Dating – Part 3 - Orbiting, Holding Space & Hardballing

Did you know that Axios is reporting that dating has now been simplified to the level that a well-known, fast-causal burger chain has partnered with a well-known food delivery company to launch a temporary dating site on which to pair prospective lovers who share an affinity for the chain’s version of a buffalo chicken sandwich? “Yes, I met your mother over our shared love of fried and brown chicken breasts covered in a house-made buffalo sauce that features a tangy flavor with a lot of sweetness balanced by a hint of spice. It’s not as spicy as it can be, but the lack of heat allows you to focus on the layers of flavors, from pungent garlic to smokey paprika and a noticeably sharp tangy finish.” Oy vey. If that is the basis of a sustainable, long-term, committed relationship that has some depth – that true love can be found in the mutual exploration of layers of flavor - I’ll dance naked in Macy’s window. Dating is not about gimmicks. It is about authenticity, about which I’ve recorded a podcast and published a blog post.

So far, in this series, we’ve talked about ghosting and mosting, submarines and zombies. If one were to inventory those terms, you’d think that dating was connected to the supernatural with a slight military influence thrown in. So now, on to space terms -orbiting and holding space – with a side of effective message transmission from your space capsule. How did dating become this complicated?

Orbiting. The person that ghosts you then continues to follow you on social media and may interact with you by liking or retweeting your tweets or liking your Instagram photos or whatever. The thinking is that this is a new behavior that only started because of social media. No. It just made it easier. Depending on what they knew about you when you dated, even without social media you could have been orbited in a sense. They could know mutual friends or someone in your family and have kept close tabs on you that way. Or you somehow kept running in to them at your favorite movie theater or restaurant or store or wherever. Social media just makes keeping tabs on somebody much easier. It takes a lot less leg work.

Why would someone do this? As we’ve talked about, people have all kinds of issues when it comes to relationships. Love, intimacy, caring, vulnerability, communication, etc., are all very scary things. One of the big reasons they are unnerving is that it involves emotions – feeling them, dealing with them, knowing what to do with them. I am currently involved in an ongoing online discussion with a few folks on Twitter who preach and swear by the gospel of avoiding feelings at all costs. The best self-care you can give yourself, they say, is to stay with logic and reason through thick and thin. I can see professional relationships being based mostly on logic and reason. But how does one navigate marriage and/or parenthood, or friendship or familial connections solely from a basis of the rational when relationships of all kinds are messy and complicated? You can’t love or be loved without venturing into the waters of emotion.

We all want to be cared for. We all want and need some kind of human connection in our lives. But how well prepared are we for the “big” relationships? Lots of people aren’t emotionally prepared to know how to deal with the emotions that relationships bring up. There are no “How To” manuals. No two relationships are alike. And we can and hopefully do learn a great deal about ourselves in the process. It is a lot to take on even when you are prepared to try to navigate those waters. But suppose someone is not able to maneuver through those depths even though they really liked you and don’t want to lose contact completely. Then orbiting, though creepy, makes more sense.

The point here is that when someone demonstrates that they don’t have the capacity, for whatever reason, to go further and they don’t even have the ability to have an honest conversation about that fact, then bless them and let them go, unless they are posing a threat to you. Either engage or ignore their presence in your social media feed. Call them out if you want to. If they pose a threat, then take whatever steps you need to keep them at a distance and keep yourself safe.

Holding Space. Holding space is a term that initially came out of talk therapy. The therapist provides a safe space in which the client can be open and honest and not feel judged. And that is important. Thing is that your therapist’s office is not the only place you should be open and honest. That space, ideally, is established and held by both parties to a relationship. However, it often is up to one of the couple to provide and hold that safe space while their partner acclimates and learns to function within it.

My question is why would you have to announce to someone that you are holding space for them? Regardless of whether the activity is fun and light, or a deep conversation, or anything in between, are you not usually present with the people you are with? We all want to be seen and heard and the experience I will have, if you have been present with me, is that I will feel seen and heard, without feeling any judgment coming toward me. Now, if we are having a serious conversation, then I need to up my game a little bit and be even more focused, actively listening but also paying attention to body language, facial expressions, etc. I don’t need to offer solution or try to fix anything. But you still need to be seen and heard and met where you are and accepted and not judged.

If you are not in the space to be present with someone, then OK. Be honest about that and see if their pressing need can wait a bit or, if it is acutely important, give yourself a minute or two to get ready to be in a more present headspace. Being present is important.

“Hardballing”. The truth is that we teach others how we want to be treated. If I do not inform you about what is and is not OK in your treatment of me, then I am relying on your own sense and practice of common decency; of being respectful; and of being present. Or I am either expecting how I want you treat me to come to you in some sort of an epiphany or psychic insight, or I am willing to put up with anything you dish out. And, as we have been discussing, putting up with anything is not OK and certainly is not healthy or productive. Thus, I need to be clear withing myself and then clear with you about what I want from you and from the potential relationship we are embarking on.

