An excerpt from the book Boundaries in Dating
by John Townsend and Henry Cloud
If you find that you are not really friends with someone you
have a "crush"
on, let that be a warning signal that something is wrong.
Do not think that someone who has no character is going to
develop it just
because you want him or her to grow.
If being attracted to the wrong person is a pattern, do not
blame it on
external reasons, but take responsibility for being the one who has a
problem and work on finding its cause.
Make yourself face the hard questions about the person you
are with. With
the help of friends, be honest about whether or not you really "like"
the
person as well as have "chemistry" with him or her. Romantic feelings
can be
very deceptive, and even pathological. They are not "true love."
Reserve your dating life for people actively involved in
the growth process.
Those who are taking ownership of their deficits are less likely to develop
dependencies on the strengths of others.
Set boundaries on your tendencies to rescue each other from
your character
deficits. If you are the connector, don't do all the relational work for
your date. If you are the assertive one, don't enable your date by doing all
the confronting. Encourage, but don't rescue.
Make a distinction between attraction to a person based on
your deficits, or
someone's attraction to you based on their deficits, and attraction to a
person's uniqueness and differentness.
Make sure your dating relationship involves both love and
truth. Challenge
each other to grow. If your relationship is one of total comfort, you may
be
contributing to each other's spiritual laziness.
Be in the growth process yourself. Growth attracts growth.
You will find
yourself more drawn to others for healthy reasons, and less attracted to
others because of what you don't possess.
Normalize and identify each of your character deficits. Such
issues as
detachment, irresponsibility, over responsibility, perfectionism, authority
conflicts, and the like, should be topics that you both can talk about
personally, about yourself and each other. Be agents of growth, healing, and
change for each other, specifically in these issues.
PS. Please contact authors with any comments... see www.newlife.com
< Back to Where You Once Belonged >