Monday, July 20, 2009

Things aren't like they used to be

I recently went on a date that I would definitely label “the best date ever”. Never, in my four years of being single, has any date ever come close to this category. This guy, who I swore I wouldn’t write about, was the kind of guy that could actually carry on an intelligent conversation while having fun at the same time, he opened doors, laughed at my jokes, asked me about me, and most important, was actually interested in what I had to say. The thing I liked the most was our ability to laugh the entire night. His sense of humor was right up there with mine, quick, witty and a bit sarcastic. Never was there a dull moment in our conversation.

As I look back on this date, I have realized that men and women don’t know how to date anymore. It’s all about meeting out somewhere and having fun but never getting the opportunity to actually have good conversation and get to know one another. This is the reason I believe that most relationships don’t work out today. We spend way to much time focusing on partying and having fun together but never take the time to actually learn anything of substance about each other.

Why can’t we take dating back to the time when women were ladies and men were gentlemen. There was no rush to jump into a relationship or bed, for that matter. Men respected women and women respected men. There were real rules to courtship and no one ever thought to go against these rules. The rules often led to real relationships and real commitment. Men knew how to treat women. They courted them properly. They opened car doors and genuinely got to know the woman they were with. They knew the process of courtship and they knew that the end result was commitment, love, marriage, and sex. Today, however, things have changed, everything is backwards. The end has become the beginning. Sex has somehow become the prize when the prize should actually be commitment and love. Sex, in my mind, should be the reward for getting to know someone and falling in love with them. It shouldn’t be given away in the beginning! Men and women are equally guilty of this.

The sexual revolution has made us who we are today. Both men and women at that time thought it was great. Men could have sex without commitment and women could have sex without hesitation or question. No one needed love, no one needed commitment. No one wanted love and no one wanted commitment. Guilt free sex…it was (and still is) all the rage. Women gave up their rights to be loved and cherished. The more partners the better, no expectations from anyone. And things haven’t changed much since then. Men and women are still using sex for the wrong reasons. I don’t believe this is how we were created to live!

I think we need a revolution of our own. Nothing major, it doesn’t need to be painful! We need to step away from a sexual revolution and into another, one man, one woman at a time. I once saw written that we need to stop our “Sex and the City” attitudes towards who we are and what we need. I love that! I think the men of our generation have been taught by us, that the goal is sex and that we all share that same goal. Well, I’ve got news for you…I don’t share that same goal and I believe there are a lot of women out there like me, but are to scared to step up and take a stand. We need to stand up for what we believe in! Don’t fall to the pressures of our friends, the media, the world.

I think it is time we start thinking about ourselves and our needs, instead of doing what everyone else is doing. I believe if we do this we will retain the relationships of the men and women who come into our lives. We will actually know our spouses before we marry them! Huh, what a crazy concept!

29 comments:

  1. Wow! I have been reading your posts for a month now, and have really enjoyed your experiences and your thoughts.

    This post is spot on!

    I am very impressed you are expressing the way many men and women feel, but just now "strong" enough to stand for what they know deep down is right.

    Although you don't know me, you have me reading your blog everyday.

    Great work!

    Sincerely,
    JFK

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  2. WHOA, SISTA!!!! ROCK ON, MY SWEET GF!!!! You are taking a stand and I love and respect you all the more for it! You are 100% RIGHT in my humble opinion!!!! Watch the Rob Bell NOOMA DVD titled "Flame"...very VERY good and oh so true. Kudos to you, Jules!!!! xoxox, kate

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  3. Stopping by from SITS. As a single woman in my 40's who's been there, done that - I agree 100%

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  4. Hi there! I know you wrote this ages ago, but I'm from SITS and you had this linked in your "Oh Happy Day" post.

    I just wrote about this like last week sometime. I actually found a HuffPo blog post that agreed with this stance! Obviously most of the comments disagreed...

    Anyway, here it is if you'd like to read it: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/pegah-patra/the-cost-of-sexual-freedo_b_530107.html

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  5. I'm with you. I've never had sex outside of a long-term relationship, and I certainly don't feel I've missed out.

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  6. You hit the nail on the head! I am 30 years old - gak! - and I still can't wrap my head around the idea of jumping straight into bed. Sure, I made some mistakes back in the day, but overall, I was a long term relationship kind of gal. There's something to be said for holding off a bit. It's not like s-e-x is going anywhere!

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  7. This post rocks! Sex definitely should NOT be the goal of dating! There are a lot of people around who do believe sex should only come after marriage and then only with the one they married.

    Congrats on your SITS day!

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  8. You are so right
    happy sits day
    I think I'll share this on sunday surf

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  9. Yeah, I loved this post.

    Came from SITS. Staying for YOU!

    Just followed you (-:

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  10. So true...I think we've completely screwed up our kids for the future re: sex. Good for you for pointing it out!

    Alex aka Ma What's For Dinner
    www.mawhats4dinner.com

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  11. A-freaking-men! I do not understand the concept of sex without love...It just doesn't hit home with me. You are so completely right. We need to bring back old-school values and let dating go backt o its innocence.

