Is timing everything in dating?

#brunchtalk: Is timing everything in dating?

00:00:00 - 00:05:00

This episode is brought to you by the one love foundation. Many stories on true crime podcasts start with abusive relationships. The numbers of people affected by relationship abuse are startling. Over one in three women, nearly one in three men and over one in two trans non binary people will be in an abusive relationship in their lifetimes. Abusive relationships rarely start with physical abuse. Instead, there are often red flags like manipulation, isolation, belittling, and volatility. Not all unhealthy relationships become abusive, but all abusive relationships start out as unhealthy ones. One love foundation, a national nonprofit dedicated to ending relationship abuse and creating a world of healthier relationships wants to empower you to see the signs of an unhealthy relationship before things go too far. Go to join one love dot org to see the signs, and know how to help a friend who may be in an unhealthy relationship. That's join one love dot org and learn how to spot the signs of unhealthy and healthy relationship behaviors. The dateable podcast is an insider's look into modern dating that The Huffington Post calls one of the top ten podcasts about love and sex. On each episode, we'll talk to real daters about everything from sex parties to sex droughts, date fails to diaper fetishes and first moves to first loves. I'm your host UA shoe, former dating coach turned dating sociologist. You also hear from my co host and producer Julie Kraft chick as we explore this crazy dateable world. It is our favorite time of the weekend, which is brunch because we get to do brunch talk. Welcome to brunch talk by the date of the podcast. We dive into your burning dating questions, help facilitate some crowdsource answers. And so we don't have to navigate this alone. We can do this together over brunch. I love when people tell us that they'll play this on a Sunday morning and make their food at their home and it's almost like we're there with them. Just chatting away. That is such a great feeling to hear. And you know, this started off as an experiment. And we've got in such good response and feedback from it in the questions. Keep coming in, so we're really excited this is take it off. We've also heard that we have some new listeners who came in through brunch talk and maybe have only listened to brunch talks. So this is just a reminder that we do have a longer episode that drops every Tuesday or Wednesday, whatever your time zone you're on. But that episode explores a deeper topic, usually with an expert or with a guest, so they're two different formats of shows and the other one's a little bit longer, but just so you know if you're just coming in through brunch talk, we do have another show during the week. This is like your side and that's the full meal, so. If you're warming up with the side dish, it's time to upgrade to the entree. Or maybe you're just not that hungry, so you just want a little side dish today, and then when you were hungry, you're ready for the main dish. Are we still talking about our podcast? No, I'm just kidding. Exactly. Should we just cut out now and go to brunch? Yeah. Yeah. We won't do that. But we will cut out now and get to the question, the meaty question. Oh, yes. Of this, do vegetarians say meaty? Do they go, oh, that's a new topic. Sorry, vegetarian listeners were like losing your appetite as we speak. Maybe I don't know, vegetarians tell us you say, oh, that's a leafy topic. We should start using that. I'll leafy topic. Let's make it a thing. We'll be plant forward from now on. I want to be inclusive. The question for this episode is is timing everything in dating. One of our favorite questions and I feel like we can't even count the amount of times we've gotten a form, a variation of this question, but one came in recently and the more details on this question. I'm finding myself in this current dilemma. We both have this undeniable connection, one that I've never experienced before. However, outside factors have made it almost impossible to grow further together. And if we both made some priority adjustments, we could possibly try to make it work again. Is timing everything or is this the wrong person? I mean, we played around with the formula for a while. Is it the person? Is it timing? And I think we can ultimately say that it has to be a combination of both. I'm sure that's not what you want to hear. But if you find the right person by the timing doesn't work out, that's actually not the right person. It's funny that we separate the two. Like, oh, there are external factors that are preventing us from being together. That means that's not the right person. So this is why we hold on to the concept of like the one that got away or the gold standard because we think, oh, we found the right person. It just wasn't the right time. No such thing. If the timing was right, that person wasn't right. We always hear right person wrong time.

