Becoming… first, then I’ll date

There is an idea I often hear from singles, in different forms. It is the idea of “I first need to…”

… work on myself.

… heal.

… become more confident.

… learn to trust again.

… get my life together.

… feel happy on my own.

… have more time and energy.

… then I’ll be ready for dating/a relationship.

And I understand the logic.

It sounds responsible. Self-aware, even. Surely it is better to work through our problems before bringing another person into them?Sometimes, yes. But I think we have taken one truth — that we are responsible for ourselves — and accidentally turned it into something that is not true; We need to become some better, more healed, more secure version of ourselves before we can build a healthy relationship.

We don’t. Because our own journey doesn’t end when a relationship begins. They can happen at the same time.

We tend to imagine life in chapters

First I’ll sort this out. Then I’ll do that.

“When work calms down, I’ll have more time.”

“Once I feel better about myself, I’ll start dating.”

“After I’ve dealt with what happened to me, I’ll be able to let someone in.”

But life rarely works that neatly. We raise children while figuring out how to be parents. We build careers while figuring out what we actually want from them. We build a life while figuring out what we want that life to look like. We rarely finish one part of life before beginning the next. Why would relationships be different?

You don’t have to finish your personal development and then begin your relationship journey. You can do both.

Let’s look at some of the things we commonly think we need to work through, fix or become before we’re ready for a relationship.
Feel free to scroll straight to the one that sounds most like you.

• “I need to heal first.”

  Maybe you came out of a relationship that really hurt you. Someone broke your trust. You lost yourself somewhere along the way. You went through a difficult breakup. Or something else happened in your life that left you thinking:

  I need to heal from this before I can let someone new in.

  Sometimes, you do need a bit of time. There is a period after being hurt when what you need might simply be to recover, make sense of what happened and find your footing again. There may even times when dating genuinely isn't where your energy should go for the time being. But there is a big difference between “I need some time right now to deal with this particular thing.” and “I need to be healed before I can have a healthy relationship.” Because at some point, acute recovery turns into the longer journey of ongoing healing. At that point, healing becomes something that continues while the rest of your life starts moving again.

  Besides, what does ’healed’ actually look like? No triggers? No insecurities? No painful memories that sometimes resurface? If that is the standard, I’m not sure any of us ever become fully healed.

  A healthy relationship doesn't require two finished people. It requires two people who can increasingly become better at understand themselves, each other, communicate, taking responsibility, repair and grow.

  Your ongoing health journey can continue while you love someone. Quite the opposite actually, having someone loving and supportive beside you can make the journey easier.

  So instead of:
  Am I healed enough to date?

  Try:
  Do I genuinely need some time away from dating to deal with what is happening right now
  - or am I subconsciously waiting until my past ‘no longer affects me’ before I allow myself to move forward?

• “What happened to me changed me.”

  Sometimes something happens that divides life into a before and an after. A painful relationship. Betrayal. Grief. Illness. A painful childhood chapter. Burnout. Divorce. Abuse. When something changes us deeply, it can feel like we need to somehow put ourselves back together before we can be ready for the kind of relationship we want. This comes from that we, without noticing it, slowly let ‘This happened to me’ become ‘This is part of who I am’. And you think that person is broken or not good enough for your imagined partner.

  Your story and your identity are not the same thing.

  What happened is part of your history. It may have changed you. But there is so much more to you than what happened to you. You don't need to wait until one particularly painful part of your story feels ‘resolved’ before you allow yourself to start writing the next part. Let moving forward look more like:

  I am me. This is part of my story, not my whole identity. And my story is still being written.

  You can practise this one date at a time. Let your date get to know YOU — not only what happened to you. Share your story in pieces. Notice what feels right to share and when. Let people earn access to the more vulnerable parts of your story. Pay attention to who can receive your story with the care it deserves.

  If the separation of your identity and history has become deeply entangled, getting professional support to untangle the two needs to be an important part in moving forward.

• “I need to become a better version of myself.”

  Maybe your version isn't healing at all. Maybe it’s:

  • I need to be more confident

  • I need to love myself

  • I need to be less anxious

  • I need to get in shape

  • I need to sort out my career or

  • I need to be comfortable being alone

  There will always be a version of us in the future who seems better suited for dating. More confident. More interesting. More successful. More secure. More emotionally mature. And that’s great. I applaud you for striving for growth. The problem comes when growth becomes an entrance requirement for participating in your own life. Because the finish line has a habit of moving…

  You become more confident — but now you need to feel more secure.
  You get the new job — but now work is too intense.
  You learn to enjoy being alone — but suddenly dating threatens the lovely life you've built.

  There will always be another thing you could improve before you begin.

  You are allowed to grow toward something while also moving toward someone.

  Fill in the blank: Before I can focus on dating, I need to become ______.
  Then ask yourself, why? What exactly do I think I won't be able to do, handle or have until I become that person? And does it actually stop me from dating — or would it simply make dating feel a little easier and a little less scary?

