What is settling?

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LotusCarsLtd

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What exactly is settling in dating? I often hear that settling is bad but was never given an explanation for what it is.

For example: there is a cute girl in my choir but I have reservations about approaching her. It’s not that I’m afraid of approaching her or anything…there are just certain things about her that bother me a bit. I wonder if approaching her is a form of settling because I feel I could find someone else that I am more attracted to.

So what exactly is settling?
 
LotusCarsLtd said:
What exactly is settling in dating? I often hear that settling is bad but was never given an explanation for what it is.

For example: there is a cute girl in my choir but I have reservations about approaching her. It’s not that I’m afraid of approaching her or anything…there are just certain things about her that bother me a bit. I wonder if approaching her is a form of settling because I feel I could find someone else that I am more attracted to.

So what exactly is settling?
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Probably there will always be someone you could find you’d be more attracted to, even once you’re married. If you want to define settling that way, then most of us settle.

Settling is choosing to be with someone you don’t really want because you realize you can’t get any better.
 
Settling is like ordering fish sticks when what you really want is prime rib. 😃
 
To me settling is abandoning the “core” values you expect from your future spouse and you are aware will condition the quality of your potential marriage for fear of never finding somebody who will fit and so ending alone.

BUT settling is not to be confused with “rethinking your check-list” :
  • we all have items in our “check-list” that truly have nothing to do in it, and are not to be set at a level with core values : for example, I had "must be a good dancer "in my check-list for a long time… DH was the worst dancer ever when I knew him, and at first not very motivated to learn. But once he saw how I enjoyed dancing, he decided to learn. We spent horrible (!) evenings trying to learn,:eek: till one day he finally began progressing, and now be both enjoy dancing together.🙂
    Similar with looks and many other things, that are more or less consciously on our check-list…😊
  • your future spouse will anyway have numerous flaws. What should nevertheless always be on your check-list (and which I hadn’t realized before I found these items in my now DH and understood how important they were) is
    – Is she / he able / Does he want to communicate ?
    – Is she/ he able to commit ?
    – and above all: is she/he able to acknowledge her/his faults and work on them?
    This last point will solve many issues, and may make up for many “missing items” on said check-list.
Oh, and a last thing: these last items can sometimes be discerned before dating, but often you just have to get into some kind of relationship with somebody to realize he or she is totally unable to accept that they have any faults at all / ought to adapt the way they behaving.🤷
Once you’ve seen that => run.
 
FrenchGwen said:
Oh, and a last thing: these last items can sometimes be discerned before dating, but often you just have to get into some kind of relationship with somebody to realize he or she is totally unable to accept that they have any faults at all / ought to adapt the way they behaving.🤷
Once you’ve seen that => run.
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A thousand times over, I agree. It is painful to be in a relationship with that kind of person. Trust me I know 😛 Often you’ll kid yourself and say actually I suppose they don’t really have to work on that or well I guess thats acceptable behaviour… Because you half-heartedly expect love to change everything. Wrong. Not only that, but people like that are selfish beyond belief. Without even doing it on purpose, they will take and take and take, and when they have taken everything they’ll bail because they see themselves as perfect in every way and you’ve just validated them. Point is, as soon as you see any warning sign like this, run as far as you can. Wish them well and get out. Trust FrenchGwen, and trust me. 👍
 
LotusCarsLtd said:
What exactly is settling in dating? I often hear that settling is bad but was never given an explanation for what it is.

For example: there is a cute girl in my choir but I have reservations about approaching her. It’s not that I’m afraid of approaching her or anything…there are just certain things about her that bother me a bit. I wonder if approaching her is a form of settling because I feel I could find someone else that I am more attracted to.

So what exactly is settling?
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LotusCarsLtd…I think everyone else defined ‘settling’ pretty well, so I won’t add another definition…but what I will say is that you are very young. You got so much time to meet someone. If there are things that bother you about a girl now, don’t feel you have to compromise that much yet.

We all have strengths and weaknesses. Just because that girl may do one or two things that bother you, doesn’t mean she doesn’t have some really positive traits that far outweigh the things you think are negative. I wouldn’t say that is settling per se.
 
Settling is the first step toward spending the rest of your life married to person A but wishing you were married to person B.
 
flyingfish said:
Probably there will always be someone you could find you’d be more attracted to, even once you’re married. If you want to define settling that way, then most of us settle.

Settling is choosing to be with someone you don’t really want because you realize you can’t get any better.
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What she said.

(How nice to agree with you some time, Flyingfish. :))
LotusCarsLtd said:
For example: there is a cute girl in my choir but I have reservations about approaching her. It’s not that I’m afraid of approaching her or anything…there are just certain things about her that bother me a bit. I wonder if approaching her is a form of settling because I feel I could find someone else that I am more attracted to.
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You will always be attracted to other women. That’s just something you have to live with. Besides, attraction comes on many levels (e.g. not just physical) and there’s a couple of factors other than attraction that make you want to be or stay with someone. Last but not least, your choices and actions shape your attitudes too, so choosing to be a faithful husband once you’ve married changes you in a way.

Now as for that girl. If you start a relationship with someone who isn’t so great a prospect from your point of view, that’s settling. Especially if you look at it in terms of can you or can’t you get any better, it probably means you’re just reviewing your options. Would be nice to fall in love instead (without switching off your brain, naturally), wouldn’t it? 😉 Don’t yield in to pressure, including the one from the so called biological clock (and you’re not old anyway).

