For many of us, it seems the world of dating is now more than ever in a state of flux. While I am confident that bars and clubs will continue to be places where people meet one another, on-line dating and smart phone applications offer us the opportunity to meet people from the comfort of our own homes and as such have changed the stage forever.
Smart phone apps (or just the apps, as they are called) can tell you who is on-line, who they are interested in dating or having sex with, what their sexual proclivities are, their ‘stats’, and how far away they are in real time.
Many of us enjoy and are good at casual sex, but many of us still have difficulty connecting on a deeper level and forming loving lasting relationships that can be easily found on the apps.
Good sex is life affirming as can be a satisfying hookup, but a hookup is not the stuff of relationship building. In fact, with all the presumptions and emotions that can come with such intimacy, it can confuse us and complicate a potential relationship. When you meet someone for an old fashion date after being set up by friends, for example, you share details about yourself (like your real name, to start). Over time – but not too much time, you’ll both share your interests, your wants and needs, and you’ll both discover each other’s foibles. If you’re both honest you will find the connection grows and deepens, or evolves into something other than a partnership. You begin to trust the other person more and more as you each share discover the other. Love requires trust.
The problem with sex too early on is that we reveal and share our carnal selves in a most intimate way. For example, once you have been intimate in a sexual way with someone, asking them for their last name can be an embarrassing question. Not so, if done early on in the date.
None of this is to suggest that there needs to be a marriage proposal or a withering courtship prior to sex. What all this does mean, in my mind, is that you might want to consider where your hookup might lead in the long term, if what you want is a relationship. Does this hookup have potential, and if it does, what to do I next?
Good sex doesn’t necessarily have much to do with a good relationship (although a good relationship includes good sex – however partners shape that), but if you’re thinking about relationships, don’t think a hot hookup and sex means you’ve come across your lifelong partner. Ask those important questions, be honest, to meet again if that’s the right thing to do, but this time think about “do I want to date this person?” And start asking some other important questions like. “What do I want and need, what does he want and need from me, and could he or I really be that person for the other?” …and then go have some hot sex.