Dating and relationships are hard, even the good ones. There is one relationship mistake to avoid above all others for women. It will keep you single, unhappy, and frustrated. It's a common mistake that women make with men. And it's probably one you are guilty of making even today.
If you look at the list of the biggest relationship mistakes, you might actually not thing of this one, which is why it is so important to consider…
Trying To Hide Your Insecurity
Let me walk through the process, you’re going on a date and you have some feelings of insecurity. For whatever reason, you’re not feeling good enough – not smart enough, not pretty enough, not social enough, not funny enough, but you’re going on this date so what do you do? You're trying to hide it. How do you hide it? Well, remember we put our best foot forward. What that means is that we overcompensate for that insecurity. So, let's say your insecurity is not being funny enough, then on the date, you’re going to show up trying to be super funny and entertaining, making sure the man has a really good time, constantly checking how much he laughs and checking for his approval.
However, what happens at that moment is that you lose yourself and you’re not authentically connected to the man. And believe it or not, the man can sense that. In the moment he may be like, “oh wow I'm having such a good time, we’re laughing and we have great banter,” but then he goes home and feels hesitant about calling you, despite having a good time. The reason why is because he hasn't developed trust towards you. If you first want to look more at what that would look like for you, take my free quiz to attract the right man for you and we'll see how you’re showing up in dating by clicking the link below!
Okay so back to the date, why has he not developed trust? This is because you have not been very connected to yourself. He wasn't able to feel your emotions just felt your “facade.” Now for you, it may even feel authentic, I get it, but the reality is that it isn’t, it's a coping mechanism. You’re not being transparent, and one thing that I always say, you are handing a man an emotional resume from the get-go. That's also why sometimes women come to me and say, you know what Antia? I don't have a problem getting to the second or third date, but after five or six dates, it just fizzles out. He just becomes less interested or we become physical and then becomes less interested or he starts to communicate less and so on.
Now, this doesn't relate to what happened on that fifth or sixth date, it’s what happened on that first or second date, you didn't establish enough rapport. You didn't build enough trust so that he feels safe later on in the third and fourth and fifth date. So men will use different words because they will not be able necessarily to pinpoint it exactly to communicate it, but they will make little mention things like, “hey I never feel you being sad,” or “I never feel you authentically, I feel you're protecting yourself.”
What do you want to do instead? You want to advocate for your insecurity. When I met my husband of almost seven years, Brody, I told him from the get-go, “I want to let you know that on the attachment style scale, I am scoring more anxious. What that looks like for me is that I can sometimes act a little funny, I may get attached and then pull back suddenly and that may be disorienting for you.” I gave him context. I'm not hiding my insecurity, I’m not necessarily leading with my insecurity, but I'm communicating my insecurity.
Now, what that did for Brody is he said, “wow, this created so much trust inside of me because I knew what was happening and I also knew that you weren’t making me responsible.” And that's the thing too, the men often say they feel like now it’s on them to solve the problem and carry the weight. Then of course, if you fear being a burden then that re-traumatizes you instead of setting the men up for success. So communicating your insecurity allows you to get a favorable response from the man but also alleviates those feelings of being a burden. Also, he’s going to be honest with you when maybe an insecure or maybe avoidant part of him comes up.
One of my clients Doris met this amazing guy (her story is up on our Youtube, by the way) who was more DA – a dismissive-avoidant- but because she had set that emotionally authentic atmosphere he was able then to also communicate authentically with her. Typically he would just have checked out early on but she invited him into authenticity and they are still happily dating.
#1 Relationship Mistake Conclusion
All right, ladies, this is it for today. I hope this article was helpful for you. If you haven't taken the free quiz, go ahead and do so down below and also I invite you to take part in my Facebook group at MYMFBgroup.com or click the link down below.
