What Do You Really Want?

Why am I addressing this so far along in the blog? Why did I not address it right off? Because what you want does not matter. At least not when you’re first dating. But as you progress along in your dating prowess, at some point you will be looking for The One and then you will want to be more choosy. And when that time comes (give it at least a year of dating practice,) you do need to be clear about what values are important to you and what you want in a woman.

So stop reading now and make a list of the traits of your ideal woman.

Done? Okay, that was probably pretty easy to do. Now ask yourself: is your list realistic? Do *you* have the traits you’re looking for in a woman? If you don’t possess a lot of them, why would the woman you’ve described be interested in you? Your partner is not going to “complete” you or make up for the things you suck at.

Does your description of your ideal women take into account your basic values? A person who is a good match can be very different from you on the surface. She might not read or watch sci-fi or even know the difference between fantasy and sci-fi. She might, God forbid, have a degree in English and have satisfied her college science requirement by taking “Chemistry for Humanities Majors.” Geeks tend to eliminate possibles based on superficial preferences, like having arcane knowledge about twentieth-century nuclear physicists, grieving the passing of Gary Gygax or being a Farscape fan. But it’s actually desirable to be “opposites” in surface ways. What a good match should have in common with you are your basic life values, not necessarily your preference in leisure activities. Having some separate interests allows you to retain your individuality and get some time apart while you engage in your hobbies, and it also means you can stretch each other and teach each other new things if your areas of interest are different. But you do want your underlying values to be the same if you want to stay together in the long term.

Next time: I'll begin discussing basic life values, starting with "Security versus Freedom."