{"id":16589,"date":"2020-04-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-04-01T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sasee.wpenginepowered.com\/?p=16589"},"modified":"2024-03-26T15:08:42","modified_gmt":"2024-03-26T19:08:42","slug":"ditch-tinder-and-find-the-one","status":"publish","type":"essay","link":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/essay\/ditch-tinder-and-find-the-one\/","title":{"rendered":"Ditch Tinder and Find \u201cThe One\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

So ask yourself the question: If I can pick one person to be on a team with, would he or she be that one?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

\u201cSo how come you and your husband are still together?\u201d The chit chat around us stopped instantly. My old school friends, all of whom were now divorced mothers, stopped what they were doing and turned to me. And I, in turn, looked at each of them. How was it possible that such beautiful, funny and talented women were all divorced? And how come my husband and I were still so happy after 24 years together? I answered as honestly as I could.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are a team. We are good at managing our life together.\u201d<\/p>\n

They looked at me with puzzled and (was I seeing that right?) disappointed expressions. I guess that this was not the answer they had expected. But then, what did they expect? That I would say something soppy like, \u201cHe\u2019s my soul mate,\u201d or even, \u201cI knew the minute that I met him that he was \u2018The One?\u2019\u201d Maybe I had to explain myself better.<\/p>\n

\u201cSay you fall for a guy because he\u2019s a good dancer. Eventually, you don\u2019t go out dancing that much anymore. Or, he cracks great jokes. At some point you have heard them all. Or he looks really hot. One day, he may get a beer belly, he may go bald. Those early attractions are all fleeting.\u201d<\/p>\n

My friends gazed off into the distance, maybe thinking back to what attracted them to their exes.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo what made you pick your husband then?\u201d one of them asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe seemed like home-baked bread to me,\u201d I answered, \u201cGood-looking bread, but in an honest, solid, good-for-you, and what-you-see-is-what-you-get kinda way.\u201d<\/p>\n

The chatter picked back up again as my friends shared that their exes definitely did not fit the \u201chonest\u201d or \u201cgood-for-you\u201d labels. They mentioned \u201cfixer-uppers\u201d and \u201cbad boys.\u201d Maybe they had hoped to fix these guys? Some mentioned that they had fallen for their exes because of looks or because they seemed a bit dangerous and exciting. Now, I\u2019m not saying that I have never fallen into that trap or that I haven\u2019t dated these \u201cdangerous\u201d men before. But who wants the future father of their child to be \u201cdangerous?\u201d<\/p>\n

I think this is the problem. As people are looking for a life partner, they just follow their feelings. And a sexy, dangerous person will stir up all kinds of emotions and feelings in us. That does not mean that he or she should, therefore, be the person that we date! Or marry! Or have kids with!<\/p>\n

Maybe the emotion that overtakes us \u2013 butterflies in our stomachs, the electricity that we feel \u2013 is simply pure adrenaline? We all know that adrenaline (our fight or flight response) gets released when we are under threat. Therefore, we may think that our body says \u201cThis is The One!\u201d when in reality it may be saying, \u201cDanger, danger, run!\u201d We often bypass the good guys (or girls) in our lives and go for the ones that make the adrenaline course through our bodies.So should we settle for a life without excitement or butterflies? No, not at all. But, maybe, experiencing those feelings for someone who is essentially a stranger is not the best indicator of whether or not that stranger is the right person for us as a life partner. We may fall for a good-looking face, snazzy chat-up lines, a six-pack, or a sharp dresser \u2013 and think that we are falling for \u201cthe main course\u201d when, in reality we are reacting to \u201cthe trimmings\u201d of a person. These trimmings change over time. The main course is someone\u2019s deeper character traits. Is he or she honest? Is there empathy? What about dedication and commitment? Or the way he or she views life? Those are the things we are left with eventually; the deeper essence of a person. So ask yourself the question: If I can pick one person to be on a team with, would he or she be that one?<\/p>\n

My friends all agreed that they were never really \u201ca team\u201d with their exes, and that it had never occurred to them; the importance of being a team.<\/p>\n

Maybe it\u2019s time to ditch Tinder swiping. Instead, focus on how safe you feel with someone, how much you admire them and the life they have built (or are building) for themselves, how much you feel respected and \u201cseen\u201d by them, and how well your different character traits complement each other. It\u2019s all about putting a team together. The most successful teams are often the ones where those with different talents are combined.<\/p>\n

I was physically attracted to my husband when I first met him, but it was a calmer attraction than I had known before. There was no adrenaline overload, no panicked feelings, and no obsession. Instead, I felt warmth and a curiosity to learn more about him. That attraction has only increased over time. We continue to discover more of each other and deepen our love with each discovery that we make.<\/p>\n

My husband gave me the nicest compliment recently. He said that he found me more beautiful today than I was all those years ago. But as he said it, I saw him think. Because, logically, we both knew that I looked better twenty years ago. Still, I knew exactly what he meant. He said, \u201cYou are somehow more…more\u2026\u201d and I finished his sentence for him, \u201cyou.\u201d His eyes lit up. \u201cYes! That\u2019s it! You are more you.\u201d<\/p>\n

And that sums it all up. When your relationship is based on the essence of someone, not on the superficial, not on the \u201couter trimmings,\u201d then the love only gets deeper over time. Then the butterflies can come. Oh, they don\u2019t flutter manically or obsessively but flutter they do; in a steady and ever-strengthening way. And with each passing day, year, and decade you come to realize that you have actually ended up sharing your life with The One.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So ask yourself the question: If I can pick one person to be on a team with, would he or she be that one? \u201cSo how come you and your […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_tec_requires_first_save":true,"_gspb_post_css":"","rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_tribe_blocks_recurrence_rules":"","_tribe_blocks_recurrence_description":"","_tribe_blocks_recurrence_exclusions":"","footnotes":""},"essay_type":[46],"essay-category":[],"class_list":["post-16589","essay","type-essay","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","essay_type-features"],"blocksy_meta":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/essay\/16589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/essay"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/essay"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/essay\/16589\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"essay_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/essay_type?post=16589"},{"taxonomy":"essay-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sasee.com\/ro\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/essay-category?post=16589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}