  Keep becoming more confident, secure, healthy, interesting, successful — whatever growth looks like for you. Just don't postpone living your life, or dating, until you've become the person you're working toward.

  (Besides, there is something pretty amazing about finding someone who gets to know and love you as you are now — and who also gets to watch you grow into the person you’re becoming, celebrating with you along the way.)

• “It wouldn't be fair to bring this into a relationship.”

  This one often comes from a good place. We don't want another person to carry our baggage. We don't want them to become our therapist. We don't want someone else to fix our life.

  Good. They shouldn't have to. But somewhere along the way, we seem to have confused taking responsibility for ourselves with needing to handle everything ourselves.

  Those aren't the same thing. You can be responsible for your own emotions and still tell your partner you're struggling. You can work on an insecurity and still ask for reassurance sometimes. You can take responsibility for changing a pattern while accepting support when changing it is difficult.

  That is part of what close relationships are. Sometimes one person has more strength and lends some of it to the other. And then, at another point in life, the roles reverse. The important question isn't whether you bring difficulties into a relationship. You will. So will they. The more useful question is: What do I expect the other person to do with them? There is a big difference between “This is yours to fix.” and “This is mine to work on. Can you be beside me while I do?”

• “I need to be able to trust again.”

  You got hurt. Someone left when you thought they were staying. Or they cheated. Lied. Hid things from you. Broke promises. Said one thing and did another. Or slowly gave you reasons to question what you could believe. When someone has broken your trust, trusting someone new can feel almost impossible. You know now how badly it can hurt when you get it wrong. Of course you don't want to repeat that.

  After an experience like that, it can easily feel like your ability to trust is the problem. So you say to yourself, I will not date right now. Not until the hurt fades or the fear goes away or the day when trusting someone new somehow feels natural again.

  Time can help the hurt become less painful, but trust isn't only something you feel. There are skills involved. Skills that help you recognise who is trustworthy.

  • You can learn to pay more attention to what someone repeatedly does, and rely less on what they say.

  • You can learn to no longer be surprised when someone who repeatedly doesn’t follow through on the small things, also fails to follow through on the big things.

  • You can learn to communicate boundaries — and use the way someone responds as information. If they don't respect your small no, don't bet on them suddenly respecting the big ones.

  • You can learn to let trust grow gradually instead of immediately deciding someone is either trustworthy or not.

  • And you can learn to take what you see seriously — including walking away when someone isn't showing you trustworthiness and investing your time in someone whose actions actually give you reasons to trust them.

  None of this guarantees that you won't get hurt. But you can get much better at recognising who to trust, how much to trust them with, and when someone's behaviour is telling you to stop all together.

  So instead of asking:
  How can I be able to trust again?

  Try:
  How can I get better at recognising who is trustworthy — and how much of my trust they have currently earned?

• “There’s too much going on right now.”

  Work is crazy. You're exhausted. Something is happening in your family. You need to get through this month. Then Christmas is coming. Then you have that big thing at work. Then you desperately need a holiday. And suddenly another year has passed.

  There absolutely are periods in life when we don't have the capacity to date. But if “not right now” is becoming your standard answer, it might be time to ask a different question: Where does finding a relationship actually sit among the priorities in my life?

  Is finding a lifelong partner more important than progressing at work?

  More important than keeping every social commitment?

  Trying the new restaurant?

  Watching another series?

  There isn't a correct answer. But if finding a lifelong relationship — and perhaps building a family — is one of the things you want most in your life, it can't continually be the first thing you remove when life gets too much.

  If reading that immediately makes you feel stressed because dating feels like one enormous thing you couldn't possibly take on right now - then you need to make it smaller. You don't need to find your lifelong partner this month. You only need to take the next small step.

  • Spend ten minutes on a dating app.

  • Tell a friend you're genuinely open to be introduced to someone.

  • Talk to one new person this week.

  • Say hi to someone you find interesting at work.

  • Make eye contact and smile to someone who caught your eye in the grocery store.

  • Choose one evening this month that you're willing to do something where you at least hypothetically could meet someone. Instead of meeting your friends at home, suggest you take a drink after work first.

  If even figuring out where to start feels overwhelming, find someone to help you break it down.

  So instead of:
  Do I have the time and energy to date right now?

  Try:
  If finding a life partner is genuinely important to me, how can I make room in my busy life to have some time and energy for it?

Your journey doesn't stop when “our journey” begins

Perhaps this is the idea I want you to take from all of this; A relationship isn't where two completed people meet. You will have your journey. The person you meet will have theirs. And you will create a third one together.

Mine & Yours & Ours

At times they will be separate, at other times they will be completely intertwined. You will influence each other. Support each other. Challenge each other. Sometimes you will need more from your partner, at other times it’s the other way around. And through it all, you remain two people responsible for your own lives, choices and growth.

That isn't a contradiction. That's a healthy relationship. So yes, work on yourself. Heal what needs healing. Grow. Build confidence. You can still look for love while you do all of that. You can do both.

You got this.
If not, then we’ll help you.

/Freja

Founder