How to Raise Your Stakes |
Your expectations
The etiquette of dating
how to write the best profile of yourself,
how to conduct the first telephone call,
how to develop acceptable get-out procedures along with tips on how to handle rejection…and much more….
all leading up to the first meeting
SO, you've decided that you don't fancy going to singles' clubs & discos (you may have tried them), or getting involved with someone you work with, and that one-to-one dating could be the answer for you.
The trouble is, you may be a novice. You've heard about some of the pitfalls. If you're dating already, you may have encountered some of the pitfalls yourself.
HOW SHOULD YOU GO ABOUT IT?
Yourself and your Expectations
ELIGIBILITY - an elusive quality - the 'IT' factor.
Have you got 'it'?
What is 'it' (good looks, personality, attitude, wealth, a mixture of some or all of these, or what?)
How can you get 'it'?
My members' questionnaires, surveys and feedback gives us some of the answers
Everyone's definition of eligibility will be different, but it's an inescapable fact that some people are more eligible than others.
Prince William is, in one way, much more eligible than Tom down the road, but Tom is much more eligible in his own environment (just so long as he's prepared to be realistic).
A tall man is more eligible than a short man because one presumes that he has a choice (should he so wish) of both shorter and taller ladies.
A beautiful lady is more eligible than a plainer one because she has a choice (should she so wish) of both handsome men and more average-looking men.
A rich man is more eligible than a poor man because he has much more choice as regards the age and the attractiveness of a partner than a poor man (just think of Michael Winner or Mick Jagger!). A young lady is more eligible than an older lady because she has a choice (should she so wish) of both men her own age and older men.
The purpose of this report is to show everyone how they can be eligible, how to make the very best of their assets, and how to know what their chosen types would consider eligible
Some people have 'it' with no effort. Some need to work at 'it'. What about you?
YOUR OWN ELIGIBILITY TEST
Now write two lists of general characteristics that to you, personally, sum up your 'eligibility' , and eligibility in the opposite sex.
a) all your good points which make you eligible in your opinion (you may need more space, don't be modest!)
b) qualities in the OPPOSITE sex which would make them eligible (to you)
To give you the general idea, regardless of sex, here are some of the sort of qualities of eligibility I would personally use: good looks and physique, reasonable income, well groomed, charm, social ease, good manners, personality characteristics such as adventurous, sense of humour.....
The next, much more difficult exercise, is to imagine you are your ideal sort of person of the opposite sex.
Try to get into their head. What, reasonably, would their list of requirements be in you? (Try to be honest here!)
Now, is there a shortfall between the list of your own assets in terms of eligibility, and in what they would be looking for?
If you can find no shortfall, not even one little thing, then eligibility isn't something you'll need to work on (apart from just a wee bit of arrogance??)
On the other hand, quite a few of us could now be feeling slightly depressed.
Don't give up.
This is the worst it gets and although you may have some work to do, it's uphill from here on!
There is a great deal everyone can do about their own eligibility whilst still being themselves.
If you've got 'it', flaunt 'it'. Work upon what you have got
To the right person/people, you can learn to be eligible
BEING REALISTIC
It's of course sensible to aim at the sort of person who is realistic for you and who is most likely to find you eligible from their point of view.
Tom down the road may be a dream for Lucy in the next village, but not at all eligible to Zara Phillips (and what would her mother say!).
Self-delusion is the enemy of successful dating. I could give countless examples where my members have simply aimed for people who would refuse to meet them. In most cases they knew this, but still were not willing to compromise. Yet they were also unwilling to accept failure.
They blame the other person for being unsuitable rather than themselves, or the agency for ignoring their wishes.
'Happy the man who early learns the wide chasm that
lies between his wishes and his powers!'
Johann W. von Goethe
Some singles, long-term singles especially, live in Cloud Cuckoo Land
Here is one of many stories I could tell of the gulf between a member's demands and what they are likely to achieve:
Jane (not her real name!) was a 5'2", 38 year old lady and a little overweight, with rather forceful manner (maybe to cover terror!) Each time my introduction agency set her up with a date she narrowed down further the sort of people she would meet. Finally she phoned us, incensed, "I asked you for a 6'foot, well built, dark haired non-smoker and my last date was fair haired, only 5'9" tall and older than me"
All agencies have countless stories like this. Every newspaper can find this sort of dissatisfied member in any agency.
