m going to communicate that I’d like to explore the possibility of a long-term committed relationship with that person I’m dating. He may or may not be interested in pursuing the same vision and I want to know that relatively early. With that information, I can choose to continue to have fun with him or move on to find someone who wants to work toward a long-term committed relationship.
Interested to read this continuing dialogue.
Lest we forget the game, for lack of a better word, doesn’t end with wedding vows…no no no. The game then turns into a war, an occupation, a global conquest of compassion, compromise, collateral, cuddling and strategy as the rose colored glasses crack then fade as two twenty somethings look down the long tunnel of life.
Complete Honesty is nearly impossible.
Compassion is where it is at.
Dude, you are a man of wisdom. I am learning a lot of life lessons at this very moment.
I wouldn’t be comfy with the 4 man plan. I was dating a guy who was obviously dating a few women and I really felt he could barely keep as straight ( but he cooked and was a really good cuddler and we were all letting it slide ) . I couldn’t handle it and soon bailed.
Problem is, most people are complete egomaniacs. They themselves are at the center of their own universes.
If you put someone or something else at the center of your universe, that’s co-dependency. You depend on the “other” to make all your decisions for you. This is a manifestation of over-identification.
It fundamentally is about keeping a dynamic tension in your life between you and another. That other could be G-d, a person, or a flower.
It is about having the consciousness of both at the same time.
It is a dance.
Sometimes, one will have to take precedence over the other.
If it is the self, this is called survival.
But to care about the other for the sake of the other, is compassion.
As someone said above, complete honesty is nearly impossible.
Yet it is essential.
Have a nice day,
PPB
Boston, MA
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