Dating With Intentionality

“A lot of the challenges we face today as singles center around the confusion of intentionality. The standards of our culture leave us believing it is okay to date with selfish intent—to date without purpose, with no plan, without deliberate acknowledgement and respect for the other person’s feelings, heart, and emotions.” Brandy Coty–Single Matters

The word that stands out to me the most in the quote above is ‟purpose.” I expect that word stood out to a lot of you as well. It has stood out to the fifty million people who have bought a copy of The Purpose-Driven Life.

What are we here for? What are we supposed to be doing with our lives? How do we even find out the answers to these questions?

To live a life without purpose is to meander about our existence aimlessly, being blown about helter skelter like a hamburger wrapper in the wind. That´s no way to live our lives, and I think most of us are aware of that. So why would we date that way? It doesn´t make sense when you think of it like that. The problem is that we don´t tend to think about it like that if we are in the act of doing it.

This was me twenty years ago. I had married and divorced my high school sweetheart. Now I had to start dating again, something I hadn´t done since I was a teenager. I had no idea how to go about it. What were the rules again? Were they different now? I hadn´t been single since the age of fifteen, and I was out of my depth.

Two smartphones, each with an image of a red neon heart — 21st Century Love Connection. (amrothman/Pixabay)

Technology to the Rescue!

So, how does a cave-dwelling introvert such as myself go about meeting women? I supposed leaving the house would be involved, which is more challenging than normal for someone with social anxiety.

Fortunately for me, science was keeping pace with my life, and had developed not only the internet, but dating sites! But which one to pick?

Because I didn´t know the first thing about dating with intentionality, my criteria were pretty weak. I was broke, so it needed to be a free site. And…that´s about as far as I got.

I was still a baby Christian at this point, so I wasn´t familiar with the concept of praying for God´s will in a mate. I didn´t even know what I was looking for myself, much less what God had in mind for me. To be honest, I probably shouldn´t have been looking at all. I was a textbook example of dating without purpose. And here´s where it got me.

My Dating Hall of Shame

Website #1—I don´t remember the names of any of these websites, and it´s just as well. I got a little excited when 24 hours after signing up on this one, I had some 100% matches! The first was a dominatrix seeking a submissive. I am thinking they should have asked some more detailed background questions?
Website #2—This one had a chat feature, which was cool. So, I am chatting with this nurse, when she asks if I want to see the tattoo she just got. I´m not really into tattoos, but sure, I said, why not? She sent me a pic, which showed a good deal more than just where the tattoo was. She then broke the ensuing awkwardness by saying I was too short for her, and that was that.
Website #3—Actually got a date from this one! It wasn´t really that great though. She was nice, but a bit insecure. I found out how insecure the following week when I went back to that site to try again. I found a profile that looked all right and sent an inquiry. It was the same girl. As it turned out, she had made multiple profiles to trap guys that she thought might be cheating on her. So that was the end of that.
Website #4—Got an actual date from this one too. Turned out to be a former co-worker from about seven years before. This was my first lesson in dating with intentionality. She was. Robustly. By the time we finished dinner, I felt that she was disappointed that she didn´t get a marriage proposal on the first date. Never heard from her again.

Making Melody on eHarmony

Of all people, it was actually my ex-wife who saved me from this soul-sucking cycle of dating without purpose.

One weekend when she was dropping the kids off for visitation, she noticed that I had one of these sites up on my computer screen. (I had my computer set up in the dining room because single guy.) She saw my sad little results page and just looked at me and said, ‟What are you doing?” Out of pity, she told me about a site called eHarmony.com .

Soon afterward (maybe that night, I don´t remember), I decided to check it out. The first thing I saw was $49.95/month. Nope. That broke the first, and only, rule. After a couple of days, reason took over. You get what you pay for, and you pay for what you get. Free wasn´t getting me anywhere, so perhaps an investment was in order. I plunked down $49.95 for a one-month membership.

