I regularly read on-line dating blogs. Well, not because I still seek partner, but because I can (also) follow the problems of meeting and choosing a partner for today's young people. In these columns, you can read personal accounts of some dating stories. Although they are by their very nature subjective, they highlight some general characteristics. The man or woman tells what he/she thinks happened from his/her own point of view. In the following, I will analyse the conclusions that can be drawn from the telling of these stories from a self-knowledge perspective.

1. Self-justification

The writers of the stories try to say, either overtly or covertly, that they did everything well, while the other (who is a jerk, etc.) could not even do that... The tendency to self-justification is a general problem of self-knowledge, which arises from the fact that the personality deflects in various ways the confrontation with himself/herself, which is essentially the source of its failure. The everyone else is stupid, I'm the only "helicopter" viewpoint, leads to dissociation from the partner, thus precluding even the possibility of a partnership. This is a general social problem, since the individual does not experience in his/her environment (almost nowhere) a behaviour pattern that could successfully demonstrate an unbiased analysis of the relationship between oneself and the other. This is a learned behaviour, it does not come from from instinct, i.e. if one cannot figure it out on one's own, one should seek a trainer who is skilled in this.

2. Martyr approach

Almost the opposite of the previous one, where the writer of the story blames only himself/herself for the failure, because he/she is so lame, naive, good-natured, trusting in everyone and can't change; but let come someone who helps him/her, because he/she wants to find someone so badly. Otherwise, he/she has tried to show the opposite type of behaviour (pushy, distrustful, cautious) when meeting people, but he/she has failed at that too. What both behaviours have in common is that because the person has not found himself/herself (no inner stability), he/she does not give himself/herself, but wears a mask and is busy maintaining the mask when meeting people, and thus distrusts those he/she can trust and votes trust to those who deceive him/her, i.e. always blunders. The solution here would be also to increase self-knowledge, which gives the individual an inner stability, enabling him/her to recognise the right person for him/her.

3. Lack of recognition of the mirror

In the process of getting to know each other, parties are attracted to people who possess qualities that they do not recognise in themselves. This is why dating is a very good game, if you are aware of it. These qualities in the other person tend to be denounced by us because they are repressed in ourselves. On the other hand, we identify the partner with his/her qualities, and judging his/her qualities leads to judging the person. Here we should ask ourselves: why do the same persons always come into the picture? If we encounter a recurring trait and explore it within ourselves, then the judgement ceases because we are able to accept that trait and the person who carries it disappears from our life or will no longer bother us. The method of self-discovery also has to be learned, it takes a very high level of awareness to figure out alone how to do it.

4. Self-attunement (expectation of wonder)

Given a person who is comfortable with himself/herself and meets a similarly closed personality type. They start dating and are shocked to find that nothing happens between them. Now, that wasn't real either. This situation repeats itself. It's as if the person is waiting for someone from out of the sky to drop in, who is exactly their ideal, and with whom the miracle happens the first time. A love story, an all-encompassing love that breaks the routine of everyday life, the kind of love that romance novels are all about. None of which were true, I should point out, because the author himself/herself (previously) wrote his/her own desire in a novel, thus realising what he/she had failed to achieve in Life. There is no miracle, if there is one, we create it! Man is tuned by default to himself. If you expect him/her to tune to you, you'll can wait till doomsday. You have to open up my daughter (son), if you want a husband (wife). And if you not, don't whine. In the old days, a woman was always tuned to a man, that was the basis. Women in today's world have learned to tune into themselves, and that's right. But, if they want to be in a partnership, they have to learn to tune in to the man, because the man can't. He only has a chance to learn if we teach him!

5. "I don't know" status

A significant proportion of young people are in a "don't know" state, existing, vegetating. This means that they don't know who they are, they don't know what they want, they don't know why they are like this, etc. Nothing will develop from this state of "not knowing", it is a pit from which one must first climb out if one wants to change. If one encounters a partner candidate in a state of "not knowing", one should not immediately abandon him/her. He/she may be a potentially valuable person, just is not yet mature personality. You may have to wait 20 years for him/her to "boil over" on his/her own, but if you help him/her, less will be enough. People expect ready personality from the other. Be ready for partnership, marriage, having children. If we expect to be ready for something, we will never get into it because we will never be completely ready. The point is that we arrive at the result of the process during the process. It's in the process of partnering that we learn how to do it right, and until then we're going to fail a lot. It is natural for women to want to settle down because they need peace of mind and security to have children, and they expect men to provide that. Often in vain. Do not wait for anything or anyone, do what comes from the heart and accept what life brings.

6. Different levels of personality development

It is natural for people to want a partner of the same level of development, because it is easier to get along with him/her. But if there is no such person? As a solution, it may not be a good idea to bridge this problem with a large age gap. Even if the level of personality development is the same at the moment of mate selection, there is no guarantee that it will remain the same; it occurs that you have to learn to live with someone you are raising. The person you bring up today may overtake you in ten years and give back what you helped him/her to achieve! 

Become you want to be and don't chase a wagon that won't pick you up. The key to success is in you!

Margaret Rhasoda-Varga
UCCM head-master
(Without illusions, excerpt)