If no 6' tall, well-built, dark haired, non-smoking gent of the right age group wants to meet a short, plumpish older lady, the agency can't force him!
'Miracle Seekers' is what the Dating and Introduction Agency information website www.whichintro.com calls these people.
To quote, "The people who join an agency and then suffer disappointment and frustration are usually those who haven't worked out what's real......
"The man of 54 who wants to find a woman of 27-34.... saying he would like to start a family....maybe it's an excuse for wanting someone young enough to be his daughter, so that other men will admire his pulling power..."The 35-year-old woman who wants to meet a man who is intelligent, charming, good-looking etc - and at least 6' tall. She herself is 5'5". She refuses to even talk to a man on the telephone unless he's her idea of the right height..."The young man living on an isolated farm who works seven days a week and wants to make a lot of new friends within thirty miles of him. He knows, really, that there's hardly anyone of his age living that close..."
To conclude, they say, "Joining an introduction agency is a practical, realistic, positive step. It needs a realistic approach.....It's not an exercise in dreaming. So make a good assessment of what you want. Work out whether the sort of person you think you would like to meet would also like to meet you. Don't ask for the moon....."
Then there are those things that some people adamantly rule out in a date on the grounds of one thing only. They refuse to even consider any of the positive attributes of that person.
For instance, dogs (I don't mean dating dogs, but people with dogs!). Many refuse to meet a dog owner. Then there are beards. Many ladies refuse to meet a man with a beard.
We're only talking about a meeting at this stage, not marriage!
In my introduction agency days when I personally did the matching for people, I must admit to not giving a particular bit of information to someone that I knew would be prejudiced against the date I was setting up, when I also knew that in every other respect this date could be 'the one'. In many, many cases I've been proved right, and the members have thanked me
Members who pay a lot of money for an introduction agency sometimes do themselves no favours. Having paid, some may subconsciously treat it as a sort of 'cash and carry'. If they see a particularly nice 'peach' on the shelf they feel they can buy it, irrespective of the views of the 'peach' (who in this case has also paid good money and has his/her own ideas about who may put them in their shopping basket!).
Isn't it bizarre how ones wash bin collects more and more odd socks (not changing the subject, honest)!
My student son has given up wearing matched socks, one can be grey and the other green for all he cares, and this has further added to a bin full of odd socks collected over several years. Some have gone into the wrong colour wash, some he's taken back to college. Some have been worn much more than others. Every now and then I tip all sixty or so odd socks out onto the floor and try to make wearable pairs out of them with the best matches possible.
I do an initial sort by colour. Then I do my best and get the ones together which look the nearest, though to get a good colour match I may have slightly different texture or size or ribbing. I might find a few pairs which originally went together, but hve experienced different washes and usage.
I might find just one pair that is perfect! (I could of course give up and throw the lot away - can't think why I don't!).
An Introduction Agency works for you very much like this. In a Dating Agency you work for yourself very much like this.
As we get older we increasingly become a by-product of our own history/'baggage'. There are very few exact matches (according to both parties' absolute ideals 'on paper'), so we do the best we can with the very best matches possible.
People arranging their own dates through a dating agency like Grapevine, the newspaper or an Internet agency would be very, very lucky to find a match where no compromise has to be made on either side.
"He travelled the world to find his perfect woman. When he met her, sadly, she was looking for the perfect man" (letter to the Daily Mail)
So you're fussy? That's good. It is a sign of how highly you rate your self-worth. People like someone with self-confidence.
Unless however you are a Tom Cruise or Julia Roberts, you may need to work on being a catch if you are fussy and want to 'hook' that special sort of person!
Perhaps, though, you're not fussy enough...
Some people are not particular enough!
If you read a profile through an agency or paper ad. which indicates that the individual is not at all choosy about another's presentation, weight, or virtually anything - they will meet just about anybody - then you may well read into it that they are unlikely to value themselves or care about their own presentation, dress etc.
Successful dating is about achieving the balance between what you feel is ideal and what you know to be reasonably achievable - which some of you may feel is one and the same thing!
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