00:05:00 - 00:10:01

Nope. Nope. Wrong time wrong person, basically. Yep. And I agree. I think I was victim to this for years. I thought that I had found the right person, just some personal things had to change on his side and then once it did, everything would be good. Spoiler alert, it never did. And I think actually being removed from the situation, all the things that I thought it was outside. Of course, those were still factors. I don't want to diminish that life happens and sometimes life does get in the way because it's not like dating is our only thing that's happening in our worlds. That being said, I do believe that the right person will want to make it work. And it doesn't mean that they don't want to, that they're a bad person, and they didn't have feelings for you, but maybe they're just not in the place to make it work. It almost doesn't matter what the reason is, all that matters is that they're not committing. And it took me entering this new relationship. I don't know why I knew it's been a year and a half. But the relationship I'm currently to realize that it was a commitment issue. That's what the core was that we don't know the circumstance in this response that came in from our listener that there's reasons why they're growing apart, maybe distance of where you live, like there can be a lot of these factors, but at the end of the day, unless you're going to make it work by making some changes, then it almost doesn't matter what the reason is. I think a reframe of this question could be, what is the formula for a healthy, sustaining relationship? Yes. And that formula is a combination of the mutual attraction, basic foundational attraction, plus the willingness to build a life together. Yes. And when we're talking about timing, I think, a very important question to ask your partner is, what is the life we want to build together? And if you're not aligned on that, then you're with the wrong person. And I've given this example a few times when I was in my 20s, I met someone who's ready to lock it down, get married, and have kids. He did everything right. This man treated me so well. He was such a wonderful person. I can honestly say, write person, I guess anybody could say, that's a right person. We did all the right things. But our life goals at that time were different. He wanted to move to the suburbs and start having kids already. We were living in New York City. I wasn't even done exploring New York yet. I would have been happy with someone who was committed to exploring more of the city life and grow within the city life first, but we didn't see eye to eye on that. So yeah, some could argue right person wrong time. No, just a wrong person for me, despite him being a wonderful partner. And that doesn't mean, I don't think you should hold out for someone, but it doesn't mean that you can't come into each other's orbits. At a later point, I'm thinking of you and your current partner. There were many years that you knew each other, not that you were in the mentality of like, is this the right person, but it wasn't the right person for either one of you because of where you both were in your life. And then it became the right person. I do think that's different though than holding on for someone to become the right person with the right time. That feels like a recipe for failure. I think if that's going to happen, it just needs to happen organically. Taken for someone that wasted in my opinion too many years. Holding out for that. So I think that it's one of those things that it's really easy to justify, like if only this changed or that changed. But what is the current situation? You have to be realistic with what that is and move in your life accordingly. And if so much, you happen to become aligned in the future. That's amazing, but it's more of the exception than the rule. And this question I hope will show that to be more flexible in who you are in a relationship. I think as we get older, we've heard this and I'm guilty of this. It's like, you feel like you're a certain identity. I'm this person. I'm a city person and I'm never going to move to the suburbs. I'm never going to do that. And in a relationship, it doesn't work like that. It's like, how can I be the right person for my partner every day? And when you choose not to be the right person, that's when you kind of part ways. So I think a good way to look at this is in any relationship. Is you have the choice to be the right person for your partner and can you be flexible in the things that you've hung on to forever, we all have that identity that we hang on to and being nimble in that, I think, is really a good recipe for a good relationship. It's like, how do you define bright person? We're defining it as someone you have a long-term partnership with. And I feel like that was the way the question was phrased too, right? Like we're not doing it anymore because of these obstacles. That being said, baby, it's redefining what that means fully because I think you can have a connection with someone and they don't end up being your life partner, even like I think about soul mates versus life partners. You can have someone come into your world and absolutely change it.

