I am basically a home body, which means I drop my child at school, go to work, pick my child up and then go home. I don't do clubs, and when I go to the movies 9 times out of 10 I have my child with me and we are going to see some child friendly movie she wants to see. Dating is much different then it was when I was in my 20's. A guy would take me out to dinner, maybe go to a show and he would bring me home and we would sit in te car and finish having our conversation. He would walk me to the door say good night and then go home. Now, from what I'm hearing dating has a new face, especially among these 20 something's now. Especially in the club setting. Oh, my goodness. I can't put them all in the same bag. It just makes me ask, "what is dating now?"
I last dated when I was 23 years old. I then chose to be celibate until I was 25. This is when I discovered Al-Islam and got married to the man who gave me shahada. I was married four times between the ages of 25 to 34. I am not ashamed of it. Between me marrying these four men was two years that I was to myself. These two year intervals between each man was supposed to be my introspection time, but I kept marrying the same man, just a different body. I sought a divorce on moral issues. There were things I saw about them that I morally could not deal with and when I asked about certain things before we got married I was either lied to or told half the story as I would later find out. The only one who was decent was my third husband. He decided he wanted girlfriends as well. We are still friends, but I could not be remarried to him again. He loves women to much, and I'm one that doesn't look back once I walk away unless it was a situation that was just plain childish on both our ends then I would give it a go again, but that hasn't happened yet.
My fear of dealing with men that left me feeling and locking myself away like a hermit was in 2006 with my last husband. He literally put fear in me concerning men that I never had towards men before in my life. It was eating me up so much that I had to resolve within myself that I refused to be afraid any longer because of what this one guy did. I made my resolve and then put into the universe the type of men that I wanted to grace the presence of me and my child. A year later the universe answered and I met a guy who is a mutual friend to a sister I know. He and I are now friends, and he has helped renew my faith, but I realize the process of that renewal began with me. If I didn't release that negative energy that man had shown to me I would be a negative, resentful woman towards men, and its not fair to the opposite sex to let that type of baggage on to them and they had absolutely nothing to do with the way you are feeling now.
So, from 2006 up until September of 2011 I have been a hermit going through introspection of my life and what I want. It for me was about emotional clearing. I had to emotionally cleanse myself of all the crap I have been holdiing onto. I remember my spiritual teacher I was seeing back in 2006 telling me, "You are in a lot of pain. You have to let go of that fear. You will let go of the pain. You must learn to feel. You have to feel." It was all true what he was telling me. Alot of us are caught up in just having someone in our lives and we have not yet emotionally healed from whatever it is that has us bound up with that fear. You can't enjoy the person that you have present in your life if you are afraid of them leaving you. Think they are merely there to make you happy, or that you can't live without them if they spiritually out grow you. If you are comfortable, and happy with yourself, that person who comes and is then present with you then becomes your compliment. If they leave or spiritually, emotionally out grow you you'll be fine because you were actually fine before they arrived. You have to have an emotional clean slate before you start to seek out anyone else. To learn and take one another for what you/ they are can't be done when you still hanging onto past baggage lugging it around with you. You're still concerned about how someone from your past hurt you and you take that into a present relationship worrying if they will hurt you the same way has set you up for being hurt again because you brought it in with you and you didn't take the time to emotionally cleanse yourself. You became unfair not only to yourself but to that new person. You must emotionally heal. The hurt will only re-surface until you stop, look it straight in the situation and deal with it. Learn from it. Heal from it. Grow from it. Move on and away from it.
I've meet people who because they had a bad upbringing and mommy wasn't around or doing what she was supposed to do, and you show them some kindness this person became attached, and afraid if i left that he would loose it. Well, I did leave and he is doing fine. We have to leaarn to be okay with being alone for a while as well. When your alone you get to learn more about who you are.
Well, now I'm ready to come out the hermit mode, and start putting myself back out there which I'm finding has changed and its different now for me, because I didn't have a child before. This is the part where it becomes a litte difficult because even though I want to start meeting people again, I don't believe in putting my child off on my mother. I do that enough with her picking up and watching her after school. So, it has brought me into the mind of, it would just be better to have a platonic male relationship. You get to know the person much better than you would dating them. With a friendship you get to see the genuine, authenic person instead of meeting the first impression person you get on a date. You get to see how that person interacts with others on a personal level when they are just hanging out with people they know. There is no special show being put on, just for your benefit so you'll like them. You are also building a foundation for your relationship with that person whether it goes beyond a friendshp or not. You also have a foundation.
I had a male friend in high school. I was in the eleventh and he was in the tenth. We had one class together and we would talk in class and still do our work and the teacher didn't mind. I think she liked the way we interacted with one another as well. We stayed friends after high school, but it never progressed any further than a friendship because I was not attracted to him any more than on a friend basis. He had a beautiful personality, funny, and he was nice looking, intelligent. I remember he took me out on a date and it just felt strange. That's when I knew that it wouldn't be anymore than what it was already. I moved to Georgia and we lost touch. I want a friendship with a guy first. I just think that is so important if anything is going to last. It may not be for you, but dating for me just seems superfical and sexual. I may not want to have sex with you that week, two weeks from then or even a month from meeting you. Sex is sacred, so I consider my celibacy a virtue. Who ever he is he must accept. No manipualtion games, just accept. I consider my womb sacred and not a deposit center for every man's seed. There's no sign here that says, 'all deposits welcome'. I'm at the point in my life where just merely having sex is not satisifing enough for me. I want to expereince Tantra. I want to experience a spiritual, emotional connection with the man that I am with, and that right there alone is sacred. Sex is not just screwing everybody just because they look good. Its not dirty, but it is sacred, and there is a spiritual connection being made. (This isn't meant to do with just anybody. So a one night stand won't work. This is for a long term partner.) Exchanging of energies, not just body fluids. So, there can be no drama attached to him especially since I want to experience Tantra.
This is where my journey has led me. This is where I am at. We must get back to building foundations with one another. Learning self-control of just having sex with anybody and not checking them out fully. You could possibly be passing the 'one' for you by just because she said she wants to be just friends. Hear those words, just friends. Not a booty call, not your casual sex partner, not your one night stand, but your friend. Meaning she likes you and wants to get to know the genuine, authentic you, and if you show it to her and stay real with her, you may get her and have her for a while and be truely happy with what you got. She not only knows the genuine, authenic you, you know the genuine, authenic her.