Chapter 83 Dating and Romance.
Youth is an exciting season in everyones life. It is a time for growth, friendship, dating and romance. Dating however, should serve the right purpose of finding the perfect mate to share ones life. The first question that arises is: Are you old enough to date?
You must first develop emotional maturity, the prerequisite for romance and marriage. Ideally, you should begin dating after you are 21. Before this, it is best to have a large circle of acquaintance where you better your chance of meeting someone who matches you. Which would you rather do, choose a good apple from hundreds, or choose from 5 miserable ones left on the shelf? Dont jump into a relationship, until you have watched and assessed many dozens of prospective partners. You can do this among the hundreds that you meet and get acquainted with. Subsequently, you narrow your choices. Dating too soon confines your interest to one person, when you should be associating with a wide spectrum of people to develop your social skills, knowledge, career and emotional maturity. There is much enjoyment in meeting people, seeing places, doing social work and accomplishing projects.
This is therefore not a time to toy around with other peo ples affection. This is a period of prospecting not passion, investigation not intimacy. Too many youngsters get their values and priorities wrong. Their confusion could bring unnecessary distress sooner or later. A wise teenager would concentrate on his or her studies and qualifications, gain financial strength and emotional maturity before plunging into romance and marriage, a case of multiple winnings. Marriage is therefore, better after the age of 24.
Make a wise choice. Love at first sight may be all right but a second look is better; love with insight is better still. Infatuation abounds and happens fast. Crushes with good looks and smooth talks can be amazingly short-lived. Remember, whatever is soonest hot is soonest cold. Romantic excitement about each other is not enough to carry the couple through the years ahead. Eyes clouded by rosy emotions and fantasies and removed from reality and reason can bring great disenchantment later. Dont get carried away. True love develops slowly, with appreciation for a partners total personality, spirituality and values. It gives and cares unselfishly, and brings out the best in the couple. As soon as you are interested in a person, you can still move in groups and keep some distances so that you can see the real person and make better judgement before you are drowned in passion, and become blindly committed.
Everyone deserves to find the ideal partner, yet people rarely employ a strategy for baiting and netting the right one. Write down all the things you want in your mate in the areas of values, virtues... Written goals ensure good choices. Dont forget, you can supplement goal-setting with affirmation and visualisation to find your perfect mate. You can make things happen, believe me.
There are dangers and pitfalls. Let us look at lifes harsh realities: Some teenagers started dating at 16 in high school. As a result they performed badly in their studies. Then their emotional immaturity couldnt sustain the romance and the pair broke off, resulting in double losses. Even if the relationship continued, they would have dated 8 years before they were financially sound for the wedding, they would be beset by weak academic qualifications, a mediocre job, and overintimacy before a lustreless marriage.
Adolescence often brings unhealthy influence and temptation. Many teenage boys mix with the wrong group who - often through insecurity - have the compulsion to prove their masculinity and mettle. They are not looking to give affection or something, only to get it. They form the bad habits of promiscuity, which hamper their growth into sensible, strong and secure adults.
Promiscuity often brings disappointments, and worse, feelings of guilt, lowered self-respect and self-image. Many began with honourable values but learned to live by another, resulting in much emotional conflict. They have crossed the line of no-return and regret.
In contrast, chaste and romantic love was the order of the day some 30 to 50 years ago. Sadly, there is so little of that now. Lust has taken over with little moral values, even though we are physically still the same. A wrong set of principles and habits, adopted by 500 million people, is still a wrong set of doctrines! Young people now ought to revive, or re-create those traditionally cherished convictions through their mutual respect, good conduct and wise usage of time and leisure.
Romances are not without sad endings. Remember always, that to love is to be vulnerable. Surprises, disappointments or unforeseen circumstances may befall you. Joy and intimacy may end in detachment, loneliness and grief. In loving and losing someone, remember the principle of happiness: Accept everything, what you can change and cannot change. Admit too that you cannot make someone love you, or love you forever.
The season of courtship is of great importance, it offers potential mates the opportunity to learn more about each other. This is an opportune time to assess each others overall maturity and compatibility. Ideally, this period should not be too long, as it brings restlessness and physical temptation.
Your values and judgement affect the success of your marriage. Before marriage, meaningful communication, understanding, goal-setting, and mutual encouragement are perhaps more important than showering affection on each other. Date in groups, set limits and avoid those tempting circumstances.
Falling in love is only the onset of romance; it may not lead to lasting true love. It only gives us a taste of what it should be, permanently. Romantic love ought to be limited to dating, while passionate love should be reserved for marriage. Matrimony deserves its holiness.
Romantic love can obscure the significance of understanding, sharing and caring. Besides, married life brings a lot of harsh realities and disenchantment, like piled up dishes and laundry, sick and sobbing babies, and endless bills to be paid!
Human beings are the highest form of life on earth, and marriage is their most important union. The power to start life is too wonderful and sacred to be treated casually. How could we take this alliance so lightly? Those who do often end up with disharmony and even divorce. Many a marriage fails because the partners ignore its sanctity, and did not prepare for it with respect for its dignity and divinity. There is now this growing disregard; in America, for every 4 marriages, there is 1 separation or divorce, with sad consequences.
Extensive surveys in Europe and America found that couples who lived together before marriage were more likely to separate or divorce after that. Teenage promiscuity is also known to increase sexually transmitted diseases, unwanted pregnancy and its resultant problems and poverty.
Passion and physical intimacy alone cannot forge a permanent bond, especially when meaningful communication, learning and progress are precluded. The less fortunate ended up in an unwanted marriage or unwed motherhood. Sow discipline and devotion, and you will reap a harvest of fidelity and felicity.
While showing restraint in the face of passion and provocation, think about the great and precious future you are preparing for. In the years to come you will look back at your courtship with pride and satisfaction.
When you are old enough and emotionally matured, when you have qualified academically and professionally, when you have made numerous acquaintances and identified your ideal and compatible sweetheart-to-be, you may start dating. You have deserved this sweetest season of your life. Happy dating and sweet romancing!
"Love endures only when the lovers love many things together and not merely each other." - Walter Lippmann.
"Man and woman are made to love each other. It"s only by loving each other that they can achieve anything." - Christina Stead, Australian writer.