As I said in part three – I recommend avoiding “interviewing” when you meet someone online or otherwise. But some people do ask a lot of questions, mostly because they are insecure and not present with the natural flow of getting to know someone. Asking questions is a fair way to try to establish trust. I have often said that the purpose of communication is to learn to understand each other so we can feel safe enough to love and trust each other. But “interviewing” is this gone overboard, and it is not likely to leave us feeling more trusting after a first or second meeting. But how do we learn to trust someone? This is a huge question, even if we don’t meet on a dating site.
Answer: move slowly and resolve your own issues.
Moving slowly creates space to learn about the other person in a more natural way. Taking the time to communicate via phone or email before a first meeting can expose people who are prone to getting distracted by the next “shinny new” person. It can expose people who are primarily looking for sex or money. It can give us a chance to learn about someone without subjecting the connection to the pressures of “The Fantasy Bond” (see Internet Dating #2 Getting Beyond the Fantasy or Chapter 23 of my book) or of anxiously asked questions. Moving slowly gives us more opportunities to see if someone is likely to be who they say they are, and it gives us time to self-soothe and work with, own, and resolve, our own trust issues!
Regardless of the relationship or how you meet, it seems that we all know that it is good to move slow, but in many ways few of us do move slowly. I think it is also valuable to notice that most discussion of moving slowly seems to be focused on not having sex too early. But what about after we make love? I think we should continue to try to move slowly after becoming lovers too and get to know someone without rushing too far forward. It will help if we continue to give the relationship and the person room to be themselves and evolve with us.
Another powerful aspect of trust is about learning to be truthful and authentic yourself. You can’t be aware and feel someone else’s misrepresentations when you are busy covering up your own. Notice how many people are complaining about other people’s deceptions, fear of people who are players, lying about age, relationship status, and more? If we are avoiding a hard truth about ourselves we will be less able to sense things in others because the energy we are spending selling our own selves results in our not being present to what the other is sharing (or not sharing) with us. Share honestly and you will attract more honesty.
And lastly, the ultimate in trust is in trusting your own worth. Relax into your value and you will have greater trust in others to do the same. Self-Soothing, Self-Soothing, Self-Sooooottthhhhiiiinnnngggg ….
To soothing our wounds and trusting that we are valuable,
Peter
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