What surprises me in the dating life of women is when I see the following story line:
This talented and hardworking woman is successful in her work.
She has many good friends and knows how to throw an awesome dinner party.
She meets a man.
The man gives her a great compliment,
and buys her some flowers,
and then gets physical with her.
Afterwards, he slows down from calling.
So she reaches out to him.
She offers to bring him soup when he’s sick.
She asks him where this is going.
He gives her a kiss infrequently and forgets to ask her about her day.
He’s likes some of the attention and sees her maybe once a week.
She hangs on to him because of the hope that this is heading towards a
real relationship, with so little investment.
I see a version of this story often. What surprises me is that the women in the story are high value in so many areas of their life. They dress well, exercise and take good care of themselves. They’ve handled their finances well. They’ve worked hard to achieve great things in the world and they are often loved by many people. But for some reason in the area of their love life they are willing to accept crumbs.
The mystery in all of this is that if they bought a blouse at the store and saw a snag leading to a hole, they’d take it back. Why then can it be so hard to “return” a man that’s not showing himself to be high quality?
When you are dating, and especially if you are getting to know a high quantity of men online, it’s not a matter of if you’ll be offered crumbs from a man, it’s a matter of when. When a man’s behavior leads the dating process with low effort or when his behavior downshifts from previously putting in a lot of effort, it can easily feel disappointing or hurtful.
While we may not say these thoughts exactly, our feelings can stem from thinking things like, “Am I not that interesting to him?” “Maybe I’m not worth the effort?” “Maybe I need to be giving more in the relationship to earn his love?”
And so, instead of speaking up and asking for what we’d prefer or waving him along to get yourself ready for the next man - you accept the little he gives.
You are hungry for a meal, yet you sit down and tell yourself you’ll be ok with crumbs.
The key to shifting this pattern is very simple - yet it can take consistent work to walk out it out.
This key is this: you must believe that you are worthy of the full meal. You must give yourself that value, like in every other area of your life.
Often we need the support of another person to help us to truly shift and stand in the kind of value that enables us to communicate with confidence what we need to a man. Or to rally the inner strength to let a man pass by that’s only offering crumbs.
If you’d like to start welcoming better quality men into your life, then reach out! I’d love to support you on your journey towards getting the full meal of love that you’ve been craving.