Just Shoot Me
Boil me in oil. Stick bamboo shoots in my nails. Place me in front of a Mack truck travelling at 110 mph. Push me into a piranha filled vat of monkey sweat, but please, please don't ask me to suffer through one more "First Date."
Can anything be more nerve wracking, demoralizing, or doomed to certain failure than a first date? Even when it leads to love, that initial encounter is, more often than not, an exercise in deep emotional distress. It is all expectation and possibility leading to disappointment and disillusionment.
But, does it have to be this way?
It Isn't Human Resources
Too often, we treat the first date as a job interview. We turn a critical eye toward an unlucky prospect that must meet decades of expectation for our lifetime companion. We sit in judgement on them as they sit in judgement on us. Neither one of us is comfortable. Both resent the implication of questions regarding employment, vehicle ownership and past relationships. How can we hope to discover anything about this other person when defenses are raised?
We can't. If we hope to know anything important about this other person then we must resist the temptation to interview them. We must enter into this initial meeting without expectations, open to the possibility of discovering something previously unimagined, and possibly more wonderful than anything for which we could have hoped.
