Based on the title, you’re probably expecting some major insights into the details of creating successful dating experiences. I promise to give you plenty of those in other articles, but for now, I’ll focus on the 2 MOST important and most basic requirements of dating: contacting the person and making the date. Yeah, I know, that’s obvious, so why waste time discussing it? Well, it seems like it’s not that obvious to everyone, because every third guy I try to set up either can’t seem to find the time to contact the woman for at least a week or sometimes just doesn’t contact her at all. Crazy, right?
Now let’s make sure we’re on the same page here. Despite the hyper-modern egalitarian society we live, it’s still almost always (99% of the time) the man’s job to contact the woman to ask her for a date. He either gets her contact info directly from her or from the person trying to set him up on the date. In either case there is no reason for the man to fear rejection. The woman has already agreed to the date, one way or another. All he has to do is call her and set up a time and place to meet. Simple. So why are so many guys not doing it?
There are several reasons why a guy won’t call, and I’ll analyze each of them in an upcoming post. For now I want to focus on the most common excuse: too busy. Whether it’s true or not is irrelevant for now, and in any case, most woman choose to believe it (the alternatives are to painful).
So guys, let’s say you really are swamped at work. You’ve got trials to litigate, stocks to trade, deals to finance, and patients to see and…WAIT. How long does it take to make a phone call? Getting home too late; call during the day. I know you have a cell phone, at least one, and you’ve always got it strapped to your hip ready for action, so how hard is it to take a moment or two to call the woman you’ve already committed to contacting?
Maybe you feel uncomfortable making a call on the run or without enough time to give it your full attention? Here’s your solution. Just call her, let her know that you’re too swamped at work to chat (most women like hearing that a guy is working hard), but you’d like to make a date to meet her asap. No need to chat on the phone, you’ll have plenty of time when you see her.
But wait, you’re really too busy to meet her this week. That’s fine, just let her know that you really do want to see her but it’ll have to be next week. If you’re even too busy to do that, then maybe you should just tell her to forget about it because the truth is, if you were really interested you’d find some way to make it work (girls, did you hear that?).
Now, if your blackberry fell into the toilet, find another way to contact her. Use Facebook. Email her. Text her. Send her a freakin’ homing pigeon. Just contact her. Let me repeat: if you took her number or got set up with her, YOU MUST CONTACT HER. Is that clear?
Oh, and when you contact her, MAKE THE DATE. Don’t just leave it ambiguous. If you can’t agree upon a date because of future timings, then make a firm commitment to speak at a specific time to finalize plans. Don’t make tentative plans to bump into each other in the local supermarket or on the subway platform. Make plans to go out on a date, just you and her. Yeah, I know it’s a lot to ask, but I really believe that you can handle it. Please don’t embarrass me.
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2 Comments on "2 Things You Must Do To Date"
I am a guy. I’ve witnessed the same among some friends. Typically combination of two things are going on; burn out factor and ambivalence. A lot of times people (both men and women) just agree to go out because they really have no good reason not to (at least according to the person who is setting them up) but the desire is really not there. I think if someone can not make that call in a week or more then the message is clear that they really do not want to date this person or they are just simply burned out by the process. It is sad but true and has happened to a lot of us. Advice from many is to never say no to set-up because then the shadchan may write you off. A person has to be ready.
I can not say the same thing for someone who asks for a girl’s number and never calls.
It’s so crazy when we need to get down to basics. But if that is what we’ve gotta do, then good on you for doing it.
But I think that you still didn’t get all the way down to the root of the problem here. I think that most issues within dating have nothing to do with dating. They are about showing sensitivity towards others.
With this example, of the guy not calling the girl in a timely manner, I’d recommend completely forgetting that we’re talking about a phone call for a date.
Now think about it: Anyone who told anyone else they’re going to give them a call, should in a timely manner. And until we’re able to show consideration for each other (even if it’s a date you don’t feel like meeting), nothing too great is going to be able to happen.