Never dated

We understand that the challenges you have finding a girlfriend are very emotionally demanding for you. There are many men who haven’t had a girlfriend by the age of 22, even though it may not seem like that. A lot of people have experienced the same thing as you, and what is considered normal varies from setting to setting. We encourage you to remind yourself that you still have plenty of time to find a girlfriend. Finding a partner for life is not something to be done quickly, and it needs to be taken seriously. Our advice is that you need to remember that the situation you are in now is not unusual for a man of your age.

It’s easy to think that everyone else has experienced much more than we have, although this isn’t necessarily true. It’s important to be relaxed and not give in to stress as you try to find a girl to date, because if you don’t, girls might sense the stress. If a man shows clearly that he is after a girlfriend when he talks to a woman, then she will sense it and might feel tense, and this can lead to her quickly withdrawing – quite the opposite of his intention! We advise you not to think about dating when you talk to women. Just spend time getting to know other people, both men and women, and be genuinely interested in people without being focused on dating all the time.

When you find a woman you would like to date, and are trying to get to know her, it’s wise to think things through and be prepared for the possibility that she might reject you. We can never be certain that people will like us in the way we want to be liked, and this is especially true when thinking of people of the opposite sex. Investing in other people makes us vulnerable, especially in the early stages of dating. You can’t be sure that you will be received in the way you want. It may also be that the strong feelings you have for a girl may cause her to withdraw, which is the opposite reaction from what you wanted. This will feel quite bad, but we think it is important that you’re prepared for that too. Most importantly, at the same time as you take your feelings seriously, you also need to respect the other person’s feelings whether they want to date or not.

Telling a girl who you’ve fallen in love with about your feelings for her can be quite risky. However, there isn’t any way to avoid this risk if you want to start dating. You have to dare to be vulnerable and invest in the other person, while remembering that nothing may come of it. Mutual respect plays a central role in this. Later on there will be a time when you have to make your intentions clear, when you will talk to her about your feelings and your desire to get to know her better, and maybe invite her to do something with you that will strengthen your friendship.

In our experience fear of rejection causes lots of people to make mistakes when they approach the opposite sex. If the basis from which you operate is a poor self-image, then you can almost expect to be rejected before you really are. Starting on a foundation like this will soon lead to an artificially rapid process of trying to date. This is because you might ask the girl to date too soon, so that you get the ‘unavoidable’ rejection out of the way instead of drawing it out. If you want to know if she likes you, and you become too pushy, then she’ll probably get cold feet and start avoiding you – unless she’s as much in love with you as you are with her. As you might understand, it’s not always easy to give advice in this context. We don’t know you so the advice we offer may not be all that relevant for you, but we do hope that some of these ideas will be helpful.

It’s important to remember that you don’t need to stress and try to sell yourself by pretending to be someone you are not, just be yourself. It won’t help at all to try to be someone other than yourself, people will find out sooner or later. Just be open, and be yourself, so you don’t surprise each other later on. Having said that, as you get to know each other better, it is totally natural to discover new aspects of the other person – but not because they have tried to hide things from you. No one is perfect, but sometimes we do try to hide things. If you want to be trusted, be honest. We understand that this can be demanding, but there aren’t really so many other options. So hope, trust and pray that one day you will be discovered and liked by a girl who likes you for who you are, and who you also like and enjoy being with.

We would recommend you to find a good friend or leader who you trust, and tell them you need to talk to them about something. It’s always good to have someone who can support you, and who can advise you based on the fact that they know you better than we do.