Singles and Dating?
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This Month:
A Dozen Places to Meet Men
30 Things to do Once You've Met Him
Being single can be the most exhilarating and liberating time in your life. Or it can be a time of wanting, desperation, and loneliness. It all depends on how you view your journey. We highly recommend you choose the high road and have the time of your life. If you want romance, love and marriage, or just a date, be vigilant and open to the opportunities and the possibilities that appear on your life path. Live your life, and don't make looking for a mate your sole purpose. Here's some help to guide you along the way. Every month the "Single and Dating?" section will have new and interesting things for singles who just want a great relationship, or get deeper with love and commitment leading to a great marriage.
A Dozen Places to Meet Men
Most great relationships don't begin in bars and clubs so we purposely did not include them because they are rather tiring places to try to meet Mr. Right. Try these instead. Always remember to pursue those things that interest you or try things you've never done, so even if you don't meet a hottie, you still spent time doing things you enjoyed or you learned something new.
- Home fix it and hardware stores – some offer free home fix it classes. Wouldn’t you like to add a dimmer switch in your bed room?
- Sporting events
- Anything to do with cars or computers
- Volunteer or join male-rich organizations in which you share interests or offer to volunteer for special events – conventions, workshops, dinners, etc.
- Dog park – be sure to bring a dog otherwise, you just look desperate
- Bookstores
- Men’s department at high-end clothing stores – you could be shopping for your brother, dad, grandpa, or uncle!
- Enrichment courses at local colleges – finance and investing, real estate, car repair, building computers (building anything!), home repair (plumbing, electricity, etc.), outdoor landscaping, wine tasting, travel, sports, foreign language, etc.
- Join a Co-ed sports team – soccer, flag football, bicycling, running, tennis.
- Join a hobby organization – chess, fly model planes, poker, etc.
- Have a mixer (wine and cheese, cards, celebrate national Potato Day, etc.) – every woman has to invite 2 decent guys that she of course doesn’t have the hots for. Be sure to ask your mother, grandma, aunts, etc. if their friends have sons or grandsons who might be eligible.
- Church – singles groups if you can stand it, but go for the various groups that might attract more men than women – traffic control or event set up for example.
Tried on-line dating yet? We only have a few favorites:
CAUTION!! Remember, no matter how comfortable you feel with someone you meet online they are still a stranger, and you really don't know them. You only know what they've said about themselves which could be true or could be totally made up (they could even lie about their gender and use a photo out of a magazine!). Most sites have dating safety guidelines, make sure you read them, follow them and be safe.
30 Things to do Once You've Met Him
Unless you are going to have an arranged marriage with someone sight unseen, we highly recommend spending time in a variety of situations with your man in order to really get to know him. We didn't list all the traditional stuff that you will do anyway like dinner, movies, parties, clubs, concerts. A lot of the things we have on our list are one-on-one or small gatherings.
You want to see how he handles himself outside of his comfort zone as well as within it, so have some fun and spend time doing things that will foster intimacy as opposed to sex. Keep him so busy that he has to work extra hard to even get to the subject of you dropping your drawers for a roll in the hay. Just in case you didn't know, having sex is the slowest way to get a man to the altar (if the milk is free?) . See the top 10 reasons men won't commit - click here
Our team wracked their brains to come up with 30 things to do with your honey. Many of them are designed to put you in situations where you are doing something (a must for many men), so you can interact physically and talk. Men often talk more easily when they are doing something else and not having to talk face-to-face (feels less confrontational). The first thing you want to do is to ask him what kinds of things he likes to do, and make sure you do some of them too.
- Take a class together –exercise, foreign language, scuba diving, golf, tennis, cooking, painting, car maintenance, dancing - anything you both agree on.
- Work out or go hiking together, train for a road race or a half marathon.
- Volunteer together – help children, the homeless, usher at concerts or plays, Habitat for Humanity, etc. etc. (does he have a favorite charity? That shows a giving spirit).
- Attend church together (is he a participant, an observer, or not interested?)
- Make a list of things neither of you have done but always wanted to and start doing them.
- Attend ethnic or cultural festivals (does he respect other races and cultures, is he willing to learn more?).
- Discover small quaint towns or take short road trips (driving trips are a good time to talk about any and everything).
- Have small get-together's with his friends and yours (observe not only the type of people his friends are, but how he interacts with them, how he treats you around them, and how he treats your friends).
- Do a project together – detail your cars, plant a garden, build something, paint or wallpaper the hallway, etc.
- Have a romantic picnic – each of you bring some of your favorite foods and see what you end up with!
- Buy music together then each pick your favorite song to “dedicate” to each other -(creates a long lasting memory).
