When you're dating, the right person will bring out the desire to give to them and to help them — especially if you're a man — rather than to think about what you can get out of them. This is the most original dating insight I've had after years of dating in my twenties and then dating again after divorce.
How I Used to Date: Calculating What I Could Get
Always, when I would meet a woman, my thought was what I want and how do I get it. That was my thought process. Dating to me, before meeting this woman I met a week ago, was this: as soon as I meet a woman, I'm immediately calculating what I have to do to get what I want. Everything I'm doing is just a logical calculation. Do I need to take her out to dinner? Do I need to make her laugh? How do I adjust my personality to get her to like me, to get what I want?
Getting what I want. And getting what I want wasn't just limited to sex — it was also attention, validation, physical touch, laughter, and a relationship. But my first thought was always, what am I getting out of this? I want the sex. I want the relationship. I want my friends to be impressed with this woman at my side. My first thought was, okay, how do I get her to do what I want her to do?
Meeting Her: The First Time My Thought Was "How Can I Help?"
I just had a completely different experience for the first time in my life with dating. Seven days ago, I met a woman, and my thought with her was: how can I help her? To me, that's a sign that it's the right person.
Now, does it mean that every person you have that feeling towards is going to work out? No, because ultimately it needs to be mutual. It needs to be that I have the help to offer — I have the desire to give to her and serve her — and she wants to receive that. Just me going around willing, asking how can I help this woman, how can I serve her, and wanting to give so much to her — that's a good sign that it could be the right person. But in order for it to fully be the right person, they need to want to receive.
Yesterday, I had such a fantastic date with the woman I'm dating now, and she was open to receiving six hours of time with me — talking about her business, having amazing conversations, going out to dinner, crying together. Today, she seems a little more closed off to receiving. And yet, what's constant is my desire to give and serve her. That's there all the time.
What My Marriage Taught Me About Giving to Get
There were times when I was married where giving was what I was thinking about, and having kids especially really draws out that desire to give. But one of the things I can isolate as a learning opportunity from my marriage and my divorce is that a lot of my thinking around being married was: here's what I want, and am I getting it? Am I getting the sex I want? Am I getting the respect I think I deserve? Am I getting the lifestyle? Is my woman fitting into my life how I want her to?
I was often thinking of what I could do for her. I was often doing whatever I could to serve her. Still, though, what was primary was: how do I get what I want? That was the primary thinking. I'm washing the dishes so that then she'll want to have sex with me later. I'm cleaning the house so she'll be happy with me and validate me. I'm willing to say whatever she wants to hear so we don't have an argument.
And that is something that makes life difficult. It makes dating difficult. I just wasn't conscious of this before. To me it just was, well, that's how you do things. Doesn't everybody go around focused on what you want to get, where what you give is given so it can help you get what you want?
Now, yes — it's not like wanting to give to someone else totally drowns out the desire to receive. In dating this woman, I'm very aware of what I want to receive, but it's not the primary thing I'm thinking about. The primary thing I'm thinking about is: how may I serve her? How can I help her? How can I give to her? If the most helpful thing I can do is give her some space today, then I'm willing to do that. I also sent her a voice memo saying, hey, it seems like maybe — I'm having a little fear that maybe you're closing up today. That's okay. I'm here no matter what. I'd love to spend time with you, but if you want a day to yourself, that's fine too. I'm here to give no matter what, and whether you want to receive is up to you.
Life Gives Back What We Give Out
What I've noticed is that with this energy of giving, I'm setting myself up to also receive better than I've ever received before, because in my experience life generally gives us what we give out ourselves. If I give out a lot of love, life will generally give me a lot of love back — and I'll often be somewhat blind when it doesn't. I'll just ignore it, often. When I'm focused on the love I'm giving and on building a character that can give the most love possible, when that's my mindset in dating, then I'm not so sensitive to or paying attention to anything besides that.
If I want to give to a woman and she doesn't want to receive, then I try again another day, if we're dating already. Or if we haven't started dating and I open my heart to a woman and she's not interested, then I open my heart to the next woman. I do that again and again until I find a woman who says, I would like to receive this love from you. Then the beauty is when you have that exchange where you give love and then you get. You give and you get, and you give and you get. To me, you maximize that by focusing on the giving. How may I serve this person? What can I do? How can I help?
