Relationship Goals #1: Ultra-compatibility

A few reflections on bagging a partner you’re compatible with (if one is in the market for that sort of thing).

In the interests of avoiding yet another collection of pithy statements containing love and relationship advice (and I’m referring to my own articles here), what follows is a personal account of my love life of late.

Recent weeks have yielded clarity on achieving one of my relationship goals of finding a person that I am ultra-compatible with. As this is a common desire, and as I am fairly basic with my dating challenges, some of it may speak to your experience.

Relevant context: I’m a 34 year old female and I work freelance, which has meant that I travel a few times a year for one to two months at a time. From the perspective of attracting dudes, I would say I’m a Goldilocks amount of attractive and accomplished. That is to say enough not to warrant any of the challenges associated with being either too much or too little.

In other words, I do okay.

I’ve yet to develop any scarcity mentality about meeting potential partners, although mustering the enthusiasm to put myself in their way is challenging. I am not consistently present to the pain of being single, although like most of us I go through hungry periods.

I’ve been single for around three years (so yes, I’ve learned to be alone, thanks very much). This has given me the opportunity to reflect at length on such topics as the overall desirability of relationships, what makes a good one, and how I’ve contributed to the unhappy demise of earlier relationships. Apparently not everyone seeks to attain clarity over these matters, which honestly is beyond me, but that is a rant for another day.

I met the person I am seeing now — we’ll call him Chris because that’s his name — back in February when we were both travelling through Vietnam. Because I was only around half way through my trip when we met and he was nearing the end of his, it was five weeks before we could start seeing each other properly.

We’ve now been seeing one another for around six weeks at a pace that is more restrained than both our temperaments, due to us living in different cities. The time between our dates has had the benefit of pacifying the girl-child in me that has tended to freak out about entering into relationships without due diligence or a solid foundation. (The fact that this has never actually happened does not preclude it from being a source of anxiety apparently.)

So far, so good. It’s felt easy and natural. We share a certain way of looking at the world, our conversations are absorbing whilst fun and lighthearted, and we have these cute and (mostly thanks to Chris) thoughtful little dates that we both get plenty of time to look forward to. Our visions for the future seem broadly in a line, although we have not chatted about that too much. We are “seeing how things go” — as ya do.

The main point of my latest pontification is this:

There are a couple of reasons why things with Chris almost didn’t get off the ground. Given how great things are going, and that it is becoming clear that he and I are above averagely compatible, I’d have deeply regretted this.

Here are the reasons it almost never happened:

I wasn’t as open to meeting someone, due to being at the dangerous ‘almost-but-not-quite’ phase with somebody else

At the time I met Chris, my attention was being claimed already by someone I had been sort of dating in London prior to leaving for Asia for two months.

I wasn’t sure about my compatibility with this person (pretty meaningless of itself, as being “sure” about anyone is challenging). But there had been brief moments during our dating that I could see a future with him, and I had formed somewhat of an attachment. The effect of this was that I wasn’t as open to meeting guys on my trip as I perhaps would have been.

This may have affected things with Chris, in that we almost left Vietnam without spending any time beyond that initial contact we had. In fact, had serendipity not forced the issue, we’d probably not be seeing each other now.

As fate would have it, the thing with the other guy had already begun dissolving into the ever-expanding pool of prospects that went nowhere before I returned to London. So I was all closed off for nuthin’!

I have to wonder how many other times my attentions had been diverted in this way from a potential right person.

I would offer this: Women and men, but especially women because it runs counter to our biology: do remember to keep your options open when it’s very early on.

Don’t be stupid.

I had judged him on what I thought I knew about his work

Bit scared to write about this one, but here goes:

Certain professions have been, until now, unpalatable to date. For me, bar work happens to be one of those professions. Unless it is a temporary situation (and even then to be honest), it’s hard for me to see myself dating a guy who tends bars full-time.

It is not about a job not being well paid or prestigious, although I certainly would struggle to stay attracted to a person who couldn’t pay their way. It is about the predictable challenges of trying to have a relationship with someone who is in a completely different life and lifestyle to you.

Chris, I learned early on, is a head bartender at a posh hotel. When I discovered this, immediately my mind went straight to the unsocial hours and booze, and I had pretty much discounted him as a serious romantic prospect (I realise how hateful this sounds). Although I enjoy a glass of vino or three on occasions, I avoid drinking excessively because I am too vain and pain-adverse to bear the consequences. Plus, given the granny schedule that I favor in order to stay psychologically well and productive, it really wouldn’t work out between me and a night-owl playboy.

Needless to say, my early judgments were ungrounded.

His job doesn’t require him to work unsocial hours (not currently anyway). He has a lot of training and education in hospitality and business, which frankly, I find fascinating, as it isn’t an area I have involved myself much in to date. He is smart, passionate and enthusiastic about his industry — he didn’t just wind up there. And — oh so importantly — he has a clear direction about where he intends to take his career.

I will be much less hasty about judging people by their work in future.

And by the same token, I will be conscious to avoid subconsciously awarding guys with any extra kudos for having high-prestige jobs.

Being an entrepreneur or a company director or whatever doesn’t mean a person wouldn’t be a complete nightmare to date.

