Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Thing(s) to look for in a Girl

The previous idea about contentment and abundance applies for what guys should look for in girls too. Though there are two specific signs I do warn guys about: insecurity and unforgiveness.

Let us talk about unforgiveness first because it is simpler. Simply put, regardless of how highly she thinks of you right now, if she easily developes and harbours grudges after being slighted, or made fun of, or put down, she will eventually just as easily hold grudges against you, and who wants that? I am not saying that you need to find someone who does not get angry, everyone this side of heaven has their limits, but you can obviously tell when someone gets angry, then deals with it and dissipates it after a short while, even if they might want to hold their distance after being hurt (which is natural, for a time), versus someone who maliciously gossips and shows contempt and is out to get someone continually after she has been slighted by them (nevermind just girls, I have struggled with this one before).

One of the first things I tell guys to look for is whether the girl has begun to recgonize her own insecurity and self-worth issues. Almost all girls (in all my years there have been few exceptions) wrestle with those issues to some extent. Even the really ambitious, bubbly, or out-going types might be doing so to find their security and worth in their achievements or public image or social status, rather than the love and the promises of her heavenly Father. As a guy, you do not want to be the answer to those issues, as much as being the knight in shining armour might feel noble and heroic for a while (as a dear brother once warned me before dating, don't be a hero. It would have saved me a lot of grief if I had listened).

Not that you need to look for someone who has completely conquered them, but you do want to look for a girl that has begun to address those issues with God and with her sisters (some girls will attempt to address issues with ambiguous brother/boyfriend-ish relationships. Bad idea, for reasons I cannot even begin to list here). Because if she does not recognize she has these issues, that God needs to heal them, and that she needs to share in that journey with her sisters, it is almost 100% guaranteed that conciously or subconciously she will expect you to deal with it all. Not only are us guys inadaquate for that (as much as we may aspire to be, we will never be her heavenly Father), but you cannot even begin to try because she either does not see those issues as a source of her relational conflict and hurt, or worse, she will pin the source of those hurts to your lack of love (which is of course always true, because she is expecting the full love of the Father from you. Good luck with that).

A good sign that a girl has at least begun dealing with her insecurity and self-worth issues is whether they take themselves too seriously. Can they laugh at themselves? How do they handle being embarassed? Can they play along and be teased publically (though note, I am not talking about being a doormat. That is just as big a red flag) without being angry or hurt? Do they share and allow themselves to be in situations of weakness? (the "I'm trying and really struggling/failing" type of weakness, not the woeful "I'm a girl I can't do anything but wait for a husband" type. Stay far far away from that one, there is only one name who can be her saviour).

Another thing some people really love to focus on is this idea of submission, but just like the idea of producing for the guys, a girl that follows you and believes your every word (what a lot of young Christian guys foolishly embrace as submission) tells you nothing about where she is with God. You have no idea if she actually submits to God, only that she needs a proxy to God and for now has found you for that role (refer to my previous point about feeling noble and heroic). So actually what it does tell you is that she probably has a poor connection with her Father. Besides, if your spouse is simply going to blindly obey you, you are sunk, because when the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit. As much as we would like to pridefully think otherwise, us guys are blind more often than we would like.

Up next is a short piece how to look for the signs in the previous posts (hint: to quote a TV show, people lie).

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