The Quarter Life: Romantic Relationships

It's the moment that you've all been waiting for, round two of The Quarter Life. My first Quarter Life, a post on friendship and community, can be found right here. Bryce's first Quarter Life post can be found here, and his new post, like all of his other fine writing, can be found over at Six Hours On Sunday.

If you're new to this blog since we started The Quarter Life I suggest checking out the old posts first to see what it is that we're doing up in here. I'm also well aware that some other folks are probably going to be jumping in on this, so if you are over the age of twenty (and under the age of thirty), and feel like writing a post for this, let me know and I will link it up here.

One final note. I have written this post from my own perspective, i.e., the perspective of a man who engages in romantic relationships exclusively with women. This is not to exclude other types of relationships, but rather to avoid speaking about things which I have not experienced for myself. Just so you know.



When I think about "romantic" relationships and the period of life that I am in right now, my thoughts immediately separate into two distinct categories. In the first category are memories of past relationships, my current thoughts about women, love, and associated nonsense, and finally, my desires and prayers for my relationships in the future.

The second category, which I must confess is substantially more active than the first at this present moment, is filled with my thoughts about, memories of, and great hopes for my friends' relationships, their better halves, and in some cases, their future spouses.

As I am prone to do, I find that I have processed the entirety of romantic love down into two neat packages: my own, and everybody else's.

I could write a monster of a blog post if I chose to talk about both of these things, so instead I think I'll just stick with myself. It's not that I don't love my friends, it's just that I'm such a great topic choice. I jest. I'm also not going to say very much about God in this post as it would stretch an already long post to the point of breaking. Instead I will say that my thoughts here are informed so deeply by my faith that to dwell on them would be like pointing out the sun when looking at the sky. And I'll leave it at that.

Ok, it's confession time. If I'm going to talk about relationships, I have to get this one out of the way: I used to have this sort of formula thing for dating. That sounds pretty sick, I know. I used it in order to figure out who I should date, and when I should date them. It's an odd thing to have to admit to. To be honest, if someone were trying to get me interested in dating their friend, finding out that said friend had a "dating formula" would just about guarantee that the two of us would never see the inside of a movie theater alone. Ah hypocrisy.

But I basically used that formula to guide my romantic life for years, and to some extent I still do. I have acquired the good sense to stop thinking about it as a formula, but much of the philosophy from those days does in fact remain. In my defense, I will say that both the formula and the philosophy were either stolen directly from my sister, or developed in the context of her own reflections about her dating experiences. And now she's happily married with a really cool dog, so it can't be all bad, right?

So what was the formula? Well before I get into that let me talk a little bit about the philosophy behind the formula. My general sense when I first started using the formula was that dating, as most of us practiced it, was a bad thing. Bad in the sense that that most of my friends and I just sort of stumbled into dating with the vague notion that it felt good and everyone else was doing it.

I did have the good sense, even at that tender age, to realize that not dating was sort of a bad idea as well. Josh Harris never convinced me that "kissing dating goodbye" was something to which I should aspire. The transition from being single to a lifetime of marriage, no matter how much some Christians (*cough Boundless webzine cough*) like to talk about "courtship," seems like it should have at least a few intermediary steps. And some of those steps should include dinner and a movie with someone you aren't committed to sharing a bed with for the rest of your earthly days.

So my formula for dating was born from a sense that dating is a great thing when practiced with extreme restraint. And the formula helped me to figure out when I should enter into the wonderful mystery that is a relationship, and when it'd be best if I just stayed clear of it and, sigh, her, altogether.

Here's the formula: If I began to like a woman, that is to say, favored her above any of the other women in my acquaintance, the first step I would take was to hurry up and wait. Doing nothing was a key strategy in my dating formula. Why nothing? Well, nothing gives you a lot of time for the deer-in-the-headlights attraction to go away and a little bit of clear thinking to return to the situation. That incredibly smart/attractive/fun girl in my Women's Studies class? Also a devout atheist. Hmmm, guess it's a good thing I didn't ask her to dinner. To be quite honest, doing nothing is what I have done for most of my life. I have spent years doing nothing with one girl or another. I'm great at doing nothing.

And that's basically the way that the formula works. It's nothing if not simple. If you notice yourself liking a girl, the most important thing that you can possibly do is to say nothing to her and never do anything about it. Nothing is the backbone of the whole system.

Ok, you got me. The one problem with my formula is that if you always do nothing then there's a pretty good chance that you will never date anyone. Ever. That's not a formula, that's a religious order. It's a fair criticism. This is where the exception clause comes in. You always do nothing until someone comes along who is so compelling that you absolutely must must make an exception for them. So you break the cardinal commandment of doing nothing and you actually say something to her. You might even ask her name. Kidding.

At this stage in life there are always good reasons why, at any given time, I probably shouldn't be dating. And there are always pretty compelling reasons why I shouldn't be dating most of the women that I might be interested in. But sometimes you meet someone so great that none of that matters. So dating, in my opinion, should be reserved for the times when that woman is so incredible that not getting into a relationship with her would be a folly of the highest order.

And this is where I can start to get myself into trouble. The thing is, I know A LOT of incredible women. A multitude. A plethora. A surplus even. I know more awesome women than I can be friends with, let alone date. But clearly I am not trying very hard given that I am currently seeing none of them. Which is an observation that actually takes us into a different philosophy I have on relationships. The "table" philosophy, as I like to call it.

The four legs of any successful relationship (hence the table) are spiritual, intellectual, relational, and physical. I think that's pretty self-explanatory. For a relationship to work, two people need to be compatible in those four ways. And as most of us know, that isn't exactly easy to achieve. So the question is not "Is this girl amazing?" but rather "Is this girl amazing for me?" Because of this the question "Are you dating anyone right now?" always struck me as mostly harmless, but the ensuing "Would you like to be?" always rubbed me the wrong way. Dating, I have always believed, is something that you embark upon not because you would like to at any given time, but because you encounter someone so incredible that you have no other choice but to share at least some part of your life with them.

And so that's where I'm at. I've stopped using the formula, but I'm still using the philosophy. I still look at dating with quite a bit of hesitancy, and at marriage with a sense that "I really want this- at some point in the future." And I still weigh my interest in women (one woman at a time, naturally) against whether or not dating one of them is the only sensible thing I could possibly do. Not very romantic, I know. But I hope that it's fair to me and fair to potential partners, and I pray that it's faithful. And one day in the future I believe that it will lead me to someone to hike with, watch BOTH versions of "Pride and Prejudice" with, to argue with, and to play with. Most importantly, I pray that it will bring me into the steady presence of someone who will travel with me on a path that will bring both of us closer to the people that God would have us be.

That is just about as close to living happily ever after as I would care to have it.