- Go to a bookstore and pick out books for each other based on what you know (or think you know) about each other so far.
- Dream together – “If you could do anything in the world…..” If you could live anywhere in the world,” “If you could meet any famous person…” etc. – you get the idea?
- Read a magazine article or book together (let him choose –learning what interests him and if he is a man who reads) – wrapped in each other’s arms.
- Cook together – a candlelight dinner or invite people over.
- Make a list and share with each other of all the things you would like to do before you die.
- Sing and dance together alone – or throw a karaoke party.
- Get a telescope and star gaze together or visit a planetarium.
- Throw a dart at the state map and plan a trip to wherever the dart hits.
- Celebrate occasions that are special just to the two of you – the first time he took his carburetor apart and got it back together, when you hung out at a family gathering all day and didn’t get into it with your sister, – whatever is funny or noteworthy to you.
- Write a letter or poem to each other while together.
- Play games together – outdoors, indoors- basketball, tennis, board games, cards, etc.
- Play 5 questions each – no holds barred.
- Get into a friendly discussion about politics or anything the two of you don’t see eye to eye on, but agree to disagree and passionately kiss whenever someone gets really fired up! (Do not try to make someone think the way you do and ask more than tell – try to really understand what your partner believes and why. Never make fun or negative remarks about what they believe).
- Give him a "whatever you want to do together day," and see what he comes up with - don't put it down.
- Go hot air ballooning.
- Go on a photo safari in your city or at nearby landmark or tourist attraction. Process them at a one hour photo shop and mix your and his to make each of you an album of your day together over pizza.
- Attend cultural events in town – galleries, jazz clubs, plays, poetry readings, comedy clubs.
- Make a CD of his 10 favorite songs and your 10 favorite songs and listen attentively.
- Share your 2, 5, and 10 year personal plans (what you want to accomplish personally, professionally) or if you don’t have any, talk about it and help each other to formulate them.
- Is he legitimatley self-sufficient (employed, owns a business) or is he currently (or has a pattern) living off of a woman (whether a relative, a girlfriend or a wife).
- Is he really single and truly straight? If one or the other is not the case take off now, neither will change significantly enough to make a relationship work. Men who date while married will do that to you too honey. Gay men don't make good husbands for straight women - just believe it okay? By the way, men who claim they like women and have sex with men but say they aren't homosexual are lying to themselves and to you. Heterosexual men DO NOT do men - they just don't - ever.
- Can he give you an incurable or deadly disease if you have intimate contact with him? Back when your parents were dating they didn't have to ask to see recent test results, today you need to. Sounds unromantic? How does HIV, AIDS, Herpes, Hepatitis, or any other sexually transmitted disease (click here for the facts) sound?
- Is he addicted to anything? (drugs, alcohol, tobacco, porn, etc.) If he is, he doesn't need a woman right now, he needs to figure out why he desires to destryoy the one life he has and get clean. Some will, some won't, and only that person can make that choice.
- Does he have a plan for his life and is he working it? - Men don't do well when they are meandering through life (who does?-; they need to be working towards a goal, achieving and accomplishing, conquering something in order to feel good about themselves Watch out for excuses.
- Does he try to isolate you from friends and family, wanting all of your time instead, or is suspicious when you are with others and not with him? This is not because he is just so darn crazy about you - men like this have a high probability of being extremely needy to downright abusive and very dangerous. If he can't trust you without knowing exactly where you are, you can't trust him at all - go and go fast.
- Does he respect you in his words and actions and treat you how you wish to be treated? Pushing, shoving, hitting, slapping, name calling are all completely and totally unacceptable behavior and you should not tolerate it at all. You must have basic respect and agreement of how you treat each other. If he is already an adult and doesn't get this, he never may since treating people with basic respect is something he should have learned by the time he was five. What you start out with you usually end up with because people don't magically change!
- Does he want you to buy him things, pay his bills, get him a cell phone, loan him money, pay his car note, or want to use your credit card, etc.? Send him packing. He wants to use you not partner with you, and his credit and financial management skills are so bad he can't and won't do any of those things on his own.
Dating Cautions - Give Your Relationship a Chance
Sadly we must look at the down side to relationships and what makes them start off or go bad. To give love and romance a chance, and hoping that it becomes a wonerful relationship or a great marriage you must start off with the right stuff. For women especially, our heads sometimes get stuck in the clouds and the glaring red flags look a pretty pink despite what your girlfriends are trying to get you to see. Never be so desperate or head over heels that you can't take a step back and evaluate. The following are the basics you need to make sure you don't get into to begin with for any hope of a successful relationship:
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