I’ve become lazy about developing relationships with people in real life

I cannot blame entirely the guy I was sort-of-not-seeing for my lack of openness to spending time with Chris after we met. Why? Because I am slow to embrace spending time with new friends, too. At this stage in life, it’s really hard to motivate myself to build new friendships. I don’t get enough time with the ones I already have.

In future, I would be more open.

I would also be open to say, dating friends of friends or acquaintances. Or people at work. (I think that those who avoid dating people at work probably have zero confidence in their ability to handle relationships without reducing people to states of psychosis. Meeting people at work is surely still one of the better ways of meeting someone you’re compatible with! No?).

Honestly, we are all far too reliant on the dating apps. They are great but should not be relied on exclusively to get dates.

If your excuse for only meeting people online is that you’re a workaholic, then that reason is going to be a problem throughout your relationships (unless you manage to find someone who minimizes their needs to such a degree that your workaholism can continue uninterrupted).

If your excuse is that you’re introverted, it’s still no excuse!!

In future, I would have a mind’s eye on meeting people IRL.

A few additional observations I want to offer around the topic of “finding the right partner”:

Personality theory is useful

Horoscoping is — to me at least — horrifying, but personality theory? Hell yeahs I am going to try scope that information out of perspective partners!

Most people don’t know the 16 personality types enough to understand them. This is one obsession that I do feel places me at an advantage when it comes to the dating and relationships arena.

I’ve been known to get people I’m interested in to do an Enneagram test, and Myers Briggs too if I can get away with it. Not everyone wants to play ball, and that’s fine as I can usually work it out.

I do not use this information to assess compatibility, or to manipulate a person’s image of me. I mostly use it to help me to empathize with a person, and not take behaviour so personally, which is a useful ability when you’re dating somebody.

However, personality type can help clue you into compatibility issues. I’m sorry if you don’t like that idea, but it’s true. Humans behave in predictable ways given their personality types. What’s the harm in having that information up front?

Chris is an INFJ, Enneagram 2; I am an ENFJ, Enneagram 7.

Yes, it’s understood to be a compatible pairing.

Yes, I have found that to be on point so far — in the precise way anticipated by the models.

Paranoia about being somebody’s anybody is real

Compatibility is, in my experience, something that takes a while to deduce.

In exploring whether I am compatible with a person, I want to be reassured that they also are doing their own evaluating. To be honest, that hasn’t always been evident. Or I often feel like I am being evaluated by the wrong criteria.

Everybody wants to know that the person that they are with chose them for their personal qualities. Whether they are attracted to your weird humor or your patience and kindness. You want your other half to be able to convincingly answer the question “what is it exactly you like about me?” Right?

With some guys I’ve dated, I have felt like they had their green light on, and that any ole Sheila with xyz qualities would have fit the bill.

To be honest, I’ve been freaked out a couple of times when Chris has mentioned not enjoying being alone, or when he has said things that made me think that having a generic somebody on the end of the phone would do. Given that we met when we were both travelling alone, I had assumed a level of comfort around solitude.

I’ve realized, though, that I’m probably overly wary of those that haven’t spent a chunk of time alone, given how valuable I have found that to be in my life. I feel that without that, a person is usually codependent in their approach to relationships. I am probably a bit paranoid about it.

With Chris, I have realized that he is just a warm guy who thrives off a lot of human connection. (Not like me; I can be pretty Ice Queen at times). He likes animals and children, like, genuinely. I enjoy his kind, gentle and warm qualities. I like how although he has a strong work ethic, he isn’t like other people I have dated who have prioritized their work ahead of spending time with me.

So how can you be sure that someone is choosing you for you, and not just because they need or want somebody, anybody, now, now, NOW?

What I have decided is that it really doesn’t matter much.

So what if they were going to settle for the next good person that came along?

In reality, there has to be some kind of a hunger to exit the single market, or you two will lack glue.

Ask yourself the Amy Question

The Amy Question (concept from Nancy Kline) is this:

“What do you already know that you are going to find out in a year?”

The question cuts through the human tendency for self-delusion. When it comes to love, people are as deluded as we get.

Realistically, I know that with Chris, alcohol, and just sensory pleasures in general, are a huge part of his life. I’m into it as it’s so different to how I am. But I am going to have to find a way to relax my somewhat functional and regimented approach to eating and drinking, or this could potentially become a source of conflict. Equally, he is going to need to accept that I am old (literally I am seven years older than him) and slightly more boring.

I can also predict that although we would easily create a really happy and loving relationship, we’ll both naturally avoid conflict to the potential detriment of our relationship health. So somebody, and ideally both of us, would need to stay on top of that.

When I’m honest with myself, I can see very early on where a relationship is headed, and how it will be. I can see the nature of the challenges ahead.

I am not sure whether everyone can do this, or whether this arises from my personality type or the healthy self-awareness I have built. But we all have an intuition and the ability to observe people.

The Amy question should help everybody to assess compatibility at the outset.

Next up in the relationship goals series, I intend to wax lyrical on how to avoid decay and rot from taking hold in a relationship, keeping the romance alive, and the goal of mutual growth. It may take a while for me to develop the insight and experience to write those articles… but I live in hope.