Dating at a Christian college can be a bit tricky.

Many Christians only want to date someone that they would consider marrying. But then, how do you know if you would consider marrying them without first dating them?

As I watched other couples date, I came to the conclusion that what many were doing was somewhat circular. You meet and put your best foot forward, go on three dates, become officially (or unofficially) a couple, spend a few months together continuing to invest in the relationship, begin finally acting like their normal selves, find out their normal selves are not compatible, break up, then take time to recover from the breakup woes, then repeat the process two, three, or more times during their college career.

Then, there were other couples who met freshman year, dated for three years (often focusing most of their attention on each other), broke up Junior year… and then since most everyone else their age already has their friend groups well-established regroup and maybe go try to meet some Freshmen or make some new off-campus friends.

I decided instead to get to know as many people as possible in order to be sure that the girl that I found was “the one” that was for me. And even more to focus on becoming “the one” to attract “the one.” Often I found that by getting to know people as friends often simplified things and being free from romantic relationships allowed me to grow without the confusion inherent to most dating relationships. And I found that if a girl doesn’t know that you are sorta into her, then she tends to act more like her everyday self (and that is who you marry) much earlier on (and without the heartbreak).

I have jokingly said that “I have dated more girls than they know” because very often I found that those who seemed so amazing at first, very quickly showed their true colors when they didn’t know that you were interested in them. Of course, the danger of this approach,  is that if you linger too long you could get caught in the “friend zone.” And this is where I found myself and this is how I got out of it.

 

 

February 2001

I was in the dorm talking with a group of guys and somehow Jen’s name came up. I made comment that if anyone was to marry Jen and their marriage was not wonderful, it would be their fault. Everyone turned and looked at me as to say, “What? Are you into this girl?” and I thought, “What? Am I into this girl?”

I then quickly excused myself from the room and thought, “Why can’t I be the guy with the wonderful marriage!”

 

In hindsight, there was a lot of interactions with Jen that led up to this moment. I remembered that from the moment we met three years before, how I had walked away so impressed by her moral stance. Over those years we would spend countless hours talking about things that mattered. She also had a thoughtfulness that was contagious. I remembered when we led guys and girls from our dorms to babysit a group of 7 kids (their father was in the hospital). As everyone else focused on the kids, Jen began cleaning up the kitchen. So, I went into the bathroom and began scrubbing out the tub. I recounted the jealousy that I felt when she was exclusively not dating one of the guys on my dorm (it was complicated).

 

As I mentioned above, all too often people merely seem compatible because they are working hard to make things work and outside of dating, people usually show their true colors more quickly. With Jen everything seemed so easy. I could expect that any time spent with her would be fun as well as intellectually & spiritually stimulating. It would certainly be a shame if she were to graduate and I never even attempted to ask her out. I knew that I would regret it. Over the years that I had known Jen, I had seen her in just about every situation. From leading her dorm full of girls, to street evangelism, to ministering to the poor, to hanging out with her family.

 

By this time, I had come to grips with three important dating facts.

First, I had I learned it is better to keep your own cards close to your chest at first and like poker, never go all in until you see the other player continue to raise the stakes and you have some idea as to what cards they are holding.

Second, I had also come to the conclusion that the difference between romance and stalking is whether or not the girl is interested. So, I would hold off on any serious romancing until I got the go ahead; I had to play it cool if I was to pull this off.

Third, if a girl is not interested, then she is simply not the one for me nor I the one for her. In my mind, when they expressed their disinterest, I would turn it around in my head as though they had just failed to meet my biggest criteria- being into me. I would think, “Well, I’m sorry, it’s just not going to work out (for you). The girl I date needs to be into me.”

 

 

So, when Jen agreed to go out to dinner (and it was made clear that it was a date), I was really ready to be OK with whatever her answer was. If she said she wasn’t interested, then I knew she wasn’t the one for me. But on the other hand, we knew each other so well, that if she said that she wanted to redefine our relationship romantically, that it was likely that it would end in marriage (and I was OK with that too, although a bit intimidated with that prospect).

While on our first official date we talked for hours. Conversation was easy and fun, like always. When the time was right I pulled out a pack of blank playing cards and made cards appear as she named them. I explained that the cards were there all along, you just couldn’t see them. I explained to her that I thought that this trick reminded me of our relationship- could it be that there were things that were always there that we couldn’t see? And with that, she agreed and we moved quite seamlessly from the friend zone into courtship. But, then again, perhaps we never left the friendship zone. Perhaps that is why I still look forward to spending every moment with her and why home is wherever we are together.

 

 

As I look back on my time in the “friend zone,” I have no regrets.

As my boys come of age, I will pour into them all that I learned from a life lived mostly in the friends zone, equipping them them with the emotional intelligence to navigate it. Among the lessons that I will pass on are:

1. Become the one to attract the one (the better you are the better you will attract).
2. Get to know girls first for who they are, not for who you want them to be, not for how they look, not for how they make your body feel.
3. Don’t stress over it if someone is not into you (by definition, if they are “the one” for you, then things will work out).
4. Don’t go all in all at once (pace yourself and let her show you some of her cards before you do).
5. Remember that it is only considered romance once the person wants to be pursued.
6. Don’t fear the Friend Zone – that very well could be the place where your life-long romantic friendship is born.

 

Have you considered how you want to approach teaching your children about relationships based upon the ones you have been in?

 

In case you missed it you can read here about Her side of the story  …