Response #26

1. To meet people:

-Venture out on your own occasionally. I had seen/briefly talked to Brian at some of the activities, but we didn't really get talking until I went to dessert social by myself (my rommate was out of town) and I didn't have her constantly with me. It forced me to start some conversations on my own and I recognized someone I knew but hadn't really talked to before. We really hit it off and he asked me out later that night. Sometimes its easier to talk to someone when you are by yourself and it makes it easier for them to ask you out (less pressure than when you are with your flock of girlfriends). I may not have talked to him at all if my roommate had been there.

-Be open minded and give it some time. I honestly would not have thought I would date/marry my husband based on my first impressions (he was quiet and I was too- I didn't really notice him that much at first). It took us a while to get to know each other, but we realized we had a lot in common. It took me a while to realize that I wanted to date seriously/exclusively but I am really glad we didn't worry too much about what other people thought/expected.

2. To get married

-Expect there to be bumps along the way and don't let them de-rail you (unless, obviously, they are serious enough to be persistent problems). I think we expect our dating relationships to be too perfect and give up on them before they have a chance to really grow. Like any realtionship, marriage is challenging but you help each other through the challenges and learn to love your husband/wife and all their faults/quirks/talents/strengths/etc. I think you can start to learn to do this as you date. In fact, working through challenges when you are dating can help you get to know the person in a different way and can tell you a lot about them and what they would be like as a spouse. Working through challenges as you date will make it easier to transition to marriage- where you will frequently encounter misunderstandings, stress, sleep-deprivation and all the other normal things in life. If you learn to deal with some of these things early on, you won't be clueless about how to overcome challenges in your marriage. Basically, some challenges in your dating relationship can be beneficial and actually pretty normal.

-Date for enough time. This one is pretty obvious but can be the hardest part of seriously dating. For us, we talked about marriage after dating for about 8 months, but we continued dating for about 6 more months before seriously considering it and getting engaged (and then 2 and 1/2 months of engagement). I think it was important for us to talk about it so that we were on the same page, but then to let some time pass before really making a decision. I think it allowed us to date with a purpose for the next 6 months and also allowed us time to see if that is really what we both wanted. The timing is different for everyone, but I was glad that we didn't decided to get married the instant we had first mentioned the subject.

Hope that helps!