It’s only natural that something bothers you in a girl. I doubt you could find any woman nothing in whom would bother you. There’s always something. Question is, are we going to laugh it off or is it going to bring us down? The answer isn’t always simple because the gravity of the problem isn’t the only factor here. For example, we have our “pet peeves” that peeve us more than some objectively more grave concerns that we’d be more willing to live with for other reasons (e.g. our own familiary with those issues resulting in more understanding). You will need to nail down the problem with the girl and think it over and I seriously suggest you don’t skip this step. It will be far less easy when you get involved.

This said, you can always meet her for a coffee (if she agrees, naturally) and have a conversation without indicating romantic interest or imposing commitment. If you do so, I’d be very careful because it doesn’t seem like you’re starting to develop feelings for her or like it’s personal for some other reasons, as I said, it seems to be just reviewing your options. So you’d better keep a level head and a sober outlook.

By the way, a girl wouldn’t be happy to hear you were settling for her. In fact, you’d be far happier to be able to say, “yes, yes, yes, I want it!” than, “okay, I’ll settle.” Sometimes this requires waiting.
 
NewsTheMan said:
A thousand times over, I agree. It is painful to be in a relationship with that kind of person. Trust me I know 😛 Often you’ll kid yourself and say actually I suppose they don’t really have to work on that or well I guess thats acceptable behaviour… Because you half-heartedly expect love to change everything. Wrong. Not only that, but people like that are selfish beyond belief. Without even doing it on purpose, they will take and take and take, and when they have taken everything they’ll bail because they see themselves as perfect in every way and you’ve just validated them. Point is, as soon as you see any warning sign like this, run as far as you can. Wish them well and get out. Trust FrenchGwen, and trust me. 👍
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I third that. It’s nice to be with someone who recognises he’s fallible and is willing to work on it, as well as to adapt to you somehow, somewhat, so that your life together (whether as friends or more) is easier, while it’s awfully hard to interact with someone who thinks he has no faults, all he does is great, he has nothing to work on etc. etc. *Insanely *attractive women lose their charm when behaving that way, once you’ve had some experience with it.

I also agree with FrenchGwen (who is a wonderful lady for laying her thoughts out in bullet points) on communication and commitment. There’s plenty of people with poor communication skills but some have the willingness to try and communicate anyway. Those will be fine. Now there are people who just don’t get it and they won’t communicate. Well, sorry, one can’t have a relationship without communication or with deficient communication. This is, Lotus, why I put so much stress on how those chosen girls of yours get to the business of sending you a message or giving you a call.

As for commitment, while certainly not necessarily true, as people mature enough for commitment will often have little time on their hands because of work etc. and they might be sparing with their social meetings because of appreciating the value of time (for some people a free evening is a precious thing and they won’t readily give it up for a meeting with a relative stranger), but at the same time it must be noted that busy, busy, busy and questionably veritably busy is not an attitude that bodes well for commitment. Commitment requires some self-management that enables one to avoid being always on the run, as well as the willingness and actual ability to sacrifice some time. And ability and willingness to make that time and to make arrangements for spending it with another.

Trust me, you don’t want a wife that can’t get a message to you, doesn’t care if she can, is always on the run when you need her and her precious busy-busy-busy is more important than you. And while as you grow in her eyes and become closer and closer to her heart, a woman’s behaviour will change, what you need to change is not the behaviour itself but the attitude. And that’s something not as easily changed, and more intimate to a person’s character. This connects with the fact that you generally want to marry a woman that doesn’t have a “me first” attitude and those are hard to find (not to say men are any better).
 
chevalier said:
I also agree with FrenchGwen (who is a wonderful lady for laying her thoughts out in bullet points)
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😃 (terrible, how deep one’s school system can print its mark) 😛
chevalier said:
There’s plenty of people with poor communication skills but some have the willingness to try and communicate anyway. Those will be fine. Now there are people who just don’t get it and they won’t communicate. Well, sorry, one can’t have a relationship without communication or with deficient communication.
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👍 exactly that.
 
I think settling has to do with your own expectations…

Some people have this HUGE “checklist” of requirements when it comes to finding their spouse. If one thing on that list isn’t met, then I would consider that “settling” for that one item…

So my advice… shorten your list. 🙂

Keep it to the BASICS… *FAITH *and FAMILY…
 
What about SANITY? :p:D It would be very hard for me to give up. :sad_yes: You say I have to? :o
 
chevalier said:
I was going to ask where that school was because I would go and cast my net in its grad club. 😛
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😃 Paris. Sciences Po Paris. Has a great grad club, by the way… you may even find some nice polish girl who was there, since it’s a highly internationalized university. One of my best (male) friends there was half-Polish. 😛
 
Em_in_FL said:
If that belongs on your basic list then by all means… 😃

I lost hope a long time ago… :whacky: 😛
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:D:D Me too. And on second thoughts, INSANITY has its own charm… I guess I would now get bored with a somewhat sane person 😛
 
FrenchGwen said:
😃 Paris. Sciences Po Paris. Has a great grad club, by the way… you may even find some nice polish girl who was there, since it’s a highly internationalized university. One of my best (male) friends there was half-Polish. 😛
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That’s okay, I can speak French with a genuine British accent! 😛
Em_in_FL said:
If that belongs on your basic list then by all means… 😃

I lost hope a long time ago… :whacky: 😛
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Of course! It’s paramountly important for a woman to be able to convey her accusations, I mean, thoughts, in a clear, coherent and timely manner!
 
FrenchGwen said:
:D:D Me too. And on second thoughts, INSANITY has its own charm… I guess I would now get bored with a somewhat sane person 😛
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As the Roman Rota loves to say, the Catholic definition of normalcy allows for a moderate degree of anomaly. :p:D
 
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