Change The Conversationনমুনা

Expectations in Dating

Why are our expectations so lofty? We want our romantic relationships to follow a linear course, like a love story in a movie that resolves in ninety minutes. It doesn’t help that with the weaving of social media into our cultural fabric, we now know way more about other people’s lives than I believe we were ever intended to know. We know exactly how many of our friends are in relationships, engaged, or having babies. The running tallies are ever before us as we scroll and scroll and scroll through social media.

When milestones are popping up in everyone else’s life, it’s a constant reminder that they’re not happening in yours. And it hurts. It hurts a lot. The best thing to do in regards to expectations is to hold them lightly, not in a death grip. Life is not passing by. You are not forgotten.

Trust that God’s timing is preparing you perfectly and that it hasn’t slipped His mind to bring about someone to date, or to bring about a job, or whatever else you might be waiting on. Yes, life is a grand story, but it’s not a movie. The plot of life won’t resolve tightly just because you think it should.

Besides my first boyfriend and the man I married, there were several other guys throughout college who either I was interested in, or they were interested in me. We’d start exchanging texts every so often, and then it was every day. I’d see them on campus more and more. Sometimes they would read more into my words and actions than what was actually there. Sometimes I would do the same. But then it would just … fizzle. The texts would slow and then stop all together. Or sometimes it happened abruptly. Personally, that was more hurtful than the end of an actual relationship. I wanted to know why so-and-so stopped talking to me, why he started hanging out with another girl, why I was suddenly not worth getting to know.

The journalist in me desperately wanted to know why. The writer in me wanted there to be a story behind the why.

In His mercy, the Lord gave me two thoughts for closure on these non-relationships. Isn’t God gracious? He knows that sometimes we need closure, even when nothing has happened. 

One was a tweet which, paraphrased, said that perhaps silence is all the closure you need. This freed me up so much to quit spending my mental energy trying to find the lock on a door that didn’t even exist.

The other was a quote from Emily Freeman in Simply Tuesday which says, “Maybe there’s no story at all. Perhaps it just is.” 

Perhaps it just is. Let that settle into your soul for a moment.

On our path to the altar, we want each interaction, conversation, and relationship to be filled with meaning and weightiness. We expect the answers and resolutions to come sooner rather than later. We want there to be a prince inside every frog, a hidden meaning under each rock. A story at every turn. But that is a fantasy.  

Maybe you need to let a relationship, a friendship, just be. Even with the best of intentions, even with your seeking to honor the Lord, the relationship didn’t move forward. It didn’t blow up. There is no story to tell. It just is. And that is okay. Give yourself permission to let it be and move on. Each interaction is shaping you. You wouldn’t be who you are if it weren’t for that. Even when there seems to be no "why" to a relationship, you can trust the end result with God, who sees all things laid out from beginning to end. We can lay our expectations in His capable hands.