In the world of dating, I believe each person should have at least 2 dates to learn about each other before you throw the baby out w/the bathwater (unless of, course, someone does something totally out of the box offensive). I’m starting to question the technique even though a wise rabbi told me this is the key to allowing your soul mate to find you. Recently, during a first date, I met someone who was smart, funny and someone you’d want to hang out with and though there were no fireworks, there was a lovely ease of conversation. However, though I came in with an open heart, he didn’t pick up on those signals and start talking to my heart. I sort of felt “nothing at all”. This doesn’t make him a bad person, it simply means he’s not my person. I have a great life, career, home, friends and I’m happy. The whipped cream on top of the Ben&Jerry’s half baked is someone who speaks to my heart and protects all the feelings there. Someone who can tune into that frequency and begin to talk to my heart which in fact is someone good at slowly creating intimacy with another human being.
You know, sometimes you meet someone of any gender and the conversation feels like a hug, like someone is saying, “I see you.” I do that with people I care about, but also with people I just have met because our hearts are talking to each other; not our brains, preconceived notions, fears, but our ever-present hearts. It’s the vulnerable, unguarded space. Took me a long time to learn how to do that, but now I do know how to sit quietly and listen to another person and not be too afraid to show them me (not the artist/business person/writer), but me. Because, in a mate, I’m not looking for someone to do business with, I’m looking for someone to share hearts with.
Since, I now know I want someone who is emotionally intelligent and gracious. If that is not there, no matter how good we look on paper or how witty the conversation, I know you’re not the one. That is a red flag, that what you’re “not feeling” is actually something potentially toxic for you. Doesn’t make the guy a bad person, just makes him not my person. And sure enough, when I experience a twinge of nothing, it usually rears it’s head at or slightly before the second date. Every time. For example, I’m sick, like bedridden sick. I have to take a rain check on a date and when the guy’s response is “Feel better quick.” And then 2 hours later another text, “Problem. I hope you find what you’re looking for.” I’m like wow, you are mean and totally defended. This has happened before and the heart response is to pick up the phone and try to connect and tell the person to feel better. But that is now where he went. Maybe he saw I was online and you felt cheated on, but we’ve only had one date. I get to be online to change my profile or give yours a detailed read or even respond to other people. I get to do that, because we don’t know each other well enough to even know if we’re going to be an item. Now I could get into so many analytical storeis about what that meant and blah blah blah and what’s wrong with him. But, maybe it’s the Pema Chodron or maybe it’s years of sitting in Dr. O’s office, but in either event, my only response is to feel in the moment, “Ouch, you hurt my feelings.” That’s it. No rampage, no concerning myself with someone else’s issues, just being with that hurt, feeling it and letting it go. All of this without creating some crazy story about it that only makes me feel worse and has no value for me in this present moment.
Wow, so now I’m amending my 2 date rule to one first date: one coffee, one hour and if you make me feel even a little emotionally unsafe, I’m no longer going to chalk that up to 1st date nervousness. What I’m going to do is close my eyes (just in case, ur too fine for words and there’s a possibility that I could distracted LOL)and then I am going to listen to you with my heart and if she says “nothing”, I will know that she is right and graciously end the date. But if she says “yes”, I will follow, stay open and never give up…
I met the love of my life doing this and we met online, so there’s possibility everywhere. That relationship taught me just how unready I was, but it also opened my spirit to what intimacy, trust and tenderness feels like. That relationship and that person changed my life and opened my heart…so I will always cherish the memory of it, no matter what. Especially since my heart had never really opened to a man until he came along.
So, next coffee date, eyes closed, heart open.
(to be continued as i figure this shit out)