Rank the following in order of importance to you in dating:

1. Male attention
2. Getting a ring
3. Landing the guy that got away
4. Connecting with someone

Research shows that only ONE of those options is guaranteed to make you happier. Which one is it? I’ll tell you in a minute, but first…

You know how important it is to have goals. If you didn’t have goals, you’d end up spinning your wheels. Goals move you forward. They challenge you to decide what you want and what you’re going to do to get it.

In dating, your goals might include going on a certain number of dates per week or always getting asked on a second date.

But here’s the kicker:

Achieving those goals won’t necessarily make you any happier.

How many times have you gotten something you REALLY wanted and worked hard for…

Only to feel much the same after the initial buzz wore off?

Getting what we want doesn’t always make us feel any better.

It turns out that WHY you pursue your goals matters even more than WHAT those goals are.

Pursue a goal for the right reasons, and you’ll feel a lot happier—even if you never achieve it.

Pursue a goal for the wrong reasons, and you’ll end up feeling more anxious and unhappy—even if you manage to achieve it.

That’s especially true in dating.

If you date from a place of extrinsic motivation, you’ll find dating a lot more stressful and difficult.

If you date from a place of intrinsic motivation, you’ll find dating a lot more fun and satisfying.

So what are these two different types of motivation, and how can you use them to succeed in dating?

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When you’re really interested in a guy, how do you show it?

Do you:

1. Tell him straight off the bat?
2. Flirt?
3. Invade his personal space?
4. Drop a hint to his friends?

Each option has advantages and drawbacks.

Telling him straight off the bat means you don’t have to wait around wondering if he feels the same way. But you might scare him off.

Flirting is a time-honored way to indicate interest. But some men can be oblivious.

Invading his personal space is a clear sign you want to get close. But he can take it to mean you want sex, rather than a real relationship.

Dropping a hint to his friends ensures your interest will find its way to his ears. But it’s kind of grade school, isn’t it?

Guys have it easier. In their world, there’s only one socially-acceptable way to show interest in a girl:

Ask her out.

If a man can’t get up the courage to ask her out, the idea goes, then he’s not much of a man.

A man’s interest is black-and-white. You don’t have to decode his body language or decipher his mysterious texts. All you have to do is notice if he’s asking to see you again … or not.

This “man code” puts a lot of pressure on guys. Even though they don’t have to figure out the best way to show a woman they’re interested, they have to buck up and ask her out—knowing she could say no.

The shame and humiliation of rejection puts a lot of guys off from asking women out. They’d rather admire her from afar than face the cold hard reality of her indifference.

These guys need a little help from you.

If you suspect a guy is interested in you but hasn’t asked you out yet, your job is to make it easy for him to ask you out.

If he jumps on that opening and asks you out, then you know for sure he’s into you.

(And if you go out with him and he asks to see you again, then he’s DEFINITELY into you!)

If he doesn’t ask you out, even though you’ve made it super-easy for him, then he’s not into you enough. Move on to someone who is. So here’s what you do if you want to clear the way for him to ask you out:

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“She doesn’t respect me, so why should I have to respect her?” Dillon leaned forward, certain I’d agree with him.

But Jayla cut in with a shrug of her shoulders, “I’d respect him if he started acting like a man instead of a teenage boy.”

Dillon looked to me, “See what I have to put up with?”

I knew that if I said nothing, they’d go straight into fighting over the same thing they always fought about. Outrage over what he did. Indignation over what she did.

An image flickered through my mind of another couple, sitting in the same place Dillon and Jayla were sitting now. On the surface, they seemed completely different. Honey was a big personality, and she kept her man in line.

“He don’t dare disrespect me,” she declared with confidence.

The man sitting next to her didn’t say a word, but I could see the tension in his hunched shoulders. Maybe Honey had trained him to respect her, but I wondered if his submission was hiding feelings of resentment.

Respect is a big issue in relationships. And for good reason.

There’s no love without respect.

Some psychologists even believe that respect is MORE important than love.

You can grow to love someone you respect deeply. But feeling disrespected by someone erodes the very foundation of your relationship.

So what exactly is respect?

We’d normally say it’s a feeling of admiration towards someone. You hold them in high regard. That doesn’t mean you think they’re perfect; sometimes they do or say things that are wrong. But their human imperfections don’t diminish the light you see shining in them.

Many spiritual traditions encourage respect towards all living beings. In this broader view of respect, you don’t even have to like someone to respect them. You choose to treat others with respect, regardless of how you feel about them personally.

It’s this view that I believe is most useful in relationships.

Dillon and Jayla believed that respect had to be earned, that you couldn’t respect someone who didn’t deserve it.

What I hoped to teach them was that respect was like love: best when it’s mutual, habitual, and as unconditional as possible.

If there’s disrespect going on in your relationship, don’t fight about it. Talk about it.

Here are the 3 Respect Principles you should be discussing.

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Jade came to me with a clear focus for what she wanted to work on.

“I want to show my boyfriend that he can trust me,” she said. “He had a really toxic relationship with his ex, and now he says he’s scared of getting close to anyone else again. How can I help him get over his fears?”

Jade was the kind of woman any man would feel thankful for. She radiated warmth, generosity, and dependability. She was determined to improve herself and make a wonderful life for the man she’d eventually marry.

“Did anything happen to make him doubt you?” I asked.

“No, not that I know of.”

“What are you doing right now to help him overcome his fears from the past?”

“Like, everything!” She threw her hands up in frustration. “I give him plenty of space. I don’t push him. I don’t ask much of him. But it’s not working. He says he needs more time.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard a story like this.

There are a lot of men who won’t get close to a woman because of their troubled past.

For some, it’s because their parents divorced and they’re afraid the same thing will happen to them. Others won’t get close because a nasty breakup soured them on relationships. Still others are afraid of being rejected or used or letting someone down.

These men are lucky to find partners like Jade who are willing to work with them.

Jade wanted to help her boyfriend get over his fears. She had so much love to give him. But he had to be willing to receive it.

In a moment, I’ll give you 3 questions that will help you decide if his desire for a relationship is greater than his fears.

But first, let’s see if we can get inside his head.

Have you ever really wanted a relationship…

But felt scared?

If so, what were you afraid of?

Were you afraid of getting hurt? Of giving away all your power to someone else? Of making a fool out of yourself? Of messing up your one shot with someone you really respected?

If you take relationships seriously, then of course you’re going to be nervous. The more you want anything, the more frightened you’ll feel of taking that first step. Once you start, it feels like there’s no going back.

For some, the dream is so big and attractive that it paralyzes them. It’s easier to wish and hope than actually do something about it. Never trying means you’ll never fail.

Some men fall into that camp. They’d rather fantasize about a relationship than do anything about it.

Because you’re reading this, I don’t think that describes you. 😉 I think you’re more than willing to do the work to get a great relationship, even if it means you might get rejected or dumped.

But is he willing?

Holding back from you may be his way of protecting himself.

What he doesn’t realize is that he’s protecting himself from love as well as heartbreak.

You need to know whether this man can get over his fears so he can love you the way you deserve … or whether he’ll choose his fears over you.

Find out by asking yourself these 3 questions.

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