Guest Post: A Date A Week

“James, I want you to do something for me.” This coming from my advisor usually means that he is going to ask me to do something really hard, but it will push me to become a better person. I replied, “Yeah, of course. What is it?” A slight grin appeared on his face as he replied, “I want you to go on a date a week.” A date a week!! He had to be kidding.

He knows that I am not that type of a social person and that I just stumble on my words whenever I try to talk to a pretty girl. Also, he expected me to have a date a week for the rest of my life. I was not planning on dying anytime soon... Before I could say anything, he told me, “James, I know that if you do this you will prepare yourself for the future, with how to deal with different types of people. In the long run, you will find the correct person to marry."

 Grudgingly I accept the challenge and I left his office. Once I was out of his view I was steaming. This time he had gone to far. He could not seriously think that I was going to follow through with this gone too far. I am not actually going to do this.

 As I let time pass, I cooled off and began to ponder about having a date a week. I still feel as if it was an outrageous request, but I started to see what the purpose he was trying to get at. He wanted me to meet people and make new friends. I have not always had the best of friends in my life. A lot of them led me down some dangerous paths. However, through some help and retribution, I was able to get my life back on track. With the insight that my advisor gave me, I could see why he would invite me to have a date a week, but the idea still bugged me. In my eyes, a date was when you get dressed up, wash the car, go to the store and get flowers or chocolates, and then you go to the girl's house and pick her up. Then you take her out to a nice dinner and to a movie. If you did not notice, my brain was stuck on the typical movie date night. I was not sure how I was going to do this. I did not have that kind of money and the closest thing I had to a girlfriend was the girl taking my order at the McDonalds checkout line. This seemed utterly impossible.

 There were a couple of mindsets that I needed to change if I wanted to survive this challenge. If I wanted to do this to the best of my ability, I would need to figure out what it meant for me to go on a date and what the purpose of dating is. I would also need to figure out how to overcome my social anxiety. As I wrote these things down, I realized that I had a lot of work to do. Luckily, since I was not planning on dying anytime soon, I had plenty of time to figure out what my advisor wanted me to get out of going on a date every week.

While considering the multiple definitions of what a date is, I found myself coming up with two ends of the spectrum. One end would be for the people that think that dating is unimportant and not needed anymore. The other side of the spectrum is that it is dead but still important. After figuring out the two outliers of dating in my mind, I created a graph of dating to help me find the middle ground of dating.

 Starting on the far-left side of dating, I found something very similar to dating. Most people would call this hanging out. Hanging out is a very broad term used to protect ourselves from any emotional damage, because when you hang out there is no commitment or expectation from one person to another. I see it as a person that is looking to go for a swim, but is testing the waters first to make sure there is nothing too dangerous in the water. With my heart being broken multiple times I can understand why people would want to just hang out, so that they can just see if it will lead to something more, without actually putting their heart on the line.     On the far-right side of the spectrum, dating is dead but still important. I figure what people mean by this is that most people do not progress past just hanging out with people. As people in college, I think we can understand why it would be important to date, so that we can have that connection with people and get to know them better. The problem that I see with this side of the spectrum is that people expect too much too fast. They want that perfect Disney ending immediately, without going through the steps to get it. If we are really looking for true love, I believe that is going to take some time. We are not in a movie where things just happen because there's an audience to please in the next two hours. There are actual connections with people, not just toys in our movie of life.

 After considering what goes into the both far sides of the dating spectrum, I decided that the common ground between the two is getting to know someone. For me that is really what both sides want to achieve just in different ways. One wants to just test the waters while avoiding as much pain as possible, while the other expects the results to be immediate. While considering these two sides, I came up with my new definition of a date, being: when you go on a date with someone you are looking to get to know them.

 As I was considering what my purpose of dating was, I thought back to what my advisor said about being able to work with people that have different personalities and how that will also prepare me to become a father. I first had to consider my goals as a person, and I had to think about if getting married was part of my life plan. I would one day like to get married and have kids; that is one of my goals in life. However, I am also very scared of getting married to a person and then it not working out the way I planned. For me, that is where I was able to base my purpose or, I guess I should say purposes, in dating. Throughout the dating process, my purpose is going to change.

 My purpose has to change while I am dating, because if I am trying to decide if I want to marry a girl on my first date with her, then I am not going to see who she really is. All the negative parts of her will be sticking out to me. Thus, the beginning part of dating, for me, will need to be learning who this person is, deciding if they could be my best friend. Being a best friend, for me, is very important. A best friend is a person that will always be there when I need to talk, is the person that I can do anything with, and the person that will just tell me how it is.

Whether hanging out or going on dates it does not matter because you begin to pinpoint what you want in a friend. This has helped me, because then I can find the people that want to build me up and stay away from the people that want to tear me down. What I am looking for in friends are people that will build me up and I will help build them up.

 When looking for a person that will be your best friend for most instances in my life, it has not happened just out of nowhere but it comes in steps over time. This will most likely begin by hanging out. When you hang out, you can get to know them on a basic level. Then, you should move on to dating, because then you will get to know that person better and on a more personal level. You will begin to learn things about yourself because you will see things that you do that annoy people and also things that you like in people then you can start to change things about yourself or you can keep doing the things that make you and other people happy.

 I believe that is what my advisor meant when he told me that if I went on a date a week; it will prepare me for the future. When going on dates with different people, you learn things about them and you will also learn how to deal with people and their issues. It is a principle of how to treat people even when you do not see eye to eye. If we were going to be honest, we all know people that drive us a little crazy. However, if you get to know people and their stories, it makes it easier to get along with them.

 I have seen that is very good to know how to deal with people. I heard a phrase one time from a friend that if you can't beat them, then kill them with kindness. You cannot learn how to do this if you do not have practice. You practice by being around people and talking and doing things with them. This has always been a hard thing for me to do, because I am more of a stick to myself type of guy. I have always been the quiet one in school and people would try to force me to socialize with others. I have made multiple people very upset, because I would rather sit in my own thoughts rather than talk to other people. Both types of people are very necessary to make the world go 'round, because we all have our things that we are good at and that we can offer to the world. With that said, I do think that it is important for all of us to learn whether that is to socialize with people or to learn to take a step back and think. One of the reasons why I think my advisor challenged me to do this is because I am such a quiet person.

Even though I have changed my definition of what a date is does not mean I do not want the same thing. It just means that I see it from a different point of view. In the beginning I was afraid to date. Now I feel that I can embrace dating as me because now I know what I want. I want to make friendships that last.

- James "Stevo" Stevenson