Am I looking for something short-term, medium-term, or a long-term committed relationship? Do I even want a committed relationship or NSA? Do I expect or want the relationship to go somewhere in real time, in real life, or are we just pen pals online, texting, messaging, dragging out the conversation that really goes nowhere but feeds my need for attention without us ever having to actually meet? I am told that dragging out online conversations that go nowhere is called breadcrumbing. So now we are introducing baking terms into our collection of dating terms drawn from the supernatural, from space travel and from the military. But I digress.

What do I want? And does what I want mesh with what you want, at least at this point in time? Now, as we get to know one another, all that may change, certainly so. But supposedly what hardballing is about is that we are trying to make sure there are no surprises, no bs, no games, and everything is above board and transparent, another currently popular word. The potential trap here is, as we talked about in “Ya Gotta Get a Gimmick,” what I call the Pre-husband Interview - the checklist we run somebody through before we even go on a date. In trying to cover all the bases up front and making sure there are no surprises, not only will you possibly avoid the unpleasant surprises, but you will also never get the really delightful and welcomed surprises either.

By all means, set your boundaries by be clear on an on-going basis about what those boundaries are – what is and is not OK. As example, for me, sarcasm and constant witticisms wear thin very quickly. I need someone who can hold a conversation that has some depth. Don’t rush into a relationship or, once in, don’t try to rush the progress of the relationship. Let it unfold and enjoy the journey. Good communication is important. Again, is what you are looking for and what they are looking for – FWB, activity buddies, casual dating, or an openness to see where things go – in synch with one another?

Start with simple things. What are your preferred methods of communication? Text? Phone call? Email? Messenger? Video calls? What? Primarily I want to be called. Texts and other forms of written communication can be more easily misconstrued than when I hear your voice. What is the response time you expect? Communicate early on, over time, who you are, what you are looking for, what is not negotiable for you, and what you are hoping to find. But, above all, have fun with the process of discovering the mysteries of another human being.

Next time, we will talk about preparing for the dating journey.

© 2022   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Perfect

I clearly remember when I started hearing the response, “Perfect,” to pretty much anything said in a conversational exchange. Could be on the phone with customer service about my computer or the cable company and as they are asking me to try different things to get everything working, I would respond that I’d done whatever they had said to do. “Perfect,” was the response every time. “Well,” I tell a friend, “I’ve got to go to the grocery store tomorrow.” “Perfect.” “Then I thought I’d finally pick up the extension cord I’ve been needing.” “Perfect.” “I want to see if my right big toe will fit in my left nostril.” “Perfect.”

Now “Perfect” used to be reserved and used as a superlative indicating something was exceptional or had surpassed expectations in some way. Now it substitutes for, “OK.” At first, hearing the word more than I was used to was oddly comforting. We all like praise for doing well. But as it became more ubiquitous, it became oddly disconcerting. Things were being referred to as being perfect, but those things didn’t rise to a level where perfection should even have been a consideration.

Now I am reading in the press that the drive for individual perfectionist tendencies has become widespread and problematic since the early 00s. (Perfectionism Is Increasing Over Time: A Meta-Analysis of Birth Cohort Differences From 1989 to 2016 – published in the Psychological Bulletin of the American Psychological Association in 2017) The authors, Thomas Curran, University of Bath, and Andrew P. Hill, York St. John University write, “From the 1980s onward, neoliberal governance in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom has emphasized competitive individualism and people have seemingly responded, in kind, by agitating to perfect themselves and their lifestyles. . . Cross-temporal meta-analysis revealed that levels of self-oriented perfectionism, socially prescribed perfectionism, and other-oriented perfectionism have linearly increased. . . the findings indicate that recent generations of young people perceive that others are more demanding of them, are more demanding of others, and are more demanding of themselves.”

While there are societal pressures eliciting this kind of behavior, let’s take a step back and have a look at how misleading and potentially dangerous this striving ultimately is.

Often, when we feel we have to do something perfectly or everything perfectly, we immediately run into two problems. First, perfect is the enemy of good enough. In truth, good enough is good enough. Why? Because, problem number two, for something to be perfect it must remain unchanging, static. Perfection is a static state. Works of art like a Monet painting are perfect because they hang on a wall and never change. They are perfect just the way they are. Humans are constantly growing, changing, and evolving. We are imperfect. Therefore, it is neither possible nor desirable for us to remain fixed because we learn, we change, we grow.

