You've dated a lot. And the last time that you were set up with someone, or had a "Match date," you were hoping that the mystery person would finally be the right person and that you wouldn't have to date anymore. And you were probably hoping that this date would really see you for who you really were; that they would appreciate your good qualities, and unselfishly give you their attention. You may have been hoping that they would not be like the last person you dated or with whom you had a relationship.
Face it: these really present people are difficult to find. And while waiting to stumble upon one, you've probably been busy trying to protect yourself from all the other self-absorbed, negative, boring, tedious, and selfish people out there.
So how do you avoid wasting your time with these kinds of people without shutting down?
The answer may surprise you.
Quit judging. Start delighting. Stop sizing-up everyone you meet. Instead, start really seeing people and appreciating everyone for who they are.
Now you're thinking, well, isn't that sweet and theoretical. Of course she can't possibly mean I'm supposed to apply this to people I might date! If I don't size people up, how will I know who to avoid, or who I want to pursue? Won't I set myself up for more trouble or disappointment if I don't carefully analyze my options and possibilities?
These questions imply the existence of the omnipotent list. Whether yours is a mental list or explicitly written out like a grocery list, the list is what we have decided is our minimum acceptable standard and, by golly, this list has power! We're not going to settle for anything less this time! That list is also omnipresent. It goes with us everywhere, on the airplane, to the grocery store, to get gas, to the cleaners, wherever people are, we've got the list.
So, in order to address this legitimate question of how to practically "quit judging and start delighting", I'm got to tell you about an illuminating experience I recently had at a party where the conversation turned to the topic of dating. All of the women with me in the conversation expressed dissatisfaction with "the dating scene". One middle-aged woman even went as far to encourage the young woman in the group not to date in order to avoid all the losers and jerks she was sure to encounter out there. I was silent during her man-bashing, until she turned to me and said, "Come on! You're not saying anything. Tell her what I'm saying is true."
I'm afraid what I said didn't exactly accomplish her objective.
"I cannot agree with you," I said. "As an adult, I've never had a bad date. I've actually met tons of interesting men and had an absolute blast along the way."
After all the booing and hissing stopped, someone challenged me, "You can't tell us that you've never gone out with a jerk!"
"Yes I can. I've never gone out with a jerk." I continued, "And I attribute that record to this one fact: I always delight in the person I am with even if that person is not the one with whom I want to spend the rest of my life. I put my list aside and just enjoy the person, their journey, their life, and the new window they open for me through which I can see the world!"
The man-basher jumped all over this answer, "Yeah, but, how do you delight in someone who is a real creep? There are so many creepy, I mean, really creepy guys out there. Are you telling us that you would DELIGHT in a rapist?"
"No, I'm not saying that. Of course you should have a reasonable idea about a man's strength of character before you go out with him. If he doesn't have integrity, don't go anywhere with him."
"Well isn't that easy to say?" the man-basher laughed sarcastically, "The trouble is ALL men represent themselves as having integrity and THEN you find out who they really are later! You can ask them all the right questions and they will give you all the right answers. But that doesn't tell you anything!"
(BTW: If this would have been a group of men having the same conversation, it would have gone like this: "They ALL start out nice, but later they ALL turn into the B word'." Or, as one of my good friends says, "The babe you think is so hot just made some other guy's life a living hell!")
First of all, one doesn't find out who a person is by asking and answering polite questions back and forth. You find out who a person is by noticing who they are to other people. An old adage says it well; You can tell more about people by what they say about others than by what others say about them (or what they say about themselves). Or, this one; if you want to know what a person is really like, watch the way they treat people from whom they have nothing to gain.
For instance, you'll get a clue if someone is misrepresenting themselves or is going to do a Dr. Jekyll / Mr. Hyde-change later when you ask them about their former relationships. Notice if they are just as respectful and generous when discussing their EX, their parents, their former bosses, etc. as they are being to you right now. Also watch how they interact with people in their path, i.e. the waiter, the clerk, the traffic, etc. However they treat these people is exactly the same manner you will be treated when the newness of your relationship wears off.
Part of the problem with this approach is that we are often so negative ourselves that we don't even notice the other person's negative behavior as a big, waving-in-the-breeze-for-everyone-to-see, red flag! Here lies the real danger! Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character."
Another part of the problem is that we are hearing what we want to hear. We can be so optimistic when we are desperate to find what we want! We have this incredible knack for believing the best (even though someone is spewing negativity) until they later disappoint us. Then we quickly go back to the I-told-you-so mode.
Last, but, by no means, least, there is the it-takes-one-to-know-one problem. If you are not a person of integrity yourself, how do you know if the other person is? You have to BE the person you want to meet: which means, no fudging on your age, your stories, your history.
If you want people to be honest with you, you MUST be honest with them. Honesty begets honesty. Humility begets humility. Arrogance begets arrogance. Fear begets fear. And if you think someone won't give you a chance if they know certain things about you, then they are not the person you are looking for anyway. As Mary Anne Williamson says in Return To Love, "If it's not your train, don't try to get on it. Your train is coming later and you don't want to miss it."
A Chinese proverb says, "Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are." When you are yourself that's when you become delightful to others. Gertrude Stein said, "No one real is boring." And let me add some Dr. Seuss wisdom to this thought. I think he had it right: "Today you are you. That is truer than true. No one can be youer than you!" And, when we are relaxed and real, then we have the emotional freedom to really see others.
Most of us have stopped really seeing people around us. Instead, we look right through each other and straight at our own agendas. And, by agendas, I'm not just talking about schedules, rather our own self-protection and what we have decided we need in life, i.e. the list! We walk past people all the time because we have determined in a nanosecond that we have no interest in them. We go on a blind date and as soon as our prey fails one of our litmus tests, we disengage. We write people off our list with a flick, or we push the mute button while pretending to listen to people with whom we are forced to politely interact.
If we want to get better results with relationships, we have to change this habit of discounting (or even calculating) the worth of every human being that crosses our paths.
In my own experience, changing this behavior has been critical to finding the right people, the miracles in my life. Even if I meet someone who is obviously self-absorbed, dishonest, or otherwise scary, I avoid the self-protection mode and, instead, take the time to appreciate their pain, their journey, their humanity. This type of presence with people is rare. It is always noticed. And, whether they acknowledge it at the time, it always works miracles in other people.