Manipulation vs. Leverage
By Nina Atwood
Nick says that when a guy isn’t interested in marriage, it’s usually because he’s not interested in HER (the particular woman he’s dating at that time), at least not interested enough to think of her as a future wife. He validates the reality that putting the question of marriage on the table early is uncomfortable. That’s the point of doing it.
When a guy is uncomfortable talking about marriage as a future goal, he may be sitting in front of the wrong woman. When he can’t engage in a discussion about marriage as a life goal, it may indicate that he’s dating for fun and games only. The point of bringing it up is to gauge the comfort level of the person in front of you. What you want to discover, whether you’re the guy or the girl, is if you’re on the same page about basic life goals, especially marriage.
Manipulation is being silent about your true agenda, going with the flow while you bide your time, reeling someone in, having a plan that you can’t discuss openly. She’s aiming for marriage while he’s dating for fun times/good times. Eventually, she puts the issue on the table with a lot of emotional loading and he feels blind-sided. This isn’t healthy, and often results in settle for relationships.
Using leverage means recognizing when you have a strong attraction with someone who matches your values and basic life goals. With that kind of strong pull toward one another, it’s easy and natural to bring up marriage sometime in the first five dates as a discussion of basic life goals; i.e., “I don’t know yet if we’re right for each other for the long haul – we’ve just begun to get to know each other – but I need you to know that I’m not in this for fun and games. I’m serious about finding someone to share my life with, and if we’re not right for that, I want to move on sooner rather than later. How about you?”
Open, honest, simple, basic, no emotional loading (because you don’t yet have a serious investment), and the opportunity is created for alignment early on. Waiting months for this first discussion of basic life goals puts you at risk for discovering way down the road, after you’re in love, that you are aiming for vastly different targets.
Entry Filed under: Dating
