Being honest
with yourself and about your date, and clearly knowing what you desire from the
dating relationship are the only ways to ensure that those desires will e met,
or if not, that you won’t suffer needless disappointment.
23. Managing Expectations While Dating
The fact of
dating means that you will have some expectations, hopes and anticipation.
Those emotions are important because they help to put a lot of excitement into
your dating experience. But they also have to be kept in check as they can also
work to your disadvantage.
In dating, you
will justifiably expect to spend time with the person and to be a part of their
private world. In getting to know the person, in sharing information about
yourself and in getting information about the individual, you have to be
respectful of your date and give him or her personal space.
Personal space
means that you give your date time to be alone, to do other things without you
and to also be with others. It also means that you have to respect your date’s
privacy and not seek any personal information that your date isn’t very
forthcoming about revealing.
You also have to be careful and mindful about your
expectations as they relate to your date’s time – how much you demand and how
you infringe upon the person’s time. Again, dating undoubtedly means that you
both will have to make time for each other. But you can’t expect the individual
to always make seeing you and arranging dates their only, or even