Dating vs. Courtship

Dating. What does that word mean to you? What does it mean to you if someone asks you on a date (or you ask someone else out on a date)? What did it mean to your parents? What about your grandparents? Believe it or not, the definition of a “date” and “dating” have changed over the years and not for the better.

There are five steps to a relationship that should be taken sequentially to provide the best scenario for a successful marriage.

1.     Dating

2.     Courtship

3.     Engagement

4.     Marriage

5.     The Rest of Your Life with Your Spouse

So how do you define dating? Is there a difference between dating and hanging out? I can’t answer the first one for you but let me answer that second one. In fact, here is Dallin H. Oaks also answering that one as well (I highly recommend this video, just follow the link). He defines a date as an activity which is: Planned, Paired off, and Paid for. When someone is dating, they are engaged in a wide variety of activities with a wide variety of people. The key to this step is “wide variety” of both activities and people! This is easy to understand when you consider what the purpose of dating is: an opportunity to learn about yourself and other people. Most importantly, dating should be used to develop skills and abilities which you can use to serve others and prepare you for marriage. When you date, you should be determining what you like in other people, the qualities in yourself that you should improve or display more often, and having fun together.

The next step is courting. Courting sounds like a really old-fashioned word that brings up visions of Victorian-era suitors attempting to woo the ladies with all kinds of displays. Personally, I’d like to argue that even then those suitors would date prior to courting because there is a difference between dating and courting. Courting is a commitment to a single person with the intent of determining if that person is right for you to marry. You should not date exclusively (or in other words, court) until you are at a place in your life where you are willing and able to be married.

The Relationship Attachment Model (shown above) describes how best to develop a relationship with another person. There are five areas: Know, Trust, Rely, Commit, and Touch. In order to healthily progress a relationship, one must raise each area to higher levels. There is a rule though, you must move from left to right and none of the different levels can be higher than that which precedes it (i.e. Trust cannot be higher than Know). Here are some quick definitions of these areas:

1.     Know – how well you know who they are in all seasons of the year and all moods

2.     Trust – being able to confide in someone

3.     Rely – being able to trust someone to do something without your direct supervision (i.e. please take care of my dog while I’m away on vacation)

4.     Commitment – becoming solely devoted to that person

5.     Touch – physical interaction between two people

When a relationship progresses by these rules, it grows healthily and happily. These sorts of relationship progressions naturally lead into committed, loyal, mutually advantageous, and wonderful marriages and friendships. When we prematurely commit to a person by courting them after the first date, we haven’t gotten to Know that person. We haven’t had enough time to Trust or Rely on them in order to determine if they’d be a suitable partner and we are setting ourselves up for failure and heartbreak.

Here’s my advice. Date a lot of people, Court less people than you date, and take your time. You don’t want to rush into marriage if you’re not 100% about it.

My wife and I had adequate time to come to Know each other in our dating and, in that time, we came to trust each other with relative ease. We found it easy to disclose ourselves to one another and share are deepest thoughts and feelings. Once we Trusted each other in this way, Relying on each other to was easy. I was confident that I could rely on her to continue being thoughtful of me and my family. Before too long, we were committed to each other and began to Court. This involved greater time together, openness about our thoughts, experiences, emotions, and feelings, and serious consideration that we could become married. Long story short, I proposed, she said yes, now we’re living the rest of our lives together and we continue to Court!

If we change the culture of one date=committed relationship, our marriages will become healthier.