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Please don’t accept me as I am.

One day I will look my future husband in the face and say it: “Please don’t accept me as I am.” I turned 30 before I decided that I would do this — a decision that Timothy Keller helped me make.

In his book The Meaning of Marriage, Keller dissects, in part, the prevalent urge to resist relationships with people who won’t accept us as we are, whose involvement with us could disrupt the habits we established before we met.

The quest then is for a spouse who doesn’t just choose and love you as you are, but whose relationship with you doesn’t change you.

Which makes little sense for us who are Catholic, because we believe that marriage, like all vocations, should change us — we’re supposed to be holier at the end than we were at the beginning, because of grace and each other. We’re supposed to be committed to each other’s sainthood, not to maintenance of each other’s status quo. Continue reading “Please don’t accept me as I am.”

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How to determine what your significant other is thinking.

I recently saw an article about body language and dating that had the following subheadline: “Next time you find yourself wondering what he’s thinking, try observing these nonverbal cues.”

Or—here’s an idea—ASK HIM (or her, gentlemen. It works for you, too).

We do not know what other people are thinking but advice that encourages us to use any method for finding out other than “ask them” is advice that discourages communication. And that is advice that misleads us.

We are designed to communicate explicitly in relationships.

This is not always easy but it is healthy, and it is worth discomfort. If we are unwilling to communicate while we date we will be unwilling while we are married.

And neither our world nor our Church needs more marriages with the walls that spouses build between each other when they don’t communicate.

New to my work? Check out my book, Chastity Is For Lovers: Single, Happy, and (Still) a Virgin.

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. So, if you click the links and purchase the products I recommend, I earn a little commission at no extra cost to you. And when you do, I am sincerely grateful.

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Is a first kiss a litmus test?

I recently read an article about first kisses, and it didn’t sit right. The author called a first kiss a litmus test. It’s how you confirm that he’s into you, she wrote — it’s how you determine whether he’s confident.

And maybe, for her, that’s what a first kiss is. And maybe it is for you, too — a gauge you use to measure stuff, like your interest in a person, or a person’s confidence. But is it supposed to be?

Continue reading “Is a first kiss a litmus test?”

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Three relationship resolutions for 2016.

Relationships are good but hard, and I know it because of personal experience and because of the emails I received throughout 2015 from readers whose requests best can be summed up with one word.

“HELP.” — as in, “Should I break up with her?” and “Why won’t he ask me out?” and “Should I pursue a relationship with her?” and “Is it ok to tell him that I like him?”

It is normal to desire to do relationships well and it is also normal to feel a lot like you have no idea what you are doing. Continue reading “Three relationship resolutions for 2016.”

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What Tim Tebow’s breakup can teach us.

Tim Tebow got dumped. Again. This time, the girl is Olivia Culpo, a former Miss USA who allegedly called it quits after a couple of months because she “can’t handle” Tebow’s sexual abstinence.

So last week, a New York Daily News gossip blog mocked the famous football player for his inability to “find the endzone,” and wrote that it isn’t the first time that his decision to save sex has caused him to fumble in his love life.

Which is ludicrous.

It’s not ludicrous because Tebow didn’t fumble. He absolutely fumbled. We all do. But he didn’t fumble because he decided to save sex. He fumbled because he decided to date a girl who thinks saving sex is a bad idea.

And I wonder why — why a person who intends to live life like God designed it decided to date a person who isn’t into that. Maybe for the same reason I did? Continue reading “What Tim Tebow’s breakup can teach us.”