Don’t be a need free zone

Make a request. Share a feeling. Express a need. 

Many of us refrain from asking for too much or revealing something of our feelings when we’re in the early stages of dating. I don’t want to appear needy, is the common cry. 

These things do not make you needy. They make you human.

And there is a really good point to making it a deliberate practice to express feelings, needs or requests in the ‘getting to know you’ phase: you get a sense of the mettle of the person.

Do they find it irritating that you request to move tables because you’re a bit chilly?

Do they blow off your expression of disappointment because they turned up 30 minutes late and didn’t let you know?

Do they ride roughshod over your suggestion that you need to get home early, and then try hard to coerce you into just one more drink?

By authentically expressing your feelings, needs and making requests from the start of a dating relationship, you’ll get an earlier and keener sense of what inner resources and capacities this person has. Are they generous, kind, compassionate? Are they selfish, self-centred, grouchy under pressure? 

These are all important things to be aware of before you continue to invest your heart.