I did something that the site discouraged by putting my kids in my profile picture. At least I had the sense to be up front with anyone who was looking about what they would be getting themselves into.

I could tell right away that this was a different ball game. eHarmony had multiple stages of getting to know prospective dates before you ever met them, from multiple choice to open-ended questions, a must have/can´t stand list, to free conversation. At any stage, if it didn´t feel right, you could just click a button and eHarmony would handle the ‟it´s not you, it´s me” awkwardness. Neat system!

After a few days, they matched me with a community college educator named Diana.

She ‟fast-tracked” me, which is where you skip over some of those steps and go straight to open communication. I was froke out by this at first. Was this woman the black hole of emotional need? No, as it turned out, she only had a couple of weeks left in the six-month membership she had bought, and she wanted to be sure we had enough time to really talk to each other.

We quickly found out we were able to make each other laugh. I told her that the word ‟soulmate,” so prevalent on eHarmony, just ‟gave me a rash.” She told me she had three questions to see if I was first-date material: Was I an axe murderer? Was I a cross-dresser? And Did I have all my teeth?

I responded, ‟Not an axe murderer, still have all except my wisdom teeth, and that incident with the black negligee was blown completely out of proportion.” It worked. She agreed to meet me for dinner.

Now it was my turn for a test. I still didn´t know what the ideal woman was, but I knew we had to be food-compatible for a relationship to be viable. I asked her where she wanted to meet. She said, ‟Well, to me the Italians can do no wrong for food.” My mother is Italian. Good answer.

She also mentioned that she didn´t get a nervous stomach around men, so she wouldn´t be one of those gals who just ordered a salad and water because she didn´t want to eat in front of a man. I said that was good, because I liked to cook, so what use to me is a girlfriend who wouldn´t eat? She responded, ‟I think I like you.”

The Last First Date

We met at an Italian restaurant in the city where we both worked. Neither one of us had first-date jitters, because eHarmony´s system had taken care of that. By the time you actually meet one of your connections in person, you have already moved past the initial awkwardness. It just feels comfortable, like you have known them much longer than a couple of weeks.

Long story short, we opened the restaurant, we closed the restaurant, and we hung out in the parking lot for another hour after closing. As we decided it was finally time to bring our evening to an end, she asked me two words that changed my life.

Hand underlining "What's Next" on whiteboard in red marker — Marco Verch/ccnull.de

There are two ways to look at that question.

A guy would typically think of what´s next chronologically. A second date perhaps? That´s about as far down the road as we typically look.

The other way to look at that question is through the lens of intentionality. What´s next for the rest of my life? While men think about planning each step of the journey, women tend to look further down the road to the destination.

Oddly, on that evening, it was Diana thinking about the first thing and me thinking about the second one. What WAS next for the rest of my life? Wandering without purpose certainly held no appeal. The Bible wasn´t really any help (Hint: don´t read 1 Corinthians 7 for dating advice).

Then I realized what was actually behind the question. She was giving me an out. I learned what I needed to know about dating with intentionality at that moment. Diana knew what she wanted and was not going to settle for less. She was 39 years old and never married when we met. She made it clear that she didn´t need me. As a single woman, she did not feel like half of something. She was complete in and of herself. Yet, although she didn´t need me, she seemed to want me.

This is when I discovered that being wanted is so much more attractive than being needed. This damsel was not anywhere in the vicinity of distress. She was giving me a chance to escape, but I didn´t want to leave.

The Takeaway

Although I write about relationships a lot, I still don´t consider myself an expert. I certainly did not intend this article as a how-to guide for dating. Every individual is different, and so is the dynamic of every couple.

I will say this, though. If you choose to date, be intentional. Date with purpose. Know where and what the target is before you fire off any arrows. Anything less is a waste of time, for both you and your partner. We don´t know how much time we have left on this earth, so count your days, and make your days count.

And if you think dating with intentionality is arduous work, wait till you get married!