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  12. You preach it sista! I couldn't agree with you more. There is nothing more masculine than knowing how to cherish a woman you care about. We have 3 boys and 1 girl and we are working hard to teach them what it means to actually court or be courted by someone. My boys open doors for ladies, allow them (with prompting) to go first in line, etc. Great post.

    Alison

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  13. Clap, clap, clap, clap! Brava!!WHat a phenomenal post! I couldn't agree more. I love this line: "Women gave up their right to be loved and cherished." Can you imagine if {SHOCK} people actually waited until they were {gasp} MARRIED before they had sex? You are so right, maybe if people had more dates like yours with this gentleman, people WOULD know their spouses when they got married. And the divorce rate wouldn't be so dang high. Well done.

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  14. You totally rock my face OFF!! I totally agree with you, 100%!!!

    Every time I meet a guy... one of the first things they start talking about is sex! That is an INSTANT turn off and instantly ruins the date and ANY chance they may have had with me.

    I am not an object and I refuse to be treated like one!

    I want the relationship, the commitment, the LOVE!!

    And by golly, I'M WORTH IT!!!!

    It's funny, I was recently talking to an 'old friend' and he asked me how long IT had been. I told him it had been quite a while and he went off on some tangent. I said, "Whoa, whoa, WHOA! Wait a minute here! If I wanted it, I'd get it. Where ever I wanted it! But I CHOOSE NOT to."

    Heh. That shut him up real quick like.

    Butthole.

    :D

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  15. Preach it, sister! You said it much better than I could... What we've done in our society today is traded our valuable diamonds with cheap dime store imitations. It's time we throw the worthless fake jewelry away and trade back in for the REAL thing!

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  16. Amen!!!! Sex minus love and committment leaves one feeling empty and used. Who the heck needs that?

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  17. AMEN! I totally agree, and unfortunately, didn't learn to think this way until after I was married...at least I can teach my children the right - and dignified - way to go about it.

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  18. My husband and I met 3 weeks before he deployed to Iraq. So we had a whole year of just talking on the phone and through email. I got to know so much about him that I probably never would have found out had we had a "normal" dating relationship. They being said, once we started living together, it turns out we were very compatible on the phone, but not so much when it came to household chores. It was a struggle for awhile, but I think because we knew how to talk to one another we were able to figure out the rest of it.

    And sex didn't really have much to do with any of it. Well....ok....he was deployed for a year...for about the first month after he came home sex had ALOT to do with it :)

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  19. AWESOME! I'm with you!

    One of the things that attracted me most to my husband was his own hesitancy to bring up sex when we first started getting to know each other. His only referrence to it was to refer to the girls he'd been dating and how it was all THEY could talk about (like, how on the first date a girl told him, straight up, that she liked in a certain rear place...who does that????). We were very like-minded on the entire subject, and still are. But it is rare nowadays, for sure.

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  20. I could not agree more! Even in my relationship with my fiance, sometimes I have to ask him if we can just kiss, and work our way up to sex. Why do we have to just jump right in?
    I think sometimes I was born in the wrong time period. I want a dance card, and for a man to have to ask me to dance, not grind up on me at a nightclub. Sigh...

    Happy Sits Day!

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  21. Count me in for your revolution SITSta! I like your thinking!

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  22. Fantastic post. I completely agree with you. I wish that everyone could share in this way of thinking. Maybe if they did, a lot more people would be in successful relationships and would be a lot happier! :D

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  23. Happy SITS day!

    You're absolutely right about dating and getting to know a guy while he gets to know you. There are still good guys out there, just like the one on your date. I won't date a guy who doesn't treat me with respect, as I treat him with respect.

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  24. Perhaps not completely return to the days of old (There is a TV show about a 50s advertising agency, I can’t remember its name for the life of me atm but its a great look at that era!) rather just include these things today. I have always viewed that there is no shameful sex for women... if they pick the right guy to have sex with!
    Most woman have at least one or two guys that they either did or didn’t date that they remember as “GREAT SEX” that they felt no shame when walking away from it...and I can hesitant a guess that this was GREAT SEX because they did pick the right guy. A guy in their league, who are respectful, who they had a good time with...that they picked on a day/night that they felt good about themselves and what they deserved.
    Rather than the last one left on the dance floor at 3am as their egos and esteem have left the building along with all the decent guys.
    I think that if all woman, used THAT memory standard with every guy they had sex with... you would find a large deterioration in flippant sexual behaviour in women... and then perhaps an increase in decent men... because the expectations were now higher...

    But unfortunately until all women jump on this wagon (as it was in the days of old) woman who want to set this standard may have to ‘go without’ for a while...and I don’t mean just sex.

    Any who, that my Two cents. Great writing BTW, am a fan, will be back, happy SITS day!

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  25. Great post- I may just print it out and read it to my daughters in another 5 years or so.
    Stopping by from SITS!

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  26. This is exactly what I am hoping to teach my children. I want to teach them how it used to be, not what it is like now.

    Stopping by from SITS.

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