00:10:01 - 00:15:02

And that's still a success in dating. I know I was just talking about time wasted with my past partner that wasn't going to commit, but I actually take that back because I think it actually set me up for today. And I don't want to diminish the connection that was there, even though it didn't end up being a life partner. The part where you go wrong or where I went wrong was trying to take something that's more of that soulmate connection or even if you don't want to use the word soulmate just the connection that's not for the long haul and trying to make it be a life partner. That's where I think there is a differentiation that needs to happen. I'm glad you brought that up because we do hang on to these narratives in a relationship. For some of you, it's the meet Q. Just because of this great meet cute, you feel like you have to carry on with this relationship because it's such a great story. You were meant to be. Okay, I recently met someone whose brother was going through a bad divorce and what he ended up doing was he revisited an old friend of his from college and they reignited their connection. So at the time that he had met his wife, you're also met this woman, and then when that marriage dissipated, he came back for this other woman. And in the moment it felt very romantic, like this was meant to be all these years missed connections. Now we're absolutely together. At the end, you kind of have to say it was just another relationship and it was another learning and she was hanging on to the idea of, oh, this is someone coming back into my life. This has to be it. We're meant to be, but they were completely incompatible for each other. So they yes, yeah. You can't hang on to this narrative because guess what? We're not trying to make movies out of our relationships. This is your life, stop hanging on to what you're trying to write and just let the story play out naturally. Don't force it. I am so glad you brought that up because I think the meet cute story is such a big part of the story. Before we go further, let's hold that thought for a quick message. This episode is brought to you by the one love foundation. The numbers of people affected by relationship abuse are startling. Abusive relationships rarely start with physical abuse. Instead, they're often bred flags, like manipulation, isolation, belittling, and volatility. Do you know the signs? One law foundation, a national nonprofit dedicated to ending relationship abuse, empowers you to see the signs of an unhealthy relationship before things go too far. Visit join one love dot org and learn to spot the signs of unhealthy and healthy relationship behaviors. This episode is brought to you by gobble, gobble delivers Gourmet, freshly prepped 15 minute meal kits right to your doorstep. 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Again, go to gobble dot com slash dateable 6 three 6. I want to also talk about you only know what you know. I think for me, I'll use my own example because it's easiest. I thought this was the once in a lifetime connection because it was the most connected to anyone that I ever felt before. Now, in retrospect, when I have a partner that is more of a life partner, we're doing life together, feels much more committed in every way. I realize that that was definitely not as serious as I thought it was. But to me, at the time, it was the most serious thing that I had. So a lot of times we say, is it the right person or the wrong time? We have to look at, is this actually what I'm looking for? If you look and think about what you want in a partner, I'm assuming someone that shows up consistently. Someone who is there for you, through thick and thin, like that person usually isn't if there's some big reason why they can't be fully committed to you. So I think that's just another thing to think about, what is the definition here of the right person? Is it just because it's the most connected we felt? That doesn't mean that that is our soulmate the one. There could be someone out there that you have the same thing with or better in a different way that there aren't these barriers because you're both just want to do it.

00:15:02 - 00:20:00

You both want to be together. We create barriers. We create them. They're like artificially made. We create these barriers because, again, we want to, it's almost like we want to create friction. We want to create this idea that we have to work hard for this. What's the romantic mounted decline? This thing will win someone over. It's all the rom coms in Disney movies we watched. And it is so dumb because we end up writing off people who actually make it easy for us. Yes. But then we think, oh, maybe this is too easy. Why is this? Why is this going so well? Why are we hearing that? Why is this going so well? There must be something wrong. I'm going to look for that something wrong. What if we can change our perspective on how the story should go and just let it play out naturally instead of looking for these mountains to climb? Because guess what? Some of the best relationships there are no mountains to climb. Imagine that. It's just smooth. I mean, it's not easy, no relationship is easy, but you are able to climb some hills. That's okay. Maybe some bumps. Right. But there is no fucking mountains for you to climb, stop trekking along. Especially in the first couple months. Like, that's the honeymoon. If it's not easy then, it's only gonna get harder. I feel like relationships, at least to buy a video, get harder over time. The beginning part is everyone's just in the love hormones and you know, that's what it should be fairly easy. And if it's not then, then this person probably doesn't have the same plan or like priorities as you. What do you think about this, Julie? Because you're going to know exactly what I'm talking about. Oh, goodness. It goes something like this. I'm seeing someone. I really like them. They say they're just not ready for me or this relationship right now. But once they move or once they get the job or once they finish school or once they're mom, it moves out of the house, then they'll be ready for this relationship. It's the if and then you can't see me unless you're odd our YouTube channel, but I know there's always gonna be another reason. I really, I don't know, I'm so torn because that the saying like if they wanted to, they would. Like, I don't love that saying either because I do believe there are some life things. Like I don't think it's just like as black and white as what that's saying is. Okay, let's take the example, this person that just needs to finish school. That's their priority right now. That's great. You know, there's nothing wrong with that, but holding out for this person to finally be ready. It just feels like it's so much easier to go find someone that's already ready. It sees the value in front of them. If you two happen to reconnect in a year or two years and it takes off immediately from there, great by all means do it. For someone I feel like that did wait around for someone. I don't think you should wait around for someone because it's never going to resolve, I think. You're creating resentment from the beginning of the relationship. Because let's say you wait for this person and you do end up together. As the person who has been waiting, you're thinking, well, you better pay me back for my time. Relationship worthwhile if that relationship doesn't work out, you place a 100% of the blame on the other person because you're like, well, I did my part. I waited. The waiting game never bodes well, because every day we're changing, so you're actually waiting for a different person to be aligned with you in the future. We can not predict the future, even if this person finishes their goals, they could want different things. Once those goals are finished, they're basically telling you I don't want to be with you right now. That's all you need to hear. I don't want to be with you right now. There's this other example of, how about this? I'm dating someone who doesn't have much relationship experience. They don't want to be with me, but I really feel like I'm the best option for them. I'm going to let them date around and see and I know they'll come back and know that I am the best person for them. Now, because also no, not everyone needs to date a hundred people before they find someone that's a good fit for them. So that's one BS right there. If they are the type of person that wants to date around, that's the stage of life that they're in. It's not like I don't know why we're thinking it needs to be that in order for it to be this. I see those as two independent constructs completely. I agree. The wedding I went to last weekend, we sat at a table where most of the couple's met in college or shortly after college and they've only been with each other and they're going strong and when I dug into why their relationship was so strong it's because they've dated multiple people within that relationship. You don't need to date physically different people. They've just been changing and evolving so much that even 5 years ago they felt like the relationship was completely different.

00:20:00 - 00:25:01

And I really admire that because that is what creates the bond between two people. It's like you're evolving and changing together. You don't need to be sleeping around with other people to know, oh hey, I really should be with this person. If anything, it's probably just going to make them realize I really just want to keep sleeping around. I mean, all these scenarios all they're doing as, you know, I'm a big Hollywood mother fan, but there was this episode that they called basically you're on someone's hook. And it was a chain of one Ted the bad character had this girl. He was pursuing that she had a guy that she was pursuing. And it was just like a chain and he had a girl that was pursuing him that he had on the hook. And that's all it's doing this right now. And that in that episode, that's why I thought of it. It would be like, I'm really into you, but not right now. And that right there was like, I want a relationship, but not right now. That was like the hook right there, the right now. But we're living for the right now. We gotta be evaluate your choices right now. And yes, we can look at the potential of someone. But that potential is not a fact. It's not fully realized. It's just a concept. The right now is fully formed. It's tangible, it's in front of you, and you can really truly judge this person that your relationship based on the right now. Yeah. I mean, I'm going to throw it back to another brunch talk we did. The difference between settling and being picky are you for what brunch talk. But we did a list of the only 7 things that matter in a partner. In the first one was consistency in how they're showing up. And we said it if that's not there, all the other ones don't matter. Again, pending you're looking for a long-term committed relationship. But with this whole thing with the right person right time, if things were different, we could be together. The reality is that's number one is missing. In some way. Or you wouldn't be asking this question in the first place. So it almost doesn't matter what the rest of that connection looks like unless you just want to say it's the right connection for the fleeting moment. But that's usually not the right person. That's not the right person. It's a good moment to have. It's not love, though. The one, right? If you believe in the one, yes. Yeah, if you believe in the one, that's a whole other topic. Oh my God, but no, but the most dangerous thing that can come out of this right person thing is believing that they're the one and waiting for it. I probably sound like a broken record on that, but that is the biggest learning I've had in my dating life and I think I hope that could get past to people is like, we need to separate reality with fantasy. Like what's actually happening versus what do we want to be happening? And you know, it's really nice to live in the world of, oh, in a month when they're done with school or when they move closer. Next year, it's a nice space to be in because it's not reality of being like damn this sucks we can't be together. I get it. It's like, I know what some of you in this situation are thinking, but they treat me like we're already in a relationship. They've introduced me as their boyfriend girlfriend partner, whatever, but their actions aren't lining up to what you're hoping to happen. So it's very easy for people to act coupling. I know that's what gets you confused. But we do have to know that imagine if someone act a couple with you and actually was proud and wanted to be in a relationship with you versus someone who just acts coupling but then says I don't want to be with you, maybe later. Hot and cold. Imagine how much better it could be, yeah. Don't be with that. That's what settling is. We often misuse this word. Oh, I don't want to settle for someone less than me. No. You're settling for someone who's not giving you what you want. That acetylene and that's type of settling. We will not settle for. That is the ultimate satellite paradox. Why we think that we can't settle for someone under 6 feet, yet we can settle for being treated like wishy washy, situation chip, no clear committed future, like what? That makes a dose that's no sense. No sense. Okay, anybody listening. We're getting heated here and there's a good reason for this because we know you have a friend who needs to hear this right now. Send them this episode. Help them get out of their own hellhole of waiting or thinking about timing or what ifs and then send it to their friend who needs to hear this right now or maybe you're the one who needed to hear this right now. Repeat it to it. We wish. Ten times over. We wish we had listened to this. Oh my God. Before we got into the waiting game of this, is it? It's just a timing. No. Get over that fact, share this with a friend, replay it. Your friend will very much appreciate it. The reason why we are so passionate about it because for all the hours that the two of us could get back for this. So we're here to do the work for you to already go through this misery. So you don't have to do it again. And I know it's a nice romantic story to tell yourself that love conquers all.

00:25:01 - 00:28:16

It doesn't. And if it truly does, you'll reconnect at some point. But don't hold out for it. Yeah, love is built. Love has created love does not save you, okay? It's not a given. It's something you create together. So if someone's not willing to create that love for you or with you, it can not conquer it because they never existed in the first fucking place, okay? We're telling you this because we've done our 10,000 hours, consider as experts in the waiting and timing game. You're welcome. Do we want to be experts at this? I don't know, but we are. Thanks for coming to our TED Talk. You're welcome. This is what we should do our TED Talk on. I feel like we're heated on this one. Yeah, we should. It's because we know there's something better out there and we know that when you are thinking that timing is the reason you end up adapting to this other person, opposed to putting your needs first. So it's coming from a place of love. It's coming from, if any of this felt like it was a little tough love and hard hitting. It's because we know that person is out there that can not freaking wait to be with you and how much better is that than having someone that's half in it. We don't want just a tip. It's never not just never a good feeling. The whole fucking thing. Okay. That can mean so much more. So much more, but happy brunch hope you all are enjoying your meals or your walks, whatever activity you're doing right now. Keep sending in these questions, like we said, we never run out of questions. We never stop answering questions, send them in, no question is bad for this show. We'll try to get to every question. So send those in, you can email us hello at dateable podcast dot com or you can DM us on Instagram at dateable podcast. We'll see you next week. Bye. The dateable podcast is part of the frolic podcast network. Find more podcasts you'll love at frolic media slash podcasts. Want to continue the conversation? First, follow us on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter with the handle at dateable podcast. Tag us in any post with a hashtag stay dateable and trust us. We look at all those pose. Then head over to our website dateable podcast dot com. There you'll find all the episodes as well as articles, videos, and our coaching service with vetted industry experts. You can also find our premium Y series where we dissect, analyze, and offer solutions to some of the most common dating conundrums. We're also downloadable for free on Spotify, Apple podcasts, Google Play, overcast, stitcher radio, and other podcast platforms. Your feedback is valuable to us, so don't forget to leave us a review. And most importantly, remember to stay dateable. Hear that. That's the sound of a patient whose health data is protected from a cyberattack. And that, that's the sound of a financial system that's digitally secured from bad actors. Right now, there's an invisible war being fought on a digital battlefield that impacts what we do every day. That's why at periton, we do that can't be done to help protect the vital systems we rely on, because if we don't, the alternative is unimaginable, periton.