“I have the perfect solution,” and, therefore, we must do it this way. “I have the perfect idea or perfect concept.” Problem herein is that once something has been deemed perfect, it is given no room to change and evolve. We get so caught up in something being the one true way, that it almost becomes dogma versus a living, breathing process. We block out learning along the way. We can become absolutist rather giving ourselves the space to explore and learn. Why must something be perfect in order to merit taking action? Why isn’t it enough that a solution or idea is practical or workable or even a good interim step?

Are we allowed to make missteps or mistakes? Of course we are. Whose rules are these that we can’t? How else can we learn? Where else would the motivation come from to take risks, try new things? One thing I have learned as truth is that when I make a mistake, I need to be the one to hold my hand up, say, “Yeah, I did it.” And then ask for help or forgiveness or both. People will break their backs to help you. They won’t if you make excuses, try to place blame elsewhere, deny responsibility, or whine about how hard something is. But admit something isn’t working or didn’t work and, “Here, let me help you,” will be the response. And next time and the time after that and the time after that you’ll get better and better and better at problem solving or coming up with better courses of action, personally and professionally.

Very often, when we feel we must do something perfectly, what we are telling ourselves is that we don’t trust ourselves – our judgment, our thought processes, the quality of our work, our ability to honestly communicate in relationships, or our ability to be and do good enough. Think about what has become a stock answer to the interview question, “What is your greatest weakness?” “I tend to be a perfectionist in my work.” Problem here is that not only is it a cop-out answer, it can hide tendencies of being unyielding, intemperate, uncooperative, or unwilling to see other people’s point of view.

Beneath that, what is the fear? If we are not perfect at work, what will happen? Will we be disciplined? Demoted? Ostracized? Fired? In that process we will, in some way, undermine our own judgment and ability to think critically or creatively, and our trust in our own work. And it is us doing it to ourselves. How realistic are those fears? Yeah, the workplace is competitive and, in too many workplaces, the idea is that we are all replaceable in a moment’s notice. “Well, Schmendrick made a mistake or their work was less than perfect so let’s get rid of them.” Is that the kind of place you’d want to work? Are the people you work for really like that? Any great inventor, thinker, writer, etc., will tell you that they failed many times along the way to their greatest successes as it was those mistakes and the places where they fell short that they learned and changed their perspectives, or got new ideas or new inspiration, or found a new direction or solution.

In relationships, how can you or anybody possibly be perfect? What you will most likely do is wind up doing one of two things. One is that you will walk on egg shells around your friends or family or significant other. Heaven forbid you say or do the wrong thing. You could piss them off or make them unhappy and they won’t like/love you anymore. Or they will abandon/betray/humiliate you because you weren’t perfect? Or you accept whatever they throw at you, good and bad, so as to not jeopardize your standing with them and potentially lose the relationship. You wind up diminishing or invalidating your own needs in the relationship so as to not be demanding and, therefore, less than perfect. Or you lose yourself completely in trying to meet all of their needs so that they deem you the perfect friend, partner, relative, parent.

Think about the people who try to be the perfect parent. They often fall into the trap of trying to be their kids’ best friend instead of the person who teaches them how to best make their way through life and what it means to be fully and completely human in the very best sense of what that can mean. Teaching them to love and care and have compassion for themselves and others. Encouraging their dreams. Being there when they fall short. And also teaching them that everything in life comes with consequences – both good and bad - depending on the choices made. Thus, teach them how to make good choices. But nowhere in that is there a demand of doing it perfectly.

Think about the stress we place on ourselves when we hold ourselves to the standard of perfection. “I must succeed in doing the impossible.” Stress eventually wears us down and affects our physical, emotional, and mental health. Anxious, fearful, undermining our strengths and abilities, and what we know as our own sound judgment. We begin to question and doubt ourselves and self-doubt – whether you are doubting yourself or making someone else doubt themselves – is very damaging. Yes, be skeptical so that you can re-examine the way you approach your life and its problems. Yes, learn from that re-examination and that willingness to see things differently. But swan diving into self-doubt because you can’t be perfect is a no win proposition.

The demand of being perfect has been shown to lead to things like eating disorders and PTSD. It has also been linked to such issues as bulimia, anorexia, depression, anxiety, and more. It is not a healthy behavior and yet, I can hear someone thinking – “Well, at least we know what can happen. Perfect.”

Certainly in life, strive to do your best. Putting your best foot forward, in that sense, at work or with friends or family and, most importantly, with yourself, is a good thing. It means that you are open to doing better with everything you do, learning along the way, but also enjoying the journey in a way that demanding perfection never will allow. Some days you will be glorious in your achievements and other days – meh. Welcome to the human experience. Winston Churchill put it best, “"To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often." Change is really the only constant in life, as much as we may tell ourselves we hate change. But when we learn that we can improve almost anything in our lives, just a little bit every day, then we have opened the door to the potential of ongoing happiness and continued success.

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc