Dating and Preparing for Marriage

     Hey y'all! Welcome back to the Kunzler Kronicles! This week's blog is going to be about dating and preparing for marriage. So that begs the question of "what is the reason for dating?" This is really a important topic and question because the perception, culture, and style of dating has changed. Dating greatly impacts marriage and yet in some cultures like the culture in India that you have arranged marriages and you actually don't date the person that you meet. That is very different from the western culture of dating. So why am I talking about dating and marriage and why would there be an emphasis on dating and on marriage? That is because families can either indirectly be the cause of a lot of problems within societies and also because good solid families can fix a lot of the problems in society.

    So that begs the question, what is the purpose of dating? There are lots of different reasons or explanations for the term dating.  It basically comes down to this "the purpose of dating is to learn and more about what you like in a partner and things that you would not like to have in a partner for marriage relationship." 

    If we go back about 50 years or more the term dating had a meaning of going on multiple dates with different people and having a wide range of experiences so you can see many qualities that you would like in a future partner and what to look for. In todays culture dating means that you are one on one in a relationship with someone else and that you are together as a couple. So what happened to make this change in such a short amount of time? This has probably happened due to large amounts of media and celebrity relationships happening in different outlets of movies, tv shows, and other entertainment.

    Dating has also changed because going back 50 or so years we didn't have the technology that we have today. Technology has changed the ways we date because going back people mainly dated using the term of propinquity. You may notice that the word propinquity is very similar to the word proximity. They also have very similar meanings. Proximity means closeness. Propinquity means how much access that you have to another. Going back around 50 years in New York the average person married someone who was only 3 1/2 blocks away from where they lived. This is possibly because they had close propinquity to each other. They would possibly have shared schools, friends, or gone to a lot of similar places and had a greater chance of meeting. This has changed dating because technology has given us the ability to connect with others all the way across the globe.

    Now looking more into dating, as mentioned before, dating 50 years ago was going on dates with multiple people and just have a good time getting to know the other person and then over time and taking more people out you would then start to "hone in" on a few people that you really liked and soon start a courtship with someone. Now dating has turned into more of a culture of "hanging out" with a person that you think find attractive. One night stands are turning into a really popular thing, and for more than one reason that can be dangerous. (Send me a message or comment if you would like to know more about that as I don't have as much time as I would like to talk about that). We need to change casual dating, like hanging out, into a much more assertive dating, like actual dates. 

So what is an actual date? An actual date is something that is planned, where you are in a pair(s), and that in someway is paid for. Now you may be shrinking at the last one saying something like "Paid for?!?! I don't have money to take a lot of people out on dates! that is okay! be creative and find inexpensive but fun things to do! That also helps with the planning portion of a date. Take time to plan something that you would think they would enjoy! That means you need to pay attention to them and find common ground. Nobody likes a date where you get in the car and ask "what do you want to do?" and get the response of "I don't know, what would you like to do?" If you are going to ask someone on a date be prepared to plan and pay for whatever you may end up doing! Planning a date shows that you have a level of maturity to your date and also that you are putting in effort! People like that!

Due to this being a long post already please reach out if you have any questions or would like to know more!