Why I’m Single: Part 2

REASON #1: You don’t go on dates. You say it yourself, “I hate first dates,” so you get out of them in your own way. Just because you don’t prefer small talk, you need to be willing to have it before you bombard a guy with the deeper issues, and delve into the mysteries of the internal workings of the human heart and mind.There, I said it.

REASON #2: You let your past experiences play too big of a role. There have had awful words spoken to you. Some from childhood and some more recent. I think these have had effect on you, maybe not always directly, but in some form or another. I think it has developed a certain distance about you.

You’re not a very easy person to compliment and some guys might not know how to take that. I mean that in the sense of when a compliment is given, you shrug it off and redirect it. When did compliments become the changing room at a clothing store? And, no, I’m not talking about Dress Barn.

You take the compliment, try it on and look at yourself in a few different angles and decide that it doesn’t fit you, flatter you, or go with your complexion. Actually, most times, you won’t even let it get to that point. You immediately yell, “SHIELDS UP!” and boom…compliment deflected.

Granted some guys may throw out compliments like they exhale a breath, and it means nothing more to them. But, at some point, you should realize that some of those guys are genuine, and some of us mean what we say, and we even believe it to be true. Let us compliment you because you deserve them. When you shrug off compliments, you appear standoffish.

REASON #3: You’re expectations are too high. I know you’ve been told that your standards are too high, which seems to be the go-to excuse, but, I think your expectations are what’s getting in your way.

When certain things don’t happen, or they happen out of the order you want/expect them, you see it as a red flag or a deal breaker. This isn’t a math problem to solve. Though you, like me, believe there is a particular order for certain things in a relationship, it doesn’t mean that all things in a relationship are bound by an order of operations.

For the most part, I don’t believe there is a, “Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally”* for relationships. If there was, it would strip the relationship of its organic, and healthy nature.(*Emanda Note: That’s a math acronym that I had to Google. It has nothing to do with his actual Aunt Sally, who I hear is a real jerk.)

REASON #4: You believe in fairy tales. You have some really good examples of relationships in your life. However, they’re just that, examples. Just because something works for someone else, doesn’t mean that we all will relate in the same way.

Everyone seems to have this need to glamorize their lives, be it love life or life in general, and the outcome of that is people striving to find what others have, or portray to have.

There is such pressure for romance to happen within a certain framework, and on a certain timeline, instead of romance just developing naturally. It’s almost a requirement for love to fit in a box, opposed to it being a pleasant surprise to be enjoyed.

I could be wrong, and maybe you want the timeline experience, but it feels like us guys have to read from the Required Romantic Expressions playbook to even be taken seriously. Maybe it’s because “love” is such a commercialized industry, and rom coms rule the world, but it seems that if it’s not magical all the time, it’s flagged as, “not meant to be.“

REASON #5: I think you’re afraid of settling. You want something truly God-inspired, but, if you’re not willing to let things play out, and give it a real chance, then how is God ever to work in the relationship? We know that God’s way is usually not the way we would have done it, or doesn’t yield exactly what we expected for an outcome, but you need to take a leap of faith sometimes.

I think you want a man who is already “where he needs to be” in life, and I think that people change together, and through their life together, are changed for the better because of their connection to one another.

So, there you have it.

He didn’t say anything about my muffin top, my chubby cheeks, or my hips that certainly do not lie. Nothing about me needing to show more skin, or how I need to quit wearing leggings, or buy one of those bras that make your cleavage look like a credit card swipe. He didn’t even mention all my weird quirks or obsessive tendencies, and I have many.

It was all about my guts, my heart, and my core…and that hit a nerve.

What about you? Have you ever had someone be gut honest with you?