It’s become almost a cliché of the dating world that men are fearful of commitment.
But nowadays many women are starting to adopt that same trait too. What’s that about, and how is a man who’s decidedly not afraid of commitment deal with the increasing numbers of women out there who are?
What’s Good for the Gander…
It goes both ways: what’s good for the goose has always been good for the gander, but now the reverse is true as well, and in more ways than ever.
Self-sabotage, stereotyping, “playing the field”, hopping into the sack and, alternatively, rejecting prospective mates without ever getting to know them are all traits that used to be the sole domain of the typical male. But no longer.
Women of today, especially those in their 20’s and 30’s, are increasingly following paths that were once laid out for men and men alone, including adopting the worse of men’s behaviors.
It wasn’t that long ago that women were still subjugated – “lesser-than’s” to their male counterparts. Once upon a time women were expected to stay home and raise the family while men headed off to work to feed, clothe, and house them.
But now the career-woman has become commonplace, and the single woman (even the single mother) has become more and more widely accepted in society. These are huge and overdue advances in human civilization (evolutionary, even). But as with progress in all its many forms, it also comes saddled with its own whole new set of challenges.
Those Awful Statistics
Part of the problem is the statistic that everyone seems to have heard about by now that at least half of all marriages end in divorce. So why get married, then? That’s a question many men and women ask when they consider these figures.
Rather than ponder what it is about people of today that gets them to marry so hastily without cementing certain key components of a healthy relationship – communication, compatibility, willingness to share one’s life and personal space with another person – we’re prone to dismiss marriage as a system riddled with holes and destined for failure. That’s a backwards conclusion to draw if ever we’ve heard one.
Many people get married out of fear, because they don’t want to be the last of their friends to do so, lest they wind up an old maid. Others get married because it’s what’s expected of them. Or for the children, already in existence, on the way, or in the form of a biological clock with a very loud tick. But if more people waited until they found the right person to marry, if they waited until both of them were sure that this was what they wanted, to spend the rest of their lives together, even when it means working through the hard stuff (and there’s a lot of hard stuff no matter how communicative, compatible, willing, etc. one is), then a whole lot more marriages would last the long haul.
Here’s another statistic for you – the fastest-growing segment of the population in America today are single women.
Profile of the Commitment-Phobic Woman
How does a man unused to such behavior identify a woman who’s afraid of commitment? It’s not that difficult.
She’s gone on millions of first dates and nearly no second ones. She goes out with bad boys who show very little interest, if any, in whom she really is on the inside. She has a large contingent of girlfriends with whom she feels no shame about sharing every intimate detail of the time you spend together (and who she probably also puts down the moment they’re not around).
She might be a rebounder, hopping from one relationship to another with no time in-between to collect herself. Or she might have been engaged for eons and never even thought to set a wedding date.
She wears all the hallmarks of the token “Independent Woman” on the fast track to success – and may very well be at that – but she hasn’t had a genuine intimate relationship with anyone in years and puts up such a wide berth of emotional armor around her that no one, man or woman, can ever break through to get close enough to even try to have something like one with her.
Uncertainty is an Excuse
“Is this really the right person for me?” You can ask that question until you’re blue in the face and never get an answer as it’s a loaded question. The question she should be asking instead is, “Do I love this person and want to share my life with him?”
The grass-is-always-greener mentality, especially in today’s immediate gratification culture, is a dangerous place to operate from, as it shields a person from all the abundant bounty on this side of the mountain. There’s not much you can do to convince a woman of this, is this is indeed her modus operandi. All you really can do when you identify such a trait is to run as fast as you can in the opposite direction.
Don’t worry about losing her by doing this. Because, first of all, if this is how she thinks, then you never really had her to begin with. And second of all (and more importantly), if she really does love you and want to be with you, she’ll realize her mistake once you’re out the door and come running (or crawling) back to you. Either way, you haven’t lost anything other than a burdensome ball and chain keeping you stuck moving in an endless circle.
Picky, Picky, Picky
When women bond, they bond tightly. They travel in droves and it’s hard as hell for any man to break through that barrier. To boot, now that they have independence and earning power, they’ve started taking on men’s less admirable trait of pickiness, expecting the guy they date to be (or at least look like) a male supermodel. How’s an everyday guy supposed to compete with that? Answer – he’s not.
The Time’s They Are A’Changing
These days men aren’t the only ones afraid of commitment, and by the same token, women aren’t the only ones desiring it. Men don’t just enter the dating pool to get laid. Sure, some of them may, but not most. Why go to all the trouble when they could just as easily find someone to meet that need at a bar or a night club. Most men explore dating because they genuinely want to meet another person for authentic companionship and affection.
The tables have turned. The stereotypes have been shattered. And the sooner you realize this, the easier a time you will have in weeding the duds out of your dating pool and getting your true needs met.