Prioritizing Dating

In one of my group coaching sessions, a client of mine told me that she feels like she’s actually the 40% guy in her dating connections.

She’s a single mom and has other priorities. On top of that, there are other things like hobbies and hanging out with friends that are more fun to do than dating.

The way that I explained it to her is that our life is kind of like a company.

We have different departments, like work, family, friends, health, hobbies, and dating.

We pump our energy into these different departments, and then that produces a certain outcome.

Our priorities are clearest when it comes to how we choose to invest our energy.

When there’s a budget problem, dating is one of the departments where it’s the easiest to justify a layoff.

As I was explaining this, my client responded that she has always thought of dating as kind of a frivolous thing, rather than something that's essential or necessary.

Do you have a similar belief around the Department of Dating?

The first thing you’re going to want to do is change your mindset.

Don't wait until dating becomes urgent to prioritize it. Don’t wait until you have a wedding to go to or until you get sick and want someone to support you.

In dating, we take little steps toward the bigger picture of what we want our life to look like, and if you're reading this, you probably want your life to unfold with another person.

It's better to have those moments and think about how you’ve grown so much over the past six months because you have engaged in this process.

My client was also feeling like dating was something that wastes her energy, and like it was a choice between that and investing in things that add value to her life.

In order to prioritize dating, you need to see dating as an investment in yourself.

Think about that bigger picture and that vision that you want to create. In dating, we get to practice being the woman that we want to be.

If you're taking the SATs, you don't just show up that day and take the test for the first time.

You take practice tests, and you learn and you grow from what you know and what you don't know.

If you were giving a big keynote speech, you'd probably practice that speech a few times before you stand up on stage.

Similarly, dating is a great opportunity for us to practice the skill of connecting with people.

You can think about relationships (even short relationships like dates) as an investment in yourself, in your vision, and in who you want to become.

Once we've managed our mindset and we genuinely see dating as an opportunity to invest in ourselves, then we go into the schedule to see how we can actually prioritize dating.

I’ve noticed that for a lot of people, not being busy can be really uncomfortable.

That can be for different reasons, like not feeling productive enough if we have a lot of free time.

Sometimes we actually are creating the busyness in our life because of our discomfort with having more space.

So rather than just shoving more into your very full schedule and then adding dating to that, really take stock of which of these things you have to do, and which of them you could actually live without

Sometimes it feels like everything's important and we have to spend a certain amount of time on each particular project or activity.

Just think about what has the most impact, coming from the mindset of dating being equally important to your life and the vision that you want to create.

And lastly, think about your expectations for what it really looks like to prioritize dating.

It's not going on 50 dates or spending hours and hours on the apps every day.  It’s not a part-time job.

It just looks like going on one date per week and connecting with somebody a little bit in your free time throughout the day.

That's enough to start creating momentum in your dating life.