I'm Making My Videos the Same Way Now
I'm intending to do that in my videos too, because I've often approached my videos the same way I approached dating. My videos were me showing up to the studio in here saying, okay, what do I need to say to get them to watch, and to get the money I want, and to get the followers and the respect and all that? What do I need to do to be famous? You can see there are a lot of videos on YouTube where the person might have a lot of loving character in their personal life, but when they show up on camera, it seems that their motivation is often: I'll do and say whatever I need to do to get the most views possible.
In my vlog this morning, I was talking about this and I had a fantastic cry. I did a video where I talked about how I cried out for my queen, and then I met her. I was crying during that video, talking about the life I've had and about the last 24 hours — that's what my vlogs do. And I'm really grateful the woman I'm dating said she actually watched some of my videos and she was proud of them. I'm like, wow, that's such a different reaction than I've experienced before. I'm so grateful.
As soon as I met this woman, this desire to give just surged out of me. That was a reflection of something in her also, because I've met a lot of women and the desire to give did not surge out of me. I was open. I asked — I said, please, I'm ready for my queen. What do I need to do to be ready for her? And the answer is: we need to be ready to give. You need to be ready to serve. You need to be ready to love. You need to be ready to help her have the best experience and the best life possible. Be ready to give that to her, rather than thinking, okay, here's what I want and what do I need to do to get it? Think: how do I give all the love I have to give? If it's the right person, that love will come back. And when the love comes back, it makes me want to give again. That's the cycle — give, receive, give, receive.
Most Dating Advice Has It Backwards
A lot of us in dating have been tricked into trying to maximize what we're receiving and minimize what we're giving. That is going to consistently produce suffering. So much dating content is all based around how you maximize what you get and minimize what you give. I don't want to do that anymore. Even if I'm out-giving, I would rather out-give and sometimes take the chance of being hurt.
And yes, if you're giving in a place where you're not receiving back, then it doesn't make sense to stay there. Especially, a lot of women have the experience where they do show up ready to give love and receive it, and the man is not. Perhaps that was part of the woman's selection process, though — perhaps she passed by men who would have given her love and selected the one who wouldn't.
What I want to do is put videos out on this dating channel — the ones you'll find on my Dating playlist — that give you love, that give you hope, and that give you inspiration, so that when you look out at dating, you don't think it's broken. You look out and think: all I have to do is love people and be prepared to give love to someone else, especially as a man. Then the love you're wanting will be given back to you when it's the right person. And if a person has proven incapable of giving you back the love you're giving, then it does make sense to move on, especially in the beginning.
That's where I felt a little fear, because this woman I met is just so amazing and has encouraged me to give so much love. I'm not going to move on from this easily, which puts me in a very risky position to get hurt. And at the same time, I'd rather be in a position to get hurt than go around trying to just focus on what I'm getting and minimize what I'm giving. That's an awful way to date — and it's how I've dated most of my life.
I'm Here to Witness You
So if you want to give to me, and you want me to support you, to see you, and to witness you — if you want me to be a witness to what your world is and your dating life — I'm prepared to give you my time, my attention, and my love. I'm prepared to listen to you talk about your dating life. And what's beautiful is that with me, you can really share from the heart.
If you need to cry, if you're frustrated with your dating life, if you don't know what to do, if you want to have an amazing person in your life and be ready for them — I'm prepared to give you an exchange of value, where I'm prepared to receive money and give you love, support, and listening. An open-hearted connection. I'm here to exchange love with you and to be there to support you through your dating journey. I'm not here to tell you what to do, or to act like I have it all figured out, or to give you systems or games or tricks or advice. I'm here to lead by example. This is how I love and date with an open heart, and this is how I live courageously and authentically. If you're interested in receiving that, you can schedule a one-on-one call with me.
And I'm here to listen to you, because the more I get to listen to you and witness you, the more it inspires my future videos. A lot of my videos right now are inspired by my own personal experiences in the middle of dating, and I would love to witness what you are going through in dating, so that I can add that to my perspective — and so that you will feel seen, that you will feel heard, that you will feel connected, that you will feel loved. Because just being witnessed, being paid attention to, and being validated — that's super valuable. That is often what a lot of us are looking for in dating: someone just to witness us, just to love us as we are, just to let us be seen as ourselves. I'm here to support you in that.