Relationship Pacing

Got this message today from one of my students:

"Hey Jake, Whats up? I coudlnt get together with this girl, first there was a storm and i chose  to postpone it, later she was coming to watch a play im workin on(not acting though) but her grandma was sick, and today we were meetin after she got off from work and she says that she cares a Lot about me but says she is not sure if she wants yo "date" me. She says she'd see me but without an agenda, like if it comes up ir Something. Tonight we were going to a bar to have a drink.  What should I do?"  


This is a great question, and common one.  What's going on here is an issue of relationship pacing.  You see, a woman responds the best to a man when she is the one working to push the relationship forward and the man allows her to make consistent progress in doing so.  In this manner a woman works to get a man and she places value on the relationship when he allows it.

The student here is in a situation that's very much unlike what I've described above.  Instead of letting the woman take the lead when it comes to moving the relationship forward, she has somehow gotten the idea that he definitely wants a relationship.

Does the girl want a relationship?  

IT DOESN'T MATTER!  

What matters in this case is the timing of it all.  The woman could have wanted or not wanted a relationship, who knows.  The problem is that the second that she gets the idea that a man definitely wants a relationship, if she gets that idea one second before she's wanting it, then it's far too soon and his demise begins.

A woman needs to want a relationship for awhile before the relationship actually gets serious, because if she doesn't and the relationship starts prematurely, then she's going to second guess her decision and start to want out.  The opposite is true when she's working to move the relationship forward because the guy is lagging behind.  When this is the case, the woman is in a constant state of feeling like she wants more from the man.  It's important to give her the gift of feeling this way because it's the state where women are the happiest overall.

You can mess this up.  

I've personally messed this up in many ways.  At first I was having issues like this student where I wanted relationships too quickly, and then once I started fixing that issue (like i'm going to talk about in a second here...) I started gaining the ability to keep women around a bit longer.   Fast forward 10 years and I was making the opposite mistake, where women I dated felt constantly like they had to compete for me constantly with other women.  This is an equally bad issue because when a woman feels like the guy she is dating is unattainable, she starts to lose hope that she can be with him and in-turn her motivation suffers.

The so-called "sweet spot" here is when the man doesn't put any pressure on for a relationship at all and then allows the women to move the relationship forward when the timing is right for her.  One trick though, the man makes sure she's moving things forward just a bit slower than she would like.  This keeps the woman wanting more and keeps her emotionally involved with him.  He knows that if he gives the woman all of his compliance that it's only a matter of time before she gets bored.

So how does the student above put this plan in action?  

The solution here is to recognize this problem when you see the symptom above and immediately work to fix it before it becomes a huge issue that ruins the relationship.  In the example above, the woman says she "cares a lot about him but doesn't know if she wants to "date" him.

Wait just a second here!  This guy didn't say he wanted to be in a relationship, so where is she getting this idea???

She's getting this idea from his actions.  Men can do any one of a number of things that will give the woman this idea, and usually it's when many different actions add up that the woman gets the overwhelming idea that he wants more than she does.

So the solution here is to immediately address this issue when it comes up by staunchly opposing her statement, then later the guy needs to take a serious look at his behaviors so that he can work to take away whatever is causing her to believe he's so eager to be exclusive with her.

Saying this another way, when the girl says she cares a lot about him but doesn't know if she wants to date exclusively, the guy needs to immediately say something like "WHOOOOA there!  Who said anything about me wanting to be in a relationship with you?!?  I sure as hell didn't say that!"

Now the girl is in a situation where she has to defend her opinion or start to adjust in her mind what is happening.  Usually this type of a statement will cause her to second guess herself and buy the guy some more time, and that's why it's imperative that he do that immediately if he wants to save whatever they've got going.

In fact, I would argue that the guy should work to move far slower than he thinks she wants to go.  I would recommend in this situation he work things out verbally, then make it out to be not a big deal and that they'd hangout soon.  Then if I were the guy I'd back off on giving her attention quite a bit.  If I was texting her daily I'd stop and wait until she texted me, then I'd try to get her into a pattern where she's the one seeking my attention instead of me giving it more than she wants.

In addition to texting, I'd back off on how much we were hanging out.  I might go back to just seeing her once a week and I'd start dating other girls as well.

The reality here is that the guy in question is just further along in his thoughts and feelings than the girl is, and that usually results in him chasing and the woman leaving, so make sure that if you're ever in this position you immediately take steps to change your behavior otherwise you will 100% of the time lose this girl.

My recommendation when this happens is to immediately get ahold of me (shameless plug) because if you are getting this response from women then you are  OBVIOUSLY doing something that you will repeat over and over until you learn what exactly it is that is killing this girl's want for you.  When you figure that behavior out (or the many behaviors) then you can effectively eliminate them and many times save your relationship.

However, again I warn you... I've never once seen a guy with this problem be able to solve it on his own and keep the girl.  EVER.  Now i'm not trying to make this blog post into a fucking commercial for myself, what i'd really like to do here is just to teach you that simple trick about framing.

The trick is that when a girl frames you in a way that you don't like or that you immediately realize is a big problem, you should immediately work to frame yourself in another way or you risk losing what you've got.  This goes for situations like the above and it also goes for when you're first meeting a woman and you've only been talking one minute to her.

So what would you say to this girl and why do you think it's happening with him?  Comment below!  Talk with you soon,

Jake